Iii: Diaspora, Remittances & Caribbean Development
Remittances and Diasporic Networks
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Remittances and Diasporic NetworksAs van Ham (2002:263) remarks, “the world can be understood as a massive and complex communication network with multiple transaction flows.” In conceptualising Caribbean transnationalism as a series of socio-economic networks, I problematise the strategic value of the financial flows generated by the remittance economy for the Caribbean and its Diasporas. My assessment highlights the importance of assessing flows of financial capital (in this case, remittances) and human capital not only in terms of their narrowly economic effects, but also in light of their social ramifications, opportunity cost and implications for social capital. The study’s findings indicate that despite the statistical attractiveness of remittance income, the capacity of remittances to promote significant change in the countries in the South is limited. Remittances and their growth as much a function of improved collection techniques, shifts in developed countries' approaches to aid and development and the transnationalisation of household income as they are reflections of actual increases in productivity or income by diasporic citizens. While remittances provide much-needed financial resources to households, I argue, the losses in terms of social and human capital, moral hazard, as well as the attendant deficiencies in the overall content and use of these flows cast significant doubt on the future benefits and sustainability of remittance-based foreign currency income. The study also demonstrates the need the further development of a multi-level social and economic framework for the maximisation of the benefits of migration for countries of the South. Table 7: Remittance Income by Country, including per capita income
Source: IMF Balance of Payments Statistics (2002) and UNDP Human Development Report (2002).*For India the data are for 2000. In terms of sheer volume, the Caribbean region may appear to be a small player in the remittance market. For example, of the estimated $US 32 billion transferred to the Latin American and Caribbean region in 2003 (MIF 2003: 4), the latter received only about a third of total recorded remittances, with Mexico alone accounting for a slightly greater amount than the entire Caribbean region (Best, 2003: 19). However, growth rates of remittance flows were highest in the Caribbean region (MIF, 2003: 5-6). In fact, the proportional contribution of remittances to GDP and per capita income in the Caribbean are among the highest in the world, especially in states such as Jamaica, the Dominican Republic and Haiti (Chami, 2003: 29-31). In Adams’ 2003 study of 24 labour-exporting countries over the period 1981-2000, LAC countries were found to have the highest growth rates in overseas workers’ remittances (13.5%) followed by sub-Saharan Africa (Adams, 2003: 23-24). The average growth in overseas workers’ remittances was calculated at 13.5%, over 16 times greater than the average growth in GDP in the LAC region (Adams, 2003: 25). While some of this spectacular growth may be credited to the improvement in statistical collection techniques, the sheer volume of remittances to the LAC region has underlined for many the importance of this flow and its potential value in terms of the promotion of development (Black, 2003: 3). In addition, as González-Alvarado and Sánchez (2003: 101) note, remittance revenues over the past five years have been 150% of the LAC region’s total debt service payments. It should also be remembered that current figures still vastly understate the volume of remittances entering the region, due to the use of illegal, informal or currently untraced channels. Despite this fact, critical comparative analyses of the value of the Caribbean diasporic economy have been scarce. Among the most pertinent are Return Migration and Remittances: Developing A Caribbean Perspective by Stinner et al., and Elizabeth Thomas-Hope's study, “Globalization and the Development of a Caribbean Migration Culture”. The former provides valuable statistical information on the volume of remittance flows, in terms of both gross and per capita income transferred to the country of origin from the diaspora, while Thomas-Hope's more recent study exemplifies the difficulty of accurately quantifying returning financial flows and the actual size of (Caribbean) Diasporas, primarily as a result of illegal immigration. As part of the complex of transactions that occur within the diasporic economy, remittances may be broadly defined as “transfers made from earnings and/or accumulated stock of wealth by individuals who are resident in a foreign country on a temporary or permanent basis” (Bascom, 1990: 4). This broader definition is used to focus on the question of earnings, accumulated wealth and the transfer thereof among members of families and communities. The value of remittances for the North has received very little attention. Remittances from the North are predominantly handled and distributed by major North-based firms especially in the case of the Caribbean and Latin American Diasporas in North America. Much of current research in the North has focussed on the management of vast flows of financial remittances, primarily due to the fiscal and security issued involved. However, in-kind remittances represent a significant proportion of intra-household transactions, and usually involve the purchase of goods and/or services from providers in the North. Table 8: Remittances as a Percentage of GDP, Selected Countries of the South
* Remittance levels for Haiti are as estimated by the IADB. Source: International Monetary Fund, Balance of Payments Yearbook 2002; Migration Information Source; World Bank, World Development Indicators 2002. Finally, proponents of the development value of remittances often note that these transfers tend to redistribute income to a greater degree than foreign direct investment and overseas development aid (Hugo, 2003: 5). Indeed, while participation in the remittance economy is now becoming a ubiquitous social phenomenon in parts of the Americas such as Mexico, remittance receivers are typically on the lower rungs of the socio-economic ladder (Suro, 2003: 4). In addition, as Samuel notes, rural or agriculturally-related households tend to opt for migration as a source of income due to the variability of income and diminishing returns that have been persistent features of the agricultural sector in the 20th and 21st centuries (Samuel, 1996: 5). In so far as these observations hold true, the thesis of superior redistributive capacity of remittances vis-à-vis overseas development aid and/or foreign direct investment may be quite accurate. As a result, the income to CARICOM states, estimated at USD 2 billion may have an even greater social impact that its size suggests. For instance, while in Jamaica the average annual remittance remains slightly less than per capita GDP (2100 USD vs 2171 USD), it must remembered that the former may be received by households whose resident members’ income may be significantly less than the national average. Empirically, some scholars posit that economic slumps in the Caribbean region would have been much longer and deeper had it not been for the contribution of remittance income (Best, 2003: 19). Relatedly, as Gillespie et al. highlight, countries such as China and Egypt benefited significantly from diasporic investment at times when these countries were considered unattractive by multinational interests. In addition to their static effects, these inflows had a demonstration effect and served to improve non-diasporic investors' perceptions of the investment climate in these countries. In short, remittances' capacity to alleviate economic and political crises, reduce dependence on foreign aid and investment and prevent further mass migration towards the North also represents a reduction in potential costs to taxpayers and governments in the North. Similarly, the sheer volume of remittances does not present us with a sufficiently sophisticated indication of its value for the South. It is important to view the remittance not only as an act of ‘enlightened altruism’ as per Samuel (2003: 5), or even the product of the efforts of individual migrants to “provide funds to improve the well being of their families and the vitality of their households” (Myhre, 2003: 1), but as return-on-investment (ROI). In an approach pioneered by Mincer (1978), the concept of household investment in migration has been suggested by several sociological and anthropological studies. For example, Stepick and Schwartz (1998) notes in their study of the Haitian diaspora in the United States of America that the decision to migrate is often taken and financed by households, with the individual migrant selected as the candidate for the expression of this strategy. While this concept of migration and remittance being a phenomenon which takes place in the context of a transnational household is quite well-known, it is yet to be fully incorporated into thinking on the remittance economy. It implies, as Chami notes, that the sending members abroad may already represent the family’s main investment project” (Chami, 2003: 21). One of the major implications of the conceptualisation of the remittance as return-on-investment is that the converse transaction, i.e. the investment involved in migration carries a certain cost and may even involve the incurring of debt. As Portes and Hoffman note, migration as an investment alternative is not open to households at the lowest income level because of the increased transaction costs created by restrictions imposed by receiving countries, the cost of the journey itself and early settlement costs such as accreditation, housing and telecommunications (2003: 70). As a result, while the remittance revenue in the Caribbean, measured in the most extreme case in Haiti as 325% of average per capita income (USD 1300 vs USD 375) may assist in keeping unemployed individuals and working poor out of positions of absolute poverty, especially in periods of severe crisis (Best, 2003: 19), the overall effect on absolute poverty may be severely affected by the costs associated with the migration option. The value of remittance flows as development capital or a potential source of investment capital may be overstated, at least in its current form. This applies equally to the capacity of unrecorded remittance flows6 to provide micro-finance resources to the country of origin as per Puri and Ritzena (1999). Unrecorded or not, remittance flows to the Caribbean and Latin America (with the possible exception of flows from Japan to Brazil) generally come from relatively poor workers. While the cases of Fondasyon Kole Zepol (FONKOZE) in Haiti and the Social Investment Fund for Local Development (FIDSL) in El Salvador suggest that investment and remittances can be combined by channelling remittance flows into micro-finance and reducing transaction costs (Hastings, 2002), the use of remittance income as financing for development implies a number of challenges, chief among which is that of changing the nature of the remittance from ROI or ‘compensatory flows’ (Chami, 2003: 21) to a generative source of capital in excess of the migration ROI or migration-related debts. In fact, in the case of the Caribbean, where high levels of spending on imports of both essential and luxury items have made balance of payments deficits an endemic phenomenon, the influx of hard currency has been seen as another advantage of remittance flows from the North. Several other factors are relevant to the value of the migrant labour remittances. Several researchers have identified a multiplier effect from remittance income ranging from 3.2 in Mexico (Adelman and Taylor, 1990) to 1.24 in Bangladesh (Stahl and Habib, 1989). In general terms, the argument of these studies is that as at least some remittance income is spent of domestic products, there will be some multiplier effect on the local economy. (Chami, 2003: 43-47) However, insofar as remittances constitute the financing of consumption, especially that of imported clothing and foodstuffs, there may be a negative effect on the local production of staples. In addition to negating the value of the influx of foreign exchange, the impact of goods remitted in kind (in terms of the demonstration effect)7 and the use of money remittances for luxury purchases (2-17% according to Suro 2003: 11) may be inflationary. Further research on the complex relationship between luxury purchases and the concept of social mobility in the South is necessary but beyond the scope of this thesis. Several analysts have noted the contribution of migration and remittances to income convergence (Faini, 2002). In the case of the contemporary Caribbean, however, the increasing costs of migration coupled with selective practices among receiving states has changed somewhat that dynamics of the traditional migration-remittance equation. In the host country or global city (Mittelman, 2000: 289), instead of income convergence, in many cases, one witnesses the transnationalization of poverty. In the Haitian-US diaspora for example (based mainly in New York and Miami), 84% of jobholders migrated after 1980 earned less than $20,000 per annum while living with dependents (Hastings, 2002: 33). The costs of circular migration/pilgrimage and the remittance of an average of 15% of annual household income also cut deeply into already small migrant budgets. This profile of trans-urban poverty is compounded by the growing costs of housing, food and transportation in global cities without the high incomes necessary to compensate, especially in light of the lower wages associated with the feminization of labour migration from many Caribbean states. In many cases, however, the capacity of remittances to alleviate poverty has been ascribed to social or collective remittances. Various researchers have pointed to collective remittances, especially those sent for the purpose of infrastructural development, as a form of investment in human capital reproduction via its positive effect on community health, learning facilities, and even the development of organizational skills through the transnational activity of remittance-related development projects (Goldring, 2003: 18). Also important, as alluded to earlier, is the contribution of diasporic citizens’ donations to reconstruction efforts regarding natural disasters- to which the Caribbean region is particularly vulnerable (See Gafar, 2002: 221). The capacity of these types of remittances to finance education and supplement other forms of social spending may be seen as a positive. Indeed, Caribbean diasporas have an established tradition of such forms of donations or social remittances. Newer types of social remittance, such as ICT-based projects (that will be discussed in the one of the following case studies) are now emerging as part of Diasporas’ general contribution to the welfare of their home region. Despite a demonstrated willingness to assist, Diasporas’ fundraising capacity is currently limited by the structures and resources of their constituent institutions, including families and hometown associations (HTAs).8 Despite this, some analysts have pointed to the positive effects of investments by diasporic entrepreneurs in their countries of origin. This observation is especially relevant in the case of individuals and firms operating transnationally. However, as Affleck notes in his study of the US-Caribbean entrepreneur, and as is reflected in various studies on Diaspora (see Affleck 1981, Henry 1994 and CRRF 2000), many begin businesses as a response to discrimination and lack access to external sources of capital. The majority of business owners may therefore not be in a position to invest significant sums into long-term projects or instruments into their countries of origin. The increasing dependence of Caribbean states such as Jamaica on foreign exchange earnings from overseas workers, coupled with the highly volatile and mature industry, tourism, characterized by inflexibility, high cost-return ratios and vulnerability to natural disasters and newcomers (Sanders, 2003: 6) places the Caribbean in a position of extreme vulnerability. Variations in the North American labour market affect tourism demand as demand for the service is highly elastic and migrant workers tend to be among the first casualties of economic downturn through layoffs in construction and retail sectors as well as low-end manufacturing retrenchment. In addition, the positive collective impact of the Diaspora on infrastructural development and poverty reduction must be balanced against the question of moral hazard, where governments may be able to take politically inconvenient measures to address social and economic imbalances within the country by the very existence of strong remittance flows. This moral hazard, in addition to threatening government spending on basic infrastructure, can also extend to spending on other forms of human capital development as education and health. In terms of verifiable effects, however, it is admittedly difficult to establish definite causal relationships between increases in remittance flows and reduction in social spending. In fact, there is a plausible case for the inverse. It can be argued also that in already poor policy environments, diasporic remittances may be preferable to other forms of foreign assistance due to the usual lack of contingencies and greater levels of consultation between donors and receivers. Another element of the debate on the contribution of migration to the social sector centres on the impact of migration on the health and education sectors of various Caribbean states. While between 2% and 7% of total remittances are dedicated to educational expenses (Suro, 2003), the concomitant loss of professionals in the education and health care sector places severe pressure on systems of human capital reproduction in Caribbean countries (Mittelman, 2000: 285-286). Jamaica alone, between 2000 and 2002, recorded the loss of two thousand teachers through migration, while the majority of resignations by teachers in Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago in the same period have also been linked to migration (Jackson-Miller: 1-2). The effect of migration by health care professionals on the Caribbean is even more pronounced. Despite a surplus of medical professionals in countries such as Cuba, most Caribbean states feature characteristics similar to Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica where, at a time when the HIV/AIDS crisis and increases in chronic diseases related to aging populations continue to take a serious toll on health budgets throughout the region, the migration of medical professionals has placed the health-care sector in an even more precarious position. As Schmid notes in her study on the health-care sector in Trinidad and Tobago, over the period 1998-2003 nurse outmigration has led to forced mergers of wards, an increased use of part-time staff and student trainees and the closing of several community health centres (maternity) that were opened in the 1980s (Schmid, 2003: 17). The relationship between migration, remittances and health has at least one other dimension. Circular migration among sex workers and the relatively high incidence of drug abuse, use of prostitutes, and poor and dangerous working conditions raise the possibility of increased incidences of disabilities, chronic diseases or sexually-transmitted infections, including HIV/AIDS. These risks, in addition to the still uncalculated costs of social services to deal with these diseases and infections, threaten the maintenance of a healthy workforce- a key ingredient for economic growth- and weigh significantly against the positive effects of remittances on the social infrastructure of the Caribbean countries.9 Migration theory has for some time regarded emigration as an avenue for the movement of surplus or unsuitable factors to other labour markets. This argument is challenged by the reality of social and political obstacles to market clearance. In other words, while surplus or unsuitable factors may move from home countries to new markets, the integration of these factors into the latter is often complicated by linguistic, legal and political barriers. This is exemplified by the experiences of migrants in the recognized professions. In Canada, for example, whereas professional migrants are actively recruited (e.g. teachers, lawyers, engineers, doctors, nurses, computer and laboratory technologists),10 migrants qualified to practice in these higher-paid professions have traditionally found accreditation and licensing extremely difficult (Kunz, Milan and Schetagne, 2000: 11). Despite intermittent reforms, preference continues to be given to nationals except in the case of migrants willing to settle in non-metropolitan areas or non-traditional provinces i.e. other than British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario and Québec. In some cases, the cost and complexity of the accreditation process, which may also include non-paid retraining and testing, may be beyond the resources of recently arrived migrants (Kunz, Milan and Schetagne, 2000: 11). Even when employed, immigrants in Canada earn significantly [16% (male) and 7% (female)] less than Canadian-born white workers. This scenario is especially worrying for the Caribbean region which, unlike Central America or Mexico has a fairly high level of educational attainment among its North American diaspora (Mellyn, 2003: 6). In Jamaica, for example, over 90% of legal migrants to the US over 25 years had secondary (46.6) or tertiary (45.27) level education (Adams, 2003: 24). In practice, therefore, the potential for productive investment in the South as a return for the emigration of highly-skilled workers may be significantly reduced as individuals opt for lower-paying occupations in the short to medium term. In the last year of the 20th century, Peter G. Peterson opined that “global aging will become the transcendent political and economic issue” of the next hundred years, destined to “dominate and daunt the public policy agendas of all the developed countries” (Peterson, 2000: 5). In the same year, in its report Replacement Migration: Is it A Solution to Declining and Aging Populations? the Population Division of the United Nations confirmed the need for concern or attention. Table 9: Regional Population by Age Group: 2000/2015  It revealed that it would be highly unlikely that the rapidly aging ‘developed’ nations of Europe, North America and East Asia would attain a replacement-level fertility rate in the foreseeable future. In addition, one of the major findings of the UN study was that despite the massive numbers of immigrants required to offset general population decline in the Global North, even larger were the “numbers of migrants needed to offset declines in the working-age population” (Pop. Div, 2000: 7). This reality has already had an effect on international immigration policy and outcomes. To take one example, the majority of migrants arriving in Canada during the 1990s were aged between 25 and 44 (46%). In fact, working age migrants accounted for 66% of the growth in Canada’s working age population. The impact was heaviest in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal, where almost 74% of the new migrants aged 25-64 were living in 2001. It is these major and global cities that are dominated by migration from the South (including People’s Republic of China, Jamaica, Haiti, Guyana, the Philippines, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, South Korea and Vietnam). It is foreseeable then that remittances to the South should continue to increase over the medium term. Lipietz (1998) presents a range of possibilities for labour in a new techno-economic paradigm. His most probable, in my view, is a mix of Kalmarism, or multi-skilled, semi-autonomous work with flexible time and Neo-Taylorism, where workers (usually women, children and/or indentured/prison labourers) perform repetitive, deskilled tasks, and are hired and laid-off in accordance with demand (Wigfield: 34). Table 10: Projected Countries/Areas for Population Decline, 2000-2050
Source: International Organization for Migration In other terms, the re-organisation of production, the post-Fordist (or neo-Fordist) techno-economic paradigm combines the decentralisation of management, the centralisation of high-skill work in the core and the outsourcing of low-skilled production to a younger, racialised and gendered periphery. Even as these tendencies are mitigated at this time by the very nature of certain sectors (i.e. the immobility of key factors of production and the increasing need for low-cost services in the core), the structure of diaspora in the post-Fordist period reflects this possibility, with an increased outflux of both highly-skilled individuals and unskilled and/or illegal migrants from the (geographical) periphery to satisfy the need for domestic services and various forms of unskilled labour. Among the best means for witnessing the effects of these trends is gender analysis of the Caribbean migrant populations. Indeed, as Bolles (1999:25) argues, “gender…analysis can actually deepen the understanding of Caribbean reality, as well as point the way towards what needs to be done.” 11 Gender is a constitutive element in the formation of labour markets which affects the sexual division of labour, the nature of hierarchy in the working environment and, perhaps most importantly, the location, duration and rewards of work (Brah, 1996: 128). By the early 1980s, both Bolles (1981) and Gordon (1981) reported that a majority semi-skilled and unskilled Caribbean labour diaspora featured a vast majority of women, mostly employed in low-skill occupations (Gordon, 1981: 31). The entrenchment of a female-based underclass within the Caribbean Diaspora has serious implications for the capacity of the Diaspora to support Caribbean development in their country of origin and destination. Table 11: Female Migrants as % of Total International Migrants, 1960-2000
Source: Zlotnik, H. Global Dimensions of Female Migration (2003) While the male sojourner pattern continued into the 1960s with Caribbean migrations to England and the USA, as the post-Fordist period began (1972-1979), “at least fifty-one percent of the immigrants to England and the USA from Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados, Guyana, Jamaica, St. Kitts-Nevis, and Antigua were women” (Bonnett: 140). Starting in 1965, female immigrants12 entered occupational roles such as custodians, domestics, factory hands, sales personnel, secretaries and paraprofessionals in the public service agencies (Bryce-Laporte, 1981: ix). Legal immigrants from 1966 to 1978 in the USA featured a 2:3 male-to-female ratio (2,891,925 women of a total of 4,409,802). For example, as Bolles (1981) suggests, 58% of Jamaican migrants to the USA between 1962 and 1976 were women. Coupled with traditional matrifocal family structures, the re-gendering of Caribbean labour migration is also central to the phenomenon of transnationalisation of Caribbean households. The potential for the incorporation of increasing numbers of women in caring work in the aging North raises complications for family reunification, especially due to the live-in work arrangements commonly required of geriatric care. Illegal Trade, Drug Trafficking and Global Diasporic NetworksBeyond the monetary or physical aspects of remittances, research on the Diasporas in various parts of the global South points to the value of returning migrants as agents of technology transfer, as well as intangibles such as knowledge of foreign markets and social norms (see Kapur, 2001; Brinkerhoff, 2003; Johnson and Sedaca, 2004). One must balance these indications against the reality of skill mismatch and fragility of many projects of return migration (Kurlansky, 1992). In addition, the flow of human capital and ideas from Diasporas to their homelands has not always had positive effects. For example, a major issue in the Caribbean and the wider LAC region has been the deportation of naturalized criminals to their ‘countries of origin’.13 The effects of these deportations include a loss of income and family breakup for households in North America (Bower, 2001). As Headley notes, the significant rise and persistence of violent crime in several Caribbean countries can be linked to the return of deported criminals, especially from North America (Headley, 1996: 10). As Sanders notes (2003: 9), the creation of networks by deported criminals has added to local and regional law enforcement problems and prospective costs by increasing the incidence of drug and arms trafficking, kidnapping, and creating the need for more efficient tracking, monitoring and control of deported individuals. Interviews with deported individuals have revealed a lack of institutional capacity in Trinidad and Tobago for their representation and reintegration. Criminal deportees may have useful skills and experience, but are not rapidly absorbed. The drug nexus is infrequently noticed in contemporary international relations or international political economy studies. Stack (2000) argues that ethnicity (and by extension diasporic identity), “is hugely relevant to any discussion of international drug trafficking because the production, trafficking, and sale of drugs often take place in ethnic communities within states and across state boundaries” (Stack, 2000: 81). Chinese, Colombian, Irish, Italian, Jewish, and more recently Russian immigrant communities in North America have often used crime as the “basis for upward mobility” (Stack, 2000: 82-90). As Griffith (2000: xiv) notes, the drug trade is in fact a testament to the logistical and economic capacity of the Caribbean transnational or diasporic economy, where “organic linkages among diasporic communities from the Caribbean…facilitate the transnational trade in North American (now European and Asian as well) cities.…” It should be kept in mind, however, that the illicit drug industry in the Caribbean has traditionally been controlled by multinational or local elite groups (Headley, 1996: 31). It is more accurate to state that the slight alterations in the division of labour that are necessitated by the nature of the enterprise have created the crevices that have allowed more democratic participation in this highly lucrative trade. Of the major transnational crimes, namely money laundering, cross-border fraud, theft of intellectual property, terrorism and the facilitation of tax evasion, the areas which most involve the diasporic economy are the ‘physical’ elements of traffic in drugs, humans and, to a lesser extent, arms. With the decline of the labour-intensive banana and textile industries in the region, the drug trade has become one the few lucrative, labour-intensive industries that remain open, in particular to the urban poor (Griffith, 2000: xiv). Illicit drugs provide an export good and potential for raising capital in Caribbean economies dominated by closely-knit local elites and foreign capital (Griffith: 19). While the Caribbean plays only a minor role in the production of illicit drugs, with only Belize and Jamaica as active drug-producing states in the region, the region does figure quite prominently in the inter-American illicit drug industry (Maingot, 1994: 469). Each Caribbean island plays a distinctive role. Jamaica is the region’s premier producer and exporter of marijuana. In fact, it can be argued that Jamaica’s competitive advantage in ‘high grade’ cannabis was key to its diversification and integration into other areas of the global narcotics industry (Headley, 1996: 19). The Dominican Republic is a major transhipment point for South American cocaine into Puerto Rico and the rest of the USA. The advanced financial infrastructure of Aruba, Bahamas, and the Cayman Islands, as well as the highly corrupt financial sectors of Haiti serve as havens for money laundering sector of the illegal drug industry (Kawell, 2002: 16). Despite this diversity, the effects of the transnational narcotics trade are widespread enough so as to constitute a regional concern. The flow of drugs and arms through Caribbean complicates legitimate trade, as countries’ exports are held for close inspections (Griffith, 2000: 21). In addition, investigating and addressing crime involves a diversion of economic resources. The image of the Caribbean as a drug transhipment area, partially as a result of illegal flows within the diasporic political economy, has serious implications for the overall economic development of the region. For example, the concomitant shipment of legal and illegal exports from the Caribbean has led to costly delays as customs officials in North America disrupt legitimate shipments. The effect of the diasporic narcotics trade is not felt only in the region. The image and lifestyle of Caribbean diasporas in North America and Western Europe have been profoundly shaped by the geopolitics and techno-economic paradigms within the global illegal drug (esp. cocaine) industry. A key example is that of the Jamaican Diaspora. Since 1984, overseas Jamaicans in Canada, the USA and Great Britain have created a Global Production Network, based on the trafficking (import and distribution) of illegal drugs (Headley, 1996: 4). In addition, since 1986, Chinese Tongs and Triads have participated in the wholesale import of heroin into the USA, especially in New York City, and have provided the product to African-American and Hispanic retailers for distribution (Stack, 2000: 90). Caribbean diasporans have therefore been directly (through participation) or indirectly (through proximity to African-American and Latin-American communities) implicated in the trade of heroin. This has meant that the drug phenomenon has been centred in Caribbean and Black urban neighbourhoods of North American global cities, creating social and economic strife for Caribbean diasporic citizens. Damage has also been done to the social image of the Caribbean migrant in the highly publicised “War on Drugs” by American law enforcement agencies. In considering the value of increased remittance revenues, therefore, one must include the externalities of the transnationalisation of households as a growing number of children and adolescents in Caribbean states are unsupervised by parents or guardians who may spend months or years at a time abroad. A lack of counselling and advisory facilities has allowed the emergence of serious personal and social problems among the offspring of migrants in the region. As social costs associated with the migration phenomenon increase, the funds available for the support of these projects are decreasing. Another aspect of moral hazard may be revealed in decreases in Offical Development Assistance (ODA) as the development community appears to be focused on the improvement of efficiency in recruitment and remittance as an alternative to measures such as debt relief. Remittances and Business Development- An entrepreneurial approachIn the following section, I focus on two aspects of the emerging commercial opportunities afforded the Caribbean service sector by Global Diasporic Networks and their socio-economic contexts in the North, value-added financial services and diasporic educational services. Trade in Services represents a large contribution to Caribbean economies, however diversification of non-tourism exports is slow in the Caribbean, though minor advances have been made in areas such as financial services (Barbados, OECS), information services (Barbados, Jamaica), and entertainment (mainly in Jamaica). In terms of financial services, Caribbean strategies have revolved around the creation of non-selective tax havens and offshore financial centres that register transactions arranged and managed in other areas. While Western Union and MoneyGram are the major players in the Americas, their costs have remained non-competitive and their competitiveness has been maintained by joint-ventures, franchising and brand loyalty. Larger American firms such as Wells Fargo, Citibank and Bank One, though attracted to the market, have been much slower to move, immobilised by institutional risk aversion and the tendency to use regressive fees on their clientele (higher charges for smaller accounts). Caribbean financial firms, including banks, credit unions, and building societies, may be able to take advantage of this hesitance and the ingrained mutual distrust between the immigrant and minority consumer and mainstream financial institutions in North America to carve out a highly lucrative international niche.
Products applicable to a diasporic market include: 1. Payroll programs: Already offered by several larger banks in North America, payroll cards, co-branded by credit agencies such as Visa™ may be offered to employers who deposit funds directly into the accounts of immigrant and/or teenaged employees.
As in the case of Central-American concern, Aloo.com, the remittance market presents interesting linkages with telecommunications/data transfer industries. Telecommunications linkages with the remittance economy include the purchase of telephony equipment and ‘talk-time’ as remittances in kind; and the telecommunications services usually involved in requesting, advising of or confirming receipt of remittance transactions. Money transfer, though primarily a financial endeavour, also presents significant opportunities to information technology specialists (specialised software design, database management) in the region. The integration of postal services with wireless and integrated remittance services (financial, shipping, telecommunications) represents an area for growth in the South. The increasing embeddedness of the culture of the cellular phone also presents interesting possibilities for the integration of infrastructural services in the diasporic economy (see Horst and Miller, 2006).
The Israeli/Jewish, Indian and Armenian diasporas provide excellent examples of the potential for innovation in the financial sector with regard to mobilising funds for long-term investments and philanthropic ventures. Special products include the issue of 15- or 20-year bonds that can be bought by grandparents for the grandchildren’s educational expenses (North and Whitehead, 1991: 30). Regional insurance companies and mutual funds in concert with diasporic organisations can successfully market such ventures to the professional classes of the diaspora.
The lower stratum of the Diaspora represents the major source of remittance income for LAC states, and is relatively more likely to have offspring remain in the country of origin, explaining in part the high incidence of remittances. The Caribbean’s approach to diasporic relations may require greater attention to this section14 of the Caribbean Diaspora. Income-based investments may be concentrated in the education of the second generation and/or real estate in the country of origin, but the maintenance of links with the home country, though usually quite strong, are limited by work schedule, questions of immigrant status, and the lower strata’s ability to finance travel to the Caribbean. The class of illegal migrants can be considered a subset of the lower stratum because of the limited interaction that is afforded to them by their status. Illegal migration also has a pronounced negative effect on diasporic tourism. Due to the complications involved with return, illegal migrants are generally non-circulatory and tend to have only perfunctory contact with the formal banking system. The illegal migrant population can be seen as a resource which can be moved into the banking system to the benefit of the home country. Directory: file -> fetch fetch -> 11 th Lit Semester 1 Final Study Guide!!! fetch -> Industrial Revolution Inventors fetch -> Analysis for Galveston Hurricane of 1900 fetch -> The Illuminators (Team 2) 1900 Galveston Hurricane Cycle a team Assignment fetch -> Team csi-utb ruth Reyes Jose Ferrer fetch -> Galveston Hurricane of 1900 Cycle a-teacher as a Problem Solver fetch -> Is Climate Change Starting a New Dust Bowl? Cycle A fetch -> What makes a storm a hurricane fetch -> The 1950s were the "Happy Days" because it was a time of economic prosperity, technology development, new entertainment, new fashion and family growth. The 1950s was a great time fetch -> Sputnik and The Dawn of the Space Age Download 186.21 Kb. Share with your friends:
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