Call for Papers
Mobilities and Inequalities: Towards a new ethics of policy response?
Panel proposed by the Migration, Development and Social Change Study Group
Development Studies Association
Friday 5th November 2010
Church House, Westminster, London
Panel convenors:
Katie Wright (University of East London), Tanja Bastia (University of Manchester) and Joseph Assan (University of Liverpool)
Abstract
The wider migration and development literature has called for policy responses that move beyond measures aimed at border control to seek alternatives that are based on broader understandings of constructions of poverty and inequality, human need and societal flourishing. In this context, this panel seeks to understand the complex inter-relationships between:
(i) different kinds of mobilities, including rural-urban, cross-border, international;
(ii) intersecting inequalities, such as gender, generation and ethnicity;
(ii) freedoms/ unfreedoms to migrate, particularly related to the issue of consent (voluntary, forced migration and trafficking).
The panel is interested in exploring the relationship between mobilities, inequalities and degrees of unfreedom at the theoretical level and in making a contribution to policy, particularly with a view to recasting policy responses that relate to broader questions of human wellbeing and societal flourishing.
This focus on the linkages between mobilities, intersecting inequalities and freedoms/ unfreedoms resonates with key ideas raised in the latest Human Development Report on Human Mobility and Development. Such debates have broader implications for the study of development ethics more broadly. This panel examines the theme of development ethics and policy response in the context of mobility from three different angles.
The first relates to different kinds of mobilities at different scales. For example, in the context of globalization and the global restructuring of capital, much of the literature has focused on international migration flows. At the same time, there is consensus that lower-income groups are more likely to migrate as a livelihood strategy via for example Internal (rural-rural/rural-urban) migration in the same country or cross-border migration flows in the same region. Mobility can also have contradictory impacts at different scales, for example, improving the wellbeing of migrants and households that are in receipt of remittances while exacerbating overall levels of economic and social inequality. Multi-scalar analysis is needed to understand this complex relationship between mobility, inequalities and overall development impacts. This panel proposes to consider these different kinds of mobilities and their impacts at different scales.
The second considers the complex relationship between intersecting inequalities and different types of mobility, particularly the question of how existing inequalities within places of origin and between origin and destination are a driver for increased mobility. An additional question we would like to consider is whether mobility exacerbates existing inequalities of gender, age and ethnicity, particularly in places of origin. Mobility is therefore understood as a translocal process linking multiple localities within the same social fields.
The third, 'freedoms and unfreedoms' relates to issues of consent surrounding the decision to migrate. This panel is open to considering both voluntary migration, forced migration and trafficking, different 'modes' of migrating which are here understood as being part of the same process, but involve different degrees of consent. It also considers normative questions regarding freedoms and unfreedoms as to what migrants are able to be and do.
If you are interested in contributing to this panel, please send 300-500 word paper proposals to either of the panel convenors by 15th June.
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The panel will inform the broader development of the Migration, Development and Social Change Study Group.
We will notify whether your paper has been accepted by 30th June. Full papers, which will be uploaded on the DSA conference website, are requested by Friday 3rd September 2010.
For further information about the conference, please see http://www.devstud.org.uk/events/conference/
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