The contributions to this Special Issue focus on marginalised and neglected social issues associated with the migration–development nexus. It reports research on specific groups of migrants who have so far been left out of the current debate on the relationship between migration and development. This debate has tended to be dominated by structural and economic concerns. The ultimate aim of the special issue is therefore to unsettle the terms of the discussion by placing migrants and their experiences as knowledge producers (along with a range of other actors) at the centre of the debate. The complex interconnections between migration and development in the so-called ‘North’ and ‘South’ demand that a notion of development be adopted that goes beyond the dichotomy of ‘developed’ versus ‘less developed’ countries, and that leads to an understanding of development processes that occur simultaneously in different places interconnected by migration. This requires the rethinking of the parameters and paradigms that dominate the revived debate on the relationship between international migration and development. A new vocabulary for describing and analysing these complex interlinkages is required, and the notion of ‘global chains’ is suggested here as a starting point.
From ARI workshop on International Migration and Social Development, 20-21 November 2006.
