Development and Dependence Along the New York–Haiti Remittance Corridor

Abstract

Haiti and other developing countries have increasingly turned to emigrant remittances as a potential source of development capital. There is a vigorous debate in the development community about the impacts of remittances, however, with concerns about dependence challenging the optimism about a potential new development engine. Based on interviews with forty-two remittance recipients in Haiti and forty-five corresponding senders in New York State, we find that the remittance economy in Haiti is indeed productive and has the potential to generate employment and other important development benefits. That said, there are important limitations created by broader political–economic conditions and deeply entrenched inequalities.

海地及其他发展中国家, 逐渐倚赖移民的跨国汇款, 做为发展资金的可能来源。但发展社群对于跨国汇款的影响有着活跃的辩论, 对依赖跨国汇款之担忧, 挑战了视其为潜在的新发展驱力之乐观主义。我们根据海地四十二位跨国汇款受领者及纽约州四十五位相应汇款者的访谈, 发现海地的汇款经济的确具有生产力, 并有着创造就业及其他重要发展利益的潜能。而这也意味着, 仍存在着由广泛的政治经济境况与深植的不均等所造成的重大限制。

Cada vez más, Haití y otros países en desarrollo están poniendo sus ojos en las remesas de sus emigrantes como una potencial fuente de capital de desarrollo. Sin embargo, corre un vigoroso debate en la comunidad desarrollista sobre el impacto de las remesas, con preocupaciones sobre la dependencia que ponen en entredicho el optimismo que rodea al nuevo potencial del motor del desarrollo. Con base en datos recogidos en entrevistas entre cuarenta y dos destinatarios de remesas en Haití, y cuarenta y cinco correspondientes remitentes del Estado de Nueva York, hallamos que la economía de las remesas en Haití es en verdad productiva y tiene potencial para generar empleo y otros importantes facilitadores del desarrollo. Dicho esto, existen importantes limitaciones creadas por condiciones político–económicas de gran amplitud y por desiguandades profundamente arraigadas.

Key Words::

• development
• Haiti
• inequality
• remittances
• transnational migrants

关键词:

• 发展
• 海地
• 不均等
• 汇款
• 跨国移民。

Palabras clave:

• desarrollo
• Haití
• desigualdad
• remesas
• migrantes transnacionales

Acknowledgments

Notes

*We would like to thank all of the Haitian migrants and remittance recipients who participated in this study for their generosity with their time and their insights. We would also like to thank Drs. Jessie Poon, Marieme Lo, and especially the late Alan MacPherson for shepherding this project and commenting on previous versions of this work. Finally, we thank the editors and anonymous reviewers whose comments helped improve the article.

1. The estimates vary depending on the poverty standard used; they calculated rates based on US$1 purchasing party parity (PPP), US$2 PPP, and nationally defined extreme poverty line.

2. The principal investigator, Dr. Joseph, is a member of the New York Haitian migrant community.

3. For the purposes of this study, laborers are those in occupations that are either primarily manual labor and require little to no formal training, whereas professionals are those in occupations that require formal postsecondary training or professional experience, including business owners. The professional respondents include doctors, lawyers, nurses, engineers, and government officials. The laborers include taxi drivers, bus drivers, cashiers, and cleaners.

4. In general, we found that women were much more reluctant than men to discuss finances and personal relationships and hence to participate in this study.