Unequal internationalisation and the emergence of a new epistemic community: gender and migration

In this contribution to the formation of an epistemic community and its knowledge production developed in the Paper Between fragmentation and institutionalisation: the rise of migration studies as a research field, I seek to go beyond the bibliometric analysis, and in particular explore the nature of its internationalisation, the connections authors have across the globe and the unequal valuation of differently located research. These aspects underpin networks in the formation and evolution of epistemic communities. I shall illustrate my points through an epistemic community which has grown significantly in the past two decades, but scarcely gains a mention in the Paper. Gender and migration can be placed within the much broader cluster of globalisation, and especially in more recent years, transnationalism

Family migration as a class matter

Traditionally, family migration was conceptualized as a separate form of migration from labour migration. Increasingly socio-economic criteria (labour market participation, language competence, financial resources, independence from welfare), have been applied to family migration policies in Europe, and are harder to fulfil by those with a weaker labour market position. Hence class now plays an increasingly significant role in stratifying the right to family migration. The article examines the imposition of minimum income requirements in three countries – the Netherlands, Norway and the UK – and the significance of class in its economic and cultural dimensions in meeting the requirement. For those without sufficient economic capital to meet the requirement, cultural capital may facilitate the development of coping strategies to overcome or reduce the duration of family separation. Class is not the only stratifying element: gender, age and ethnicity interact with and reinforce the effects of class

Gendered mobilities and vulnerabilities: refugee journeys to and in Europe

Recent refugee flows across the Mediterranean have been heterogeneous despite often being represented as predominantly male. However, there exist relatively little disaggregated data for adults and children which would enable us to achieve a better understanding of gendered mobilities in refugee journeys and settlement. Furthermore, such mobilities are affected by notions of vulnerability applied to those in need of protection, which prioritise the mobility of some categories. These include single parents, pregnant women, the elderly and unaccompanied minors. Drawing on data collected by international organisations and national sources (Greece, Italy) as well as a project EVI-MED (Constructing an evidence base of contemporary Mediterranean migration) (2015-2107), this article argues for the need to generate more disaggregated data (gender, age, family status) reflecting complex gendered mobilities and experiences of vulnerability

Scale and spaces of global labor markets

In this chapter I argue is, first, that other scales, and in particular the regional, have become more significant in the past few decades and that these may be as important as the global for the formation of labor markets and the circulation of capital. Second, states may be dynamic players in the determination of the boundaries of labor markets, not only in response to economic demands but also increasingly due to pressure for greater control, and even sometimes closure, from anti-immigrant populist and nationalist movements. While the state is no longer seen as a container, it nevertheless retains considerable regulatory power within which to generate its sources of labor supply using different scalar arrangements.. We see this most clearly in the discourses and practices of the British state in relation to the regional, in this case the EU, and the global, where in the past 20 years it has reconstructed a division of labor within an expanding European spatiality, providing it with flexible sources of labor and skills

Integration discourses, the purification of gender and interventions in family migrations

In a hard-hitting critique of integration, Schinkel (2018) highlights the purification of class and race which evacuates explanatory variables from studies of integration as a concept and practice. Surprisingly gendered purification is left out. This article argues that a range of gender issues presenting migrant women, especially from Muslim countries, as being deficient in modernity and contributing to poor social reproduction through their family practices and transnational ties, were at the forefront of political calls for intervention in family lives and the implementation of integration measures in the past two decades. In part this reflects an attempt to alter the class composition of family migrants and bring them closer to middle class norms and values. Such reductionist and homogenising representations continue despite the complexity of contemporary family migrations and practices, thus reinforcing the continuing purification and simplification of categories of analysis in discussions of racialised gender and classed integration in West European societies

Gender, migration and policymaking in light of the 60th anniversary of international migration

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Gender, remittances and migration: Latin Americans and Caribbeans in Europe

Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) migrations to Europe have grown rapidly and in the past few years partially replaced those to North America. Spain is the preferred destination of LAC migrants with about 840,000 LAC-born residents in 2001, a large increase over previous years. This migration is highly feminised and is likely to result in long-term settlement. It is also generating high levels of remittances. Whilst considerable work exists on the effect of remittances on households and communities in countries of origin, a gendered approach to these issues has only recently been developed. Yet, given that a high proportion of remittances in Europe are sent by and back to women, remittances are effectively circulating through transnational gendered networks. This paper examines remittances in the context of gendered migration from LAC countries to Europe and argues that policies concerning remittances need to incorporate a gender dimension. In particular we need to challenge the unproductive dichotomy between „productive‟ and „unproductive‟ activities, and recognise the significance of remittances for social reproduction, if we want to bank the unbanked. We also need to consider the effect of remittances on the lives of migrants in countries of destination

Gender and migration: IMISCOE short reader

This open access short reader offers a critical review of the debates on the transformation of migration and gendered mobilities primarily in Europe, though also engaging in wider theoretical insights. Building on empirical case studies and grounded in an analytical framework that incorporates both men and women, masculinities, sexualities and wider intersectional insights, this reader provides an accessible overview of conceptual developments and methodological shifts and their implications for a gendered understanding of migration in the past 30 years. It explores different and emerging approaches in major areas, such as: gendered labour markets across diverse sectors beyond domestic and care work to include skilled sectors of social reproduction; the significance of families in migration and transnational families; displacement, asylum and refugees and the incorporation of gender and sexuality in asylum determination; academic critiques and gendered discourses concerning integration often with the focus on Muslim women. The reader concludes with considerations of the potential impact of three notable developments on gendered migrations and mobilities: Black Lives Matter, Brexit and COVID-19. As such, it is a valuable resource for students, academics, policy makers, and practitioners.

From mobile workers to fellow citizens and back again? The future status of EU citizens in the UK

Growing concerns and hostility towards continuing large-scale flows of immigrants following the two rounds of EU enlargement and high levels of net migration played a major part in the Brexit referendum result for the UK to leave the EU. So too had welfare chauvinism, or the belief that welfare benefits should be restricted to citizens, come to the fore in negative attitudes to EU immigration, reflecting a rejection of EU migrants as fellow citizens. As the article shows, proposals as of summer 2017 for the status of current EU citizens in the UK indicate a desire by the UK government to incorporate current EU citizens within the far more restrictive British immigration rules, thereby curtailing some of their basic free movement rights, especially in relation to future family members. Leaked proposals for future EU citizens post-Brexit are to bring them within a single overall immigration system covering EU and non-EU migrants and applying differential rights of residence to skilled and less skilled, thereby stratifying EU migrants according to educational level and labour market sector. This would represent a return to the status of mobile workers with conditional rights of residence and social entitlements similar to those faced by non-EU migrants