Migrant caravans: from differentiated institutional responses to reorientation of migration policy

Abstract In 2018 and 2019, migrant caravans took place in order to reach the United States, a migration strategy adopted mainly by Centralamericans, characterized by greater visibility, lower cost and were organized through social networks. Three waves of caravans are identified, related to different institutional measures and bureaucratic-administrative categories. The article exhibits the challenges of the governance of mixed flows that characterize contemporary migration in the region and, at the same time, the measures were erratic and contradictory, the prelude to a substantive turnaround experienced by Mexican migration policy.