Migration and Inequality

Tanja Bastia

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• eBook ISBN: 9781135081072
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

The 'migration-development' nexus has emerged as an important area of both research and policy over the last ten years. However, most of the interest has focused on the potential that migration holds for poverty alleviation. Relatively little attention has been paid to the relationship between migration and inequality, particularly on inequality as a consequence of migration. This is unfortunate, given that inequality is emerging as an important area of inquiry within development studies. This edited collection explores the relationship between migration and inequality in Africa, Asia and Latin America by taking into account economic and social inequalities.

While the focus on inequality as opposed to poverty is in itself original, the book offers additional points of interest. First, it combines chapters on internal and international migration, thereby challenging the current focus in the migration literature that focuses almost exclusively on cross-border migration. Internal migration greatly outnumbers cross-border moves. Yet policy-makers as well as most studies focus on cross-border international migration. We are only just beginning to unravel the relationship between internal and cross-border migration. Second, the theme of inequality complements the existing focus in the migration-development nexus on issues of poverty. Third, the chapters focus on both economic and social inequalities, often combining an analysis of different types of inequalities. The book also covers governance and migrants' rights; gender and intersectionality; and health.

The chapters in this edited volume make an original contribution to debates on the migration-development nexus as well as the literature on inequality, which often tends to focus on economic measurements of inequality at the expense of including a thorough analysis of social inequality.

Part I

Overview

1 Migration and inequality

An introduction

Tanja Bastia

Despite the fact that only about 3 per cent of the world's population are considered migrants (UNDP 2009), migration, over recent years, has become a key development issue (de Haas 2012; Faist et al. 2011; Glick Schiller 2011). Debates about the so-called migration-development nexus have shifted from migration being seen as a ‘brain drain’ on valuable resources, to its holding potential for development, with migrants being key development actors (de Haas 2010; Faist 2008; Kunz 2008). Now discussed by government and civil society representatives at annual global meetings (Martin and Abella 2009; Piper 2009; Skeldon 2008), multi-lateral organisations such as the World Bank and the IMF are also increasingly interested in what migration has to offer for development (Kunz 2008; Ratha and Shaw 2007).

At the same time, there is also an increasing interest in better understanding how globalisation affects inequality (Goldin and Reinert 2006; Held and Kaya 2007). There is some evidence to suggest that improved standards of living in large countries such as India and China have lifted millions of people out of poverty (Held and Kaya 2007), but others have argued that despite these improvements, globalisation has actually increased global inequality (Wade 2004). Debates range from whether inequality is important at all, to how it should be measured (Held and Kaya 2007). Economic and statistical perspectives dominate much of the latter, with largely technical debates about what should be measured and how. For others, inequality is an inevitable component of globalisation and neoliberal economic policies, and it is a key political issue (Pieterse 2002) that is not easily included in economic measurements and statistics. Furthermore, inequality is also emerging as an important area of inquiry within development studies (Greig et al. 2007).

While migration is closely related to globalisation, and therefore also to inequality, most of the literature and policy interest on migration and development focuses on poverty rather than inequality. Today migration is seen as holding great potential for poverty alleviation, either in terms of the financial remittances that migrants are able to send back to their countries or communities of origin, or in terms of technological and other skills transfer to so-called developing countries. Much of this debate is dominated by the concerns and interests of countries of the North, such as managing migration in a context of heightened security concerns (Castles and Delgado Wise 2008). This literature continues to be couched in binary assumptions, in which some countries are represented as developed while others are represented as underdeveloped and therefore in need of ‘development’ (Raghuram 2009). Perspectives from the South are largely absent from these discussions (Castles and Delgado Wise 2008). As others have observed, most of the debates on migration and development continue to be framed from a narrowly economistic point of view, with little attention given to social issues (Piper 2009a).

With its focus on the relationship between migration and inequality, the aims of this volume are therefore twofold. First, it aims to rekindle an interest in the subject and bring this literature to bear in debates on migration and development, but with an expanded view of inequality – one that includes social inequality. As will be seen below, there has been a significant amount of work on migration and inequality, but most of this research has been done from an economic point of view. While at certain levels of analysis it is inevitable to focus on economic measures of inequality, contributions to this volume aim to (i) show the relevance of social inequality; and (ii) discuss the importance of combining material and social measures of inequality.

Second, when talking about social inequality, we are not only addressing social measures such as health or education, but also the question of whether migration holds the potential for disrupting unequal social structures. For example, the feminist literature on migration suggests that as women move from one area to another, they also embrace the potential to challenge patriarchal norms and therefore contribute to the construction of more equal societies (Bastia 2011; Pratt and Yeoh 2003). The same holds true for class- and caste-based inequalities, whereby low-income and low-caste migrants leave their place of origin and thus begin to construct spaces where more equal and horizontal social relations can be established (Rogaly and Coppard 2003). However, most of the empirical evidence suggests, in fact, that migration also reproduces unequal structures of caste, gender and class.¹ Some contributions to this volume therefore explore the extent to which migration holds the potential to disrupt unequal social structures and promote progressive social change, whether through individual and household migration projects (Bastia, Chapter 7) or through migrants becoming active in social movements (Piper, Chapter 3).

By engaging critically with the literature on migration and inequality, contributions in this volume also draw attention to some migration processes that have thus far been little explored. For example, while internal migration has been extensively explored in demography and the literature on urbanisation, works on internal and cross-border migration remain largely separate, with only a few recent studies beginning to draw parallels and explore the relationship between internal and cross-border movements (DeWind and Holdaway 2008; King et al. 2008; Vullnetari 2012). Some of the contributions to this volume address both internal and cross-border migration (Kandilige, Vearey and Bastia, Chapters 5, 6 and 7) and as such, highlight the importance of not privileging international moves just because they happen to cross the borders of a nation-state. Others draw on the migration literature to focus on a (thus far) under-explored type of migrant: the aid worker (Fechter, Chapter 8). While the migration and development literature has focused on skilled workers (Lowell et al. 2002; Raghuram 2009), most of this work is framed in debates about the ‘brain drain’, i.e. skilled workers leaving ‘developing countries’ to work in higher income countries. Little attention has been paid to the opposite movement, of skilled workers moving from high-income to low-income countries (Raghuram 2009). Fechter's chapter therefore explores the gendered and racialised migration experiences of aid workers working on (often) multiple development projects. Still other contributors focus on sectors that have been explored in the migration and development literature, such as the health sector, but do so from an innovative point of view. Gideon (Chapter 9), for example, moves away from addressing health as a resource loss – through brain drain – for developing countries; instead, she conceptualises health as a human right that migrants might not have direct access to.

The migration-development nexus

Since the turn of the century, migration has been characterised as globalised, accelerated, differentiated, feminised and increasingly politicised (Castles and Miller 2009). Migration has also become increasingly complex, with previously ‘sending’ or ‘receiving’ countries now fulfilling the role of both ‘sending’ and ‘receiving’ and many also becoming transit countries (Castles and Miller 2009; Samers 2010). The latest round of interest in ‘development’ in relation to migration emerged within this context, with the expression of an increasing optimism for migration to be viewed as a potential source for development. Many countries now see migrants as key agents of development, and multi-lateral organisations, such as the World Bank and the IMF, devote increasing attention to migrants and particularly to the remittances they send back to their countries of origin.

The main reason for this optimism is related to the realisation that remittance flows are often larger than both bilateral aid and foreign direct investment (Ratha and Shaw 2007). In countries with large numbers of nationals abroad, such as China, India or Mexico, remittances amount to significant foreign currency transfers, while for smaller countries with large shares of their population abroad, these financial transfers sometimes represent a significant percentage of their gross domestic product.

The seemingly almost sudden realisation of the sheer scale of these remittances (as well as the fact that more recently they proved to be resilient in times of crisis) alerted policy-makers and keen development analysts to the potential that migrants hold for development: in the context of shrinking public policy investments (particularly for social services) remittances from individual migrants were seen to have the potential to alleviate, or at least soften, the retreat of public investments by providing direct financial flows to those who needed it most (Glick Schiller 2011). Financial remittances were therefore seen as holding a huge potential for poverty alleviation (Faist and Fauser 2011).

In this context, migrants are not only seen as a source of foreign currency but also as carriers of skills, knowledge and so-called social remittances (Faist and Fauser 2011; Levitt 1998). While migrants are abroad, they often maintain communication with their families in their places of origin and therefore transmit new ideas and knowledge, whether these are related to cultural aspects of their stay abroad or the jobs they are involved in. There is often hope that, by returning, migrants will also be taking skills and knowledge acquired abroad to their countries or areas of origin. By doing this, migrants will initiate technological and economic innovation by, for example, setting up new businesses and applying new working techniques or ways of organising workplaces. Within such perspectives, there is often an underlying assumption that areas of origin are under-developed while those of destination are more technologically advanced and that, therefore, such transfer of skill back to the migrants’ area of origin will benefit the country's economic development.

Moreover, as a result of globalisation, better communication and cheaper modes of transport, it has also been observed that migration flows have changed substantially from the permanent migrations of the past, to more temporary modes of migration in current times. Temporary or circular migration is often more desirable for policy-makers in both countries of origin and destination (Skeldon 2012). For countries of origin, the temporary migration of skilled workers limits the loss of investment in human capital associated with more permanent migrations. Moreover, long-term migration is related to a gradual diminishing of remittance flows; as individuals spend longer at destinations, their relationships with family members at origin weaken, and as a result their remittances decrease over time. Temporary migration, on the other hand, allows migrants to maintain stronger family ties and to reconfirm these ties through periodic returns home, which then encourages more sustained remittancesending habits (Faist and Fauser 2011). For countries of destination, their interest is often to limit the stay of unskilled workers, while facilitating more permanent migration for highly skilled workers. It is with this aim that countries like Britain provide pathways to citizenship for more highly skilled workers, while limiting similar possibilities for unskilled workers.

Perspectives on the potentially desirable characteristics of migrants, particularly those moving from so-called ‘developing countries’ in the South to higher income countries in the North, are closely related to security and migration management and control (Castles and Delgado Wise 2008; Faist and Fauser 2011; Glick Schiller 2012). Migrants are seen in terms of what they can contribute towards their countries' development. Moreover, these perspectives assume a particular type of development – one that is generally associated with post WWII projects and closely linked with economic growth (Cowen and Shenton 1995; Hart 2001). Such positions assume that problems of under-development can be solved by technical means and technological transfers from more ‘advanced’ and ‘modern’ countries to poorer and more ‘backward’ countries; as opposed to understanding under-development as a fundamentally historical process and a problem of the unequal distribution of power in the global political arena (Crush 1995; Kothari 2005).

However, despite current portrayals of the so-called migration-development nexus as a recent occurrence in global policy, fora and academic discussions, these debates are not new. Faist and Fauser (2011) identify three phases of the migration and development debate. A first phase emerged after WWII. This lasted during the 1950s and 1960s, and had a predominant focus on remittances and return, with an implied optimism for what migration had to offer for development (de Haas 2012). The second phase ran during the 1970s and 1980s and focused on under-development and migration. Key themes during this phase were poverty and the brain drain, that is, poverty and under-development as a cause of migration. Brain drain was thought to exacerbate pre-existing poverty levels by depleting poor countries of much needed skilled workers, such as nurses and doctors (Faist and Fauser 2011); it was a largely negative view of the relationship between migration and development (de Haas 2012). The third phase, which Faist and Fauser (2011) identify as ‘migration and co-development’, is often seen as a celebration of transnational circulation and represents another swing in the ‘pendulum’ towards neo-optimism (de Haas 2012). This third phase is characterised by the following assumptions: (i) temporary and circular migration are seen as an ideal; (ii) temporary return and brain circulation are the alleged new measures that will facilitate the achievement of development; and (iii) circular transactions of established Diaspora will contribute to community development and post-conflict reconstruction.

These different standpoints and shifts, from perceiving migration as a positive and then a negative influence on development, largely reflect shifts in development theories and broader ideological perspectives (de Haas 2012). What they do have in common is an overwhelming focus on poverty. In all three phases identified by Faist and Fa...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Routledge studies in development economics
• Full Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of illustrations
• Notes on contributors
• Acknowledgements
• PART I Overview
• PART II Governance and migrants' rights
• PART III Internal and cross-border migration
• PART IV Migration, gender and intersectionality
• Index