MIGRATION AND THE WELL-BEING OF THE ‘LEFT BEHIND’ IN ASIA

This paper serves as an introduction to the three substantive papers in this themed section on the impact of migration on the well-being of the ‘left behind’ in Asia. In the light of recent migration trends such as the ‘feminization’ of migration and ‘brain-drain’ of health workers in the region, the paper provides a brief review of the existing scholarly literature on the vulnerability of different groups of the 'left behind’, particularly women, children and the elderly. It argues that a multi-dimensional approach is needed, taking into consideration not only the economic impact of remittances but also factors such as social networks and gender effects.     

华侨留守儿童的家庭教育资源与人格、行为的关系——以温州市为例的研究

采用问卷调查方式对148名华侨留守儿童、44名国内留守儿童与187名非留守儿童进行家庭教育资源、人格和行为的调查,旨在分析探讨华侨留守儿童家庭教育资源、人格与行为的特点及其关系。结果显示,华侨留守儿童的家庭教育资源、人格、行为与国内留守儿童具有显著差异;留守儿童与非留守儿童的家庭教育资源、人格、行为也具有显著差异。得出结论,华侨留守儿童的家庭教育资源、人格与行为均不如国内留守儿童、非留守儿童;与父辈生活在一起的华侨留守儿童遭受更多的惩罚与羞辱,初中生的家庭教育资源好于小学生;华侨留守儿童女生的宜人性高于男生,男生的违纪行为和攻击行为多于女生;华侨留守儿童的家庭教育资源影响其人格,人格又影响其行为。     

The Siberian Curse: How Communist Planners Left Russia Out in the Cold. Fiona Hill and Clifford Gaddy

An American geographer examines the return migration of ethnic Kazakhs from Mongolia to their ancestral homeland of Kazakhstan, and the adjustment problems confronting them upon return. This specific example of "diasporic return migration" is emblematic of a process affecting nearly every state within the former USSR, and is especially acute in Central Asia. The study, based on the author's interviews, explores obstacles to the integration of Mongolian-Kazakhs into Kazakhstani society, and raises the question of whether this process might best be conceptualized as "repatriation" or "patriation." Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: F22, J61, O18, R23. 54 references.     

Chinese migrants,morality and film ethics in Italian cinema

During 2004–2011, Italian cinema intervened in the ongoing public debates about Chinese immigration to Italy with 15 notable films, which provided a window into the moral and ethical practices of the filmmakers and those of the fictional characters, or interviewees, in their films. This migratory phenomenon, in turn, offered filmmakers a variety of stimuli and perspectives from which to contemplate the moral stakes in screening Chinese migrants in Italy in films. Italian-Chinese films, insofar as they address the self–other relationship, lend themselves to an ethical analysis. I show that Italian documentary films genuinely feature the lives of Chinese migrants through restrained and socially conscious creative means. In contrast, relevant feature films often center on the plight of marginalized native Italian characters, adopting artistic license appropriate to their market-oriented production ethos.     

Unpacking children in migration research

In the light of calls for children's geographers to attend to happenings beyond the localised perception of children themselves, this piece considers the state of migration studies when it comes to the experiences of children and young people. It provides an overview of existing research and suggests that in the context of migration, more could be done to foreground the perspectives of children in their own right. Given that attending to everyday experience is an endeavour of concern to adult-centric migration research, the paper concludes by suggesting that this might be an area in which children's geographers could contribute to another sub-discipline.     

Children of migrants in China in the twenty-first century: trends,living arrangements,age-gender structure,and geography

ABSTRACT

Children – including those of migrants – are China’s future. Children of migrants now make up close to 40% of all children in China. This paper analyzes the recent trends from 2000 to 2016 and the major aspects of the children of migrants by distilling data from multiple large national surveys and assessing the very small rural left-behind children (LBC) population figures published by the Ministry of Civil Affairs in 2016. The paper also develops a method to estimate the LBC population generated by migrants in each provincial destination between 2010 and 2015, linking up different but related populations (adult migrants, migrant children, and LBC) in the origins and destinations. This broader “origin-destination” framework allows us to pinpoint clearly a major driver of LBC and hence to identify provinces needing the most attention in national and provincial efforts to alleviate the problem of LBC.

Abbreviations: MC: Migrant Children; LBC: Left-Behind Children; MPR: Migration Participation Rate: LBCG: Left-Behind Children Generated     

海外华人跨国主义实践的模式及其差异——基于美国与新加坡的比较分析

论文参考有关跨国主义的理论文献和实证研究,分析了移民个人、移民社会以及民族国家在国际移民进程和跨国活动中所扮演的不同角色,考察了在美国和新加坡的华人新移民及其社团组织与祖籍国之间互动模式的变化。结果显示,由于国际移民的迁移历史以及移居国(地)结构的多重差异,导致了海外华人社会在人口构成和族裔社区建设等方面存在显著差异。个人、社团、祖籍国和移居国实际上并不是单方面地影响着海外华人的跨国活动及其与祖籍国的互动关系,他们的互动关系还受到国家关系和地缘政治等宏观因素的制约。因此,国际移民参与跨国活动的主要目的是为了寻求更好的、更广阔的创业和就业机会,以便提高个人和族群在移居国的社会地位,但其结果因移居国社会的结构因素影响而产生差异。     

The impacts of parental migration on children’s subjective well-being in rural china: a double-edged sword

ABSTRACT

The emerging problem of left-behind children has attracted mounting academic and policy attention. Prior studies primarily cast light on left-behind children’s education, health, and behavior, while their subjective well-being is much less understood yet. Based on a nationally representative sample of rural children aged 10–15 in 2014, we examine the impacts of different types of parental migration on children’s subjective well-being and how these affects vary between boys and girls. The results show that parental migration is a double-edged sword: children from both-parent migrant families report compromised life satisfaction and relationship quality compared with those in integral families, and mother-only migration significantly lowers children’s subjective health. On the flip side, father-only migration enhances children’s aspiration for attaining college, an encouraging effect that is even stronger than that of parental education and family income. These effects are heterogeneous by children’s gender: boys seem to be more susceptible to the disruptive effects of both-parent migration; mother-only migration effectively promotes girls’ educational aspiration while father-only migration promotes boys’. This study portrays a comprehensive image of left-behind children. Relaxation of hukou restriction, equal access to education, and revitalization of rural economies are imperative to improve the well-being of left-behind children.

Abbreviations: LBC: Left-behing children; SWB: subjective well-being     

Pre-flight experiences and migration stories: the accounts of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children

Much work about transnational migration and mobility overlooks the active role of children in such processes and experiences. This paper counters the omission from the literature by exploring the pre-flight experiences and migration stories of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children in Scotland. In doing so, we demonstrate that unaccompanied minors experience a range of traumatic situations in their countries of origin including, the death or persecution of family members, war, forced recruitment and personal persecution. In their experiences of transnational migration processes, the majority are brought by an agent, with accounts of smuggling and trafficking being minimal.     

Constructing Homeland Security: An Anemic Policy Regime

This research addresses the strength of the homeland security policy regime that was constructed after the terrorist attacks of September 2001. We argue that homeland security provides a preeminent example of the challenges of developing policy regimes that focus policymaking on a common goal across diverse subsystems. All the ingredients for fashioning a powerful regime were in place after the terrorist attacks of September 2001—a common purpose, engaged stakeholders, and institutional redesign. But for a variety of reasons that we discuss, the results are far from cohesive. The lessons we draw are more general ones regarding factors that influence the strength of boundary‐spanning policy regimes.     

语言问题与守护我们的母语

所有生命靠着信息摹写自己的世界.世界是由事实而不是由事物构造而成,所有事实是由符号的边连结方式构成.因此,要注意语言和言语、能指和所指的区别和关系.守护我们的母语,就是守护我们的家园.     

Assessing Measures Designed to Protect the Homeland

Some general parameters are proposed for evaluating homeland security measures that seek to make potential targets notably less vulnerable to terrorist attack, and these are then applied to specific policy considerations. Since the number of targets is essentially unlimited, since the probability that any given target will be attacked is near zero, since the number and competence of terrorists is limited, since target-selection is effectively a near-random process, and since a terrorist is free to redirect attention from a protected target to an unprotected one of more or less equal consequence, protection seems to be sensible only in a limited number of instances.     

Migration in childhood and its impact on national identity construction among migrants from Northern Ireland

While there is currently only a tiny literature available on Northern Ireland migration, nothing at all has as yet been published relating to the subject of the province's child migrants. This paper focuses on the migration experiences of individuals who migrated as children to and from Northern Ireland, based on interview narratives collected during the course of two studies on contemporary migration from Ireland, North and South, conducted from 2004 to 2008. In all cases, these experiences triggered identity issues for the individuals which have played out subsequently in their lives in different ways. In particular, the author seeks to understand how the memory of these events continues to construct present realities for these individuals. What awareness did these children have of sectarianism, of the Northern Ireland conflict? What was their reception in the host country and upon return to Northern Ireland? How have these experiences contributed to their identities in the present and their sense of belonging to Ireland, North and South?     

Home divided,home reconstructed: children in rural–urban migration in contemporary China

This article is centred on the geographies of Chinese children in contemporary China – an area which has been problematically overlooked in geographical literature on childhood. In employing unique mobile research methods by tracking migrant children through the migration cycle, the author conducted an extensive ethnographic study of rural migrant children aged 8–17 in China. The article explores rural children's everyday lived experience of migration and how migrant children negotiate and articulate home and belonging while on the move. The study demonstrates the dynamic environment that migrant children inhabit, the fluid, contextual and mobile nature of their life in rural migrant households, their migrancy and their active involvement in homemaking.     

Rethinking ‘trafficking’ in children's migratory processes: the role of social networks in child labour migration in Bangladesh

Although the academic and policy literature on children's migration is growing, an in-depth look of the operationalisation of networks in child labour migration is missing. The focus of policy-makers on human trafficking draws attention to children's vulnerability and their exploitation at the hands of traffickers. In the absence of research focusing on children's migration more broadly, this emphasis on trafficking risks misreading children's migratory processes. Ethnographic research undertaken in Bangladesh shows that while some exploitation may occur, it co-exists alongside gendered relations of protection. This draws attention to the need for more in-depth examination of children's networks in migration.