What is the Development in Development Studies in Northern Europe? A commentary

The question of why, in Northern Europe, African Studies are often under Development Study departments came up during a recent discussion with a mentor. Ordinarily, this sounds like an easy question; I would guess that a majority of people who study issues related to Africa are located under development studies units. But then, on second thought, it is deeper than that. Why has African Studies been irretrievably (?) linked to development studies for the past few decades? Is development study the only lens through which we can learn about African countries in the 21^st century? And in any case, what is development studies? The goal here is to provoke your thoughts, as I share my concerns. I start by looking into how development study is showcased at my University in Northern Europe and how African Studies is presented based on the history of research themes at an institute in the north of Europe. However, before going forward with my thoughts, I wish to encourage you to examine these questions in your country of residence, focusing on your institution, and share your thoughts here.

 

THE ALLIANCE: Development + Study + Colonialism + Imperialism

There are several discourses (Potter, 2014; Schuurman, 2009; Kothari, 2005) on what constitute development studies, nevertheless, ‘concerns about human conditions’ still forms the core of the discipline. However, the conceptualization and politicization of ‘concerns’ and ‘human conditions’ links development study as a discipline to the political ‘whitening’ of post-colonialism and its father imperialism. David Hulme (2014) noted that the first wave of the conception of development studies was primarily concerned with considerations of domestic social problems confronting England, France, and newly independent countries in the Americas. Although the socioeconomic conditions of those countries have been likened to countries presently characterized as developing, yet, relevantly, the geographical focus of that first wave was ‘home’ – it was members of the society that were concerned and acted with imaginations of a better society.

 

After the Second World War, a political preoccupation with reconstruction and decolonization transported the ‘concerns’ to poor and newly independent countries. The proselytes of the ‘concerns’ were foreign ‘experts’ gilded with foreign conceptions of ‘human conditions. Two things changed that became fundamental in contemporary development studies – these are geographical location of conditions conceptualized as problematic and the foreignness of the ‘experts’ charged with the task of imagining and achieving a better society, eccentrically through development policies. Hence, Development studies appear to be widely seen as fundamentally about the third world countries or countries with colonial past.  Several authors have called critical attention to the observed linkages between colonialism and the repertoire of development as propagated by powerful countries, self-identified as developed. Such critical analysis of development is spurred from arguments that colonialism did not end but mutated in the forms of economic, political, cultural and social representations. Also calling attention to the existence of conflicting agendas of power and interests within post-colonial states. The authors argue that this transmutation of colonialism as development pursuit/ policies has contributed to entrenched hegemonic power relations between the colonial masters and the colonized, effectively perpetuating ‘third world’ identities and defining notions of modernity and progress favouring colonial masters. In other words, the notion of development studies brings to mind, the relationship between a medical doctor and his patient, or better yet a veterinary doctor, or a scientist and his specimen as the voice of the ‘patient’ in this case is muffled by a plethora of causes.  There are several authors that you can read to fill in on the historiography of those arguments (Michael Cowen and Robert Shenton, Frederick Cooper, Uma kothari, Helen Tilley, Suzanne Moon, Joseph M. Hodge; Mamdani Mahmood).

 

But the work of Morgan Brigg (2002), which highlights moral responsibility and humanitarianism in the creation of development policies, becomes relevant to the focus of this piece. Briggs argues that development is concerned about the moral responsibility of colonial masters and issues of humanitarianism. Obviously, he has his point, but then, the point was quickly punctured, when Kothari responded with a quote attributed to Cecil Rhodes (remember him?): “imperialism was philanthropy – plus a 5 percent dividend on investment” (Lawlor, 2000: 63). There! Moral responsibility plus humanitarianism brings/equals economic, social, cultural or political profits. Perhaps we need to dip into “the great global poverty debate” with the starting point that most of the poorest people on the planet live in post-colonial countries (Neera Chandoke). In the utilitarian frame development studies become a case of personal morality – we have to do something to appease our moral conscience. Thinking of Thomas Pogge, does it just so happen that our moral obligation to help directs us to Africa and turns all things African into development challenges?

 

Another important factor that has been linked to the growth of development studies is the availability of international funding. International funding became key to development studies in the period of political independence of former colonial states and humanitarian aid and reconstruction in Europe. The purported goal was to garner sustained effort to ‘help’ poor people and places abroad, although Hulme (2014) noted that poverty was not the initial focus of international development interventions in poor countries. Rather, attention was mainly on the transfer of finance, technology, and knowledge from previous colonial masters, these were expected to spur economic development. Due to the concentration of interest, Currie-Alder (2016) argues that it is tempting to view development studies only in relation to international interventions, but he warns that “to do so ignores both how the field has built on earlier thinking…” Nevertheless, there are reasons to worry about what specific earlier thinking he referred to when observed from the content and self-described identity of the discipline in Northern Europe. For example, there were earlier voices (see Fanon 1961; Rodney, 1972) that posited that it was the exploitative relationship with the U.S. and Europe that was creating the social and economic conditions that have come to form the interests of development studies. Thereby, turning the attention of development studies from poor people and places to rich people and places.

 

As an instance, the Development Studies web page of my University in Europe, informs that the discipline is over 40 years old. It is further described as a relatively small unit situated in the Department of Political and Economic Studies. The discipline is described as focused on Africa, Asia, Middle East and Latin America (nowadays we can hear these regions referred to as the ‘global south’, where third world countries are located). The website informs that the discipline is ‘distinguished by its problem-orientation and multi-disciplinarity’. But, it focuses on development problems and endeavours to produce knowledge relevant to their solutions. In other words, from that description, the discipline is focused on development problems, located in Africa, Asia, Middle East and Latin America – a polar difference from the voices that located the problems in the U.S. and Europe. Intentionally or not, a perspective that does not aim to ‘eradicate exploitative relationship/interventions’ but has the goal to ‘eradicate poverty (and a list of the other ills)’ in the global South is implied.

 

Development problem-orientation situated in Africa, informs African Studies. But, where is development problem located? In Africa, Asia, Middle East, and Latin America or Brussels, London or Washington DC? To know the location of ‘development problems’, we need to ask ourselves what do we classify as ‘development problems’ and why? For example, do you classify the poor people that cannot afford food in Africa, or classify foreign trade policies and or the greed of wealthier nations, as development problems? Do you study the lifestyle of poor people in the South or Wealthier people in the North to frame and understand ‘development problems’?

A professor of development studies once said in a conference, that majority of the students in development studies are motivated by their sincere desire to change the world and make it a better place. To make the world a better place, where do you go – do you focus on the place where the symptoms of the World’s avarice are located or do you go to the place where the activities, actions, and processes that created the symptoms are found? Do you focus on the symptoms or do you focus on the causes, to ‘produce knowledge relevant to their solutions’? Is there a ‘five percent dividend’ on ‘fieldwork’?  Of course, mobility and international experience is good but has it become imperative to study development or frame the study of development as field visit – to the extent that ‘slum tourism’ are real travel programs? Is there more to Africa, than poverty and vulnerability and is there more to development than locating it in Africa specifically or global South generally?

 

 

A FINAL WORD

This geopolitical location of problem-oriented development in Africa appears to locate Solution/Prosperity etc. in the opposite side of the World while the ‘problems’ are studied in Africa (or third world countries). Africa will benefit better if African Studies is not narrowly focused on what is presently defined as development studies. But rather incorporate mainstream themes such as African engineering, situated in Engineering Department, African architectures, African medical practice (different from African medicine that is usually focused on traditional medicine and also suffers from the ‘development problem orientation’). Besides, modern medicine is commonly used in African societies. But surely, we could encourage researchers, younger and older, to study specific issues in the fields mentioned above as holistic examples within their fields and not as purely developmental challenges. As a colleague recently noted, “All knowledge production and learning processes are geared towards development”. More so, a broader framework for organizing knowledge production and learning will set us to start looking beyond the geographical limitations set by area studies. Secondly, development studies as a discipline need to critically re-examine itself and re-evaluate its content, subject, and geographical focus. We cannot continue to study development with the intent of positively and concretely influencing it without approaching our subject from a holistic perspective. Such comprehensive view will be interdisciplinary; to take advantage of more advanced tools of analysis, but also global.

 

External Evaluation, Waiting, and Pre-defense.

It has been over a year since my last post. The time has passed slowwwlyy – submitting for external examination, making reviews, rejected, new reviews, external evaluation again and now waiting for hopefully final report before the defense. The emotions have been very high and terribly low most times. But, I am still here, ‘standing’ and waiting.

A lot has been said about submitting the doctoral thesis for external evaluation, for me, it is a period of utter powerlessness, vulnerability, and frustrations. The first external evaluation revealed to me what I will call the darker side of the academic world, and leave it at that for now. It was an interesting and mind-opening experience. Yet, I have strong respect and admiration for the profession and the practitioners that uphold ethics and honour in the dispensation of their professional duties.

Other than the dramas, the period of external evaluation is just about waiting. I have been utilizing my waiting time for writing for publication and applying for jobs and funding for continuing research. Those do take my mind off the tension and anxiety related to the expected report from the external reviewers.  Also, taking this blog to the next stage is one of the things I am working on.

In the coming months, I will get back to posting at least once a month. I plan to start three new categories under this blog site. Firstly, a new category on migrants as fathers, written by young fathers coping with the challenges of being their vision of the ideal father in their communities. Secondly, I am also planning on starting another category on Migrants and aspiration in their host community. Thirdly, there will be the category about Development of Africa. There is also what will be the last post under this category on my doctoral degree, which will be written after my defense.

So, see you here next year! Happy 2017!!!

Discussion and Conclusion, PhD manuscript

WHEN THE SOCIAL NET IS UNPLUGGED: A study of poor African migrants on the street of Johannesburg.

Christal O. Spel

 

SECTION THREE: DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION

I set out to study how poor African migrants survive on the street of Johannesburg, in the harsh migration context of South Africa, and to examine the unintended consequences of South Africa’s migration context that focuses on exclusion and restriction. I identified nine African migrants that make their living from trade and services on the streets of Yeoville and Hillbrow in Johannesburg through one-on-one contact and chain referral. I conducted lifestory interviews during fieldwork and made academic sense of my huge data using narrative analysis. My methodology called attention to the temporality of the data, the subjective negotiations that produces the narrated stories that made up the data and the relevance of the researcher’s ontological and personal position in influencing the interpretation of the data.

In the study, I utilize hope, tactics and survival as theoretical themes to discuss the narratives of my respondents. I identify these concepts from the operationalization of my theoretical framework – resilience. In the previous section I presented the findings and analysis of my data under the headings of the three theoretical themes – hope, tactics and survival. From the analysis three relevant point were highlighted: Foremost, my respondents live on meeting their future desire, shifting their emphasis from the now to the future. Thus their continued presence on the street of Johannesburg are mainly influenced by mental reorganization and interpretation of past, present and future opportunities. Secondly, the everyday tactics of my respondents are borne in response to the constraints in the migration context, and also as practical steps towards the achievement of their aspirations. So, they do not just receive the rules and regulations of migration control, but actively engages the rules for their benefits. Thirdly, my interviewee’s scope of adversity is broader than the immediate South Africa’s harsh context, to include the context of their home countries. This bears on their determination to productively engage the obstacles to their aspirations in the host country.

These highlights implies certain ramifications for migration control in South Africa both at the policy level and the practice of controlling migration context. In this section, I discuss the suggested implications of the unwanted migrants hope, tactics and survival in South Africa. At the end of my discussion, I draw my conclusion by highlighting the relevant points raised in this thesis.

8. Re-Imagining Social Net: From Wellbeing to Better Life

Central in the narratives of my respondents is their quest to achieve better life. The desire for better life motivated the move from their home country and it is the hope to achieve better life that keeps them in the host country. From the stories of my respondents, better life was used to refer to a host of positive conditions, and material acquisitions of life both from a personal and country perspectives. Generally, their idea of better life contrast the societal conception of basic welfare for citizens both as the goal of social net and as the motivation for hope amongst vulnerable citizens. But most importantly, their notion of seeking for better life best reflect their socio-political condition and enduring determination to persevere in the face of entrenched constraints and deplorable conditions.

According to Ghassan (Hage, 2003) societies are the mechanisms for distributing hope through its varied mechanism of national identification and its capitalist ability to maintain citizens’ experience of the possibility of upward social mobility. In this sense, Ghassan’s location of the source of hope lies on the state, so that, citizen’s experiences of hope are relevantly linked to the perceived stability or viability of their source, which is the state. If the state is perceived to be weak or threatened, paranoia or fear is experienced instead of hope, and the state is perceived to be strong as much as it can concretize the citizen’s vision of their future in their experience of the present. This understanding of the patriarchal state, ties the hope of the South Africa poor to the South Africa state through the relationship of citizenship and nation-state (Hage, 2003).

In contrast to citizens, the unwanted migrants exist between two governments, they are neither citizens nor are they wanted migrants – living in a socio-political void. This significantly alters their access or claims to available formal support in their host society. Thus they are not recipient of societal distribution of hope, nor is their hope tied to the nation-state. For the citizens that have their hope secured to their nation-state, macro-economic challenges and failure will trigger spiraling tensions and uncertainties in them (Micklethwait & Wooldridge, 2014). When citizens’ experiences of poverty or inequality worsens, the nation-state is obliged to intervene and actively seek to ameliorate the impact on the ordinary citizens (Polanyi, 2001). One means of ameliorating poverty, insecurities and uncertainties amongst its legal members is through social programs that act as social net for vulnerable and poor citizens and protect them from the unpleasant consequences of capitalism (Battle & Torjman, 1995; Kangas & Palme, 2000).

In this understanding, the availability and guarantee of social net within a nation-state, will be directly linked to the hope of its citizens. Howbeit, social net is provided to guarantee basic social welfare of the citizens; by basic, it means that minimum welfare is calculated, evaluated and defined by the nation-state as providers of the social net. In turn, such welfare provision is expected to define the citizens’ conception of basic needs for wellbeing. In the social policy discuss this conception of social welfare ‘package’ is often referred to as the objective approach, based on arguments that social policy needs concrete facts (Johansson, 2002). In this sense, a threshold is set by the basic social welfare for what is due to a vulnerable and poor citizen, using objective social indicators that informs social policy. So, in a position of vulnerability and poverty, the citizens will know what to expect and how to get it, and policy makers are guided by objectively defined and clear indicators. In other words, social welfare as social net will set a limit socio-economically, to how low a citizen will fall, but the caveat, is that it may also act as a barrier to how high a vulnerable and poor citizen will aspire.

The hope of my respondents in their unique socio-political position as unwanted migrants presents two important challenges to the above discussion. Foremost, the participants in this study were able to preserve hope irrespective of their severed socio-political relationship with any nation-state or society and the consequent hardship they face. This challenges the notion of society as the source of individual hope, as through tactics my respondents are sustaining their hope for a better future. Secondly, notwithstanding the reality of their harsh socio-economic situation characterized by vulnerability and uncertainty, my respondents were able to keep their aspirations high and their motivation ongoing, shattering any overt or covert social limitations to their aspirations. The puzzle of their feat in being able to keep hope in conditions that ordinarily will be categorized as hopeless, and able to stir and sustain their motivation under extreme constraint, is explicated with the theory of resilience.

Resilience is provoked in the presence of adversity or in other words, from the experience of harmful and unacceptable conditions. In the absence of a coping mechanisms or means, resilience theory argues that individuals will respond by drawing on resources from various spheres in the bid to overcome the harmful and unacceptable conditions (Payne, 2011), (Folke, et al, 2002). This will imply that resilience is related to the availability or not, of resources that can contribute to improving the unacceptable conditions. For instance, if an economically secured individual should experience difficult financial situation, he or she will have several options through which the situation will be amended. In the case of a poor citizen in a country with social net, the difficult financial situation will be ameliorated by the provisions of the social net or the presence of an social agent that have the responsibility to ameliorate the difficult situation. In both cases, the amelioration has been institutionally provided and importantly, secured. However, in the case of unwanted migrants, faced with harsh conditions, options are not institutionally provided or guaranteed, creating persistent uncertainty, but giving the migrants the freedom to seek for options without any form of boundaries or guards. Interestingly, my data indicates that without any form of boundaries, my respondents creatively developed different coping means (tactically), but also, they expressed very tall aspirations and future plans. The creativity and scope of their practice of resilience commensurate with their aspirations and expectations.

My respondents did not remain as unwanted migrants in South Africa because they are seeking for basic welfare – which will translate to basic living income as guaranteed by social welfare support. Or in other words, they did not remain in South Africa just so that they can afford their basic daily meal, housing or clothing. Rather, they persevere in the South African context because they aspire to own their own successful electronic business, start a construction company at home country, start international businesses, etc. as examples. In essence, my respondents will not be satisfied with the provision of social net, they are seeking better life – by their stories, a broader, stronger and more subjective acquisition of economic and social resources. Resilience is thus the channeling of my respondents’s hope, tactics and perseverance towards better life as their goal.

This theorization is relevant in understanding the fragility of resilience as a product of adversity. It implies that if the unwanted migrants condition is ‘improved’ by providing for example, access to social provision by their host society, their behavior can be expected to change. However, it is not only their tactical practices (with special focus on extra-legal practices) that will be expected to change, but also their aspirations and motivation for personal achievement may turn downwards, stagnate or disappear. This introduces the puzzle if there can be resilience without adversity? Although this is an arguable philosophical and theoretical puzzle, my data strongly linked my participants’ perception of their adversity to their perseverance. Nevertheless, my data also strongly linked the respondents’ aspirations and motivation for self-improvement to their perception of adversity. It is also important to highlight again that the unwanted migrants’ everyday practice as tactics as theorized by Michel (ibid), are produced by the constraints of migration control. This likewise suggests that if the constraints are removed or amended, then tactics will be expected to change. It is thus problematic for a study like this that has examined tactics as agency to conclude with arguments for changes to the constraints that has created the harsh situation for the migrants. Yet, this study proposed to examine migration control from the perspective of the unwanted migrants, hence, it is important at this point to theoretically examine the relationship between the migrants’ everyday tactics and migration control. Such examination, logically, may suggests possibilities for mutually beneficial relationship between the unwanted migrants and agents of migration control.

8.1                 Controlling Tactics: A Bane of Migration Control

Migration control regulates the number and categories of migrants that are given access into the host country. Globally, the rights of a sovereign state to select those that are admitted into its territory is recognized and often emphasized by receiving countries in defending migration control practices that could be termed arbitrary or injustice. Armed with such rights and economic and political power, several governments have developed extreme and extensive practices and policies in their attempts to regulate migration flow in state interests. Yet, the very presence of irregular migrants in receiving countries attests to a gap between the objectives and goals of migration control and the outcome. Explanations for such gaps have more commonly focused on the challenges of control, highlighting flawed policies, structural imbalances, international constraints, imperfect implementations, etc (Wayne;Takeyuki;Philip;& Hollifield, 1992). While we have witnessed increasing extension and tightening of migration controls, the rights of emigration is strongly guarded as fundamental part of a modern and liberal society. Removed from the purview of direct controls by receiving countries, mobility from home country becomes relatively independent of the mechanisms of control and dependent on would be migrants interpretations or evaluations of controls in destination country.

Notwithstanding this dialectic positioning of rights to emigration and immigration, both processes combine to form the migration system and produces policy gap as one of the effects of the inherent tensions. In this vein, a unilaterally based effort to flatten the gap cannot be expected to be effective. Except, immigration control can effectively control or eliminate tactics that undermine effort and practices of control to override the gains of unwanted immigration. Attempts to control and eliminate the tactics of unwanted migrants have been effected through increasing restrictions, employing internal border controls and fortifying physical borders with technological gadgets and human agents. Paradoxically, these attempts not only failed to achieve the objectives but also created new opportunities for irregular migrations (Pâecoud & De Guchteneire, 2007). For example, increased use of professional traffickers, increased corrupt practices at the border, increased human and financial cost of immigration control. While statistical data are current proof of the ineffectiveness of a unilateral based immigration control, Michel’s (ibid) discussion of tactics also challenges success immigration control.

First and foremost, I highlighted in the discussion of my respondents’ tactics in chapter 6, that whilst immigration control is more of an administration of numbers, tactics on the other hand is subtle action – calculative, creative opportunistic and flexible. Whereas immigration control is fixated on classifying (e.g. skilled and unskilled, desirable and undesirable) and calculating (e.g. numbers of immigrants) according to administrative criteria, tactics selects fragments taken from the administrative criteria and produce new opportunities and possibilities with them. There are two implications from this point, one, because immigration control is focused on achieving its statistical administrative goals, the possibilities to represent tactical trajectories is eliminated. Thus displacing and detaching unwanted migrants tactics from the control or management of institutions. Two, because tactics is fundamentally disassociated from institutional control, immigration control is unable to capture or represent the many benefits and good works of tactics within its domain.

Secondly, Michel (ibid) was clear and forthright in his argument that tactics is an art of the weak – key words being ‘art’ and ‘weak’. As an art tactics pins its hope on creativity and what ordinarily will be referred to as inspiration, but in this case can be called bootstrapping – inventiveness from available resources. Therefore, tactics does not have the pressure, international or local, of rationality or conformity to any standardize act. Similarly, the tactics employed by unwanted migrants to circumvent migration control stipulations are not subjected to international or national pressure (social or political) to conform to certain agreed standard or practices. There are no structural relations or formal procedures to the execution of tactics. As an adversary, Michel (ibid) emphasized, tactics is formidable, protean, and persistent, tirelessly perverting the system of domination. In contrast, strategies of control are set in formal laws and regulations and bureaucratic processes that are monitored by local and international standardization and are also less responsive. More so, tactics is as weak as strategy is as strong. Indeed the strategies of immigration control are institutionally developed, highly funded and with access to huge material and military resources. Yet, Michel (ibid) argued that the strength of strategy becomes its weakness in the face of tactical adversary; indeed, “Power is bound by its very visibility” (de Certeau, 1984, s. 37). In immigration control, such boundary becomes not just limitations in terms of possible actions, but also nodes of contestations, politicizations, scrutiny and change. To mention a few; growing number of experts, NGOs, and civil society that specializes on migrants’ rights, support and advocacy, energized advocacy for human rights approach to migration, growing body of academic discourse on illegal or irregular migrations, international scrutiny and backlash on xenophobic and anti-immigrant politicking (Klotz, 2013; Peberdy, 2009; Jara & Peberdy, 2009).   Indeed, as governments out of desperation strengthen means of control, they can possibly face political and civil criticisms and recoil, as if ‘defeated by its own success’ (de Certeau, 1984, s. 40).

Contrarily, “trickery (defined as a form of deftness) is possible for the weak and often it is his only possibility…” (de Certeau, 1984, s. 37), creating mutability and invisibility that though bears the figure of a cloak of freedom, yet still experiences the constraints of structural and institutional strategies to ever be able to escape totally from it. Thus, while the ‘art’ of tactics facilitates the freedom to ‘work the system’ and make do, the agents weak position bounds and restrains. Effectively, tactics is not emancipatory but suppressive to the potentials of its agents within the order of domination. This reiterates Michel’s argument that tactic “insinuates itself into the other’s place…without taking it over…whatever it wins it does not keep… the weak must continually turn to their own ends…” (de Certeau, s. xix). Certainly, the unwanted migrant and the host government remain lock in lose-lose relationship within the constraints of immigration control on both parties.

8.2                 Can Immigration Control Cooperate with Tactics?

Rather than controlling tactic, is it possible for immigration control to cooperate with tactics? That is rather than control immigration, can the nation-state cooperate with unwanted migrants? This question is relevant to this study by its applied relevance to the everyday experiences of my research participants. Rather than being locked in lose – lose relationship, can there be cooperation between unwanted migrants and government in South Africa. South Africa specifically, face multiple challenges with regards to effectively control immigration from other African countries. These challenges are also commiserate with challenges that other African countries face in their attempt to stem or effectively manage immigration from other African countries. The reason for what can be term regional challenge cannot be unrelated to the porosity of national borders, persisting poverty, inequality and socio-political unrest in some parts of Sub-Saharan Africa and increased border fortification and human cost of migrating to the developed North (e.g. Europe) (Spel, 2014). Also importantly, is a migration control context that is characterized by inconsistent, inadequate and poorly coordinated immigration laws, regulations and administration that easily create barriers (administrative or personal) to visa renewal, acquisition or approval. Reviewing the locked relationship between unwanted migrants and government, several researchers (Everatt, 2011; Landau;Segatti;& Freemantle, 2013; Segatti, 2011a) have argued for possible means to improve the negative outcome of South Africa immigration context specifically and the irregular migration context globally.

Summarily, such calls have focused on three important hypotheses: Firstly, the call has been for immigration policy to be more responsive to the demographics of the migration context, with emphasis on analytical data. Loren, Aurelia and Iriann (Landau;Segatti;& Freemantle, 2013) emphasized this point in their contribution to the most recent State of the Nation report of South Africa (Sparg, et al, 2013), by arguing that “effective policy responses demand an accurate understanding of current conditions and dynamics” (pg. 366). Niel (Roux, 2009) also emphasized the relevance of demographic information to improving South Africa’s immigration context. However, while the South Africa migration control context will benefit immensely from improved statistical information, it will still be direly challenged in the context of curtailing unwanted migrants tactics of immigration. Michel argued “statistics can tell us virtually nothing…” (de Certeau, 1984, s. 34); he expatiated, statistics “is satisfied in classifying, calculating and tabulating units”, and so it is unable to capture the “surreptitious and guileful movement”, the tricks and fluidity of tactics. From this understanding, statistics only captures what is used, which is based on the agreed formal code that is imposed on everyone. But, as discussed in chapter 6, statistics cannot capture the ways of using, or the type of using that has not been codified formally, and it is as diverse as the individuals using it. For example, in the case of this study, statistics can capture number of those registered as asylum seekers or visitors for tourism or business visit, but cannot capture the guileful activities of the migrant or the places visited. In this vein, while demographics will go a long way in furnishing government with timely and relevant information for control purposes, it cannot curb the unwanted migrants tactics as long as control (as a means of domination, restraint and constraint) remains its goal and objective.

Secondly, focusing on the huge human cost of global irregular migration, several authors have argued for the benefits of migration without borders (MWB). Antoine and Paul (Pâecoud & De Guchteneire, 2007) have argued “in a globalized world in which migratory flows seem to elude the attempts of states to regulate such movements, the MWB scenario challenges conventional views on migration” (ss. 1). They emphasize that with fully active emigration rights, there is the necessity of considering a more comprehensive right to mobility. Emphasizing the ineffectiveness of immigration control, several other authors have questioned the militarization of immigration control, arguing that such sophisticated tools and machinery being used for immigration control, have traditionally been reserved for armed conflicts and wars not for hapless and vulnerable migrants (Nevins, 2002; Schuster, 2004). More so, there is also huge financial cost for the highly sophisticated machineries and various other structural controls utilized to manage borders (Martin, 2003). These arguments for open borders suggest that it makes economic and humanitarian sense to strive for a policy of migration without borders.

However, Bimal Ghosh (2007) argued that migration without borders “distributional impacts as well as its negative and positive externalities are likely to widen wage and income disparities both within and between rich and poor nations and generate domestic and international tension”. Ghosh identified security concerns, cost of integration and labour irregularities as some of the challenges that weakens the migration without border argument. In essence then, while the MWB scenario is right in identifying free emigration as a contributing factor to the uncontrollable migrant flow being experienced globally, the suggestion to completely abolish controls of immigration raises other concerns that will eventually eclipse its supposed gains. From my data, my participants were not overly concerned about the opportunities to enter South Africa, they were very much concerned about the freedom to conduct their business and services without victimization and harassment. They also expressed concern for access to employment opportunities in cases where they meet the skill requirements. Thus, in the South African context, Open Borders will do little to improve the experience of the unwanted migrants or the nation-state.

Thirdly, capitalizing on the opportunities and willingness for governmental cooperation, Ghosh (2007) argued that instead of immigration control, migration management should be the goal of governments. He defined migration management as “the establishment of a regime that is capable of ensuring that movement of people becomes more orderly, predictable and productive…” (s. 107). Ghosh, identifies three conditions as the basis for migration management, which he listed as: ‘labour abundant sending countries should take all necessary measures to reduce the pressure for disorderly and unwanted migration; Sending and Receiving countries should agree to work jointly and adhere to a set of specific guidelines of norms to ensure coherence of policies and action; the arrangement must be comprehensive to embrace all types of migratory flows’. The key ingredients of migration management thus are, orderliness, predictability and manageability, these also becomes its purported advantages over migration control and migration without borders. Obviously, there are some identifiable challenges with the migration management approach as suggested by Ghosh. From a tactics approach, government of ‘sending countries’ are not responsible for the mobility decision and choices of its citizens, nor are they ‘sending’ the migrants. In this sense, migration management impliedly is advocating that controls for immigration should be extended to emigration. In effect, this creates a situation of double human, financial and any other cost, presently being associated with the control of immigration. Tactics is a guileful ruse, it plays on and with the terrain imposed on it, and it is borne of unwanted and restrictive imposition. So increasing controls cannot eliminate tactics, rather tactics is transformed and renewed with alacrity and fluidity.

However, the key to fostering cooperation between the nation-state and unwanted migrant can rest with exploring the opportunities for profitability of the immigration of unwanted migrants. This is not as far fetch as it sounds, because my data shows that the unwanted migrants in South Africa are active in micro entrepreneurship through trade and services; this implies income which can be relatively taxed as business that can be supported for growth to the benefit of the host society. Furthermore, the emphasis on professional skills for immigration is becoming redundant to the South African economy with extremely high unemployment rate, rather emphasis can shift to creating opportunities for micro entrepreneurship and welcoming trade and services as means of spurring growth from below. From the close examination of the survival of my respondents in South Africa, there is indication of opportunities to explore a more mutually beneficial relationship between the nation-state and the unwanted migrants.

9. CONCLUDING REMARKS

Drawing on resilience theory I identify three conceptual themes, which are hope, tactics and survival, to analyze my data. I also utilized Michel’s (ibid) conceptual definition of tactics to examine the dynamic interaction between my respondents’ practice of survival and regulations of migration control. The research findings showed hope as relevant for unwanted migrants continued presence in the harsh socio-economic migration context. The study found that my respondents have high aspirations and expectations and the determination to pursue their expectations irrespective of the harsh migration context. The study highlighted the relevance of religious faith and participation to the sustenance of my respondents’ hope. The data showed that my respondents’ hope is quite active and does not rely on mere belief or positive affirmations, rather their hope is linked to their belief in themselves, their religious faith and the available economic resources in South Africa.

Furthermore, the study found that with hope, my respondents take practical steps to circumvent the social, economic and political constraints that could disrupt the pursuit of their aspirations. Utilizing Michel’s (ibid) conception of everyday practice as tactics, the study showed that it is the excessive constraints in the migration control context that spurs and provokes the generation of practices that undermine the stated objectives of migration control. The study thus highlighted tactics as the unintended consequences of harsh restrictions and constraints in South Africa’s immigration policy. In the discussion of my interviewees’ tactics, my findings emphasized that the practices that undermine the success of migration control are persistent, formidable and creative in ferreting new ways of perverting systems of migration management. The study showed that my respondents actively and effectively utilize their tactics for survival in their bid to achieve better life. Findings on survival indicates that the participants have nuanced experiences of the bottlenecks and constraints that characterized South Africa’s migration context. At times the constraints act as props for their tactical agency and at other times it restricts and deter the effectiveness of their tactics. In this variation of experiences, the respondents stressed the importance of determination, perseverance and opportunities as they work towards the achievement of their aspirations. The study thus call attention to the respondents determination and perseverance in waiting for and utilizing opportunities as survival; from my respondents perspective, moving back to home country is failed survival. So survival is given prominence to as the interaction and result of the participants hope and tactics.

In the examination of the data, resilience theory drew attention to some important highlights of the data. One of the important merits of resilience theory in this study is that it highlighted my participants’ perseverance within the harsh migration context of South Africa, as a strong display of individual agency for better life – A life with objective and subjective factors and experiences of wellbeing. As the migrants strengthens and justify their hope with religious affirmations, they also take advantage of identified opportunities and navigate the daily constraints with tactics to enable them continue the pursuit of their aspirations. In this sense, I begin to understand the migrants’ resilience as the function of different processes working together to create the will and means to remain in a very harsh context. Resilience as a process indicates possibilities for setbacks and opportunities for successes. Each experience, successes and setbacks counts as relevant and contributes to keep the migrant surviving on the street. The migrants hope, tactics and determination to navigate the constraints and pursue success work together in the life of the migrants. Their continued presence in their extreme context is thus enabled by drive facilitated by hope, self-preservation developed through tactics and motivation expressed through survival.

The resilience approach also highlighted my respondents hope as a rich and positive experience of their harsh situations, thus emphasizing hope as active and not naïve. More so, the resilience approach called attention to the broader macroeconomic conditions in the region as an important part of the migration context. Situating my respondents’ decisions and choices beyond individual poverty or needs. Also, utilizing lifestory interview for data collection contributed immensely to this study. It revealed my respondents preoccupation with economic activities as the means to their aspirations and not seeking for social or cash support from the government. The study highlighted that all the respondents wanted is the opportunity to keep trading and providing paid services. My participants’ emphasis on looking for better life, is a challenge to the concept of social welfare and an opportunity for further investigation for innovative social policy in Sub-Saharan region.

From the above findings and highlights, it is reasonable to conclude that South Africa’s focus on restriction and exclusion as means to manage the migration of poor African migrants cannot lead to beneficial migration outcomes for South Africa. I make this conclusion firstly because the economic contribution and potentials of the poor African migrant through informal trade and services cannot be recognized or developed by focus on restrictions and exclusions. For example, facilitation of conducive entrepreneurial environment for migrants to grow their businesses. Secondly, focus on extreme control of access and prevention of stay in South Africa unintentionally fosters illegality, corruption and exploitations (between agents of migration control and unwanted migrants desperate for permits) that compromises the goals of migration control and adversely affect security, social cohesion and cooperation within the community. Thirdly, emphasis on restrictions and exclusions only spurs the multiplication and diversification of unwanted migrants tactics and determination, which further complicates and deteriorates the migration situation. This conclusion suggests that changes to the practice and policies of migration management is necessary to create and facilitate beneficial migration experience for South Africa and the migrants.

Finally, the findings from this study raised some questions that will be interesting for further study within South Africa and the Sub-Saharan Africa region. The first question is about the age and the unwanted migrant conception of hope and survival, and his or her practice of tactics. The puzzle for me is if the older the migrant, the stronger or weaker the hope, perseverance and practices? Also, this could be linked to the life course of the migrants and how their concept of survival changes or is affected by their life stages. Certainly, this will lead to the second puzzle of how gender in relation to life course and age will affect the unwanted migrants hope, tactics and conception of survival. Thirdly for me are questions on uncertainty, resilience and social intervention? How does/Does social intervention affect the tactical agency of the migrant? This suggests a comparative study of migrants with access to social support (for example, refugees) and migrants without access to such support. It could be comparative study between migrants in two different countries or within the same country but with different access. Such studies will have important policy and practice implication and will contribute to the ongoing discourses of human development and innovative social policy in Sub-Saharan Africa.

9.1                Limitations of study

As a qualitative study, the generalizability of my findings is one of the main limitations. Denise and Bernadette, (Polit & Hungler, 1991, s. 645), defined generalizability as the “degree to which the findings can be generalized from the study sample to the entire population”. There were nine participants in this study, they were all economically active in the informal economy, eight out of the nine participants had asylum seekers permit and together they came from seven African countries (Nigeria, Cameroun, Ivory Coast, Togo, Malawi, Ethiopia and Zimbabwe). With the limited number of the participants, the research was not designed to produce results that predict the behavior of a wide classification of migrants. However, because the inquiry generated detailed and robust data on the practical life experiences and expectations of the participants, the findings forms a good basis for future focused hypothesis studies to experimentally verify and expand my conclusions.

Furthermore, time and budget constraints acted as limitations to this study. The study examined migrants’ survival experience as a process of how things got to where they are and on the move to where the migrants desired. This approach would have greatly benefitted from a longitudinal approach that tracks and interview same migrants over a period of time in order to capture the changes that transpires in their lives. However, as a doctoral study, with strict budget and time constraints, I could not afford to take the longitudinal approach to the study. Nevertheless, by adopting a lifestory methodology (Riessman, 2008), I attempted to capture the process of migrants’ survival as narratives. By giving the individuals the power to discuss their lives and tell their story, I was able to capture the process of change until the time of the interview and the plans and expectations for the future.

I only had a one interview session with each participant because time was a huge constraint for our interviewees. However, I exchanged mobile phone numbers with each participant in the understanding that I can call them any time for new questions or clarification of previous statements. For example, months after the fieldwork, one of the participants called to inform me that he is leaving South Africa, back to his home country. To the migrants, time definitely means money, as time spent on the interview sessions means time away from their street trading. Although I made up for this, by having interviews during non-trading hours (e.g. early Sunday mornings or late evenings after trade), yet I had to stick to one interview session per participants because such hours were their only limited leisure time. Additionally, time constraint created difficulties in achieving gender balance with the selection of participants for this study. Female migrants informed me that their non-trading hours were strictly for household chores and so they were unable to participate in the study. Only two females participated in the study, possibly creating a gender bias in my findings.

Finally, typical to qualitative studies are criticisms targeting reliability and validity of findings. Such criticisms often queries whether findings accurately reflect the data, including the researcher’s and methodology biases that may distort findings (Smith & Noble, 2014; Rolfe, 2006). There are challenges in this study that duly test the validity and reliability of the data. For instance, queries on the truth value of the narratives or integrity of the participants. Nevertheless, these challenges were understood from the conception of this study, and so I duly took methodological steps to counter the challenges and lay bare the intricacies of my data collection and analysis processes. Yvonna and Egon (Lincoln & Guba, 1985) argues that a researcher can alternatively meet the academic demand for validity and reliability by demonstrating methodological rigour through accounting for truth value, consistency, neutrality and applicability. I took deliberate and concrete steps to acknowledge the complexities of the narrative method that I utilize for data collection and analysis. In chapter four of this thesis, I recognize the multiple realities that exist through detailed discussion of the subjective meaning making processes that informs the lifestory interview. I also presented basic information on the background of my participants to give the reader a view to the ‘person’ behind the quotations and perspectives that forms the data for this study. Also, I utilized direct quotes from my data and incorporate the ‘stories’ given by participants into the analysis to accurately represent their views. Similarly, in chapter one and four of this thesis, I presented my personal experiences, ontological and epistemological position and perspective that informed the ‘turn’ of discussion of the findings of this study. In chapter one, I clearly presented how my personal experience led to the conception of this study and in chapter four I focused on presenting the ontological positioning of the discussion in this thesis and highlighted the epistemological-trail (including the challenges from the temporality of my participants place) that led to the analysis and discussion of the data. Through these approaches this study accounts for validity and reliability.

Content PhD manuscript

WHEN THE SOCIAL NET IS UNPLUGGED: A study of poor African migrants on the street of Johannesburg.

Christal O. Spel

Table of Contents

SECTION ONE: SETTING THE THESIS. 4

1. INTRODUCTION.. 4

1.1        Definition of concepts. 11

1.2        Thesis Outline. 13

2. BACKGROUND.. 15

2.1        Historical Context of African Migration in Africa. 15

2.2        Apartheid and African Migration to South Africa. 18

2.3        Post-apartheid African Migration to Johannesburg, South Africa. 22

2.4        Theoretical underpinning. 30

2.5        Data Collection Site- Hillbrow and Yeoville. 33

2.6        Research Aims and Objectives. 36

3. THEORETICAL REVIEW AND FRAMEWORK.. 38

3.1        A Livelihood Approach to Poor Migrants Survival 38

3.2        An Integration Approach to Poor Migrants’ Survival 40

3.3        Alternative Theoretical Approach: Resilience theory. 42

3.3.1         Modes of Survival: Unwanted migrants as the new ‘transgressive’ citizens. 42

3.2.2         Modes of Survival: Survival in context. 45

3.2.3         Modes of Resilience: Characterizing Resilience. 48

3.2.4         Modes of Resilience: Locating Resilience. 53

3.3        Operationalizing Resilience. 54

4. METHODOLOGY AND DATA PRESENTATION.. 56

4.1        The Narrative Approach: Lifestory Interview.. 58

4.2.       Implementing the narrative method: Searching and Collecting Lifestories. 61

4.2.1         The Interview Room: Creating the Self We Want Others to See. 64

4.2.2         The Researcher as Part of the Story. 65

4.3        Ethnography. 68

4.4        Empathy, Fear and Reflections on the Field. 69

4.5        Revisiting the Field: Temporality and the Researcher. 70

4.6        Meet the Interviewees. 72

4.7        Ethical Issues: Considerations and Challenges. 79

SECTION TWO: FINDINGS AND ANALYSIS. 82

5. HOPE.. 84

5.1        Issues of Uncertainty. 86

5.2        Resilience in Hope. 90

5.3        Hope in Economic Activities. 92

5.4        Hope Brokers: Religion and Pastors. 94

6. 6. TACTICS. 101

6.1        Tactics in Practice. 105

6.1.1         State: Purpose of Visit? Migrant: Looking for Better Life. 105

6.1.2         State: Duration of Stay (Days, Weeks or Months): Migrant: Until I Locate the Better in Life  109

6.1.3         State: Wishing to Work for the Republic? Yes or No: Migrant: Making Do. 111

6.2        Relevance of Time and ‘Waiting’ to Tactics. 113

7. SURVIVAL.. 118

7.1        Migration Context as Adversity. 118

7.1.1         Politics as the ‘Making’ of Unwanted Migrants’ Adversity. 118

7.1.2         Migrants Perception of Adversity. 122

7.2        Border Crossing as Survival 125

7.3        Seeking Asylum as Survival 129

7.4        Survival as Living for the Future. 132

7.5        Survival on the Streets of Johannesburg. 134

SECTION THREE: DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION.. 136

8. Re-Imagining Social Net: From Wellbeing to Better Life. 137

8.1        Controlling Tactics: A Bane of Migration Control 140

8.2        Can Immigration Control Cooperate with Tactics?. 142

9. CONCLUDING REMARKS. 145

9.1        Limitations of study. 148

REFERENCES. 151

Final stage of doctoral pursuit

Over a month ago I submitted the manuscript of my dissertation and presently I am waiting for my external reviewers’ comments. Suddenly graduation is so close, it is exciting and motivating! What more, I already know the next step, it is a continuation of my research, though the institution where it will be carried out is still unclear, but I have two amazing mentors that are strongly supporting me. For now, I will post the content page (Content PhD manuscript ) and last chapters of the manuscript (Discussion and Conclusion, PhD manuscript ), to give you a brief insight into what has kept me busy for the past year and what this PhD thesis is all about. Mind you, at this stage it is still a working draft, so do not quote and pardon the typos or grammatical errors. You can leave questions or comments here or email your questions to me (ogmudio@gmail.com).

Introducing Miyere’s mission- For those committed to overthrowing borders, starting from within.

Few days ago, while participating in the just concluded 6th World Social Forum on Migration in Johannesburg, South Africa, I came across an exhibition of posters, Pictures and barb wires arranged in a semi- circular shape on the floor… I was intrigued, and moved closer to examine the content of the exhibition – this was how I was introduced to ‘The Diary of a journey by a native soul in Africa, on Foot’. Today, I introduce Miyere and the mission, which Howard Drake, a spoke person for the mission summarized as “The Ultimate Walk for Humanity is supported and strengthened by those who are committed to taking responsibility for themselves, those committed to overthrowing the borders that exist within themselves – indeed, I don’t think they exist anywhere else but in 7 billion hearts and minds…”

Bhui, 2013, argued that it is the scope of the human experience at the centre of migration that makes it so important. While it is common to engage with such experience from a distance as the other, the migration discourse is personalised and inclusive of all non-migrants (those that consider themselves as non-migrants or legal migrants and so consider themselves excluded from the migrants experiences discourse) when borders is used symbolically to refer to boundaries within the hearts and minds rather than a geopolitical position.

For Miyere and his mission, the discourse on open borders should start with a discussion on opening our minds and hearts – a mental and spiritual emancipation. This echoes my argument that beyond getting the right policies, the deplorable conditions of unwanted migrants is emblematic of the abject condition of our humanity – socially and individually.

You are invited to take the walk and check out Miyere’s page and possibly order his book when it is published and share his message with as many as you can. Wishing you a good walk!

Below is a link to a page that will take you to resources regarding Miyere and the mission.

‘Walking is not just about leaving footprints, it is about journey. And journey is a story.
These creative energies invite us to step out into vulnerability, the unknown, while being supported by belief, trust, and a commitment to whatever destination will greet our arrival.
Both become a bridge. Communication. Allowing us to cross things that separate. Understanding. Towards meeting with unknown worlds and experiences. Connection. To listen, to share, to know’

https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/105815576834582366322/105815576834582366322/posts

Poor African Migrants on the Streets of Johannesburg: What can policy (un)do?

The tug of war between the South African Government and African migrants in Johannesburg over immigration control is not benefiting any of the parties. The South African government cannot be said to be winning this war because of the increasing presence of the migrants, and the country’s rapidly deploring international human rights image from extraordinary increases in deportations and uncontained xenophobic violence. The migrants are not finding it any easier; changing migration regulations demands new tactics for survival, associated increase in the financial and social cost of survival and escalating poverty, risk and vulnerability. In a context of post-apartheid promises of ‘good life’ for the newly enfranchised citizens and the debilitating effect of deploring macroeconomics conditions, migrants are easily identified as the reason for socio-economic ills.

Policy wise the government is shy of making concrete shift from the apartheid era’s restrictive and security centered approach to migration legislation and practices. This has contributed to the widespread anti-immigrant sentiments with insistent human rights abuses and violence against poor migrants of African descent in South Africa. Despite several attempts by the Department of Home Affairs to initiate policy reforms over the years, the changes have failed to concretely address issues underpinning the prevalent xenophobic violence and human rights abuses, but rather strengthened conditions of control and access to South Africa. Indeed, the most recent immigration policy reform of May, 2014, tightened the few opportunities for access and stay in South Africa despite great expectations for more inclusive and human right change.

WHAT ARE MIGRANTS EXPERIENCES?
In the above migration context, it is the experiences of the migrants that thrust the urgent need for sweeping policy reform into the spotlight. The experiences of the migrants can highlight the form of the modifications needed to achieve a mutually beneficial migration experience for the host and migrants. In my study of poor Africa migrants in Johannesburg, South Africa, I identified three critical aspects of migrants’ experiences in South Africa that have important implications for migration management in South Africa.

Firstly, majority of my interviewees reported that they have had their asylum seeker permits for years; the longest being 10years. They reported that some of their friends have lived with asylum seeker permits in South Africa for over 10years. Permits are often renewed twice a year, but it is easier to renew if you know and follow the informal channels. This may require a certain fee to be put between the pages of the expired permit and handed over to the designated officer or paid to an informal agent to facilitate the processing. According to one of my interviewees, it is a smooth and convenient process and the fee is affordable from the earnings of his street trade. He has thus been able to sustain the renewal of his asylum permit for the past 3years and ply his street trade. My interviewees all noted that migration control officers and the migrants are active initiators of this informal process of permit renewals. The migrants and the migration control officers can be said to have a symbiotic relationship – the officers enrich themselves while the migrants acquire the permits to remain in South Africa. These prevalent experiences suggest that the more excessive the control of access and restrictions for stay in South Africa, the greater the need for the symbiotic relationship between the officers and the migrants.

Secondly, my interviewees strongly expressed fear for their lives. Horrendous experiences includes: being part of a crowd that watched a Zimbabwean migrant bleed to death without attempt to help – it took over 45mins for the migrant to give up the ghost. When a passing police vehicle was stopped and the officers were asked to offer assistance, they reportedly replied “ai, he is a Nigerian” and drove off. In another case, a female migrant told of how she and her unborn baby were almost killed by nurses that withheld basic medical services and care for her during delivery of her child because she is a foreigner. One of the nurses told her at the peak of her labor “am not going to be kind to you… I will make the student doctors to use you to do experiment… I will deal with you”. She also reported skipping immunization for her children because of derogatory treatment from South African nurses. In her words “…they will be hitting you, put your child in order (they will scream)… they will be so harsh, especially when you are a foreigner…” Similarly, a male migrant reported “our brothers (other migrants) do not go to the hospital, because if you go there, and they admit you, you will not come out alive”. Allegedly, the nurses compromise the quality of the services offered in ways that deliberately jeopardizes the migrants’ life. Many of them have died, because they will not go to the hospital, until it is too late. I personally witnessed a similar incidence that led to the death of a young migrant man from what one can only call fever in the absence of autopsy.

Thirdly, my interviewees expressed their main concern as ‘not having the freedom to carry on trading´. Although the migrants have the asylum seekers permit that allows them to seek employment, they ultimately end up being unemployed and thus starting their own small or micro business becomes the main alternative. One interviewee noted “South African government issued people free movement, it wasn’t like that, it is not all places you go that you are free to move to work. They don’t issue out job to foreigners, they don’t do that… This asylum of a thing they gave people, inside it is written permitted to work and study, but you don’t get job…” Some of my interviewees started their street trade with as little as 50Rand (5Euro) and they feed, clothe and house themselves with proceeds from the trade. Through a largely thrifty lifestyle, majority of them are setting aside little sums as savings for future plans like migrating to another country or immediate plans like catering for family members. For example, an interviewee said “…only when I wake up, I come to my place to sell, in the night go back home again, it is finished…” Another interviewee bought himself a clipper and rented a sitting space in a hair cutting salon where he started by paying 250Rand per week (presently, 400Rand per week) from the proceeds. However, street trading is a highly contentious issue in Johannesburg, South Africa. According to my interviewee “…we are not allowed to sell, we just force ourselves to do it…”

WHAT HAS POLICY GOT TO DO WITH IT
With excessive focus on attracting highly skilled migrants from mainly developed countries, South Africa immigration policy dismally fails to recognize and accept the contributions of informal trading and micro businesses of its teeming poor and unemployed migrants. Thus rather than facilitating a conducive entrepreneurial climate for the migrants to grow their businesses, immigration policy is used to largely jeopardize migrants’ security and compound their risks. More so, the government’s focus on extreme control of access and prevention of stay in South Africa unintentionally fosters illegality, corruption and exploitations that adversely affect social cohesion and cooperation within the community. Additionally, draconian uses of immigration policy as hegemonic instrument of migrant control underestimates or ignore the active and tactical agency of the migrants. The poor migrants’ tactical survival skills have to some extent been shown to effectively surmount and negotiate the obstacles and regulations of migration control.
Furthermore, the notion that immigration policy is ‘by the government, for the migrants’ is a misconception that leaves the nodes of interaction between the migrants and ordinary citizens uncontrolled. This results in increasing dis-humanization, exploitation and abuse of the migrants by the citizens. In this respect, South Africa immigration policy is further challenged in fostering integration and cooperation between the migrants and its citizens. Generally, the unintended consequence of the immigration policy becomes counterproductive to the broader goals of immigration management.

HOW CAN POLICY UNDO THE TANGLE
Policy can undo the present migration tangle in South Africa if the government takes a marketing, rather than militaristic and hegemonic approach to its immigration policy. If migration is to profit the host country and the migrants then it is time to take a sound business approach to it. This calls for a radical and innovative approach to migration management. Conceptually, it demands a shift in the ideology that governs migration control from logic of prevention and security to one of facilitation and productivity. It departs from the conception that all migrants as humans, irrespective of formal skills, have the potential to positively contribute to the host society. It does engage its available migrant community as human resources in creating and utilizing opportunities and resources productively. The citizens are thus encouraged and educated to interact with the migrants as important resources of the country, thereby eschewing vilifications and criminalization of the migrants.

This approach can be conceptualized as an enterprise approach to immigration control. In it, South African government recognizes and treats immigration control like an enterprise, whereby the government assumes the role of an entrepreneur; citizens becomes his staff with stake holding rights and the migrants’ his clients.
Politically, this means that government needs to take interest in the migrants that are in its space with the goal to knowing and understanding their needs. That is, taking the migrants survival seriously, understanding that survival is worth any effort from the migrants and recognizing that the stakes created by immigration policies no matter how high, are worth pursuing by the migrants. In this situation, the indifferent attitude, the hype of criminalization and demonization of the migrants by the government becomes eschewed in favor of positive interest, attention and involvement. The indifferent person “does not see why they are playing…it is all the same to them… they are not making a distinction… such a person is someone who not having the principles of vision and division necessary to make distinctions, finds everything the same…” The current thrust of South Africa immigration policies cast the government in the light of the indifferent person. In this new scenario, immigration policy is utilized as a means of facilitating interaction for commonality and mutual benefits.

Furthermore, the migrants assuming the roles of clients are valued and wooed by promises of mutually beneficial interactions. For example, access to quality health care through contributory insurance and opportunity to trade through participative taxation. Thus money being paid by migrants to informally facilitate the process for official resident permits will be redirected to government in the form of tax or similar levies. More so, as clients, the migrants recognized that their responsibility is to transact in accordance with enterprise policies and their needs or desires. Trespassing the countries rules and regulations for their trade will effectively jeopardize the opportunity to practice their trade. In this case, without coercion and dehumanization, migrants are motivated to act in line with state regulations.
As in entrepreneurship, every person is a potential client; every client is a potential customer. Thus the focus of selecting migrants and accumulating inclusive benefits and rights based on capricious factors like skill and country of birth is shunned in favor of drive, hard-work and commitment to productive activities. Finally, citizens in the role of staff with stake-holding rights are very important for the profitability of the relationship between the government and migrants. Just like staff in an enterprise, they are expected to protect the rules and regulations of the company (in this case country), while treating the clients with courtesy and respect. They understand that the transactions of the clients are beneficial not only to the migrants but also to them and the enterprise – a form of dependent and mutually beneficial relationship. They are like middlemen between the migrants and the government.

For the smooth operation of the enterprise, staffs are regularly trained on client relations and company policies, while they serve relevant information to clients that can guide their interactions with the enterprise in line with company policies. In this vein, rules, regulations and institutions are strategically developed to facilitate the interactions between the citizens and the migrants. In an enterprise, this could take the form of, for example, installing a number ticketing machine to bring order to a business with unruly and impatient clients, rather than arm a policeman to bully or forcefully remove the clients. Coercion is only applied in selected cases that deserve it. This means that immigration policies should also include educating and regulating the behavior of citizens towards migrants.

In the above scenario, immigration policy assumes the primary function of facilitating an engaging and productive socio-economic context for profitable interaction between migrants and citizens.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Andersson, J. 2006. ’Informal Moves, Informal Markets’. African Affairs (The Journal of the Royal Africa Society), Vol. 105, no. 420, pg. 375-398.

Bastiat, F. ”What is Seen and What is Not Seen”. Available online at http://www.econlib.org/library/Bastiat/basEss1.html (accessed

Bourdieu, P. 2001. ’Practical Reason’. Polity Press, UK.

Coplan, D.B. 2001. A River Runs Through It: The meaning of the Lesotho – Free State border’. Africa Affairs, 100, pg. 81-116.

Coutin, S. B. 2005. ‘Contesting Ccriminality: Illegal immigration and the spatialization of legality’. Theoretical Criminology, 9:5.

De Genova, N. P. 2002. ’Migrant ”illegality” and Deportability in Everyday Life’. Annual Review of Anthropology, 31: 419-447.

Harris, N. 1995. ‘The New Untouchables: Immigration and the New World Worker’. New York, Tauris.

Klotz, A. 2013. ’Migration and National Identity in South Africa, 1860-2010’. Cambridge University Press, New York.

Landau, L. B. (ed) 2011. ‘Exorcising the Demons Within: Xenophobia, Violence and Statecraft in Contemporary South Africa’. Wits University Press, Johannesburg.

Merton, R.K. 1976. ’Sociological Ambivalence and Other Essays’. New York, Free Press.

Peberdy, S. 2009. ‘Selecting Immigrants: National Identity and South Africa’s Immigration Policies, 1910-2008’. Wits University Press, Johannesburg.

Pillay, U.; Hagg, G. and Nyamnjoy, F. with Jansen, J. (eds.). 2013. ‘State of the Nation: South Africa 2012-2013. HSRC Press, Cape Town, South Africa.

Sassen, S. 1999. ‘Guests and Aliens’. New York, New Press

Segetti, A. and Landau, B. 2011. ‘Contemporary migration to South Africa: A regional development issue’. Africa Development Forum series. Washington, DC: World Bank.

Torpey, J. 1998. ‘Coming and Going: On the State Monopolization of the Legitimate “Means of Movement”. Sociological Theory, 16: 3, November, pg. 239 – 259.

Running to conclusion

These are indeed the last Days or months – but certainly final lap to submitting first complete draft of my PhD dissertation for preliminary supervisor’s Review.

So much has happened in the last four months but the most important is that I crossed a threshold, mentally of course – I am ready for the academic World, the World of ideas, Writing and discussions or arguments depending on how you see it. I will try to capture the past four months experience in a post during the Xmas break, for I think the most important part of my race to a PhD degree happened during these months. Paradoxically, it is a part that is most difficult to capture in Words…

For now, I will post part of the conclusion/ argument of my dissertation. If you read it, please try to leave a comment – either critical or in agreement or a suggestion- as I will eventually have to defend it before a panel, so all comments are welcomed.

Wishing you a goodread of the post titled: Poor African Migrants on the Streets of Johannesburg: What can policy (un)do.

Cheers.

061014 Immigration Control – a Metaphoric Game of Football? Guest Blog by Spel

My blog post at the Nordic Africa Institute, Uppsala, Sweden

Annika Teppo, Urban Anthropology

Christal Spel is a researcher at Nordic Africa Institute’s Urban Dynamics Cluster.

The 2014 World Cup ended few months ago and one cannot forget the thrills and the chills, the winners and the whiners, the flying men and the floppers. And the drama continues with some countries suing the football administrative body (FIFA) for perceived wrongs. While enjoying the World Cup games and drama, the ‘internationalisation’ of most of the participating nations’ national teams never allowed my mind to stray far from migration. For example, Germany boasts of its Ghanaian-German Boateng and about one-third of the Dutch 2014 team was either foreign born or second generation migrants. The list of World Cup teams with migrant players is long; indeed, in contemporary football, nationality is a fluid concept and professional players with a migrant background are increasingly incorporated into national teams.

The same cannot be said for other migrants. Which Countries…

View original post 1,109 more words

Demonizing migrants

In the course of this doctoral research on migrants’ welfare in South Africa, I have come to understand that some of the strongest and most debilitating challenges, such as discrimination, oppression, injustice and yes, demonization, comes from ordinary people as host to the migrants. These negative and destructive experiences come from their partners, wives, husbands, neighbours, landlords, friends, employers, etc that are host citizens. That is, the people they share personal relationships with, often assumes such power over their lives on the basis of their migrant statutes, that in cases of any rip in relationships, the ‘power of visa/ right of stay’ is utilized as the weapon of coercion, punishment and humiliation. The psychological and social (and at times economic) devastation of reminding, exposing, emphasizing or using the vulnerability and powerlessness of the migrant by one with whom there is an established or presumed relationship of trust matters so much to the migrant- more so than experiencing the same thing from a government or institution that does not have a trust relationship with the migrant.

There is a human tragedy in the harsh and vulnerable experiences of the poor and unwanted migrants; it is the tragedy of the loss of ethical, moral and common humane values from the acts of ordinary people as host to migrants. It is indeed worrisome, how ordinary people commit unconscionable acts against other people that are migrants.

As a member of a host society, who is the migrant in your personal or social circle? How have you dealt with him/her in a conflict or vulnerable situation?