•Somali migrants are not necessarily sedentary after migrating to and settling in Europe.•Mobility capital is not a privilege of highly skilled, circulating, elite migrants.•It is constituted of ...accumulated experiences and the potential to move again.•Migrants may occupy multiple, sometimes contradictory, social positions.•Mobility is a way to benefit from these inconsistent statuses.
Based on a case study of Somali migrants who have been living in Europe for at least a decade, this paper challenges the view that post-migration life is sedentary and pleads for a dialogue between mobility studies and migration studies. It explores the various cross-border mobility practices these migrants may undertake from their country of residence and how they can be transformed into social and economic advantages. “Mobility capital” consists of the ability to engage in cross-border mobility practices at particular times but also to remain immobile by choice. Social actors with high levels of mobility capital are in a position to articulate and benefit from local anchorage and mobility practices simultaneously and to control when and how they want to be on the move. There are two facets of mobility capital: the accumulation of past experiences of crossing borders; and the potential for future movements, or the unequally shared ability to be mobile again when it appears worthwhile to be so. The diachronic focus of the study shows that biographies evolve in response to external constraints and opportunities. Furthermore, migrants’ control over their (im)mobility is shaped by their transnational social positions in their place of residence, but also in other places, including their place of origin. I argue that mobility capital is a neglected dimension of migrants’ strategies to negotiate multiple and contradictory social positions in a transnational social field.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
Background Studying social disparities in health implies the ability to measure them accurately, to compare them between different areas or countries and to follow trends over time. This study ...proposes a method for constructing a French European deprivation index, which will be replicable in several European countries and is related to an individual deprivation indicator constructed from a European survey specifically designed to study deprivation. Methods and Results Using individual data from the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions survey, goods/services indicated by individuals as being fundamental needs, the lack of which reflect deprivation, were selected. From this definition, which is specific to a cultural context, an individual deprivation indicator was constructed by selecting fundamental needs associated both with objective and subjective poverty. Next, the authors selected among variables available both in the European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions survey and French national census those best reflecting individual experience of deprivation using multivariate logistic regression. An ecological measure of deprivation was provided for all the smallest French geographical units. Preliminary validation showed a higher association between the French European Deprivation Index (EDI) score and both income and education than the Townsend index, partly ensuring its ability to measure individual socioeconomic status. Conclusion This index, which is specific to a particular cultural and social policy context, could be replicated in 25 other European countries, thereby allowing European comparisons. EDI could also be reproducible over time. EDI could prove to be a relevant tool in evidence-based policy-making for measuring and reducing social disparities in health issues and even outside the medical domain.
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BFBNIB, CMK, NMLJ, NUK, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK
Abstract
Social inequalities in health and their early-life origins have been extensively documented. Although the complex direct and intermediate mechanisms linking early-life disadvantage to later ...health are not yet fully understood, new findings on biological markers distinctly related with early-life experiences suggest a causal relationship. In this issue, Fuller-Rowell et al. (Am J Epidemiol. 2021:190(11):2284–2293) step back to examine the role of childhood disadvantage in the United States in different periods, observing that the relationship with later health seems to have strengthened over time. The main explanation the authors bring up has to do with increased income segregation and changes in labor market composition that limit opportunities for persons with low educational attainment. In other words, while the rich get richer, the poor get poorer, the middle class shrinks, and there are fewer interactions across different socioeconomic groups and the social ladder is blocked. Other evidence suggests that investments in children, through early education and academic support programs, could help reduce the consequences of childhood disadvantage on long-term health.
Patient experience is an important part of perinatal care quality. Migrant women in high-income countries often report more negative experiences than non-migrants, but evidence in Europe is patchy. ...In this study, we compared the experiences of two migrant populations with non-migrants, taking into account socioeconomic characteristics.
We surveyed mothers born in Belgium, North-Africa, and Sub-Saharan Africa (n = 877) using an adapted version of the Migrant-Friendly Maternity Care Questionnaire. Two patient experience scores were created using multiple correspondence analyses: a) information and communication with healthcare professionals and overall satisfaction with pregnancy care, and b) patient-centred aspects and satisfaction with delivery care. Through descriptive analyses and multivariable logistic regressions we estimated the associations of maternal characteristics with each score.
Overall, positive experiences were reported in terms of communication (83 %) and patient-centred care (86 %). North African immigrants with low language proficiency had higher odds of negative communication experience (especially problems understanding information) (ORa: 2.30, 95 %CI 1.17–4.50), regardless of socioeconomic position. Among women with language barriers, 88 % were never offered a professional interpreter, relying on family members for translation. Patient-centred care was not associated with maternal birth region but was rated more negatively by older mothers, those with longer residence in Belgium, and higher majority-language proficiency.
In Belgium, perinatal care experiences were generally positive, although communication with immigrants was suboptimal. Language barriers, single motherhood, and unstable housing increased communication issues. Our findings underline the necessity to improve information-exchange with immigrants and socioeconomically vulnerable women.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
Few studies consider fertility variations on a detailed spatial scale. By considering both the intensity (the number of children born) and the timing of fertility (the age of the mother when she ...gives birth), the analysis presented here provides an overview of reproductive trends in Brussels. As individual factors such as income level influence fertility patterns, the geography of these patterns points to major intra-urban socio-spatial contrasts, and also tends to show the influence of contextual factors which remain to be studied.
Few studies consider fertility variations on a detailed spatial scale. By considering both the intensity (the number of children born) and the timing of fertility (the age of the mother when she ...gives birth), the analysis presented here provides an overview of reproductive trends in Brussels. As individual factors such as income level influence fertility patterns, the geography of these patterns points to major intra-urban socio-spatial contrasts, and also tends to show the influence of contextual factors which remain to be studied.
Zhang analyses the phenomenon of private supplementary tutoring from a global perspective. The expansion of such tutoring alongside schooling is among the striking global shifts since the turn of the ...century. In many countries over half of the relevant cohorts of children receive private tutoring, with that proportion in some locations exceeding 80%. The sector has far-reaching implications for social inequalities, (in)efficiencies in educational processes, study burdens on students, family finances, innovation, and employment. Yet greatly-needed government regulations have typically been slow to catch up with the phenomenon. Commentary in the volume juxtaposes countries with strong regulations with counterparts having weak regulations. Conceptually, the book considers forces changing the roles of multiple stakeholders, including governments, entrepreneurs, teachers, families and students. A useful read for students and researchers interested in comparative education and governance.
BackgroundIn the context of containment measures against the COVID-19 pandemic, the aims were to examine the impact of lockdown and school closures on childs’ and adolescents’ health and well-being ...and social inequalities in health.MethodsLiterature review by searching five databases until November 2020. We included quantitative peer-reviewed studies reporting health and well-being outcomes in children (0–18 years) related to closure measures' impact due to COVID-19. A pair of authors assessed the risk of bias of included studies. A descriptive and narrative synthesis was carried out.FindingsTwenty-two studies, including high-income, middle-income and low-income countries, fulfilled our search criteria and were judged not to have an increased risk of bias. Studies from Australia, Spain and China showed an increase in depressive symptoms and decrease in life satisfaction. A decrease in physical activity and increase in unhealthy food consumption were shown in studies from two countries. There was a decrease in the number of visits to the emergency department in four countries, an increase in child mortality in Cameroon and a decrease by over 50% of immunisations administered in Pakistan. A significant drop of 39% in child protection medical examination referrals during 2020 compared with the previous years was found in the UK, a decrease in allegations of child abuse and neglect by almost one-third due to school closures in Florida, and an increase in the number of children with physical child abuse trauma was found in one centre in the USA.InterpretationFrom available reports, pandemic school closure and lockdown have adverse effects on child health and well-being in the short and probably long term. We urge governments to take the negative public health consequences into account before adopting restrictive measures in childhood.
•Political ecology advances sociohydrological theorisations of human-water systems.•Political ecology exposes humans' unjust and unsustainable interactions with hydrology.•Different social groups ...diversely interact and coevolve with human-water systems.•Cape Town’s legacy engendered uneven levels of water insecurity across the City.•The 2015-27 drought accelerated and exacerbated a pre-existing water crisis.
Sociohydrology has advanced understandings of water related phenomena by conceptualizing changes in hydrological flows and risks as the result of the interplay between water and society. However, social power and the heterogeneity of human societies, which are crucial to unravel the feedback mechanisms underlying human-water systems, have not been sufficiently considered. In response, this paper proposes an interdisciplinary approach that draws on political ecology perspectives to combine sociohydrological insights with analyses of social power and of the ways in which different social groups distinctively interact with water systems. We draw on empirical evidence of Cape Town’s water insecurity before and during the prolonged drought (2015–2017) that escalated into a severe water crisis, also known as Day Zero. The study integrates times series of reservoir storage and water consumption with 40 interviews and focus group discussions to firstly retrace the historical legacy of Colonial rules, Apartheid and, more recently, neoliberal policies. Within this human-water system, we show how Cape Town’s political legacy has encouraged unsustainable levels of water consumption amongst the (white) elite and tolerated chronic water insecurity amongst (black) informal dwellers. This uneven geography of water insecurity is also discernible in the unequal experiences of drought and water resilience trajectories of diverse social groups across Cape Town. We conclude that accounting for social power and inequalities can advance sociohydrology by identifying those mechanisms (within society) that determine what water is secured and what human-water interactions and dynamics will be sustained over time. Furthermore, by engaging with social power, sociohydrology can play a significant role in informing policies that reduce inequalities in water access and unsustainable water use.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPCLJ, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
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