Skip to main content

Maggi W . H . Leung

University of Amsterdam, Human Geography and International Development Studies, Faculty Member

University of Amsterdam, Geography, Planning and International Development Studies, Faculty Member

Followers

125

Following

3

Co-authors

3

Public Views

Maggi Leung is a geographer and migration scholar by training. Her research aims to account for the prevailing uneven socio-spatial impact of the flows that define our interconnected world. Leung endeavours to produce insights that contribute to more just and sustainable futures. Working with multi-scalar (from the global to the body), intersectional and translocal perspectives, her main research interests are: opportunities and challenges of migration, with a focus on related injustice; internationalisation of education and knowledge mobilities; and Chinese transnationalism and impact on global development.

Former affiliations:
Department of Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Utrecht University (2010-2021, Assistant and then Associate Professor)
Department of Geography, The University of Hong Kong (2007-2010, Assistant Professor)
Department of Geography, University of Bonn (2006-2007, Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow)
Department of Geography and Resource Management, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (2002-2006, Assistant Professor)

less

InterestsView All (10)

Uploads

Papers by Maggi W . H . Leung

The commodification of social relationships in agriculture: Evidence from northern Ethiopia

Geoforum

Making ways for ‘better education’: Placing the Shenzhen-Hong Kong mobility industry

Urban Studies

Tens of thousands of children living on Mainland China cross the border between Shenzhen and Hong... more Tens of thousands of children living on Mainland China cross the border between Shenzhen and Hong Kong for a ‘better education’ every day. A well-oiled industry is in place to manage, facilitate and control this education mobility field. It involves schools, diverse businesses and non-governmental organisations that, in articulation with the Chinese and Hong Kong states, stimulate and regulate the movement of people, materialities, ideas and practices. Drawing on our fieldwork and media analysis, this paper unpacks the transurban mobility industry to illustrate the role of the various players and how they work in conjunction to facilitate cross-border schooling, especially among the very young children. We map out and visualise with photos the workings of the schools, buses, escorts, tutoring centres, day care and boarding houses. We show how the mobility industry, intersecting with other business networks and mobility systems, links Shenzhen and Hong Kong, taking and making places ...

Rethinking knowledge and skills in migration: A spatial–temporal perspective

Population, Space and Place, 2021

Trans-knowledge? Geography, Mobility, and Knowledge in Transnational Education

Knowledge and Space, 2017

Rhythms, flows, and structures of cross‐boundary schooling: state power and educational mobilities between Shenzhen and Hong Kong

Population, Space and Place

Knowledge (im)mobility through mirco-level interactions: An analysis of the communication process in Chinese-Zambian medical co-operation

Transnational Social Review

Inclusive malt barley business and household food security in Lay Gayint district of northern Ethiopia

Food Security

Food security has become a major problem in Ethiopia. To reverse the situation, inclusive busines... more Food security has become a major problem in Ethiopia. To reverse the situation, inclusive businesses, such as malt barley production, are being promoted. However, the determinants of inclusion in the malt barley industry and the food security impacts of inclusion have not been studied systematically. Thus, the objectives of the present research were twofold, namely to investigate the reason for inclusion in, or exclusion from, the malt barley industry, and to examine the food security impacts of inclusion in three villages in Lay Gayint district, northern Ethiopia. The research used a mixed method approach. Survey data were collected from 140 non-included and 103 included farm households. In addition, focus group discussions were held with 18 included and 18 non-included households, as well as with six officials. Three multiple dimensions of food security were considered: food availability, measured by months per year during which households reported having an adequate food supply; food access, indicated by coping strategies employed by the households to secure sufficient food; and food utilisation, measured by food calorie intake, food variety and diet diversity scores, and three anthropometric measures for children under 5 years of age. Quantitative data were analysed using a two stage least square regression model, while qualitative data were analysed using thematic analysis. The results indicate that inclusion in the malt barley industry is determined by higher economic status. Older farmers and farmers living far from the main town of the district were excluded. We also show that inclusion in the malt barley industry results in higher incomes, better food access and higher diet diversity scores, but has less impact in terms of food availability, food variety score, per capita kilocalorie consumption and child growth. Based on these findings, we suggest that, in the context of inclusive business for those at the ‘bottom of the pyramid’, one needs to re-frame the targeting process of chain governance and integrate other actors who work on food and nutrition components of rural livelihoods.

Vegetable Business and Smallholders’ Food Security: Empirical Findings from Northern Ethiopia

Sustainability

In Ethiopia, there have been increased efforts to promote market-oriented vegetable production. G... more In Ethiopia, there have been increased efforts to promote market-oriented vegetable production. Given that food security is a crucial issue in Ethiopia, the question is whether market-oriented vegetable production will actually help farmers to become more food secure. Using a mixed methods approach, the present research gathered empirical evidence on the determinants of participation in the vegetable business and its food security impacts in the Raya Azebo district. The Heckman two-stage selection model was used to identify factors affecting participation in the vegetable business and its effects on several food security outcomes. A thematic analysis was applied to the qualitative data. The results show that a farmer’s participation in the vegetable business increased significantly with adequate household productive resources (e.g., land size and access to irrigation), cooperative memberships and access to extension services. On the other hand, the age of the head of household, the ...

Degrees of value: comparing the contextual complexities of UK transnational education in Malaysia and Hong Kong

Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education

China’s Confucius Institute in Indonesia: Mobility, Frictions and Local Surprises

Sustainability

China’s cross-border language promotion body, the Confucius Institute (CI), has proliferated alon... more China’s cross-border language promotion body, the Confucius Institute (CI), has proliferated along with the mobility of Chinese capital and people worldwide. It embodies the ‘Going Out’ state strategy that promotes the global spread of Chinese capital, ideas, culture and people. Often seen as a vehicle of China’s power and influence, the CI has attracted much suspicion and even rejection as compared to similar institutions of other states. This paper examines the mobility of the CI and the encountered frictions when it lands in particular places, problematizing the commonly assumed unidirectional impact of the cross-border institution as a mighty soft power instrument. Specifically, it analyses the frictions of the CI’s establishment in Indonesia, where racial and political narratives on China and Chinese-Indonesians have long prevailed. Three cases are presented: one at the national level in Jakarta and two at the local level in the cities of Bandung and Makassar. By elaborating ho...

‘One country, two systems’, ‘one city, two systems’: Citizenship as a stage for politics of mobility and bordering practices in Hong Kong

MIGRATION LETTERS

Drawing on the notion of ‘politics of mobility’ and conceptualization of borders, this paper illu... more Drawing on the notion of ‘politics of mobility’ and conceptualization of borders, this paper illustrates the peculiar, controversial and discriminatory citizenship policy, practice and discourse in Hong Kong. Under the ‘One Country, Two Systems’ constitutional principle, Hong Kong is separated from the China Mainland by an administrative border and exercises a separate residence rights regime. This paper highlights the tension produced by Hong Kong’s citizenship politics pursed by the state in turning the metropolitan into ‘Asia’s world city’ in this ‘One Country, Two Systems’ context. The world-city project entails offering right of abode (quasi citizenship) to highly-skilled migrants, ‘outstanding talents’ and investors while discriminating against those considered inappropriately-skilled such as poor family reunion migrants from mainland China.

Social Mobility via academic mobility: reconfigurations in class and gender identities among Asian scholars in the global north

Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies

Vaguely Right or Exactly Wrong: Measuring the (Spatial) Distribution of Land Resources, Income and Wealth in Rural Ethiopia

Sustainability

Educators sans frontières? Borders and power geometries in transnational education

Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies

Domesticating transnational education: discourses of social value, self-worth and the institutionalisation of failure in ‘meritocratic’ Hong Kong

Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers

Tracing the Causal Loops Through Local Perceptions of Rural Road Impacts in Ethiopia

World Development

To better grasp the interconnected range of socioeconomic impacts from the implementation of rura... more To better grasp the interconnected range of socioeconomic impacts from the implementation of rural roads in northern Ethiopia, we have experimented with Causal Loop Diagrams (CLDs), a tool commonly used in systems dynamics, but generally under-used in development research. The expansion of the rural road network in Africa is praised for reducing spatial isolation, lowering transport cost, increasing access to markets, and bringing services closer to home. However, different segments of society will benefit differently from the establishment of a rural road. This difference may lead to dynamics that either exacerbate or reduce existing inequities, which forms the central question for this paper. As part of a broader study on the multiple (in)direct effects of rural roads on productive employment, we undertook oral testimonies in four municipalities to explore how people perceive road impacts on livelihoods, mobility, and work. CLDs were then used to assemble those seemingly loose observations into a systematized view of the whole. The exercise reveals conflicting feedback processes that may dominate system at different times and drive the inequities between surplus food producers and laborer households up or down. The method used can be particularly useful for studying similar infrastructures that seemingly bring benefits to all, but may cause subtle, concealed or delayed effects, and ultimately surprising system behavior.

The exclusive nature of inclusive productive employment in the rural areas of northern Ethiopia

Work, employment and society

Inclusiveness, with its emphasis on productive employment, has become central in development poli... more Inclusiveness, with its emphasis on productive employment, has become central in development policy. From this perspective, unwaged-work is condemned for not being sufficiently productive; that is, for failing to lift incomes above a poverty threshold. However, insights from the sociology of work reveal a range of unwaged activities that are potentially highly productive in their contribution to self-reliance. The article explores whether these activities are undermined by the promotion of inclusiveness. The case study takes place in Tigray, Ethiopia. Through semi-structured interviews, the activities of different households were classified according to a typology of work based on the work of Gorz, Illich, Wheelock, Taylor, Williams and others. Results show the heterogeneous character of work and shed light on the meaning of productivity. The article ends with a discussion on the risk that inclusiveness may be achieved by replacing activities ‘that count’ with activities ‘that can b...

Engaging a temporal–spatial stretch: An inquiry into the role of the state in cultivating and claiming the Chinese knowledge diaspora

Geoforum, 2015

ABSTRACT

‘ Academic Mobility for Development’ as A Contested Notion: An Analysis of the Reach of the Chinese State in Regulating the Transnational Brains

Tijdschrift voor economische en sociale geografie, 2014

ABSTRACT

On being Chinese: Locating the Chinese self in Germany

Http Dx Doi Org 10 1080 10357820600897663, Sep 1, 2006

... 34-35, at http://www.mcc.murdoch.edu.au/ReadingRoom/litserv/SPAN/34/Ang.html, accessed 23 Apr... more

The commodification of social relationships in agriculture: Evidence from northern Ethiopia

Geoforum

Making ways for ‘better education’: Placing the Shenzhen-Hong Kong mobility industry

Urban Studies

Tens of thousands of children living on Mainland China cross the border between Shenzhen and Hong... more Tens of thousands of children living on Mainland China cross the border between Shenzhen and Hong Kong for a ‘better education’ every day. A well-oiled industry is in place to manage, facilitate and control this education mobility field. It involves schools, diverse businesses and non-governmental organisations that, in articulation with the Chinese and Hong Kong states, stimulate and regulate the movement of people, materialities, ideas and practices. Drawing on our fieldwork and media analysis, this paper unpacks the transurban mobility industry to illustrate the role of the various players and how they work in conjunction to facilitate cross-border schooling, especially among the very young children. We map out and visualise with photos the workings of the schools, buses, escorts, tutoring centres, day care and boarding houses. We show how the mobility industry, intersecting with other business networks and mobility systems, links Shenzhen and Hong Kong, taking and making places ...

Rethinking knowledge and skills in migration: A spatial–temporal perspective

Population, Space and Place, 2021

Trans-knowledge? Geography, Mobility, and Knowledge in Transnational Education

Knowledge and Space, 2017

Rhythms, flows, and structures of cross‐boundary schooling: state power and educational mobilities between Shenzhen and Hong Kong

Population, Space and Place

Knowledge (im)mobility through mirco-level interactions: An analysis of the communication process in Chinese-Zambian medical co-operation

Transnational Social Review

Inclusive malt barley business and household food security in Lay Gayint district of northern Ethiopia

Food Security

Food security has become a major problem in Ethiopia. To reverse the situation, inclusive busines... more Food security has become a major problem in Ethiopia. To reverse the situation, inclusive businesses, such as malt barley production, are being promoted. However, the determinants of inclusion in the malt barley industry and the food security impacts of inclusion have not been studied systematically. Thus, the objectives of the present research were twofold, namely to investigate the reason for inclusion in, or exclusion from, the malt barley industry, and to examine the food security impacts of inclusion in three villages in Lay Gayint district, northern Ethiopia. The research used a mixed method approach. Survey data were collected from 140 non-included and 103 included farm households. In addition, focus group discussions were held with 18 included and 18 non-included households, as well as with six officials. Three multiple dimensions of food security were considered: food availability, measured by months per year during which households reported having an adequate food supply; food access, indicated by coping strategies employed by the households to secure sufficient food; and food utilisation, measured by food calorie intake, food variety and diet diversity scores, and three anthropometric measures for children under 5 years of age. Quantitative data were analysed using a two stage least square regression model, while qualitative data were analysed using thematic analysis. The results indicate that inclusion in the malt barley industry is determined by higher economic status. Older farmers and farmers living far from the main town of the district were excluded. We also show that inclusion in the malt barley industry results in higher incomes, better food access and higher diet diversity scores, but has less impact in terms of food availability, food variety score, per capita kilocalorie consumption and child growth. Based on these findings, we suggest that, in the context of inclusive business for those at the ‘bottom of the pyramid’, one needs to re-frame the targeting process of chain governance and integrate other actors who work on food and nutrition components of rural livelihoods.

Vegetable Business and Smallholders’ Food Security: Empirical Findings from Northern Ethiopia

Sustainability

In Ethiopia, there have been increased efforts to promote market-oriented vegetable production. G... more In Ethiopia, there have been increased efforts to promote market-oriented vegetable production. Given that food security is a crucial issue in Ethiopia, the question is whether market-oriented vegetable production will actually help farmers to become more food secure. Using a mixed methods approach, the present research gathered empirical evidence on the determinants of participation in the vegetable business and its food security impacts in the Raya Azebo district. The Heckman two-stage selection model was used to identify factors affecting participation in the vegetable business and its effects on several food security outcomes. A thematic analysis was applied to the qualitative data. The results show that a farmer’s participation in the vegetable business increased significantly with adequate household productive resources (e.g., land size and access to irrigation), cooperative memberships and access to extension services. On the other hand, the age of the head of household, the ...

Degrees of value: comparing the contextual complexities of UK transnational education in Malaysia and Hong Kong

Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education

China’s Confucius Institute in Indonesia: Mobility, Frictions and Local Surprises

Sustainability

China’s cross-border language promotion body, the Confucius Institute (CI), has proliferated alon... more China’s cross-border language promotion body, the Confucius Institute (CI), has proliferated along with the mobility of Chinese capital and people worldwide. It embodies the ‘Going Out’ state strategy that promotes the global spread of Chinese capital, ideas, culture and people. Often seen as a vehicle of China’s power and influence, the CI has attracted much suspicion and even rejection as compared to similar institutions of other states. This paper examines the mobility of the CI and the encountered frictions when it lands in particular places, problematizing the commonly assumed unidirectional impact of the cross-border institution as a mighty soft power instrument. Specifically, it analyses the frictions of the CI’s establishment in Indonesia, where racial and political narratives on China and Chinese-Indonesians have long prevailed. Three cases are presented: one at the national level in Jakarta and two at the local level in the cities of Bandung and Makassar. By elaborating ho...

‘One country, two systems’, ‘one city, two systems’: Citizenship as a stage for politics of mobility and bordering practices in Hong Kong

MIGRATION LETTERS

Drawing on the notion of ‘politics of mobility’ and conceptualization of borders, this paper illu... more Drawing on the notion of ‘politics of mobility’ and conceptualization of borders, this paper illustrates the peculiar, controversial and discriminatory citizenship policy, practice and discourse in Hong Kong. Under the ‘One Country, Two Systems’ constitutional principle, Hong Kong is separated from the China Mainland by an administrative border and exercises a separate residence rights regime. This paper highlights the tension produced by Hong Kong’s citizenship politics pursed by the state in turning the metropolitan into ‘Asia’s world city’ in this ‘One Country, Two Systems’ context. The world-city project entails offering right of abode (quasi citizenship) to highly-skilled migrants, ‘outstanding talents’ and investors while discriminating against those considered inappropriately-skilled such as poor family reunion migrants from mainland China.

Social Mobility via academic mobility: reconfigurations in class and gender identities among Asian scholars in the global north

Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies

Vaguely Right or Exactly Wrong: Measuring the (Spatial) Distribution of Land Resources, Income and Wealth in Rural Ethiopia

Sustainability

Educators sans frontières? Borders and power geometries in transnational education

Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies

Domesticating transnational education: discourses of social value, self-worth and the institutionalisation of failure in ‘meritocratic’ Hong Kong

Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers

Tracing the Causal Loops Through Local Perceptions of Rural Road Impacts in Ethiopia

World Development

To better grasp the interconnected range of socioeconomic impacts from the implementation of rura... more To better grasp the interconnected range of socioeconomic impacts from the implementation of rural roads in northern Ethiopia, we have experimented with Causal Loop Diagrams (CLDs), a tool commonly used in systems dynamics, but generally under-used in development research. The expansion of the rural road network in Africa is praised for reducing spatial isolation, lowering transport cost, increasing access to markets, and bringing services closer to home. However, different segments of society will benefit differently from the establishment of a rural road. This difference may lead to dynamics that either exacerbate or reduce existing inequities, which forms the central question for this paper. As part of a broader study on the multiple (in)direct effects of rural roads on productive employment, we undertook oral testimonies in four municipalities to explore how people perceive road impacts on livelihoods, mobility, and work. CLDs were then used to assemble those seemingly loose observations into a systematized view of the whole. The exercise reveals conflicting feedback processes that may dominate system at different times and drive the inequities between surplus food producers and laborer households up or down. The method used can be particularly useful for studying similar infrastructures that seemingly bring benefits to all, but may cause subtle, concealed or delayed effects, and ultimately surprising system behavior.

The exclusive nature of inclusive productive employment in the rural areas of northern Ethiopia

Work, employment and society

Inclusiveness, with its emphasis on productive employment, has become central in development poli... more Inclusiveness, with its emphasis on productive employment, has become central in development policy. From this perspective, unwaged-work is condemned for not being sufficiently productive; that is, for failing to lift incomes above a poverty threshold. However, insights from the sociology of work reveal a range of unwaged activities that are potentially highly productive in their contribution to self-reliance. The article explores whether these activities are undermined by the promotion of inclusiveness. The case study takes place in Tigray, Ethiopia. Through semi-structured interviews, the activities of different households were classified according to a typology of work based on the work of Gorz, Illich, Wheelock, Taylor, Williams and others. Results show the heterogeneous character of work and shed light on the meaning of productivity. The article ends with a discussion on the risk that inclusiveness may be achieved by replacing activities ‘that count’ with activities ‘that can b...

Engaging a temporal–spatial stretch: An inquiry into the role of the state in cultivating and claiming the Chinese knowledge diaspora

Geoforum, 2015

ABSTRACT

‘ Academic Mobility for Development’ as A Contested Notion: An Analysis of the Reach of the Chinese State in Regulating the Transnational Brains

Tijdschrift voor economische en sociale geografie, 2014

ABSTRACT

On being Chinese: Locating the Chinese self in Germany

Http Dx Doi Org 10 1080 10357820600897663, Sep 1, 2006

... 34-35, at http://www.mcc.murdoch.edu.au/ReadingRoom/litserv/SPAN/34/Ang.html, accessed 23 Apr... more

CfP: Education without borders? Frictions and boundary-crossing in the field of internationalised education, 2nd Transmobilities & Development Conference: Frictions in a mobile world, Radboud University, Nijmegen, 8-9 June 2017

by Jill Ahrens and Maggi W . H . Leung

2nd Transmobilities & Development Conference: Frictions in a mobile world, Radboud University, Ni... more 2nd Transmobilities & Development Conference: Frictions in a mobile world, Radboud University, Nijmegen, 8-9 June 2017

CfP for the panel: Education without borders? Frictions and boundary-crossing in the field of internationalised education

The education field, across secondary, tertiary and professional levels, has become increasingly internationalised. The field is traversed by intersecting flows of people (students, staff and administrators), other tangible materials (money, books and other learning materials, equipment etc.) and intangible elements (money, knowledge, teaching and learning philosophies and techniques, management practices etc.). In migration/mobilities research, internationally mobile students have been the focus of many studies in the growing research field. While these students are generally viewed as an unproblematic migrant category, research has also shown the unevenness and ‘darker’ sides of their mobility experiences. Together with mobility, frictions and social boundary-crossings also define, in intersecting and contingent ways, the lived experiences of these mobile students. This is true for other elements in the field, e.g. institutions, practices, staff, curricula, knowledge, resources, skills and profits as well – they do not just flow across borders as often propagated but experience (and generate) frictions and (new) boundaries. The mobility and frictions of these various elements in turn shape the production, circulation and consumption of education and knowledge. It is important to examine how and why some elements cross social and geographical boundaries, while other elements are more difficult to mobilise and transfer into new contexts. This panel seeks to address the ways in which the frictions are created, experienced and resisted. How do these frictions affect geographies of knowledge and power? Who benefits from frictions? And who gets blocked? Can frictions also be creative? What are the implications for local education sectors and labour markets? Which policies and agendas have eliminated frictions and/or produced new ones? We are keen to receive abstracts from researchers interested in one or more of these questions.

Submission of abstracts: If you are interested in participating, please send a title and 250-word abstract to Jill Ahrens (j.ahrens@uu.nl) or Maggi Leung (w.h.m.leung@uu.nl) by the 7th of April.

The participation in the workshop is free, but participants have to cover their own expenses.