Human Development Impacts of Migration: South Africa Case Study

Controls on human mobility and efforts to undermine them continue to shape South Africa’s politics, economy, and society. Despite the need for improved policy responses to human mobility, reform is hindered by lack of capacity, misinformation, and anti-migrant sentiments within and outside of government. This report outlines these trends and tensions by providing a broad overview of the limited demographic and socio-economic data available on migration to and within South Africa. Doing so highlights the spatialised aspects of human mobility, trends centred on and around the country’s towns and cities. It also finds significant development potential in international migrants’ skills and entrepreneurialism. By enhancing remittances and trade, non-nationals may also expand markets for South African products and services. Despite these potential benefits, there are severe obstacles to immigration reform. These include a renewed South African populism; the influence of a strong anti-trafficking lobby; a European Union (EU) agenda promoting stricter border controls; poor implementation capacity; and endemic corruption among police and immigration officials. There are different, but equally significant problems in reforming frameworks governing domestic mobility including perceptions that in-migration is an inherent drain on municipal budgets. Recognising these limitations, the report concludes with three recommendations. (1) A conceptual reconsideration of the divisions between documented and undocumented migrants; between voluntary and forced migrants; and between international and domestic migration. (2) An analytical respatialisation in future planning and management scenarios involving regional and local bodies in evaluating, designing and implementing policy. (3) To situate migration and its management within global debates over governance and development and for ‘migration mainstreaming’ into all aspects of governance. The success of any of these initiatives will require better data, the skills to analyse that data, and the integration of data into planning processes.migration, urbanisation, governance, South Africa, policy reform, capabilities

Migrations en Afrique australe

En retraçant les transformations majeures du cadre migratoire dans l’Afrique australe post-apartheid, cet article propose de situer les enjeux économiques qui structurent aujourd’hui la réflexion sur la dynamique migration-développement, afin de mieux comprendre les choix politiques qui contraignent les gouvernements de ces nouveaux eldorados que sont devenus l’Afrique du Sud, le Botswana et la Namibie. Terre d’exil, de transit et d’installation, la pointe sud de l’Afrique australe prend aujourd’hui pleinement conscience des défis liés à son entrée dans le monde. Face à un cosmopolitisme tour à tour revendiqué et honni, les gouvernements de ces trois pays progressent, selon des modalités différenciées, dans la voie de constructions nationales qui ne pourront faire l’économie d’une réflexion plus large sur l’étranger.In retracing the major changes in migration in post-apartheid Southern Africa, this paper aims to position the economic issues that currently structure discussion on the migration-development dynamics, in order to better understand the political choices constraining the governments of South Africa, Botswana and Namibia, the new lands of opportunity. The tip of Southern Africa – a place of exile, transit and settlement – is now becoming fully aware of the challenges linked to its entry into the world. Confronted by a cosmopolitanism which is alternately claimed and hated, the governments of these three countries are following, under different patterns, nation-building paths that cannot overlook serious reflection on the world at large

“We Offer the Whole of Africa Here!”. African Curio Traders and the Marketing of a Global African Image in Post-apartheid South African Cities1

Based on a two-year fieldwork in and around Johannesburg, this paper contends that the emergence of "African markets" in the post-apartheid urban landscapes filled the niches created by the production of commodified images of the country and, by extension, the continent. The analysis focuses on the creative process at work around the identification and multi-layered reading of a "cosmopolitan" African iden­tity by different groups of actors (South African municipal authorities, retail private actors and migrant traders). It tries to show how this process has fulfilled actors' immediate and contrasted needs but has not necessarily led to countering negative clichés on African migration in the long run. It thus tries to make use of the theoreti­cal framework of the notion of ethnic entrepreneurship in its application to the South African context. The paper documents the practices and activities of the African curio trade in South African cities, the products sold, the trade networks and the imaginaries on which the perceptions of migrants, market managers and municipal councillors rely and in turn continue to fuel. After painting the specific cultural and political context of the South African tourism industry and offering a brief overview of the dissemination of new trade and migration networks towards and within South African cities, the paper finally unpacks the imagery of Africa that is conveyed to South Africans and international publics as well as its genealogy.À partir d'un travail de terrain de deux ans dans et aux alentours de Johannesburg, cet article montre comment l'émergence de « marchés africains », dans les paysages urbains post-apartheid, est venue combler une niche créée par la pro­duction d'images commercialisables du pays, et par extension, du continent. L'ana­lyse se concentre sur le processus créatif à l'œuvre autour de l'identification et des lectures multiples d'une identité africaine « cosmopolite » par différents groupes d'acteurs (les municipalités sud-africaines, le secteur privé et les commerçants migrants). On tente de montrer comment ce processus a servi les attentes immédiates et contrastées des acteurs mais n'a pas nécessairement conduit à renverser durable­ment les clichés négatifs sur la migration africaine. Le cadre théorique de la notion d'entrepreneur ethnique est ainsi appliqué au contexte sud-africain. Cet article docu­mente les pratiques et les activités de la vente d'objets artisanaux africains dans les villes sud-africaines, les produits vendus, les réseaux commerçants et les imaginaires sur lesquels les perceptions des migrants, des gérants de marché et des conseillers municipaux reposent et à leur tour contribuent à alimenter. Après avoir décrit le contexte culturel et politique de l'industrie touristique sud-africaine et donné un aperçu de l'étendue des nouveaux réseaux commerçants et migratoires inter et intra- urbains, cet article étudie l'imagerie de l'Afrique qui est véhiculée par les publics sud-africains et internationaux et par sa généalogie

Les oubliés de la croissance

Depuis la dernière régularisation des migrants mozambicains à la fin des années 1990 et malgré la très forte croissance dans le pays ces dix dernières années, les stratégies de survie des ménages de la région Sud du Mozambique restent toujours extrêmement dépendantes de la migration de travail vers l’Afrique du Sud. Mais la diminution du travail minier et la double précarisation des autres travailleurs mozambicains, à la fois confinés aux secteurs de très forte exploitation de l’économie sud-africaine et largement visés par sa politique massive de reconduites à la frontière, enferment ces populations dans un cycle de vulnérabilité. L’assouplissement du contrôle migratoire sud-africain depuis 2004 a résolu une partie du problème de l’irrégularité mais soulève d’autres questions sociales non anticipées. L’amplification récente des violences xénophobes et la faible réaction gouvernementale tant sud-africaine que mozambicaine confirment, en dépit d’initiatives nouvelles de mobilisation, l’indifférence de tous au sort de ce surplus ballotté à l’envi de part et d’autre du Corridor « prospère » de Maputo.Desde a última regularização dos imigrantes moçambicanos no fim dos anos 1990 e, apesar dum crescimento económico forte no país durante estes últimos dez anos, as estratégias de sobrevivência das famílias da região Sul de Moçambique estão sempre extremamente dependentes da emigração laboral para a África do Sul. No entanto, a diminuição do trabalho nas minas e a dupla precarização dos outros trabalhadores moçambicanos, ao mesmo tempo confinados aos sectores de grande exploração da economia sul-africana e amplamente abrangidos pela sua política de reconduções até à fronteira, aprisionam estas populações num ciclo de vulnerabilidade. A flexibilidade trazida ao controlo migratório sul-africano desde 2004 resolveu uma parte do problema da irregularidade, mas levanta outras questões sociais não antecipadas. O aumento recente da violência xenófoba e a fraca reacção governamental tanto sul-africana como moçambicana confirma, apesar de algumas novas iniciativas de mobilização, a indiferença geral perante a sorte destes trabalhadores excedentários, armadilhados por ambos os lados do corredor « próspero » de Maputo.Since the last amnesty of Mozambican migrants at the end of the 1990s and in spite of Mozambique’s very strong growth over the past ten years, the livelihood strategies of Southern Mozambican households are still extremely dependent on labour migration towards South Africa. However, the decrease in mine labour and the double vulnerability of other Mozambican workers, both confined to the most exploitative sectors of South Africa’s economy and largely targeted by its mass deportation policy, trap these populations in a cycle of precariousness. The opening of the South African migration control since 2004 has solved some aspects of the question of irregular migration but raises new unanticipated social questions. The recent escalation of xenophobic violence and the weak government response from both South Africa and Mozambique confirm, in spite of emerging mobilisation, the general indifference to the fate of this labour surplus, repeatedly thrown around the ‘prosperous’ Maputo corridor

Displacement and difference in Lubumbashi

Signs on the outskirts of the second largest city in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) welcome visitors to ‘the city of peace’. Lubumbashi has a reputation as a haven of tolerance in a violent nation but how are displaced people treated

Human Development Impacts of Migration: South Africa Case Study

Controls on human mobility and efforts to undermine them continue to shape South Africa’s politics, economy, and society. Despite the need for improved policy responses to human mobility, reform is hindered by lack of capacity, misinformation, and anti-migrant sentiments within and outside of government. This report outlines these trends and tensions by providing a broad overview of the limited demographic and socio-economic data available on migration to and within South Africa. Doing so highlights the spatialised aspects of human mobility, trends centred on and around the country’s towns and cities. It also finds significant development potential in international migrants’ skills and entrepreneurialism. By enhancing remittances and trade, non-nationals may also expand markets for South African products and services. Despite these potential benefits, there are severe obstacles to immigration reform. These include a renewed South African populism; the influence of a strong anti-trafficking lobby; a European Union (EU) agenda promoting stricter border controls; poor implementation capacity; and endemic corruption among police and immigration officials. There are different, but equally significant problems in reforming frameworks governing domestic mobility including perceptions that in-migration is an inherent drain on municipal budgets. Recognising these limitations, the report concludes with three recommendations. (1) A conceptual reconsideration of the divisions between documented and undocumented migrants; between voluntary and forced migrants; and between international and domestic migration. (2) An analytical respatialisation in future planning and management scenarios involving regional and local bodies in evaluating, designing and implementing policy. (3) To situate migration and its management within global debates over governance and development and for ‘migration mainstreaming’ into all aspects of governance. The success of any of these initiatives will require better data, the skills to analyse that data, and the integration of data into planning processes

Desplazamiento y diferencias en Lubumbashi

Los carteles a las afueras de la segunda ciudad más grande de la República Democrática del Congo le dan a uno la bienvenida a la “ciudad de la paz”. Lubumbashi goza de la reputación de ser un oasis de tolerancia en una nación violenta. No obstante, ¿cómo se trata en esta ciudad a los desplazados?