Choosing to Stay: Alternate Migration Decisions of Ghanaian Youth

Setrana, Mary Boatemaa

doi:10.17645/si.v9i1.3691

Cited by 8 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 13 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Terms such as "the age of immobility" or as "mobility bias" indicate a growing critique of the lack of analytical attention to immobility in the literature. While media narratives mainly portray a desperate desire of West African youth to reach Europe, studies have shown that half of adults in Sub-Saharan Africa do not wish to move to another country (Esipova et al, 2011;Setrana, 2021;see Schewel, 2015 for a study on Senegal).…”

Section: Changing Migration Aspirationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gendered Dynamics in West African Migration

Setrana

Kleist

2022

IMISCOE Research Series

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Much of the discourse on West African migration ignores gender perspectives or tends to focus on women ‘as’ gender while men are portrayed as, perhaps unwittingly, neutral or un-gendered. On the contrary, both men and women migrate from their homes either permanently or temporarily with or without their families. These movements impact on the traditional family system of many countries within the region and the migrants themselves. The traditional notion of the male as a ‘bread winner’ and ‘mover’ has witnessed changes; remittances transferred by both males and female migrants are used to support and improve the wellbeing of households; gender division of labour and its associated roles are re-negotiated when females migrate independently; and some female migrants are abused and exploited at destination areas. The analysis in the chapter thus indicates that there are key gendered dynamics of the impacts of migration on migrants themselves and their households. Additionally, family relations are central in the gendered dynamics of remittances, migration aspirations, and return migration. In the process, masculinity and femininity ideals are negotiated and changed, even if patriarchal norms continue to affect notions of female migration in some settings.

show abstract

Section: Changing Migration Aspirationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gendered Dynamics in West African Migration

Setrana

Kleist

2022

IMISCOE Research Series

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…This article thus contributes to transnational migration studies that overlook stayer youth's agency and their ability to cope with and shape forces structuring their lives. While structural forces constrain or encourage youth's migration aspirations, youth demonstrate agency in aspiring to move, irrespective of whether such aspirations are realised and become actual migration (Carling & Schewel, 2018;de Haas, 2021;Setrana, 2021). Literature on stayer youth's aspirations has mainly emphasised that youth aspire to migrate because their parents reside abroad.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Aspiring While Waiting: Temporality and Pacing of Ghanaian Stayer Youth’s Migration Aspirations

Osei

Mazzucato

Haagsman

2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Many youth in Global South countries, whose parents have migrated abroad while they have stayed, i.e., “stayer youth,” also aspire to migrate. While the current literature depicts stayer youth as “waiting” to emigrate, connoting passivity, recent critical youth studies suggest the importance of centring young people’s agency when focusing on their aspirations and experiences. This article investigates how stayer youth in Ghana “pace” their migration aspirations while “waiting.” By observing how youth change their aspirations over time, we first distinguish between different aspirations according to when youth first aim to migrate. Second, we “follow” stayer youth after their secondary school graduation to understand how they seek to fulfil their migration aspirations and the strategies they adopt therein. We use ethnographic data from 38 Ghanaian “stayer” young people. Our analyses show that stayer youth adapt their decision‐making when they realise some misalignment between their migration aspirations and capabilities. By analysing their adaptation strategies, we emphasise stayer youth’s agency despite structural forces confining them to what has been called “waithood.”

show abstract

“…The aspiration‐ability framework introduced by Carling (2002) has been widely used to analyse immobility in migration studies (Setrana, 2021). de Haas (2010, 2021) further refined the framework by replacing ability with the capability to analyse how (im)mobility outcomes relate to development.…”

Section: The Aspiration‐capability Framework and Nonmigration Prefere...mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The purpose of this article is to acknowledge the capability to stay and that migration aspirations may change over time and the life course. The mobility bias in migration theories focusing largely on those who migrate has left a gap in the migration literature related to why people stay, which calls for a deeper engagement with the process of choosing to stay (Setrana, 2021). This article seeks to contribute to filling this knowledge gap by focusing on Filipino nurses who, despite growing up in a culture of migration (Asis, 2006) and being trained in a profession and a system that is largely oriented towards overseas markets (Cabanda, 2017; Ortiga, 2021; Ortiga & Macabasag, 2021a, 2021b; Ortiga & Rivero, 2019), decided to stay in the Philippines.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘I chose to stay for a while’: Aspirations and capabilities in the nonmigration decision making of nurses in the Philippines

Gotehus

2023

Population Space and Place

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Focusing on Filipino nurses, who are situated in a culture of migration where nursing is seen to pave way for overseas migration, this article explores the (non)migration decision‐making process and the temporal and agentic dimensions of the decision to stay. While regimes of mobility may restrict or enable cross‐border movements through immigration regulations, this article focuses on ongoing processes within the Philippines such as labour market development, family relations and individual considerations. The analysis shows how important events, as well as anticipated events, in aspiring migrants' life cycles impact on their decisions and aspirations. Changes in the local labour market, such as the proliferation of call centres, have provided new opportunities for socioeconomic mobility within the Philippines. This article demonstrates how nonmigration of skilled workers is a complex and multilayered phenomenon. While staying has long been seen as a passive and natural situation, this article, in line with an emerging literature, acknowledges that staying requires agency. Further, nonmigration has an inherent temporal dimension as migration aspirations may change over time.

show abstract

Choosing to Stay: Alternate Migration Decisions of Ghanaian Youth

Cited by 8 publications

References 13 publications

Gendered Dynamics in West African Migration

Gendered Dynamics in West African Migration

Aspiring While Waiting: Temporality and Pacing of Ghanaian Stayer Youth’s Migration Aspirations

‘I chose to stay for a while’: Aspirations and capabilities in the nonmigration decision making of nurses in the Philippines

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About