The political economy of migrant remittances Lartey, Emmanuel K. K.
Economic notes - Monte Paschi Siena,
November 2019, 2019-11-00, 20191101, Letnik:
48, Številka:
3
Journal Article
Remittances are conceptualized as flows of money, objects, ideas, traditions, and symbolic capital, mapping out a crossborder space in which people live, work, and communicate with multiple ...belongings. However, their power to improve individual living conditions and community infrastructure mainly results from global inequality and this remittance mantra needs to be challenged by going beyond the migration-development-nexus and by revealing dependencies and frictions in remittance relations. Remittances are thus scrutinized in their effects on both social cohesion and social rupture, and by highlighting the transformative effects of remittance in the context of conflict, climate change, and the postcolonial, we shed light on the future of transnational society.
Rücküberweisungen (remittances) bestehen aus Geldsendungen, Objekten, Ideen, Traditionen und symbolischem Kapital, die einen grenzüberschreitenden Raum abbilden, in dem Menschen leben, arbeiten und kommunizieren. Ihre Kraft zur Verbesserung der individuellen Lebensbedingungen und der Gemeinschaftsinfrastruktur resultiert jedoch hauptsächlich aus einem System globaler Ungleichheit. Wir hinterfragen das so genannte remittance mantra, indem wir Abhängigkeiten und Reibungen in den Remittance-Beziehungen aufdecken. Remittances werden somit auf ihre Auswirkungen auf den sozialen Zusammenhalt und die soziale Spaltung und auf ihre transformativen Effekte hin untersucht, womit wir die Zukunft der transnationalen Gesellschaft beleuchten.
Since 2000, approximately 440,000 Mexicans have migrated to the United States every year. Tens of thousands have left children behind in Mexico to do so. For these parents, migration is a sacrifice. ...What do parents expect to accomplish by dividing their families across borders? How do families manage when they are living apart? More importantly, do parents' relocations yield the intended results? Probing the experiences of migrant parents, children in Mexico, and their caregivers, Joanna Dreby offers an up-close and personal account of the lives of families divided by borders. What she finds is that the difficulties endured by transnational families make it nearly impossible for parents' sacrifices to result in the benefits they expect. Yet, paradoxically, these hardships reinforce family members' commitments to each other. A story both of adversity and the intensity of family ties, Divided by Borders is an engaging and insightful investigation of the ways Mexican families struggle and ultimately persevere in a global economy.
This paper uses a nationally-representative household data set from Guatemala to analyze how the receipt of internal remittances (from Guatemala) and international remittances (from United States) ...affects the marginal spending behavior of households. Two findings emerge. First, controlling for selection and endogeneity, households receiving international remittances spend less at the margin on one key consumption good—food—compared to what they would have spent on this good without remittances. Second, households receiving either internal or international remittances spend more at the margin on two investment goods—education and housing—compared to what they would have spent on these goods without remittances. These findings support the growing view that remittances can help increase the level of investment in human and physical capital in remittance-receiving countries.
This paper assesses the effect of the steadily growing remittance flows to sub-Saharan Africa. Though the region receives only a small portion of the total recorded remittances to developing ...countries, and the volume of aid flows to sub-Saharan Africa swamps remittances, this paper finds that remittances, which are a stable, private transfer, have a direct poverty-mitigating effect, and promote financial development. These findings hold even after factoring in the reverse causality between remittances, poverty, and financial development. The paper posits that formalizing such flows can serve as an effective access point for “unbanked” individuals, and households.
As migration from poverty-stricken and conflict-affected countries continues to hit the headlines, this book focuses on an important counter-flow: the money that people send home. Despite ...considerable research on the impact of migration and remittances in countries of origin - increasingly viewed as a source of development capital - still little is known about refugees' remittances to conflict-affected countries because such funds are most often seen as a source of conflict finance. This book explores the dynamics, infrastructure, and far-reaching effects of remittances from the perspectives of people in the Somali regions and the diaspora. With conflict driving mass displacement, Somali society has become progressively transnational, its vigorous remittance economy reaching from the heart of the global North into wrecked cities, refugee camps, and remote rural areas. By 'following the money' the author opens a window on the everyday lives of people caught up in processes of conflict, migration, and development. The book demonstrates how, in the interstices of state disruption and globalisation, and in the shadow of violence and political uncertainty, life in the Somali regions goes on, subject to complex transnational forms of social, economic, and political innovation and change.
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