Collective Remittances and Integration: North African and North Indian Comparative Perspectives

Abstract

This paper makes the case for a joint redefinition of the concepts of transnationalism and integration in a way that would allow a better combination. Transnationalism is here defined as a coping strategy for migrants who strive to manage their integration into two (or more) settings. Integration is commonly depicted as a multi-level process which combines a social embedding into a web of interpersonal or associational relations and a systemic embedding into wider economic or political systems. Next to these levels, this work highlights a third one, namely the identity integration of migrants who seek to maintain a balance between the poles of their identity. This conceptual framework is applied in order to analyse the emergence of collective practices of development among two North African groups in France (the Moroccan Chleuhs and the Algerian Kabyles) and one UK-based North Indian group (the Sikh Punjabis). It is shown that transnational development practices, in the form of collective remittances, constitute a matrix of identity integration for migrants who want to reinvent their identity of villager despite the transformations induced by their stay abroad. However, the success of their actual engagement into cross-border practices largely depends on the effectiveness of their systemic and social integration.