Abstract
Expanding access to formal education is a universal aim of development policy worldwide, and young people today are gaining access to schooling on unprecedented levels. Taking Ethiopia as a case study, this paper explores the mobility impacts of increasing educational attainment. First, we analyse internal migration data for Ethiopia using national Labour Force Survey data, and find that that rural-to-urban migration has now replaced rural-to-rural migration as most common migration trajectory within Ethiopia. The pursuit of work and education were key motivations for rural-to-urban migration, and those with higher levels of education moved more. Second, we show how rising levels of primary and secondary education influence aspirations to migrate, distinguishing between internal and international destinations. Using novel survey data collected among rural and urban Ethiopian youth for the Young Lives project, we find that even completing primary levels of education increases the aspiration to live elsewhere. By studying the linkages between education and migration aspirations, alongside other development indicators like wealth, employment, and levels of self-efficacy, this paper contributes to an on-going debate about the relationship between development and migration and challenges common assumptions that migration is simply driven by poverty and need in poorer countries.
Highlights
Expanding access to formal education is a universal and uncontested aim of development policy worldwide, and the last several decades have ushered in dramatic shifts in access to formal schooling, at the primary and secondary level
The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between access to educational attainment and migration in Ethiopia, focusing in particular on the influence of primary and secondary schooling on young people’s imagined futures
We find that rural-to-urban migration is becoming the more common migration trajectory within Ethiopia, and that those with higher levels of education move more
Summary
Expanding access to formal education is a universal and uncontested aim of development policy worldwide, and the last several decades have ushered in dramatic shifts in access to formal schooling, at the primary and secondary level. The social benefits of widening access to formal education are well known: education tends to diversify economic opportunity, promote health, and contribute to greater gender equality (Benavot 2006). The impact of rising access to formal education on migration has received comparatively little attention. Unlike income, health or gender equality, is often not perceived as a universal good. Governments and non-governmental institutions alike, across a wide variety of contexts, perceive growing rural-to-urban migration as a threat to rural futures and urban capacity, and the international migration of skilled workers as a challenge to national development (e.g. the so-called “brain drain”)
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