'Remittances are beautiful'? Gender implications of the new global remittances trend

Third World Quarterly

Volumn 29, Issue 7, 2008, Pages 1389-1409

  Kunz, Rahel ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF LUCERNE   (Switzerland)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

GENDER ROLE; IMMIGRATION POLICY; INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION; MIGRANTS REMITTANCE; POLICY STRATEGY; POPULATION MIGRATION;

MEXICO [NORTH AMERICA]; NORTH AMERICA;

HARNESS;

EID: 53449091045     PISSN: 01436597     EISSN: 13602241     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/01436590802386617     Document Type: Article

References (96)

1. Quote from a World Bank interview with Samuel Munzele Maimbo, Senior Financial Sector Specialist in the World Bank's Africa Finance and Private Sector Unit.
2. Opening Statement by Cesare Calari, Vice President of the Financial Sector, World Bank, at the International Conference on Migrant Remittances in London, 2003. See http://www.livelihoods.org/ hot_topics/docs/RemitConfFinal.doc.
3. Remittances are commonly de.ned as the money that migrants send back to their families or communities of origin. We can distinguish between individual remittances (sent to the family) and collective remittances (sent to the community of origin).
4. Population Division of the Department of Economic and Social A.airs of the United Nations Secretariat, Trends in Total Migrant Stock: The 2005 Revision, 2005, at http://esa.un.org/migration.
5. World Bank, Migration and Remittances Factbook 2008, 2008, at http://econ.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/EXTDEC/EXTDECPROSPECTS/ 0,,contentMDK:21352016~pagePK:64165401~piPK:64165026~theSitePK: 476883,00.html. The official numbers do not include informal remittances, which are thought to be substantial. A note of caution is necessary: The increase in official remittances figures could be influenced by the increased capacity for registering such flows.
6. For example, International Relations has been, and often still is, assumed to be a gender-neutral discipline and field of enquiry, despite years of feminist IR scholarship.
7. See, for example, L Binford, 'Para salvar la economía mexicana: La trampa de las remesas', Working Paper, 2004, at http://meme.phpwebhosting.com/~migracion/modules/seminarioe/ binfordleight.pdf#search=%22binford%20leigh%20trampa%20de%20las %20remesas%22
8. and H De Haas, 'International migration, remittances and development: myths and facts', Third World Quarterly, 26 (8), 2005, pp 1269-1284.
9. M Boas & D McNeill, 'Introduction: Power and ideas in multilateral institutions - towards an interpretative framework', in Boas & McNeill (eds), Global Institutions and Development: Framing the World?, London: Routledge, 2004, p 1.
10. Ibid.
11. SV Peterson & AS Runyan, Global Gender Issues: Dilemmas in World Politics, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1993, p 1.
12. Council of the European Union, Seville European Council 21-22 June 2002: Presidency Conclusions, EU Doc 13463/02, 24 October 2002.
13. NN Sørensen, N Van Hear & P Engberg-Pedersen, 'The migration-development nexus: Evidence and policy options', International Migration, 40 (5), 2002, pp 49-71.
14. Department for International Development (DFID) & World Bank, International Conference on Migrant Remittances: Report and Conclusions London, 2003, p 11, at http://www.livelihoods.org/ hot_topics/migration/remittances.html.
15. Thus, for example, there is typically a disagreement between internal affairs departments and development departments of receiving countries. Internal affairs departments have to deal with the implications of migration for the receiving country and the often negative attitudes of the population towards immigrants, which tends to produce more restrictive approaches to migration, whereas development departments, given their field of concern, are often in favour of relative openness towards migration. The UK Home Office, for example, tends to adopt a more conventional approach aimed at preventing migration, whereas the Department for International Development (DFID) is among the frontrunners of the GRT. Within the EU there is also a certain policy incoherence and a number of obstacles to achieving a certain policy co-ordination. For an analysis of the EU context, see S Lavenex & R Kunz, 'The migration-development nexus in EU external relations', Journal of European Integration, 30 (3), 2008, pp 439-457.
16. International Labour Organisation (ILO), Migration for Employment Convention, C97, Geneva, 1949, Article 9, at http://www.ilo.org/ilolex/ english/convdisp1.htm.
17. See http://www.old.iom.int/en/who/main_mission.shtml.
18. See http://www.old.iom.int/en/who/main_history.shtml.
19. Cairo Programme of Action, 1994, Section X, at http://www.iisd.ca/Cairo/ program/p00000.html.
20. ILO, Making the Best of Globalization: Migrant Worker Remittances and Micro-Finance, Geneva: ILO, 2000, p 2.
21. FfD website at http://www.un.org/esa/ffd/ffdconf/.
22. United Nations, Monterrey Consensus, Monterrey, 2003, p 8, at http://www.un.org/esa/ffd/Monterrey-Consensus-excepts-aconf198_11.pdf.
23. See http://www.gcim.org.
24. See http://www.gcim.org/en/a_mandate.html.
25. D Ratha, 'Workers' remittances: An important and stable source of external development finance', in Global Development Finance 2003, Washington, DC: World Bank, 2003, p 157.
26. Ibid.
27. For further information about this conference, see http://www.livelihoods.org/hot_topics/migration/remittances.html.
28. DFID & World Bank, International Conference on Migrant Remittances p 3.
29. Sea Island Summit, G8 Action Plan, 2004, at http://www.g7.utoronto.ca/ summit/2004seaisland/poverty.html.
30. Within the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) it is mainly the Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF) that has been involved in issues linked to remittances and development. See http://www.iadb.org/mif/v2/ index.html.
31. For more information about the conference, see http://www.iadb.org/mif/ events.cfm?language=English&parid=9.
32. For further information about the session on gender and remittances co-organised by INSTRAW, see: http://www.un-instraw.org/en/ index.php?option=content&task=view&id=1003&Itemid=121.
33. See the Conclusions of the conference at http://www.migrationdevelopment.org/index.php?id=11.
34. See http://www.un.org/esa/population/hldmigration/.
35. For more information about the GFMD, see http://www.gfmd-fmmd.org/en/ public/global-forummigration-and-development-0.
36. See http://www.iadb.org/mif/events.cfm?language=English&parid= 9&topic=&subtopic=REMS.
37. See http://www.ifad.org/events/remittances/index.htm.
38. ILO, Towards a Fair Deal for Migrant Workers in the Global Economy report presented at the International Labour Conference, 92nd Session, Geneva: ILO, 2004, p 25, at http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/ public/-dgreports/-dcomm/documents/meetingdocument/kd00096.pdf.
39. World Bank, 'Remittances a powerful tool to reduce poverty if effectively harnessed, analysts say', News, 30 June 2005
40. and World Bank, 'When money really matters: Remittances vital to South Asia', News, 19 July 2005.
41. SM Maimbo & D Ratha (eds), Remittances: Development Impact and Future Prospects, Washington, DC: World Bank, 2005
42. and Ç Özden & M Schiff, International Migration, Remittances and the Brain Drain, Washington, DC: World Bank, 2006.
43. Thus, for example, within the ILO the two sections involved in the GRT - MIGRANT and the Social Finance Unit - adopt a slightly different framing. The MIGRANT department focuses on migrants' rights and social justice and tends to adopt a more rights-based approach. The Social Finance Unit deals with the financial aspects of migration, ie remittances and their investment, but also with the costs and risks related to migration, and in general tends to be more optimistic about the beneficial impacts of migration and remittances on development.
44. Ratha, 'Workers' remittances'.
45. Global Commission on International Migration (GCIM), Migration in an Interconnected World: New Directions for Action, Geneva: GCIM, 2005, p 26.
46. Maimbo & Ratha, Remittances, p 32.
47. World Bank, Knowledge for Change Charter, no date, at http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTKNOWLEDGEFORCHANGE/Resources/ 491519-1128696349273/2005-3R-KFC_CharterFINAL_eBook.pdf.
48. The notion of 'win-win-win' strategies was initially brought up by the World Bank and later adopted by the ILO, for example in its contributions to the High-Level Dialogue. ILO, International Labour Migration and Development: The ILO Perspective, report presented at the 61st Session of the General Assembly High-Level Dialogue on International Migration and Development, Geneva: ILO, September 2006, pp 73-81, at http://www.solidarnosc.org.pl/migracje/dokumenty/ilo/dokumenty/ ILO%20Intern%20Migr%20Persopectives%202006.pdf.
49. This idea that remittances and the link between migration and development is gender-neutral was also reflected in my interviews with Mexican government o.cials and development personnel, who often told me that remittances had nothing to do with gender.
50. L Goldring, 'Family and collective remittances to Mexico: A multi-dimensional typology', Development and Change, 35 (4), 2004, p 804.
51. J Durand, 'Los migradólares: Cien años de inversión en el medio rural', Argumentos: Estudios Críticos de la Sociedad, 5, 1988, pp 7-21
52. and Durand, Más allá de la línea: Patrones migratorios entre México y Estados Unidos, Mexico City: Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes, 1994.
53. Goldring, 'Family and collective remittances to Mexico'
54. and Goldring, 'The gender and geography of citizenship in Mexico-US transnational spaces', Identities, 7 (4), 2001, pp 501-537.
55. P Levitt, 'Social remittances: A conceptual tool for understanding migration and development', Working Paper 96.04, Cambridge, MA: Harvard, 1996
56. and Levitt, The Transnational Villagers, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2001.
57. Levitt, 'Social remittances', p 2.
58. S Nichols, 'Another kind of remittances: Transfer of agricultural innovations by migrants to their communities of origin', paper presented at the 'Second Colloquium on International Migration: Mexico-California', University of California, Berkeley, 29 March 2002.
59. L Goldring, 'La migracion México-EUA y la transnacionalización del espacio político y social: Perspectivas desde el México rural', Estudios Sociológicos, X (29), 1992, pp 315-340
60. and M Moctezuma, 'La organisación de los migrantes zacatecanos en Estados Unidos', Cuadernos Agrarios, 19-20, 2000, pp 81-104.
61. L Basch, N Glick Schiller & C Szanton Blanc, Nations Unbound: Transnational Projects, Postcolonial Predicaments, and Deterritorialized Nation-states, Amsterdam: Gordon and Breach, 1994, p 7.
62. C Ramirez, M Garcia Dominguez & J Miguez Morais, Crossing Borders: Remittances, Gender and Development, Santo Domingo, DR: INSTRAW, 2005, p 21.
63. Levitt, 'Social remittances'; Levitt, The Transnational Villagers
64. NN Sørensen, 'Migrant remittances, development and gender', DIIS Brief, 2005
65. Ramirez et al, Crossing Borders
66. and PR Pessar & SJ Mahler, 'Transnational migration: Bringing gender in', International Migration Review, 37 (3), 2003, pp 812-846.
67. See, for example, D Barrera Bassols & C Oehmichen Bazán (eds), Migración y Relaciones de Género en México, Mexico City: GIMTRAP, UNAM/IIA, 2000, pp 119-134
68. J Carling, 'Gender dimensions of international migration', Global Migration Perspectives, 35, 2005
69. B Ehrenreich & A Hochschild (eds), Global Women: Nannies, Maids, and Sex Workers in the New Economy, New York: Metropolitan Books, 2003
70. G Mummert, 'Dilemas familiares en un Michoacán de migrantes', in G Lopez Castro (ed), Diáspora Michoacana, Zamora: El Colegio de Michoacán, Gobierno del Estado de Michoacán, 2003, pp 113-145
71. and B Suárez & E Zapata (eds), Remesas: Milagros y Mucho Más Realizan las Mujeres Indígenas y Campesinas, Vols I-II, Mexico City: GIMTRAP, 2004.
72. R Kunz, 'The "social cost" of migration and remittances: Recovering the silenced voices of the global remittance trend', paper presented at the Second International Colloquium, 'Migracion y Desarrollo', 2006, at http://www.migracionydesarrollo.org.
73. See http://www.iadb.org/mif/remesas_map.cfm?language=EN&parid= 4&item1id=2
74. GCIM, Migration in an Interconnected World, p 26.
75. Ibid, p 28.
76. BRIDGE, 'Gender and migration', Cutting Edge Pack, Brighton: IDS, 2005, p 26, at http://www.bridge.ids.ac.uk/reports/CEP-Mig-OR.pdf.
77. Sørensen, 'Migrant remittances, development and gender', p 3.
78. SJ Mahler, 'Gender matters', id21 insights, 60, 2006, p 8.
79. These stereotypes are not all that new. The stereotype that women make 'better' use of money than men and spend money in ways which benefit the family rather than just themselves has been used since the emergence of Women in Development (WID) discourses and has served to legitimise specific development practice, for instance in the case of poverty reduction programmes based on handing out sums of money to women in poor households (such as the Mexican poverty programme Oportunidades).
80. United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), The State of the World Population in 2006: A Passage to Hope - Women and Migration, 2006, p 1, at http://www.unfpa.org/swp/2006/english/introduction.html.
81. For more details, see R Kunz, 'The "social cost" of migration and remittances', p 18.
82. M Marchand, R Kunz, M Mejía, EMeza, A Nieto Aguilar, R Osorno Velázquez, D Pardo Sánchez, U Revilla López, M Ricciardi & A Vences Estudillo, Tlaxcala: M¿igración o Desarrollo Local?, Puebla: CONACYT, 2006.
83. M Semyonov & A Gorodzeisky, 'Labor migration, remittances and household income: A comparison between Filipino and Filipina overseas workers', International Migration Review, 34 (1), 2005, pp 45-68.
84. E Zontini, 'Immigrant women in Barcelona: Coping with the consequences of transnational lives', Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 30 (6), 2004, p 1128.
85. Ibid, p 1123.
86. GCIM, Migration in an Interconnected World, p 28.
87. For an analysis of the 'feminisation of poverty' discourse and its implications, see R Kunz, 'Frauen als die Ärmsten der Ärmsten? Eine kritische Gender Analyse der sozialen Deutung der Feminisierung der Armut', in D Grisard, J Häberlein, A Kaiser & S Saxer (eds), Gender in Motion: Die Konstruktion von Geschlecht in Raum und Erzählung, Frankfurt: Campus Verlag, 2007, pp 316-340.
88. For research on the consequences of microcredit programmes, see, J Lairap, 'The disciplinary power of microcredit: Some preliminary evidence from Cameroon', unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Amsterdam, 2004
89. R Mallick, 'Implementing and evaluating microcredit in Bangladesh', Development in Practice, 12 (2), 2002, pp 153-163
90. A Rahman, 'Micro-credit initiatives for equitable and sustainable development: Who pays?', World Development, 27 (1), 1999, pp 67-82
91. and H Weber, 'Global governance and poverty reduction: The case of microcredit', in R Wilkinson & S Hughes (eds), Global Governance: Critical Perspectives, London: Routledge, 2002, pp 132-151.
92. Translated from Spanish by the author: 'yo creo que el rol de la mujer es muy importante, porque, está dentro del sector productivo, no, o sea, no es lo mismo que tu, si vivieras aqui en Mexico y tuvieras un esposo que se fuera a EEUU, te esta mandando dinero, digamos 500 dollares al mes, pero tu no hagas nada, no, ossea, nada mas recibes el dinero, y ya, no?...bueno si comes y te vistes y llevas a los ninos a la escuela, pero no estas haciendo nada de productivo, nada mas estas recibiendo el dinero, no, entonces yo creo que esto [estos proyectos productivos] es el complemento que ellas realizan, que a parte que reciben el dinero de sus esposos como remesas, tu tambien estas produciendo...hay una complemetaridad entre mujeres y hombres'. Mexican Government Official, April 2005.
93. The representation of Mexican migrants as heroes became prominent during the presidency of Vicente Fox. See, for example, http://www.elporvenir.com.mx/notas.asp?nota_id=160764.
94. The Iniciativa 3×1 works as a matching-funds system, whereby migrant organisations in the USA can donate money and apply for additional funding from the three levels of the Mexican government to finance a development project in their community of origin. Thus, the migrants put in one part and the project receives another three parts of funding from the three levels of the Mexican government (municipal, state and federal).
95. Kunz, 'The "social cost" of migration and remittances', p 18ff
96. and Suárez & Zapata, Remesas.