Changing mobility regimes and care: Central American women confronting processes of entrapment in southern Mexico

Susanne Willers

doi:10.20377/jfr-361

Abstract

The humanitarian crisis of Central American minor migrants in 2014 and the massive migration enforcement in Mexico during its aftermath altered the mobility of people flee-ing violence in Central America. Anti-immigration measures particularly affect women with children. Due to violence along migration routes and the lack of financial resources to migrate north, many of them must settle in southern Mexico. In this situation, access-ing formal rights through refugee protection status in Mexico becomes an important sur-vival strategy. However, this process of legalizing their immigration status requires time, knowledge, and the provision of care by other family members. This paper focuses on the experiences of refugee claimants in the southern Mexican town of Tapachula. Based on fieldwork conducted there in 2018 and drawing on earlier research from 2013 and 2014, this paper aims to analyse women’s experiences and strategies and the role of care provi-sion during this process. Findings highlight processes of re-victimization due to segment-ed labour markets and other aspects of structural and gender-based violence that impact women’s agency during this process.

Highlights

The current dire situation of Central American families trying to enter the United States has received a great deal of attention
The following research looks at the situation of Central American women refugees from Honduras and El Salvador in southern Mexico and the impact of entrapment processes on their ability to care for their families
In countries of origin where women carry most of the care responsibilities on their own, generalized social and gendered violence impact their ability to care for their children, since that, in turn, affects their ability to earn an income

Summary

Introduction

The current dire situation of Central American families trying to enter the United States has received a great deal of attention. Due to anti-immigrant policies, such as the Southern Border Plan pushed forward by the United States and implemented in Mexico in recent years, as well as generalized violence along migration routes, these families’ transit through Mexico have become very prolonged These policies have a gendered impact on refugees and migrants in transit and result in processes of entrapment and temporary immobility of migrant families, single mothers with children. The Mexican government concentrates migration control measures on the southern Mexican states, where most detentions and deportations of undocumented persons take place.4 This contributes to the development of enclaves as a space of containment, immobility, and segregation that result from migration management policies in the Mexican south The Mexican government concentrates migration control measures on the southern Mexican states, where most detentions and deportations of undocumented persons take place. This contributes to the development of enclaves as a space of containment, immobility, and segregation that result from migration management policies in the Mexican south

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