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ABSTRACT
In the context of a severe contraction of ‘development space’ for Latin American and Caribbean economies in the global political economy, we are witnessing a novel and increasingly explicit articulation of migration as a national development strategy by governments in the region. This is particularly pronounced in the Caribbean basin (defined to include Mexico). In response to the shifting shape of the transnational division of labor, the core development strategy that is being articulated is one of insertion into transnational supply chains on the basis of the provision of labor, in the sense both of populating the new transnational professional workforce and of ensuring a continual supply of cheap, low- or unskilled, often undocumented workers to a huge range of sectors in cities and outside them. This article contends that what is thereby put in place is a new political economy of inequality in the Americas, through which a dominant, transnationalized form of ‘accumulation by dispossession’ can be reinforced and deepened. This transnationalized form of accumulation by dispossession combines, in highly contingent ways, with the distinctively ‘nationalized’ governance of migration to constitute a contemporary political economy of migration in the Americas in which the developmental potential of labor mobility is subject to profound constraints.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
For their helpful contributions and reactions to previous drafts of this paper, I am grateful to Steve Jones, Tony Payne, Rorden Wilkinson, Andrew Wyatt, participants in research seminars at the Copenhagen Business School and the Universities of Liverpool, Nottingham and Lancaster, and participants in conferences associated with the Institute for the Study of the Americas (University of London) and the International Studies Association. I also appreciate the valuable comments of three anonymous referees and the helpful input from the editors of RIPE.
Notes
∗∗% growth 2003–5.
a At current market prices.
b Calculations using 2004 figures.
∗Minus percentage arises as the figure for net FDI to Bolivia in 2005 was –279.6 (US$ millions).
∗∗Minus percentage arises as the figure for aid to Trinidad and Tobago in 2004 was – 1 (US$ millions).
1. Clearly I am privileging here those processes of migration from ‘peripheral’ to ‘core’ zones of the global economy. Yet it would not do to forget about the diverse forms of what, inadequately but customarily, is referred to as ‘south-south’ migration, nor indeed forms of internal migration. What is striking is that similar forms of dispossession operate with respect to the material and social conditions of migrant workers across these arenas of migration, and that, across the world, workers' migrant status is used directly as a means of intensifying national and transnational processes of social stratification.
2. The CitationWorld Bank study (2005) considered the gains to the citizens of poor countries that would accrue from a relaxation of restrictions on labor mobility to allow an increase of 3% in the labor forces of the rich countries. The conclusion was that these would be of the order of $300 billion – around four and a half times greater than the gains from foreign aid at existing levels, before one factors in the economic gains to the rich countries themselves.
3. As only indicative examples amidst very sizeable literatures, see, on the ‘who, why, how’ question, CitationMassey and Aysa (2005); on transnationalism, CitationGlick Schiller et al. (1992); CitationSmith and Guarnizo (1998); on human smuggling and trafficking, CitationAnderson (2007); CitationAndreas (2000); CitationKempadoo (2005); CitationKyle and Koslowski (2001); on transnational recruiting networks, CitationPeck et al. (2005).
4. As CitationHewison (2006: 94–5) notes, the possibilities for corruption and the defrauding of workers are inevitably rife in this system and have been widely exploited.
5. The 10 are Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Mexico, Panama, Peru and Uruguay. Until 1991, such legislation existed only in Uruguay, Peru, Panama and El Salvador.
6. This situation was apparently changing over the course of 2008 and 2009 as the financial crisis took hold, as the growth of remittances to parts of Latin America began to slow and, later, volumes of remittances flowing to the region began to decline. The emergence of these trends adds weight to arguments concerning the precarious nature of a development strategy based heavily on remittances.
7. For a good discussion of this line of argument, see Citationde Haas (2007).
8. This is less the case in the European context, where moves have been made to conceptualize the relationship between national spaces in this transnationalized manner. The phrase that has entered into use in this regard is ‘co-development’, probably first coined in 1997 by a French scholar, Sami Naïr, during his time as director of the Interministerial Mission on Migration/Co-development. ‘Co-development’ is conceived in his definition as ‘a proposal for integrating immigration and development in a way that migration fluxes will benefit both the country of origin and the country of destiny. This is a consensual relationship between two countries that will allow migration to the country of destiny not to imply an equivalent loss in the country of origin’. See relevant documents from the Council of Europe at <http://www.coe.int/t/dg3/migration/Activities/Migration_and_co-development_en.asp>, and the ‘Co-development Newsletter’ produced by the French government at <http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/IMG/pdf/codevelopment_newsletter_no1-2.pdf>.
9. It should be noted, of course, that the notion of ‘shortage’ does not refer to demographic profile or insufficient numbers of American workers, but rather to the shortage of American workers prepared to accept the wages and conditions associated with most of the positions available.
10. Perhaps the most potent political force is the Essential Workers' Immigration Coalition (EWIC) which comprises some 50 of the most powerful employers' associations.
11. The disturbing solution proposed was to deploy prisoners in state jails as the new agricultural workers (Los Angeles Times, 1 March 2007; Washington Post, 10 March 2007). Prisoners would earn the state's standard prison pay of 60 cents a day. The contract would be between the state and farmers, the latter paying the costs of transportation and guards.
12. Author's interviews, Washington, DC, September–October 2004.
13. I am indebted to Ben Rosamond for suggesting this formulation of the argument to me.
