More Than Economic Investments: Residency by Investment (RBI), Temporary Labor Migration, and UN SDGs in the Gulf – IMC-RP 2025/1
ABSTRACT
How does residency by investment (RBI) impact low-skilled temporary labor migration in the Global South? Over the past decade, scholars have increasingly examined the complex effects of RBI or “golden visa” schemes on economic and infrastructural development, as well as human capital flows worldwide. However, despite their growing prevalence since the global COVID pandemic, less is critically known about their dynamic effects on the developmental process in wealthy Global South host states, particularly in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, which serve as the largest regional host of migrants in the Global South. Drawing from semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders, including RBI golden visa holders, migrants, wealth-based investment management professionals, and low-skilled migrant workers in the UAE, this article explores the effects of RBIs on temporary labor migration in the GCC via a single case study of the Emirati state’s RBI golden visa scheme. I argue, firstly, that the rise of RBI golden visa schemes has not only increasingly become a central tool for state development, but also intensified ‘mixed migration’ patterns, involving both elite and low-skilled migrant populations, which function as essential contributors to the care, infrastructure, and service sectors within the host country. Secondly, while RBIs generate important economic and infrastructural benefits, they also create a range of precarious economic conditions for low-skilled temporary migrants and actors in the migration industry who aim to extract diverse range of ‘migration rents’ from the growing cross-border mobility flows and influx of domestic and global capital. This is particularly evident in key domestic economic sectors like construction, real estate, and domestic work in the host country. Overall, this study contributes to critical discussions on RBIs, temporary labor migration, mobility pathways, and the social contract by examining the implications of RBIs for precarious, low-skilled temporary labor migration in the Global South.
Froilan Malit, Jr., Visiting Scholar, Department of Political Science, American University in Dubai & Senior Research Associate at the Gulf Labor Markets and Migration and Population, UAE
