“Do Not Come”: The US Root Causes Strategy and the Co-optation of the Right to Stay

Executive Summary

In 2021, the United States unveiled the Strategy for Addressing the Root Causes of Migration in Central America (“Root Causes Strategy” or “the Strategy”) to improve living conditions in El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala as a means to prevent future migration to the US-Mexico border. Through a combination of foreign policy tools and public-private investment, the US administration focused on enhancing economic, security, and governance conditions in the region. Although the Root Causes Strategy has received scrutiny in light of broader research on policies to address the root causes of migration, more attention is needed from the perspective of communities that these strategies target. Therefore, this article assesses the Root Causes Strategy’s alignment with Northern Central American communities’ plans to ensure their right to stay and thrive. It explores three areas of inquiry: the Strategy’s provision of formal engagement and participation mechanisms for local communities; the Strategy’s alignment with local communities’ priorities to ensure their right to stay; and the Strategy’s respect for local communities’ right to migrate in relation to their right to stay according to local projects of thriving.

Through critical policy analysis, relying on primary governmental sources and secondary sources on the lived experience of communities in the region, the article argues that the Root Causes Strategy co-opted communities’ right to stay for three reasons. First, Northern Central American communities’ notions of their right to stay were sidelined. Communities did not have a formal role in the design and implementation of the Strategy, which lacked transparency and accountability mechanisms. Second, the Root Causes Strategy did not align its tools with communities’ notions of thriving. Private investments lacked sufficient labor, environmental and human rights protection, and oversight mechanisms to ensure they would not result in more displacement. Funding structures and processes failed to significantly expand access by local communities in support of grass-roots community projects. The US targeted sanctions for human rights violations and corruption followed communities’ cues in some countries and occasions while neglecting them in others. Third, the United States used its root causes policy to justify a restricted notion of the right to migrate. The US administration utilized its root causes policy and the widening of some insufficient legal migration pathways to justify and advance US border externalization policies and limit access to asylum at the US-Mexico border.

The paper concludes with policy recommendations for the US administration, the US Congress, and civil society in Central America, Mexico, and the United States. It recommends delinking root causes of migration strategies from the goal of reducing migration to the donor country and foregrounding communities’ participation and perspectives before, during, and after the implementation of root causes policies.