This article proposes the concept of ‘chronopolitics’ as a heuristic for a kind of decolonial ima... more This article proposes the concept of ‘chronopolitics’ as a heuristic for a kind of decolonial imagination in migration studies, one that insists on structural changes as opposed to those relational ones that dominate the field. The article argues that migration scholars should question the coloniality of key concepts they use in their work to understand how the ‘solutions’ they propose (re)embed a colonial world and view. Building on previous critiques of migration studies, the article proposes that a chronopolitical argument to decolonising migration studies reveals the intrinsic connectivity of temporal and geographical linkages, in order to relate migration research epistemologies to ontological problems. This can allow the migration discourse to move beyond the centre, to address the current ‘black burden’ of ambivalent academic positioning and predominant methodological and conceptual approaches to migration studies. In these ways, chronopolitics adds conceptually to an underexplored debate in the field.
This article's purpose is to analyse the political work of binaries used in both domestic and glo... more This article's purpose is to analyse the political work of binaries used in both domestic and global migration governance responses with a particular focus on Zimbabwean "survival migration" at the Zimbabwe-South Africa border. This article finds that there is peculiar complementarity between South Africa's domestic migration governance framework and global migration governance frameworks aimed at a migration management approach. This article argues that this nice fit normalises the ostensibly clear distinction between migrants and refugees to deny protection to deserving asylum-seekers, which is productive in serving the political interests of the South African government. Without access to the appropriate papers and encountering a border refugee reception office that has developed de facto gatekeeping measures to prevent them from seeking asylum, as well as a United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees field office that perceives them as economic migrants, many Zimbabweans living in South Africa occupy a liminal area of categorisation and protection. Hence, the possibilities of the global migration governance providing legitimacy to exclusionary practices at the national level in South Africa are immense. This points to the need for serious engagement with "survival migration" as a category of mobility in analysis, policy, law as well as practice.
One of social science's core roles is to inform evidence-based policy making and policy inter... more One of social science's core roles is to inform evidence-based policy making and policy interventions that produce pro-poor outcomes. This paper explores prominent debates on research uptake and policy making by scholars working on several relatively underexplored issues in the 'Global South.' Drawing parallels from previous studies and reflecting on working in research uptake activities surrounding domestic and international migration, this paper calls for more nuanced ways of thinking about policy change and impact in questioning normative assumptions underlying the 'Theory of Change' approach, as well as for greater awareness of national and sub-national political values, structures, and opportunities. It does this by drawing attention to four important variables. First, the nature of the policy issue, particularly how it is framed in public and political discourse. This bears on the issue's popular appeal and, ultimately, the policy demand for research an...
South Africa is generally regarded as a ‘rainbow’ nation due to a number of different races resid... more South Africa is generally regarded as a ‘rainbow’ nation due to a number of different races residing in the country. However, forging a common South African national identity has remained elusive (Alegi, 2010; Ndlovu-Gatsheni, 2011) as the country can best be understood as a developing idea (Ndlovu-Gatsheni, 2011). Of late, xenophobic attacks continue to recur in South Africa as ‘indigenous’ South Africans target perceived ‘foreigners’ whom they blame for their social and economic woes. Both the mass media and the new media in South Africa and across the globe have been awash with stories concerning the recurring xenophobic attacks in the ‘rainbow’ nation. Academics from political science, sociology, cultural studies as well as media studies have engaged with the discourse of xenophobia from different angles. Media studies generally focus on the normative role of the media as a so-called ‘fourth estate’. Consequently, such scholarship tends to push an agenda for improving freedom of expression to ensure that the media operate unrestricted. This is done by critiquing government restrictive media policies and censorship practices where they exist. Except for the few scholars that do critique media operations (see Herman and Chomsky, 1988), at the risk of being labelled conspiracy theorists, little scholarship has focused on critiquing media performance in neo-liberal contexts like South Africa where freedom of expression is guaranteed, beyond political-economy and “capital determinism”. This paper fills this lacuna. It provides a critical framework for interpreting media coverage in South Africa, specifically in relation to migration and xenophobia, by suggesting that the media are not doing enough to alleviate xenophobia. Premised on the concept of ‘symbolic violence’ by Pierre Bourdieu (1990), this paper employs a neo-Foucauldian approach in questioning media coverage as it relates broadly to discourse, power and crisis.
The number of Zimbabwean women migrating to South Africa has increased in the post-apartheid year... more The number of Zimbabwean women migrating to South Africa has increased in the post-apartheid years (Crush and Tevera, 2010). Excluded from more closely regulated pursuits, many are employed as domestic workers. Their movements and labour are in principle protected by regional, transnational and national migration protocols and local policies regulating conditions for domestic workers. In practice these offer little: while they are able to sustain their livelihoods, without the necessary freedom to legally establish residence and accrue social security benefits, their employment remains precarious. Without such rights, they are subject to exploitation and economic precarity. At the same time it is important to acknowledge the benefits for Zimbabwean women who do find employment (albeit that for many this employment may be precarious) in South Africa and who are able to sustain a circulatory migration pattern that affords them the means to sustain their households in Zimbabwe or in So...
This article explores tensions in the ways in which non-governmental activism, as represented by ... more This article explores tensions in the ways in which non-governmental activism, as represented by trade unions and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), frames the concerns of migrant domestic workers (MDWs) living in South Africa. It analyses how seemingly polarised trade unions and NGOs involved in struggles on behalf of MDWs adopt singular discourses about labour rights at varying political moments to achieve their own goals. These singular frames conflate the issues around MDWs and their rights, reducing them to rigid categories of either ‘international migrants’ or ‘domestic workers’. The framing of MDWs’ concerns as international migrants’ rights issues reflects a transnational political approach that migrant-aligned trade unions and NGOs use in order to connect with pre-existing labour movement narratives and debates. This framing must contend with locally aligned trade unions and NGOs who frame international MDWs’ concerns essentially as equal to those of internal MDWs through the mantra ‘a worker is a worker’. This homogenising framing of worker struggles generates deep-seated xenophobic discourses about migrants in South Africa’s labour market which are compatible with a citizenship-based workers’ rights movement and ‘national chauvinism’. Although the mantra ought to allow every worker to stand up for their rights without risking immigration detention or deportation, locally aligned trade unions and NGOs use it to de-exceptionalise international migrants in order to appeal to a local constituency concerned about the economy being ‘overrun’ by international migrants. The article concludes that there is need for internal and international MDWs to organise themselves in ways that recognise their similarities and accommodate their differences.
ABSTRACT This paper draws on Pécoud’s international migration narratives (IMN) as an analytical f... more ABSTRACT This paper draws on Pécoud’s international migration narratives (IMN) as an analytical framework to examine the Global Forum on Migration and Development’s Civil Society Days (GFMD-CSD). We analyse the narratives both produced and challenged at the GFMD-CSD, suggesting that while the GFMD-CSD poses a gentle challenge to existing IMN, it falls short of meaningfully (re)politicizing predominant migration paradigms. This is partly due to how the forum is a fraught space that reflects and reproduces uneven power dynamics between the Global North and South, concealing and nullifying contestations of power. Nonetheless, the GFMD-CSD, as a hybridized, experimental and fluidly defined discourse-led ‘global’ space, still functions as an important arena through which challenges to depoliticized state-led rhetoric might slowly trickle. Therefore, a closer interpretation of self-reflexive GFMD-CSD civil society strategies might challenge Pécoud’s conceptualization of what constitutes a ‘depoliticized’ approach to migration.
Recurring xenophobic attacks on perceived foreign immigrants stand out as one of the major setbac... more Recurring xenophobic attacks on perceived foreign immigrants stand out as one of the major setbacks on South Africa's envisaged 'rainbow' nation discourse. These attacks remain a topical issue in, academic, media, social, economic and political circles. While a significant body of literature explores the coverage of migration and xenophobia issues in the South African mainstream press, studies examining media coverage of xenophobia research from research institutions are scarce. This study explores the [re]-presentation of xenophobia research findings in two popular South African newspapers: the Mail & Guardian and the Sowetan from 2008 to 2013. The study utilizes a qualitative research approach. Findings show that the two analyzed newspapers uncritically picked up stories and purveyed them without a strong base facilitated by empirical research. In essence, empirical research findings were selectively utilized to 'authenticate' or legitimize convenient ideological positions. Finally, a clear tension between discourses of 'empirical knowledge' and 'popular perceptions'; was evident in analyzed stories.
This article proposes the concept of ‘chronopolitics’ as a heuristic for a kind of decolonial ima... more This article proposes the concept of ‘chronopolitics’ as a heuristic for a kind of decolonial imagination in migration studies, one that insists on structural changes as opposed to those relational ones that dominate the field. The article argues that migration scholars should question the coloniality of key concepts they use in their work to understand how the ‘solutions’ they propose (re)embed a colonial world and view. Building on previous critiques of migration studies, the article proposes that a chronopolitical argument to decolonising migration studies reveals the intrinsic connectivity of temporal and geographical linkages, in order to relate migration research epistemologies to ontological problems. This can allow the migration discourse to move beyond the centre, to address the current ‘black burden’ of ambivalent academic positioning and predominant methodological and conceptual approaches to migration studies. In these ways, chronopolitics adds conceptually to an underexplored debate in the field.
This article's purpose is to analyse the political work of binaries used in both domestic and glo... more This article's purpose is to analyse the political work of binaries used in both domestic and global migration governance responses with a particular focus on Zimbabwean "survival migration" at the Zimbabwe-South Africa border. This article finds that there is peculiar complementarity between South Africa's domestic migration governance framework and global migration governance frameworks aimed at a migration management approach. This article argues that this nice fit normalises the ostensibly clear distinction between migrants and refugees to deny protection to deserving asylum-seekers, which is productive in serving the political interests of the South African government. Without access to the appropriate papers and encountering a border refugee reception office that has developed de facto gatekeeping measures to prevent them from seeking asylum, as well as a United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees field office that perceives them as economic migrants, many Zimbabweans living in South Africa occupy a liminal area of categorisation and protection. Hence, the possibilities of the global migration governance providing legitimacy to exclusionary practices at the national level in South Africa are immense. This points to the need for serious engagement with "survival migration" as a category of mobility in analysis, policy, law as well as practice.
One of social science's core roles is to inform evidence-based policy making and policy inter... more One of social science's core roles is to inform evidence-based policy making and policy interventions that produce pro-poor outcomes. This paper explores prominent debates on research uptake and policy making by scholars working on several relatively underexplored issues in the 'Global South.' Drawing parallels from previous studies and reflecting on working in research uptake activities surrounding domestic and international migration, this paper calls for more nuanced ways of thinking about policy change and impact in questioning normative assumptions underlying the 'Theory of Change' approach, as well as for greater awareness of national and sub-national political values, structures, and opportunities. It does this by drawing attention to four important variables. First, the nature of the policy issue, particularly how it is framed in public and political discourse. This bears on the issue's popular appeal and, ultimately, the policy demand for research an...
South Africa is generally regarded as a ‘rainbow’ nation due to a number of different races resid... more South Africa is generally regarded as a ‘rainbow’ nation due to a number of different races residing in the country. However, forging a common South African national identity has remained elusive (Alegi, 2010; Ndlovu-Gatsheni, 2011) as the country can best be understood as a developing idea (Ndlovu-Gatsheni, 2011). Of late, xenophobic attacks continue to recur in South Africa as ‘indigenous’ South Africans target perceived ‘foreigners’ whom they blame for their social and economic woes. Both the mass media and the new media in South Africa and across the globe have been awash with stories concerning the recurring xenophobic attacks in the ‘rainbow’ nation. Academics from political science, sociology, cultural studies as well as media studies have engaged with the discourse of xenophobia from different angles. Media studies generally focus on the normative role of the media as a so-called ‘fourth estate’. Consequently, such scholarship tends to push an agenda for improving freedom of expression to ensure that the media operate unrestricted. This is done by critiquing government restrictive media policies and censorship practices where they exist. Except for the few scholars that do critique media operations (see Herman and Chomsky, 1988), at the risk of being labelled conspiracy theorists, little scholarship has focused on critiquing media performance in neo-liberal contexts like South Africa where freedom of expression is guaranteed, beyond political-economy and “capital determinism”. This paper fills this lacuna. It provides a critical framework for interpreting media coverage in South Africa, specifically in relation to migration and xenophobia, by suggesting that the media are not doing enough to alleviate xenophobia. Premised on the concept of ‘symbolic violence’ by Pierre Bourdieu (1990), this paper employs a neo-Foucauldian approach in questioning media coverage as it relates broadly to discourse, power and crisis.
The number of Zimbabwean women migrating to South Africa has increased in the post-apartheid year... more The number of Zimbabwean women migrating to South Africa has increased in the post-apartheid years (Crush and Tevera, 2010). Excluded from more closely regulated pursuits, many are employed as domestic workers. Their movements and labour are in principle protected by regional, transnational and national migration protocols and local policies regulating conditions for domestic workers. In practice these offer little: while they are able to sustain their livelihoods, without the necessary freedom to legally establish residence and accrue social security benefits, their employment remains precarious. Without such rights, they are subject to exploitation and economic precarity. At the same time it is important to acknowledge the benefits for Zimbabwean women who do find employment (albeit that for many this employment may be precarious) in South Africa and who are able to sustain a circulatory migration pattern that affords them the means to sustain their households in Zimbabwe or in So...
This article explores tensions in the ways in which non-governmental activism, as represented by ... more This article explores tensions in the ways in which non-governmental activism, as represented by trade unions and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), frames the concerns of migrant domestic workers (MDWs) living in South Africa. It analyses how seemingly polarised trade unions and NGOs involved in struggles on behalf of MDWs adopt singular discourses about labour rights at varying political moments to achieve their own goals. These singular frames conflate the issues around MDWs and their rights, reducing them to rigid categories of either ‘international migrants’ or ‘domestic workers’. The framing of MDWs’ concerns as international migrants’ rights issues reflects a transnational political approach that migrant-aligned trade unions and NGOs use in order to connect with pre-existing labour movement narratives and debates. This framing must contend with locally aligned trade unions and NGOs who frame international MDWs’ concerns essentially as equal to those of internal MDWs through the mantra ‘a worker is a worker’. This homogenising framing of worker struggles generates deep-seated xenophobic discourses about migrants in South Africa’s labour market which are compatible with a citizenship-based workers’ rights movement and ‘national chauvinism’. Although the mantra ought to allow every worker to stand up for their rights without risking immigration detention or deportation, locally aligned trade unions and NGOs use it to de-exceptionalise international migrants in order to appeal to a local constituency concerned about the economy being ‘overrun’ by international migrants. The article concludes that there is need for internal and international MDWs to organise themselves in ways that recognise their similarities and accommodate their differences.
ABSTRACT This paper draws on Pécoud’s international migration narratives (IMN) as an analytical f... more ABSTRACT This paper draws on Pécoud’s international migration narratives (IMN) as an analytical framework to examine the Global Forum on Migration and Development’s Civil Society Days (GFMD-CSD). We analyse the narratives both produced and challenged at the GFMD-CSD, suggesting that while the GFMD-CSD poses a gentle challenge to existing IMN, it falls short of meaningfully (re)politicizing predominant migration paradigms. This is partly due to how the forum is a fraught space that reflects and reproduces uneven power dynamics between the Global North and South, concealing and nullifying contestations of power. Nonetheless, the GFMD-CSD, as a hybridized, experimental and fluidly defined discourse-led ‘global’ space, still functions as an important arena through which challenges to depoliticized state-led rhetoric might slowly trickle. Therefore, a closer interpretation of self-reflexive GFMD-CSD civil society strategies might challenge Pécoud’s conceptualization of what constitutes a ‘depoliticized’ approach to migration.
Recurring xenophobic attacks on perceived foreign immigrants stand out as one of the major setbac... more Recurring xenophobic attacks on perceived foreign immigrants stand out as one of the major setbacks on South Africa's envisaged 'rainbow' nation discourse. These attacks remain a topical issue in, academic, media, social, economic and political circles. While a significant body of literature explores the coverage of migration and xenophobia issues in the South African mainstream press, studies examining media coverage of xenophobia research from research institutions are scarce. This study explores the [re]-presentation of xenophobia research findings in two popular South African newspapers: the Mail & Guardian and the Sowetan from 2008 to 2013. The study utilizes a qualitative research approach. Findings show that the two analyzed newspapers uncritically picked up stories and purveyed them without a strong base facilitated by empirical research. In essence, empirical research findings were selectively utilized to 'authenticate' or legitimize convenient ideological positions. Finally, a clear tension between discourses of 'empirical knowledge' and 'popular perceptions'; was evident in analyzed stories.
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Papers by Kudakwashe Vanyoro