African Caribbean Migration

Abstract

This article seeks to examine the concept of the better life in the context of African Caribbean migration to Canada with the aim of contributing toward a more complicated and nuanced understanding of the intersection of transnational migration and decolonizing approaches in social work. Within this examination, I contend that migration by African Caribbeans is a form of resistance to the ongoing evisceration of their life chances and choices as a result of colonization. The movement of African Caribbean people is tied to a legacy of centuries of resistance to European exploitation, extortion, and extraction of resources enacted through regimes of slavery, colonization, and globalization. This article briefly explores the history of social work values in what is now known as Canada, as it relates to understanding how social work is positioned in relation to African Caribbean migration to Canada through a decolonizing lens and draws on recent findings from research with African Caribbean participants in the city of Toronto, Ontario, to critically deconstruct the concept of a better life. This deconstruction is necessary to supporting decolonizing understandings of the contemporary social conditions endured by African Caribbean peoples in Canada and to transforming relations between social work and African Caribbean peoples.