Migration Nexus Research Articles

Too rare to dare? Leveraging household surveys to boost research on climate migration

Abstract Nationally representative household surveys are a potential data source that could shed light on the climate–migration nexus. However, they are rarely designed specifically to measure or study migration and often lack the necessary features to identify connections with climate change. This paper offers a critical reflection on current challenges faced by multi-topic household surveys in responding to these needs while also highlighting the many opportunities embedded in their use. Using the Living Standards Measurement Study household survey programme of the World Bank as an example, this paper proposes a methodological agenda and practical guidance to address data gaps and advance research on climate migration.

Deciphering the nexus of climate change, agriculture, and migration: perspectives from African and Asian realms

Deciphering the nexus of climate change, agriculture, and migration: perspectives from African and Asian realms

Disembedding and re-embedding practices of social innovation at the nexus of migration and labour exploitation in agriculture

The last two decades have witnessed a growing academic debate on labour exploitation, caporalato, organised crime, and migration issues in agriculture, which, as wicked problems, are deeply interconnected and resist generalisable solutions. To contribute to this thriving debate from a social innovation lens, we investigate the organising practices meant to disrupt the organised status-quo of exploitation. Drawing upon a case study from Foggia in Puglia (southern Italy), we investigate how an Italian non-profit organisation developed and implemented a multi-stakeholder pilot project of economic integration in rural areas to confront the phenomenon of labour exploitation in agriculture. Through collaboration among authorities, civil societies, and private sectors, this pilot project managed to unlock underused resources to meet the needs of the most vulnerable individuals embedded in the local ecosystem. By developing a grounded theory on practices of disembedding and embedding, this study contributes to theories on social innovation as political actions and interactions that purposely trigger disruption in established systems of labour exploitation, organised crime, and migration.

Being My Neighbours’ Keeper: Interrogating the Management of the Terrorism–Migration Nexus in West Africa Sub-Region

Cooperation among neighbouring countries is critical for managing security threats like terrorism and migration. Despite their proximity, states often struggle to cooperate for various reasons, including a lack of solidarity, which can harm regional peace and stability. This study uses qualitative research to examine West African nations’ cooperation in combating Islamist terrorism and aiding affected individuals across borders. Applying regional security complex theory and transnationalism, we assess how terrorism-driven migration impacts regional security, peace and development, highlighting cooperation challenges. This study redefines ‘neighbour’ in international relations, emphasising proactive international solidarity and shared responsibility to address insecurity.

Protectors and Modern Princesses: A Qualitative Investigation of Gender Ideals Among Young Migrants in Berlin

The debates at the nexus of migration and gender often focus on the supposedly diverging ideals Muslims and Christians have about gender. Migrant femininities and masculinities are framed in contrast to liberal, Western values and they undermine the efforts for more gender equality in Western societies. Only a few studies have addressed non-Muslim migrants' construction of, and their perceptions of, the femininities and masculinities of others. To fill this gap, we present the findings of a qualitative social research project where 43 young people aged 16 to 29 shared with us their perceptions regarding gender ideals. In our analysis, we utilize theories developed within women's studies and critical men and masculinities scholarship and adopt an intersectional lens to investigate how young first- and second-generation migrants in Berlin with roots in different world regions imagine their own and others' ideals of masculinity and femininity. Like non-migrant youth, our research participants want their life partnerships to be based on gender equality. Contrary to this, their ideals of femininity and masculinity embrace traditional gender roles, and they mirror the racialized relations in German society. We do not argue that the migrant youth's gender ideals are significantly shaped by their ethnic or religious belonging, and thus they do differ from those of non-migrant youth. However, racial othering is relevant for these migrants' images of their life partners and should be taken under consideration while designing specific policies aimed at increasing levels of gender equality in multi-diverse societies.

The role of education in innovation–migration nexus in Europe

Using panel data between 2012 and 2020, this research examines the relationship between the flows of low-skilled immigrants and innovation in the EU-15 group of nations and Switzerland. The empirical component is generated from a theoretical model that we construct. After addressing the potential endogeneity of the share of immigrants in the population, we find that regions with a relatively high immigrant population have a favorable impact on the generation of patent applications, whereas low-skilled immigrants have the reverse effects on innovation. Hence, the results are in line with the proposition in the theoretical section that lower-educated immigrants determine social decreasing returns in the economy.

Correction to The Water–Employment–Migration nexus: Buzzword or useful framework?

Correction to The Water–Employment–Migration nexus: Buzzword or useful framework?

Identity digitalization as dispossession and entrenched displacement: digitalization at the nexus of migration “management” and climate change in Thailand and Türkiye

Digitalizing technologies are increasingly heralded by a range of powerful actors and some human rights organizations as appropriate and necessary tools for ‘managing migration’ and mitigating climate change. Yet, just as exclusionary and marginalizing discourses of “migration problems” serve to justify the digital surveillance of vulnerable and precariously statused people, the context of climate change, accelerating contestation over land and water, and discourses of catastrophe prove fertile ground for entrenching these practices and technologies in multiple ways. Researchers are identifying the dispossessive power of digitalization in the arena of personal identification and in relation to resource and land mapping, yet these dynamics are rarely interrogated in connection. In this comparative analysis, we draw from sustained ethnographic engagement and insights in critical digitalization studies and political economy to analyze the consequences of state efforts to digitalize identity and resources in Thailand and Türkiye in the age of the Anthropocene. Our research points to a need for greater attention to the ways that state efforts to digitalize identification and registration of immigrant, refugee, and stateless people link with, and can facilitate, more efficient dispossessions and displacements of precariously statused communities from vital and contested lands.

ETHNICITY IN RESEARCH ON OLDER MIGRANTS: HOW THE SCHOLARSHIP CONCEPTUALIZES IT AND WHERE WE NEED TO HEAD

Abstract A recently completed scoping review of peer-reviewed articles on older ethno-racialized minorities has shown that although conceptual and theoretical advancements have been made in the field of ethnicity and race, the social gerontological literature on these minorities continues to regard ethnicity in essentialist ways, conflates ethnicity with race and seldom operationalizes what these social positions mean to aging and old age. The impact of ethnicity is, in other words, almost always inferred in this research, which is why the field has been deemed to be characterized by data-richness and theory-poorness. Over the past three years, researchers working on the nexus of aging and migration have surveyed the current state of knowledge on older migrants (focusing on migrancy, rather than ethnicity and/ or race). One of these inventories is a meta-analysis of how research on older migrants conceptualizes ethnicity, and the manner in which this social position is presumed to impact on migrants’ old age- and aging-related experiences. At stake has also been the assessment of whether this literature differs from the scholarship on older ethno-racialized minorities, and the ways in which that scholarship conceptualizes ethnicity. This presentation offers insight into what this inventory has found out. In focus are the current state of affairs about how ethnicity is approached in research on older migrants, and the launching of a theoretically-informed and empirically-astute research agenda for the study of ethnicity in gerontology.

THE NEXUS OF AGING AND MIGRATION: THE CURRENT STATE OF KNOWLEDGE AND WHERE GERONTOLOGICAL INQUIRIES OUGHT TO HEAD

Abstract Research on older ethno-racialized minorities (which comes primarily from North America) has dominated ethno-gerontological debates over the past few decades. In this research, ethnicity and race have been primarily viewed as social positions that place older people at risk of social exclusion. Migrancy, however, has yet to receive adequate attention from social gerontologists, despite the centrality of migration and aging for demographic change globally in recent decades. When migrancy is considered by gerontologists, it is not uncommon for us to think of the vulnerability trope. The highly-charged political debates in which the social exclusion and deservingness of migrant populations have been at stake have undoubtedly contributed to this state of affairs. From the field of migration studies, some have argued that the nexus of aging and migration offers new lenses from which the intersections of ethnicity, race, migrancy and old age can be approached. This symposium brings together contributors to an international network that has been working to survey the current state of knowledge at the aging-migration nexus and where future research ought to head. This symposium will argue that the study of older migrants has far-reaching implications for the economy, public policy, societal cohesion and individual wellbeing, and that – as such – this is a theoretically-profuse angle of investigation for social gerontology.

Ethnographic Analysis of Nexus about Migration and Culture in Global Perspective

Labour migration from India to Gulf countries is the result of the consequence of globalization by process, determinants and consequences in the first century. Therefore, the present study is based on the study of the nexus of migration and culture in the context of labour migration from Uttar Pradesh to Gulf countries under an ethnographic approach through conducting field works in Uttar Pradesh as root, Mumbai as transit destination and United Arab Emirates as the international destination from November 2017 to December 2019. The findings of the study show that there is an interconnection between internal and international migration by penetration of globalization of culture of migration from Uttar Pradesh to the Gulf via Mumbai. These consequences developed as a safe zone concept of migration due to the depth penetration of cultural migration from Uttar Pradesh. The consequences of the safe zone concept may be defined as the depth penetration of the culture of migration from India to Gulf countries as the consequence of globalization.

Heritage, modernity and the Muhajirin in Amman: decolonising urban knowledge in Ras-Al-Ein

ABSTRACT Authoritative urban knowledge (AUK) in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) is a neocolonial construct firmly rooted in oriental imaginaries and colonial/modern urbanism. It informs the managerial epistemology of neoliberal ‘development’ projects, where urban studies are confined to diagnostic analysis and optimistic calls for local inclusion to counteract state authority and foreign hegemony. This study critically examines the epistemic production of urban spaces at the nexus of heritage, modernity, and migration in the MENA, anchoring the criticism in a case study of urban development in Ras-Al-Ein – also known as the Muhajirin (refugees) neighbourhood – in the historic core of Amman. It then couples ethnographic interviews conducted with the residents of Ras-Al-Ein with decolonial thinking to explore local engagement with urban space as ‘subjugated knowledge’, and to contest the persistence of the AUK. It validates this engagement as local urban knowledge (LUK) and capitalises on the self-critique, irony and resistance depicted in Ras-Al-Ein to argue for a decolonial approach to urban knowledge. It argues that LUK can shift the debate in urban studies from practice analysis to an ethnographic theorisation of urban knowledge. This theorisation is crucial for challenging adverse perceptions of peoples and places and informing development with prudent knowledge.

Ambivalent meanings of the past: state critique and memory politics in 1980s (pro-)Refugee struggles in the Federal Republic of Germany

ABSTRACT Focusing on the largely forgotten early period of (pro-)Refugee activism in the 1980s West-Germany and the role of memory politics therein, this article explores the ambiguity in critiquing the nation-state. Drawing on original data collected in seven social movement archives in Germany, different ways in which German Nazism and the Holocaust are invoked to frame and critique the present (West-)German nation-state and its migration and asylum regime are scrutinised. Three ways in which Nazism and the Holocaust were invoked and discussed by Refugee activists and their supporters are differentiated: the past as ‘reminder and warning for the present’, the past as ‘discrediting and incriminating the present’, and explicit attempts not to draw analogies between the past and the present. Overall, the article makes two key contributions. First, the article makes a historical and empirical contribution as the focus on the 1980s sheds light on a period that has so far been largely ignored when it comes to the study of (pro-)Refugee activism. By tracing different ways in which memory politics has informed and been integral to Refugee activism and support, the article makes, second, an innovative contribution to studying the nexus of (forced) migration, national identity, and memory politics.

‘Frontline corruption and emigration in the Western Balkans’

AbstractHow does frontline corruption influence individuals’ decisions to emigrate? Existing research has found that perceptions of grand political corruption promote emigration, particularly among the highly educated. In this article, we shift the focus to the role of frontline corruption in driving emigration decisions and distinguish between the effects of the payment of bribes to frontline bureaucrats and those of nepotism in public employment. Using data from the Balkan Barometer for the period 2018–21, we find that both bribe-paying experiences and perceived public-sector nepotism are important emigration drivers. Our findings also reveal that the more highly educated an individual is, the greater the influence of perceived nepotism on the emigration decision. However, the influence of first-hand experiences with bribery is larger and remains similar across education categories. Our analysis emphasizes the need to disaggregate the varied manifestations of corruption when examining the determinants of (high-skilled) emigration. This article contributes to our understanding of the drivers of emigration in the Western Balkans and the wider corruption–migration nexus.

Crafting innovation hubs: Future cities and global challenges

Governments around the world have instrumentalised the idea of cities as innovation hubs in the drive for economic competitiveness and governance of anticipated futures. Producers of global indicators have identified cities as key actors in the global competition for talent – a race for human capital taking place against rapid technological changes, and political and social disruptions. In this article, we examine the rise of global cities as innovation hubs and its role in tackling global challenges. Using qualitative content analysis and conceptual analysis of strategies from rival cities in Europe (Amsterdam vs Copenhagen) and Asia (Singapore vs Hong Kong), we unpack how future cities are articulated and constructed in the nexus of migration and knowledge policy. We find that global indicators are actively used to produce more ‘robust futures’ that shape policymaking and strategies of cities while delimiting alternatives and potential ‘creative future visions’ in addressing global challenges.

Gendered Family Violence among Migrants Seeking International Protection: A Life Course Perspective

Abstract Although family and migration scholars recognize that intimate partner violence (IPV) can motivate women’s movement between countries, little research considers IPV or other gendered family violence further back in women migrants’ life histories or explores the legacy of gendered family violence in cases where such violence is not the primary push factor. Here, we analyze in-depth interviews conducted among thirty-four Latin American women seeking asylum or international protection from a diversity of threats to comprehensively understand their experiences with childhood and adult family violence prior to migration. Our analysis reveals three key takeaways. First, IPV, incest, abandonment, and other forms of gendered family violence can characterize women’s family dynamics across the life course even when these experiences do not directly prompt migration. Second, amidst pervasive patriarchal norms, family violence has the power to destabilize women’s social circumstances and fracture their ties to family members in ways that indirectly encourage migration. Third, owing to these same gender norms, even when gendered family violence directly prompts migration, women may conceptualize their primary motive as protecting their children rather than themselves. These findings move beyond common conceptualizations of the family violence–migration nexus and highlight the breadth and implications of gendered family violence among migrants seeking protection from a broad spectrum of intra- and extra-familial threats.

An “Unsettling” Journey? Hong Kong’s Exodus to Taiwan and Australia After the 2019 Protests

This article compares the considerations, expectations, and realizations of Hong Kongers migrating to Taiwan and Australia. Based on interviews with 22 Hong Konger migrants, we identified some key drivers for Hong Kongers who moved to Taiwan or Australia. The findings add insights into the spatial–temporal nexus of migration and extend the static push–pull model by including migrants’ changing perceptions about the sociopolitical conditions of different destinations. In addition to offering a more nuanced understanding of migrants’ perceptions of and adaptations to the sociopolitical environment of the host society, we highlight that, after moving to Taiwan or Australia, Hong Kong migrants experience a gap between what they imagined at the time of migrating and the reality (political, social, and/or cultural). The imagination of the sociopolitical community in the destination countries before they leave and the gap between pre- and post-migration experiences constitute the “unsettling” characteristic of the recent Hong Kong exodus after 2019.

The causal nexus of Trans-Saharan migration: A political ecology approach from Niger

Increased Trans-Saharan migration over the past decade has spurred arguments that climate change or generic conditions of poverty drive West Africans to take this risky journey. These diagnoses are made with little empirical investigation of the conditions facing migrants and their families at home. This article reports on mixed-methods research conducted in southwestern Niger within ten communities where Trans-Saharan migration has recently begun, with interviews conducted at community, household and individual scales. Interviews were conducted within 331 households with or without members involved in Trans-Saharan migration. Individual interviews were also conducted with 67 returned Trans-Saharan migrants and 100 community youth who represent potential Trans-Saharan migrants. We find no evidence that new rainfall fluctuations influence the onset of Trans-Saharan migration. Study communities and migrant families within them are not poorer nor more food insecure than other communities or non-migrant families. The sole difference is that migrant families have more adult men. Interviews with returned Trans-Saharan migrants point to a mix of individual and family motivations for embarking on risky journeys north. A key factor is desperation – driven not by short-term scarcities but by a hopelessness due to life-long experiences of crushing poverty, past periods of recurrent drought, soil impoverishment, and political voicelessness. They go, despite knowing the grave abuses and risks they may face.

Havana's Transnational Gentrification: Highest and Best Use from Elsewhere

AbstractThis article addresses the two processes of market making and transnationalization in Havana through the lens of gentrification theory. Using a case study situated between Global South and East, this article looks more closely at transnational families and migrants as agents of gentrification in Havana, analysing how they create and exploit the rent‐gap. Returning to the central ideas of ‘highest and best use’ and ‘circulations’ in N. Smith's rent‐gap theory, I analyse how increased transnational mobility has affected the commodification and potential use of housing in Havana. Based on interviews with transnational owners who purchased housing to upgrade and convert into an Airbnb, this article shows how the “highest and best use” of a property is evaluated from elsewhere. It also demonstrates the complexities of transnational gentrification in a southern socialist city and insists on the need to understand more broadly the gentrification–migration nexus.

The climate change, conflict and migration nexus: A holistic view

AbstractCurrent discourse relating to climate change, conflict, migration (CCM), and the causal links thereof, is polarized. It is widely acknowledged that climate change will have a detrimental effect on quality of life, and that this impact will not be homogeneous across the globe. However, proposed causal links among CCM remain contentious. This paper argues that to better grasp the implications of climate change on global society and security, it is vital to develop a more systemic understanding of the interplay among CCM. Although this nexus is already recognized, studies to date have tended to be qualitative and statistical evidence of multivariate causality has been lacking, where quantitative analysis is present, it has typically been limited to two components at a time; few studies have addressed the nexus holistically, making research conclusions sometimes difficult to reconcile. Hence, by reviewing literature from a broad range of sources, this paper suggests a suite of systemic and quantitative approaches with which to address the CCM nexus. This review critically assesses the existing research approaches employed across a range of examples and suggests how leveraging the power of ‘big data’ and modelling the nexus as a complex system encapsulating both human and environmental drivers could offer new insights, especially for those looking to explore the increasing number of ‘what if’ scenarios relating to climate and human dynamics.