A mobilities perspective on migration in the context of environmental change

an article by Hanne Wiegel, Ingrid Boas and Jeroen Warner (Wageningen University, The Netherlands) published in WIREs Climate Change Volume 10 Issue 6 (November/December 2019)

Visual abstract

This coastal community in Bangladesh is affected by daily tidal inflow. Several families have moved, while others remain. Understanding dynamics between mobility and immobility in the context of environmental changes requires a mobilities approach offering a grounded perspective of the daily practices of movement.


Abstract

Academic, political, and policy debates about the connection between environmental change and human migration have long focused on migration drivers and outcomes, resulting in a limited discussion between the discourses of “desolate climate refugees” and “environmental migrants as agents of adaptation.”

These perspectives remain dominant, particularly in policy and media circles, despite academic critique and the recent emergence of more diverse approaches.

In this intervention, we contribute to the recent turn in environmental migration research by seeking to better ground and pluralise our understanding of how environmental change and human mobility relate.

We do so by offering a mobilities perspective that centres on the practices, motives, and experiences of mobility and immobility in the context of environmental change:
When and why do people decide to move — or not to move — in response to environmental changes?
How do they cope with migration pressures?
Where do they move, under what conditions, and who can or must stay behind?

This approach attends to the diverse aspirations and differential capabilities that underlie particular practices of movement or non-movement, reflecting both individual characteristics as well as interconnections with uneven power relations across local, regional, and global scales.

A mobilities approach offers a starting point for an expanded research agenda on environmental im/mobilities. This enables academic analysis and policy discussion of the human (im)mobility‐environmental change nexus to become better attuned to the actual practice and heterogeneous needs of those affected.

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Governing imperial citizenship: a historical account of citizenship revocation

an article by Deirdre Troy (Queen Mary University of London, UK) published in Citizenship Studies Volume 23 Issue 4 (2019)

Abstract

In recent years, citizenship revocation has become synonymous with terrorism, regarded as a practice reserved for the most dangerous of citizens. Yet in the UK revocation has a much longer history, spanning over 100 years, with a narrative that extends beyond the nation-state and into Empire.

This paper asks what may be learned from a historical account of citizenship revocation?

Exploring its emergence as part of the British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act 1914, this account suggests that revocation should not be analyzed in isolation but as a practice embedded in polices of immigration, naturalization, and emigration.

This paper illustrates the ways in which these policies code subjects based on race, class and gender in order to govern their mobility. From this study, it argues that citizenship revocation cannot be explained solely through security claims and suggests that the 2018 cases should be considered in the context of revocation’s history.

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“Superdiversity”: a new paradigm for inclusion in a transnational world

an article by Banu Ozkazanc-Pan (University of Massachusetts, Boston, USA; Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, USA) published in Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal Volume 38 Issue 4 (2019)

Abstract

Purpose
Transnational migration has become a defining feature of many societies across the globe. This paper focuses on contributions to diversity theorizing and research available from “superdiversity”, an analytic framework derived from transnational migration studies. “Superdiversity” speaks to the novel social transformations taking place globally and provides new opportunities, albeit with critique, for conceptualizing and studying people, difference and inclusion. The purpose of this paper is to provide innovative ways to rethink hallmark concepts of diversity scholarship by offering new insights about the role of nation-states, the concept of difference and inclusion in the midst of mobility.

Design/methodology/approach
The paper relies upon transnational migration studies as an emergent field of inquiry about societal level changes brought upon by the ongoing movement of people. The social, cultural and political transformations growing out of transnational migration are used to theorize new directions for diversity research in the context of management and organization studies. By relying on “superdiversity” and its mobility-based ontology, epistemology and methodology, the paper proposes new ways to think about and carry out research on difference and inclusion.

Findings
Deploying the analytic framework of “superdiversity,” the paper offers “belonging” as the new conversation on inclusion and proposes mobile methods as a means to study mobile subjects/objects. In addition, it discusses how the ongoing transformative societal changes by way of transnational migration impact the ways in which the author theorizes and carry out diversity research. Questions and concerns around ethics, (in)equality and representation are considered vital to future research in/around diversity.

Originality/value
Extensive changes in societies emerging out of ongoing encounters between/among different kinds of people have taken shape by way of transnational migration. As a result, emergent and novel notions of difference have been forged in a transnational manner across social fields. By examining these transformations, the paper provides new directions and challenges for diversity scholarship in the context of rising societal tensions and rhetoric around difference and “belonging” in nation-states. It also provides alternative considerations for understanding and theorizing inclusion in diversity research.

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The influence of grandparents’ social class on children’s aspiration

an article by Vanessa Moulton, Eirini Flouri, Heather Joshi and Alice Sullivan (UCL Institute of Education, London, UK) published in British Journal of Sociology of Education Volume 38 Issue 4 (2017)

Abstract

Social class mobility from grandparent to grandchild is a relatively neglected topic. Grandparents today are often healthier and more active, and have longer relationships with their grandchildren than in previous generations.

We used data from the UK’s Millennium Cohort Study (n = 8570) to investigate the influence of maternal and paternal grandparents’ social class on the aspirations of children at age seven. Using path analysis and controlling for family income, mother’s and father’s education, lone motherhood, and child’s ethnicity and gender, we found very small direct effects from the paternal grandmother’s social class to the grandchild’s classed aspirations, and small, indirect effects, via parents’ class, of grandparents’ class on child’s classed aspirations.

Multi-group analyses found few differences by ethnicity and gender. There was no evidence that, at this age, mixed-class parentage raises the aspirations of working-class children (the ‘sunken middle-class’ hypothesis).

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The embodiment of knowledge: universities as engines of growth

an article by Reinhilde Veugelers (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium) published in Oxford Review of Economic Policy Volume 32 Issue 4 (Winter 2016)

Abstract

As universities open themselves up to the marketplace for knowledge and ideas to a greater degree than in the past, debates over university missions has been common.

How can universities match their third mission, contribution to society, with their main missions of education and curiosity-driven basic research to achieve their full growth potential?

This will require a change in policy attention from targeting university patenting and faculty spin-offs, to taking a broader view on universities’ contribution to economic development, including other pathways, most notably collaborative modes and mobility of trained human capital from academe to industry.

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Destination dumping ground: The convergence of ‘unwanted’ populations in disadvantaged city areas

an article by Lynda Cheshire (The University of Queensland, Australia) and Gina Zappia (University of Tasmania, Australia) published in Urban Studies Volume 53 Number 10 (2016)

Abstract

Academic and lay discourses around disadvantaged urban areas often draw on the language of ‘dumping grounds’ to encapsulate the poverty, marginalisation and social problems often found there. Yet the concept of a dumping ground remains insufficiently theorised.

This paper addresses this issue by identifying five constituent features of the dumping ground:

• the perception of people as waste whose fate is to be discarded;
• the need to accommodate this human ‘waste’ and the logic by which places are selected for this purpose;
• the mechanisms through which this spatial sorting occurs as problem populations are moved to their ‘rightful’ place;
• the relations of power which enforce or encourage this mobility; and finally,
• the reactions of incumbent residents in neighbourhoods that are compelled to host unwanted social groups.

In the second part of this paper, these themes are illustrated via a case study of the Australian city of Logan where residents complain that their city has been treated as a dumping ground in order to explain its poor reputation.

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The Influence of Social Background on Participation in Adult Education: Applying the Cultural Capital Framework

an article by Sebastiano Cincinnato, Bram De Wever, Hilde Van Keer and Martin Valcke (Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium) published in Adult Education Quarterly Volume 66 Number 2 (May 2016)

Abstract

In this article, we address the issue of participation in adult education building on the cultural capital framework. This theoretical framework suggests that (educational) practices are affected by one’s social background and, more precisely, by the cultural resources handed down in the family context.

To examine the validity of this theoretical framework, we build on data from the Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies from 23 countries (n = 120,789). The Programme data allow using the variables parents’ educational level (a proxy for social background), educational attainment, and readiness to learn as precursors of participation in adult education (both a proxy for cultural capital).

Our findings suggest that the cultural capital framework is not fully suited to explain participation in adult education: Although social background has an (indirect) influence on participation, its effect does not concur with theoretical predictions, that is, mediated by the readiness to learn.

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Getting Around When You’re Just Getting By: Transportation Survival Strategies of the Poor

an article by Evelyn Blumenberg (UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies, Los Angeles, California) and Asha Weinstein Agrawal (San José State University, California) published in Journal of Poverty Volume 18 Issue 4 (2014)

Abstract

Researchers argue that transportation expenditures impose a heavy burden on low-income households, many of whom experience difficulty managing their travel costs. However, relatively little research explores how low-income households manage their mobility needs.

To address this issue, this study uses qualitative data from interviews with 73 low-income people living in and around San Jose, California. The interviews reveal the resiliency of low-income families in creatively managing their transportation costs.

However, the transportation survival strategies of the poor can come at a high price – fewer miles travelled and, therefore, reduced access to opportunities that may lift them out of poverty.

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National qualifications frameworks: local learning from global experience

an article by Melinda Drowley (Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education, Gloucester, UK and University of Glamorgan, Pontypridd, UK) and Helen Marshall (University of Glamorgan, Pontypridd, UK) published in Quality in Higher Education Volume 19 Issue 1 (April 2013)

Abstract

Countries developing national qualifications frameworks (NQFs) would be ill-advised simply to import models from other countries but could benefit from their experiences.

This article elucidates principles underpinning successful practice and distils lessons learned from setbacks. General purposes of NQFs are identified, noting implicit preconditions for success.

Evaluative studies illustrate tensions arising when pedagogical and socio-political assumptions embedded in the very idea of NQFs are brought to bear on socio-cultural values and traditions of learning and teaching predicated on different sets of assumptions. Questions are raised about the tendency of NQFs to perpetuate barriers to student and workforce mobility that they were supposed to dismantle.

Finally, the article examines how various countries have addressed such tensions, either by adapting their NQF to suit local practice or by attempting better to align local practice with general requirements of NQFs.

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Living on the Move: Mobility, Religion and Exclusion of Eastern European Migrants in Rural Scotland

an article by Sergei Shubin (Swansea University, Wales) published in Population, Space and Place Volume 18 Issue 5 (September/October 2012)

Abstract

The paper explores theoretical and practical issues related to spiritual mobility and engagement with Eastern European migrants in rural Scotland.

Emerging mobile lifestyles create different patterns of living ‘on the move’, but the church and other rural institutions in Scotland often fail to attend to migrants’ affective relationships with existing immigrant communities, unpredictable travelling behaviour, and cross-border spiritual links.

For this gap to be addressed, the paper develops a complex understanding of migrants living on the move. It suggests adding a spiritual element to the analysis of transnational mobilities and explores the ways in which constellations of mobility and religion generate more-than-corporeal dislocations (faith-based sensations), generate virtual movement (beyond rationality to the outside of knowing), and create new imaginations of the migrants’ place in the world.

It argues that the spiritual can be seen as an important factor in producing new social worlds and overcoming the separations and division created by migrations.

Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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Stay, leave or return? Patterns of Welsh graduate mobility

an article by Gillian Bristow, Madeleine Pill and Rhys Davies (Cardiff University) and Stephen Drinkwater (Swansea University) published in People, Place and Policy Volume 5 Issue 3 (2011)

Summary

This paper presents the initial findings of a study into Welsh graduate mobility within the UK, which has a highly uneven geography of graduate labour.

After surveying recent debates, the paper explores the extent to which Wales retains its graduate labour by examining the scale of graduate mobility and its nature in terms of qualifications. It does this by augmenting the data produced by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) with detailed analysis of Labour Force Survey (LFS) data to consider the location of successive ‘young’ graduate cohorts since the 1992 expansion of higher education.

The research finds that Wales is a net exporter of graduates and that those who migrate have higher educational attainment. However, the notion of a clear, unequivocal brain drain has to be qualified. Wales manages to retain high numbers of graduates relative to many English regions. The paper highlights that inter-regional flows of graduates are sensitive to the path dependencies of mobile graduates themselves as well as the structures of regional economies. This has implications for both higher education and regional development policies.

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Youth on the Move: ...

more support for young people's education and mobility will improve access to the job market
via Education & training

In September, the [European] Commission will adopt “Youth on the Move”, an initiative that aims to promote the mobility of students and trainees and to improve the employment situation of young people.

“Youth on the Move” will encourage EU countries to work together to give young people in Europe better opportunities to make the best of their skills. This can be achieved by improving the performance and international attractiveness of Europe’s universities and by raising the overall quality of all levels of education and training in the EU. The Commission’s upcoming proposal is a contribution to Europe 2020, the EU’s reform strategy for the coming decade. The Europe 2020 goal is to develop, over the next ten years, an economy that is based on knowledge and innovation. Young people have an important role to play in this but they need more support in order to unleash their full potential. “Youth on the Move” provides this support by contributing to better education, training and access to labour market.

Commissioner Androulla Vassiliou will hold a press conference dedicated to “Youth on the Move” on September 15. She is also keen to have an open dialogue about these important matters with the main people concerned. Their interest, opinions, experiences and participation is, of course, key to the success of the initiative and to achieving the Europe 2020 goals. She will therefore host a webstreamed debate with European youth on September 17. During this debate, the Commissioner will answer questions from a live audience, as well as from remote participants who choose to send in questions, either beforehand or in real time. More details about this event will soon be available on Commissioner Vassiliou's website.

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The Role of Career Choice in Understanding Job Mobility

an article by Ronni Pavan (Department of Economics, University of Rochester, USA) published in Labour Volume 24 Issue 2 (2010)

Abstract
This paper presents a simple model that explains how the likelihood of job changes and their complexity changes over a worker’s career, and the empirical work presented here uses the life cycle patterns of mobility and their complexity to infer the relative importance of firm-specific versus career-specific concerns as determinants of mobility decisions. The estimates of the model indicate that the contemporaneous presence of two quality matches, one career-specific and one firm-specific, is necessary to understand the patterns of the data. The model also predicts that the welfare losses implied by a disappearance of a career can be on average twice as large as the losses implied by a plant closure.

Hazel’s comment:
I’ve marked this reading the whole article when the hard copy gets onto the shelf in the British Library as it appears to present a somewhat different view of mobility from that being put forward by governments at the present time. The government view seems to be that geographic mobility is important in order to find work rather than the flexibility to move from one type of work to another or from one firm to another whether or not the geographic position has changed.

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The impact of technological mobility on workers’ careers

an article by Sumati Srinivas in Career Development International Volume 14 Issue 2 (2009)

Abstract

Purpose
The aim of this article is to define a new kind of labour mobility called technological mobility, defined here as the different levels of technological change experienced by workers as they change jobs over the course of their career. Technological mobility is viewed as a form of career mobility, and it is hypothesised that moving to jobs in higher-tech industries might prove beneficial to workers’ careers irrespective of the level of education or other measures of ability. Factors that determine upward or downward technological mobility are also investigated.
Design/methodology/approach
This hypothesis is tested using data from the NLSY79, a nationally representative survey of the United States, between the years 1988 and 2000. Determinants of upward and downward technological mobility are modeled using industry-level data on technological mobility. Technological mobility is also regressed against wages to measure its impact on careers.
Findings
Gender, education and local economic conditions are found to have a significant effect on technological mobility, but the effect varies depending on the way technological intensity is measured. The results also demonstrate that workers who move to high-tech industries are indeed rewarded with higher wages, even after controlling for education levels and other known factors.
Originality/value
Technological mobility as defined here is an original concept. It is shown to be an important component of overall career mobility. The article also provides an analysis of workers who are able to make the transition into higher-tech jobs, which is a valuable addition to the research on technological change.

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