African Human Mobility Review

Editorial

Mulugeta Dinbabo — 2024-09-11

Lifeworlds in Crisis: Making Refugees in the Chad–Sudan Borderlands

Prof Daniel Tevera — 2024-09-11

Does Climate Change Transfer Poverty from Rural to Urban Areas? Implications for Regional Sub-Saharan Research Agenda

Thanyani Madzivhandila — 2024-09-11

There is growing recognition that climate change is a worldwide phenomenon with far-reaching effects and that it is linked to an increase in the frequency of extreme weather occurrences. In rural areas of most of the sub-Saharan countries and other developing countries in the world, the frequent occurrences of extreme weather events such as flooding, heat waves, and drought have significantly destroyed livelihood activities of poor communities. Unfavorable geographic characteristics, a lack of resources, and a higher reliance on climate-sensitive sources of income among many community members in poor nations all contribute to the impact. These include livelihood activities associated with land use and agricultural practices. Sadly, the population’s capacity and incentive to stay in rural areas have been altered because of climate change and its detrimental impacts on agricultural output, income, and subsistence living; as a result, many rural dwellers are migrating to urban areas. Rural populations migrate to urban areas in search of economic opportunities to earn a living. It is evident that the expected opportunities in urban areas are not always available; thus, most of the rural migrants are stuck in informal settlements, shanty towns, and slums without access to services. Consequently, it is evident that climate change is somehow transferring poverty from rural to urban areas. This study adopted the push/pull theory as a theoretical framework to guide the discussion and analysis. Based on an extensive review of the existing literature using qualitative document analysis, the purpose of this article is to examine the role of climate change on rural–urban migration, which ultimately contributes to the increase in urban poverty. The article concludes by reviewing the current (limited) research on climate change and poverty and argues for a research agenda in the context of sub-Saharan Africa toward sustainable ways to respond to the challenges of climate-induced migration, urbanization, and poverty.

Institutionalizing Anti-Migrant Discourse in Public Healthcare: An Analysis of Medical Xenophobia against Zimbabwean Migrant Women in Johannesburg

Learnmore Mvundura — 2024-09-11

The provision of healthcare services to African migrants within the South African public healthcare system has been characterized as marred by medical xenophobia. While the literature on xenophobia in the country draws connections between xenophobic violence and how the migrant is characterized through demeaning metaphors in the media and the political space, medical xenophobia literature somewhat remains with the burden of categorically connecting specific practices that constitute medical xenophobia with the broader anti-migrant discourse. Drawing on the narratives of Zimbabwean migrant women seeking antenatal care services within the public healthcare system in Johannesburg, this paper analyzes the utterances and practices of some healthcare providers to draw connections with the anti-migrant narratives obtaining in the media, the political space, and certain anti-migrant formations (bearers of discourse). Like studies before it, this paper observes medical xenophobia and relying on Foucault’s disciplinary power as a conceptual tool, it argues that the utterances by some public healthcare professionals are indeed unabridged rearticulations of the normalized anti-migrant discourse in various sites bearing anti-migrant discourse. While acknowledging that some bureaucrats’ practices are tangential to the anti-migrant discourse, which decouples their individual actions from the discursive norm, the paper maintains that the standardized anti-migrant discourse for the large part provides frames of reference for some healthcare providers on how to perceive and treat the migrant patient, as their utterances are a restage of this discourse, usually with little to no annotations.

Editorial

Mulugeta Dinbabo — 2024-05-07

The Palgrave Handbook of South–South Migration and Inequality

Daniel Tevera — 2024-05-07

Dynamics of Protection in a Shrinking Economy: A Peak into Zimbabwe’s Refugee Regime

Gracsious Maviza — 2024-09-11

Zimbabwe has consistently experienced an influx of refugees despite its shrinking economy. This places a heavy burden on the state to provide social protection to refugees. There are limited studies that focus on the dynamics of refugee protection in resource-constrained countries like Zimbabwe, often characterized as being only immigrant-sending countries. We use data from 12 in-depth interviews with key informants to explore how the prolonged socio-economic crisis has impacted the state’s ability to provide social protection to refugees in Zimbabwe. The study also explores the relationship between the state and other stakeholders in hosting refugees in Zimbabwe. The findings suggest that socio-economic challenges in a shrinking economy affect the protection outcomes of refugees regardless of the presence of a robust refugee regime in the country.

Migration and the Constant Search for Self-Improvement in Africa

Leander Kandilige — 2024-05-07

Globally, narratives about the nexus between migration and development have gained prominence among academics, policymakers, development practitioners, as well as social partners. However, the historical and contextual factors that have shaped the patterns of migration flows within and from the African continent have been poorly conceptualized and theorized. The components of migration that have the propensity to lead to self-improvement and development such as the sending of cash, social, and political remittances; skills and knowledge transfers; and diaspora-origin country engagements, need to be examined as a composite in order to fully appreciate the developmental potential of migration within the African context. Using thematic and content analysis of relevant extant literature, we examine the contextual factors that characterize the nexus between migration and self-improvement/development in Africa. Our analyses are situated within an Africa-centered conceptualization of development and migration. We argue that the development impacts of migration vary across different regions in Africa depending on the contextual factors that shape such migrations. Migration spurs self-improvement and development just as self-improvement and development facilitate migration.

“When There is No Migration, the Whole Region Has a Problem”: The Political Priorities of Migration Policies in West Africa

Franzisca Zanker — 2024-09-11

This paper considers the implications of migration to Europe for West African governments in relation to other forms of politically relevant mobilities. This helps to understand what governments in West Africa prioritize when it comes to migration policy. No doubt, there is an increasing European influence on the migration agenda. However, despite this influence, there are still other West African interests when it comes to migration governance. These are diverse, covering development and humanitarian concerns, and include pro-active diaspora policies, restrictive immigration regimes due to economic protectionism and security concerns, as well as protecting migrants and displaced people. Thus, different countries in the region have varying sets of political priorities, though underlined by a broader unpolitical nature of migration of the everyday. The paper is based on over 130 interviews with policymakers, politicians, civil society activists, and academic experts in Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, and the Gambia in 2019. It adds to the literature on the agency of migration states in the Global South.

Editorial

Mulugeta F. Dinbabo — 2023-12-14