How does Conflict in Migrants' Country of Origin Affect Remittance-Sending? Financial Priorities and Transnational Obligations Among Somalis and Pakistanis in Norway

This article examines how conflict in the country of origin interacts with other factors in shaping migrants' remittance-sending practices. Our data come from a survey of 10 immigrant groups in Norway and semi-structured interviews with Somali and Pakistani remittance-senders and receivers. Fir...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The International migration review 2012-06, Vol.46 (2), p.283-309
Main Authors: Carling, Jørgen, Erdal, Marta Bivand, Horst, Cindy
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Children
Conflict
Conflicts
Countries
Country of origin
Desire
Employment
Expenditures
Human ecology and demography
Human Security
Immigrants
International migration
Interviews
Migrants
Migration
Noncitizens
Norway
Parents
Peacetime
Polls & surveys
Prioritizing
Qualitative data
Refugees
Remittances
Reviews
Security
Semi Structured Interviews
Socioeconomic factors
Socioeconomic status
Socioeconomics
Sociology
Sociology of migrations
State Failure
Survey data
Surveys
Transnationalism
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Summary:This article examines how conflict in the country of origin interacts with other factors in shaping migrants' remittance-sending practices. Our data come from a survey of 10 immigrant groups in Norway and semi-structured interviews with Somali and Pakistani remittance-senders and receivers. First, we conduct an in-depth comparison to explore the differences in how Somali and Pakistani migrants decide about remittance-sending. Second, we use survey data on all 10 migrant groups to evaluate whether the differences that are not explained by socioeconomic characteristics, may partly reflect whether or not there is ongoing conflict in the country of origin. In our analyses we differentiate between (1) the effect of migrants' capacity to remit and their prioritizing of local and transnational expenditures, and (2) the impact of state collapse and absence of human security on migrants' and refugees' desire to remit. We find that ongoing conflict in the country of origin exerts an upward pressure on remittance-sending.
ISSN:0197-9183
1747-7379
DOI:10.1111/j.1747-7379.2012.00888.x