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Article Excerpt
Abstract
Migrants' financial transfers have been estimated to be Somalia's largest source of revenue. The UK is believed to be a significant source of these financial transfers to Somalia. Drawing on preliminary ethnographic research in the UK during 2004, this paper firstly presents some empirical observations on the dynamics of these movements of people and money between the UK and Somalia and other parts of the Horn of Africa. Secondly, it asks, in contexts of forced migration, what is the relevance of the popular concept of migrants' financial transfers as part of a "transnational household livelihood strategy"? Notions of household, strategy, and what it means to send money in such contexts are critically reviewed. The analysis concludes with some challenges to common assumptions regarding refugees' economic actions.
Resume
Les transferts financiers d'immigrants sont consideres comme etant la plus importante source de revenus en Somalie, et le Royaume- Uni serait le principal responsable de ces transferts. A partir de recherches ethnographiques effectuees au Royaume-Uni en 2004, l'article s'attarde d'abord a des observations empiriques sur la dynamique des deplacements de personnes et d'argent entre le Royaume-Uni et la Somalie ou d'autres parties de la corne d'Afrique. Dans le contexte de l'immigration forcee, l'article aborde ensuite la question de la pertinence du concept populaire de transferts financiers d'immigrants en tant que >. Les notions de menage, de strategie et du sens lie d l'acheminement de sommes monetaires dans un tel contexte sont examinees d'un point de vue critique. L'analyse condut par quelques remises en question des hypotheses concernant les activites economiques des refugies.
Introduction
We do not think of refugees as helping to keep a country s economy afloat. We do not think of refugees as financing a telecommunications industry, providing for the basic needs of families abroad, paying for weapons for militiamen, putting equipment in hospitals. Yet these are all activities attributed to Somali migrants through the sending of money to Somalia. Financial transfers by migrants have been estimated to be Somalia's largest source of external revenue, competing with livestock exports and considerably larger than international aid flows. Annual transfers from Somali migrants in the UK, believed to be one of the largest sources of transfers, have been estimated at around nine times the UK's bilateral aid to Somalia. The uses and impacts of these transfers in Somalia and elsewhere in the Horn of Africa are complex, but a significant proportion meet the daily needs of families. (1)
Migrants' financial transfers to their country of origin are calculated to be the most stable and second-largest capital inflow to developing countries, and are increasingly highlighted in academic and policy research. (2) However, rather less attention has been paid to the dynamics of migrants' transfers to countries in conflict situations. (3) This paper highlights the fact that many Somalis recognized as refugees have taken on roles that are more commonly associated in the literature with economic migrants, namely, the sending of financial transfers for spending and investment in the country of origin. The first section presents some empirical observations on the movement of people (with a range of motivations and statuses) from Somalia to the UK, and the movement of money (shaped by various factors) from migrants in the UK to Somalia and the Horn of Africa. In the light of this evidence, the second section reflects on how the dominant micro-level model of migration and migrants' transfers as part of a "household livelihood strategy"--a concept which pervades many understandings of transfers to conflict-affected countries-helps and hinders our understandings of the UK-Somali case. The third section reflects on common assumptions regarding the economic actions of refugees.
The paper draws on fifteen in-depth interviews with Somalis in the UK and conversations at community organizations, at special events, in family settings, and with customers of a money-transfer agency during 2004.
The Movement of People and Money
The Republic of Somalia was formed in 1960 from a British and an Italian colony and collapsed in 1991. (4) Wadordism and inter-clan violence devastated parts of the country during the 1990s. In the north the secession of Somaliland and the regional administration of Puntland have provided relative stability for people devastated by violence. In parts of central and southern Somalia there are non-state authorities--clan elders, Islamic and regional groups, and even coalitions of business people--that provide a degree of stability, many supported by their own militia. Efforts to re-establish a functioning government based in the southern capital, Mogadishu, continue at the time of writing. In the latest Human Development Report, Somalia's gross domestic product (GDP) per capita is among the poorest in the world, life expectancy is forty-seven years, primary school enrolment is 14 per cent, and adult literacy is 18 per cent. Around one-sixth of Somalis live abroad, the majority in neighbouring countries, but some further afield. (5)
According to Sorensen, "Few source countries produce only asylum seekers or economic migrants." (6) Historically, there has been a range of political statuses and migration channels among Somalis living in the UK. From the 1800s, the British Merchant Navy recruited workers from the Protectorate of Somaliland, and a few thousand ex-sailors and their families were already living in the UK by the 1980s, along with small numbers of Somali students. (7) When the civil war broke out in the north of Somalia in 1988, many more Somalis applied for family reunion in the UK or claimed asylum. People have...
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