The (un)making of Bimshire and the Black Englishman: Barbadian nationalism in post-colonial Britain

This paper considers Partha Chatterjee’s [1993. The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press] theory of anti-colonial nationalism – itself a response to Benedict Anderson [(1983) 2006. Imagined Communities. Reprint, London: Verso] – to understand how migrants from Barbados and their children construct their national identities in postcolonial Britain. Using interviews with first-, second- and third-generation Barbadian-Britons, it aims to determine what it means to be Barbadian, fifty years since independence, and how this identity has developed in the long shadow of colonialism and the more recent era of sovereignty. Guided by Chatterjee’s framework of spiritual and material nationalism, the findings locate Barbadian nationalism in the dynamic spiritual domain of family, racial consciousness and culture, unaffected by British aesthetic and institutions that have endured since the island’s occupation. How is this identity constructed within the borders of the former colonial power? This research locates the Caribbean within these competing discourses of nationalism, particularly nationalism as it responds and adapts to migration.     

Neither Here Nor There

Abstract

Since 1917 all Puerto Ricans, whether island- or mainland-born, are United States citizens. Physical proximity and relatively affordable transportation encourages Puerto Rican migration to the mainland United States. Puerto Rican migration takes three forms: the “one- way migrants,” who move permanently to the mainland; the “return migrants” who migrate to the mainland but after many years return to the island and reestablish residence; and the “circular migrants” who migrate back and forth between the island and the mainland spending substantial periods of residence in both places. The following analysis emphasizes the conditions that instigate the departure of Puerto Rican migrants from both the island and the mainland, and discusses the implications of Puerto Rican circular migration for social work and the provision of social welfare programs and services.     

Opting out for Getting in: Existential Mobility in European Graduates’ Migration to Asia

Abstract

This article examines young Europeans’ emigration from Europe. Qualitative interviews with mostly white Europeans in Singapore and Tokyo reveal how these young migrants’ motility, or “potential to move”, enables them to migrate through largely overlooked channels. Fear of immobility in Europe triggers these highly-educated Europeans’ existential and physical mobility to Asia where they compete with host-country nationals and non-white migrants for jobs. Categorization into three types of access to employment unpacks the complexity behind graduates’ mobility trajectories out of the European labor market and demonstrates their rising precariousness in post-Lehman shock Europe and their changing bargaining power in the world.     

Legacies of State Socialism: A Comparative Study of Elite Attitudes towards EU Economic Competitiveness in Western and Central Eastern Europe

Abstract

The elites of Western Europe prefer social security for all citizens as the major aim of the EU, while the preference of Central and Eastern European elites is for a more globally competitive European economy. This disparity between elite preferences may be accounted for by the distinct electorates and elites’ responsive strategic calculations, or by the process of socialisation Central and Eastern European elites undergo during exposure to the EU. This article argues that the predominant reason for the difference in elite attitudes towards economic competition is the lasting effect of state socialism in Central and Eastern European countries.     

Regularization of Irregular Migrants and Social Policies: Comparative Perspectives

Abstract

This paper examines the social policy implications of the regularization of irregular immigrants. As an act of legal integration regularization arguably is about irregular migrants’ inclusion into mainstream social and legal structures and, as a corollary, has important implications for migrants’ access to social rights. Based on a recent comparative study of regularizations and their impact in seven EU Member-States, the study finds that access to social rights associated with regularizations indeed are reported as the most important impacts of regularization by regularized migrants themselves, next to access to work and related welfare entitlements.     

“It Is Better to Do Business in Africa than in Europe” – Socio-Economic Positionings among Business-Minded European Somalis Moving to Kenya

Abstract

Using the example of European Somalis moving to Kenya, this article argues that although these middle class return migrants share many similarities, they also differ in significant ways. Focusing on economically independent migrants, this paper will show that their move to Kenya is both return and onward migration at the same time. The transnational socio-economic positioning of Somali returnees in Kenya, this article demonstrates, rests on the importance of legal capital for enabling transnational mobility, which in turn is relevant for the convertibility of capital in the various local settings in which migrants settle.     

More continuity than change? US strategy toward Cuba under Obama and Trump

This article examines the policies implemented by both the Obama and Trump Administrations toward Cuba to evaluate the claim that the ‘Thaw’ of relations between Washington and Havana represents a significant change in US foreign policy toward the island nation. Despite the appearance that the change in policy is a fundamental shift, I argue that the changes in US policy toward Cuba under both Obama and Trump represent changes in the means for pursuing the same historical objectives pursued by the Washington for the past few decades. In other words, the overall strategy and objective of US hegemony in Cuba is the same, with the only change being the means for achieving these ends. The central implication of this is that the ‘Thaw’ in relations between Cuba and the US represents a new, more ‘consensual’ means to instigating the same objective of provoking American-orchestrated political, economic, social and ideological changes in the island nation.     

Cuba: heading for a new development and political model – an introduction

Cuba, this iconic revolutionary island which has brought so much hope to the Third World and, at one point, worry for a nuclear World War III, is going through a process of change never seen since Fidel Castro led his revolutionary forces to triumph around New Year’s of 1959. Yet, 10 years into the change process, led by the younger Castro Raúl (now 85), nobody can really forecast where the country will end up in socio-economic and political terms. In this TWQ subsection, two economists and three political scientists – two Cubans and three European Cuba watchers – analyse the reforms and their possible outcome.     

Too many winds to consider; which way and when to sail!: Ethiopian female transit migrants in Djibouti and the dynamics of their decision-making

Transit migration is a phenomenon on the rise partly due to the growth of international migration and more robust policies in destination countries making onward travel more difficult. The dominant discourse portrays transit migrants as agents stranded enroute-lacking agency to decide about their state of mobility/immobility. By going beyond such a normative victimization narrative of transit migrants, and by drawing on lived experiences of female Ethiopian migrants, this paper examines the agency of transit migrants; that is, the creative strategies they employ while planning their mobility/immobility, and in negotiating their precarious and vulnerable position. The paper discusses prospects of mobility/Immobility and/or settlement of migrants and factors that affect their informed decisions and argues against a monocausal analysis of factors influencing decision-making of migrants.     

Violence on Iraqi bodies: decolonising economic sanctions in security studies

Abstract

United Nations agencies report that by 1998, Iraqi infant mortality had risen from the pre-Gulf War rate of 3.7% to 12%. Insufficient food and medical supplies and deterioration of sewage and sanitation systems and electrical power systems reportedly caused an increase of 40,000 deaths annually of children under the age of 5 and of 50,000 deaths annually of older Iraqis. Why is this violence on Iraqis absent from analyses of sanctions in international relations and security studies? This paper is concerned with, first, situating sanctions against the Global South as violence by challenging the conventional theorisation of violence inflicted by the hegemon as a mechanism of ‘national security’. Second, we offer a decolonial reading of the sanctions imposed on Iraq by shifting the locus of enunciation from the state to Iraqi people’s suffering.     

Whole-of-Government Approaches to Fragile States in Africa

For a number of years fragile states have been high on the foreign policy agendas of the USA and the EU. Both actors look upon fragile states with great concern and consider them as security threats. Officially they give priority to ‘whole-of-government approaches’ (wga) when addressing the threats from these states. However, there is a gap between the policy declarations and the policies implemented by the two actors. The missing link in the implementation of wga in Africa is explained by two variables: on the one hand, material interests in the continent and, on the other hand, the institutions in Washington and Brussels involved in policy making. It is the lack of a strong foreign policy priority for Africa that explains the inadequate US implementation of wga. In the case of the EU, it is the multitude of institutions and institutional interests that explains the lack of implementation, rather than a lack of European interests in the fragile states on continent.     

Sino-Ghana bilateral relations and Chinese migrants’ illegal gold mining in Ghana

ABSTRACT

This article examines the participation of some Chinese migrants in illegal gold mining (known as galamsey) in Ghana, and how the Government’s policy to address the issue created diplomatic tension between China and Ghana. Drawing on primary data from in-depth, face-to-face interviews with 250 respondents and supplementary information from archival sources and personal observation, the study found that small-scale gold mining is an area legally reserved for Ghanaian indigenes, who faced stern competition from some Chinese migrants’ miners. Their ability to mobilize resources and machinery to execute galamsey virtually displaced the indigenes from their source of livelihood and caused environmental catastrophes. The Ghana Government’s policy response to the Chinese migrants’ galamsey, which led to arrests, sentencing and deportations of some Chinese miners, angered Beijing and fractured Ghana–China diplomatic ties. But the dispute could not collapse the entrenched bilateral relations between the two nations because the calculated mutual benefit derived from the relations was thought to be higher than the Chinese galamsey issue. Policy reforms which legally integrate Chinese migrants’ miners into the small-scale mining sector would stop galamsey and strengthen Sino-Ghana relations.     

Saving more than the children: the role of child-focused NGOs in the creation of southern security norms

The past decade has seen the emergence of ‘new critical discourses’ on security that argue for a widening of the term. This article hopes to add to such discussions by specifically examining the position of children and of the ngos that champion their rights in relation to the evolving security discourse in Southern societies. With this in mind, the first section of the article outlines the role of ngos in the contemporary practice of security. This will serve as an introduction to section two, where the activity of ngos vis-à-vis children will be considered. Such activity raises a number of questions with regard to the usefulness of incorporating children into the security discourse specifically, and to the social construction of ‘children’ generally. These will be outlined in section three. Section four argues for children to be considered as inherent to the creation of Southern security norms, while the final section concludes.     

Health and human security: a wrinkle in time or a new paradigm?

Since it was first advanced in the 1994 Human development report of the United Nations Development Programme [United Nations Development Project. (1994). Human development report. New York: UN], the concept of ‘human security’ has evolved as a holistic development-oriented acuity [Nef, J. (1999). Human security and mutual vulnerability: The global political economy of development and underdevelopment (2nd ed.). Ottawa: International Development Research Centre]. The human security concept reinforces the right to health, drawing on both the role of states and the global community's commitment to human rights. Yet, health and human security, long the purview of state power and responsibility, increasingly include alliances of state and non-state actors. This paper proceeds in three parts. The first looks at health and human security linkages, charting the trajectory of the health and human security relationship. The second deals with policy and operational implications. It explores the health–human security link, paying particular attention to the allocation of responsibility and accountability, including through private–public partnerships and rising powers such as China. The third provides a theoretical and technical analysis of the status of health and human security since 1994, taking into account its evolution vis-à-vis human rights’ development and development more broadly, also asking whether it represents but a wrinkle in time or a new sustainable development paradigm.     

The Impact of Socio-Cultural Integration on Return Intentions: Evidence from a Survey on Romanian Migrants

Abstract

This article analyzes the impact of socio-cultural integration on migrants’ intention to return to their country of origin. It distinguishes between the potential effects of inter-ethnic relations, language proficiency and perception of discrimination as components of integration. It uses individual-level data collected through an original survey among Romanian migrants in January 2018. It aims to test the effects of socio-cultural integration against those of alternative explanations provided in the literature. The findings indicate that the perception of discrimination, assessment of public institutions’ performance and belonging feelings are important predictors for return intentions.     

Intellectual Property and Food Security in Least Developed Countries

This paper analyses the impact of intellectual property laws on food security in Least Developed Countries (LDCs), taking the Pacific Islands countries as an example. It argues that ip laws are increasingly impacting upon food security, but are not being adequately taken into account in national policy development. Consequently, national ip regimes are developing in ways that undermine, rather than promote, food security. The paper argues that the particular context of LDCs, including a lack of technological development and reliance upon traditional agricultural systems, requires an approach to intellectual property that is substantially different from the ‘one size fits all’ approach mandated by the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights.     

Somewhere else: social connection and dislocation of Ethiopian migrants in Johannesburg

ABSTRACT

The meaning of personal relationships for Ethiopian migrants to Johannesburg is shaped by individual connections, by imported social networks that are adapted in the host city, and by the particular conditions of livelihood creation in the emerging Ethiopian entrepreneurial enclave of ‘Jeppe’. In their migration individuals experience both rupture and reconnection – with relatives, as well as through relationships and networks that constitute social capital in Johannesburg. The social world of Ethiopian migrants in this entrepreneurial enclave is complex. Many social connections and dislocations are affected by the life choices in which income generation and economic relations are the primary aim and social relations are necessarily secondary. Others are influenced by the strength of informal social networks that serve the needs of Ethiopian migrants. And, far from ‘here’ and ‘there’ being connected through the use of technology and advanced connectivity, ‘home’ and Johannesburg are experienced as quite separate and different places.     

Plural strategies of accessing land among peri-urban squatters

ABSTRACT

This paper discusses strategies utilized by migrants/squatters in accessing land for settlement and livelihoods in places where the state and the indigenes are not sympathetic to their needs. Although of significant policy and theoretical significance, this area has not received attention from scholarship, its dominant focus being on understanding the diverse origins, destinations, drivers and processes of migration. In addressing this issue, the study uses the case of Malawian migrants located in Zimbabwe’s peri-urban area of Norton. The finding of the paper is that there are as many strategies for acquiring land as they are migrants. The identified strategies (inheritance, seizures, and purchase) are contingent based – varying according to the access of the parties involved in the transactions.     

Migration,Reconfigurations of Family Relations and Social (In)Security: an introduction

This introduction reviews the contributions this collection of articles makes to understanding migration, social reproduction and social protection. Migration necessarily involves reconfigurations of family relations and these entail changes in the patterning of social (in)security. Our expansive interpretation of the concepts of social reproduction and social protection situate the reorganisation of gendered family lives as integral to the migration–development nexus. Life-course thinking informs analysis of how migrants ‘do family’ and what this means for gender, identity and (in)security. The collection explores how ‘care deficits’ are managed, both discursively through the negotiation of gendered ideologies about gender identity and the family, and through the everyday practice of social reproduction. The resulting reorganisation of social security involves taking on new risks and vulnerabilities for migrants and their families. For both internal and international migrants the challenges involved in securing social reproduction are powerfully shaped by welfare and migratory regimes and raise important questions about the relationship between social protection and broader social policy and citizenship issues.     

‘Sustainable Mining’? Corporate Social Responsibility,Migration and Livelihood Choices in Zambia

Whilst corporate social responsibility is now part and parcel of many multinational mining operations, and a ‘sustainable mining’ narrative a fundamental part of their public persona, companies still struggle to provide secure, long-term livelihoods for either locals or the swathe of migrants mining attracts. Minimal opportunities in the formal sector leave migrants in particular engaging in informal and illegal activities that offer poor livelihood security. In this paper we examine these activities in northern Zambia’s emerald mines to highlight some of the issues and barriers to sustainable development that exist across mining zones. We conclude that livelihood choices are not augmented by a so-called ‘sustainable mining’ approach that fails to engage all sectors of the population. We show the numerous challenges faced by migrants in this part of Zambia to accentuate the factors that need to be addressed before favourable environments for fostering sustainable mining might be achieved.