All living entities, both bio and social, have innate rights according to the physical Constructal Law (CL). Some background on CL:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgEBTPee9ZM

CL is the prerequisite to innate rights:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/356475384_THE_SCIENCE_OF_RIGHTS

Civility is the key to “migration” respecting the laws and culture while visiting, “forced or voluntary migration.”

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D5Z2SQBN

The question of whether the distinction between forced or voluntary migration matters is tied to the ethical assumption that States and their citizens have a right to exclude others from access to land. In this context, the distinction only matters if the status of forced migration overrides the right to exclude. On the other hand, if one does not assume a right to exclude, the distinction is irrelevant. As a decolonial environmentalist, I argue that the lands and waters are sovereign and transcend any authority of a supposed governmental boundaries. Just as the geese and monarch butterflies freely migrate throughout Turtle Island (North America), humans inherently possess the same right of movement. There are no checkpoints or demands to justify your presence in nature. Such restrictions are only possible through State-sanctioned violence that the public normalized (neither legalization nor normalization makes such violence moral since slavery and apartheid were also previously legalized and normalized).

On a different but related note, the common distinction between forced and voluntary or "economic" migrants largely overlooks the impacts of Western imperialism. Western countries enslaved the labor of the Global South and stole the wealth from their lands, preventing "developing" nations from investing in themselves and forcing them to stay in poverty. Countries in the Global South are not underdeveloped, but are instead overexploited. With people trying to escape the poverty imposed on them through colonization and imperialism, is this migration really "voluntary?" Yet, this distinction arises from the Western nations refusing to take accountablility of and make amends for their historical and ongoing imperialism, invalidating the experiences of those they harmed and continue to harm.

So in short, given my ethical values, there is no distinction between the two types of migration, and both should openly be allowed freedom of movement. I understand this response does not directly answer your question in relation to international law, but I hope it highlights some of the underlying biases that are shaping this conversation.

Kamil Strzępek I reckon the scope of human rights for migrants often varies depending on the type of migration. For migrants who move voluntarily, such as for work or education, their rights may be broader, as they often enter countries with established agreements and legal frameworks for their protection. However, for those fleeing conflict, persecution, or environmental disasters, such as refugees or climate migrants, the scope of their rights can be narrower, depending on the host country's asylum policies and international legal protections like the 1951 Refugee Convention. In general, while certain core human rights are universally guaranteed, the extent to which migrants can access social, economic, and political rights can differ greatly depending on their migration status and the legal framework of the host country.

Some perspectives contend that individuals undertaking unauthorized migration merit diminished human rights protections due to the inherent illegality of their entry. This position often posits that such migrants may harbor detrimental intentions toward host communities. For instance, certain narratives characterize Rohingya migration into Rakhine State as deliberately antagonistic toward the local populace.

Kamil Strzępek From what I’ve seen, the type of migration absolutely shapes how rights are applied, but not always in fair or logical ways. Refugees fleeing war or persecution tend to have more legal protections (at least on paper) because international laws like the Refugee Convention recognize their vulnerability. But economic migrants? They often fall through the cracks, treated as ‘less urgent’ even when their survival is at stake.

What troubles me is how arbitrary this looks in real life. A Syrian escaping bombs gets asylum, while a Honduran farmer fleeing climate-ruined crops gets called an ‘economic migrant’ and turned away, even though both are fighting for their lives. During crises like wars or natural disasters, these labels start to feel especially unfair.

Your research could really help untangle this. By showing how rights shift depending on migration ‘categories,’ you’re exposing a system that often values some lives over others. Personally, I think human rights shouldn’t be a sliding scale, but until we fix the rules, your work helps spotlight where the system fails.

Aftab Haider Thank you for your insightful contribution to the discussion. Migration manifests in various forms (types), and it is important to examine the criteria that differentiate them. Which legal and institutional actors should be engaged in this discourse?

Nyi Nyi Aung Thank you for your insightful input. It looks like you pointed out the so-called abuse of human rights.