Settling the Narratives: UN-Habitat’s Framing of Migration Challenges and The Limits of Urban Development Solutions

This paper expands the study of international organisations shaping migration governance norms beyond familiar actors such as the UNHCR or IOM to include the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat). In the years since the passage of the New Urban Agenda, UN-Habitat has strategically positioned itself within migration governance by constructing three interconnected narratives: migrants as governance capacity strains on local governments, migrants as vulnerable populations requiring integration support, and migration as a consequence of poor urban development policies. Through frame analysis of 23 UN-Habitat publications from 2016 to 2025, combined with historical analysis tracing the organisation's evolution from spatial planning coordinator to migration governance actor, this research reveals how UN-Habitat leverages its urban expertise to claim authority over the local dimensions of migration management. While UN-Habitat's emphasis on forced displacement, climate migration, and uniquely urban forms of displacement, such as gentrification, distinguishes it from traditional migration agencies, my analysis demonstrates that its proposed solutions, such as particularly participatory informal settlement upgrading, rely on assumptions about migrant temporalities that privilege permanent residence over circular and seasonal migration patterns. Evidence from contexts like Nairobi City County’s Korogocho settlement, Bangladesh, and India complicates this picture and illustrates how UN-Habitat’s institutional mandate for stable urban development creates blind spots that risk constraining rather than enhancing migrant agency and choice.