SISTEMA DE COLECCIÓN DE SOLUCIÓN

This thesis incorporates migration as a dimension of landscapes of fertility, as this research is located within a rural area of South Africa where there is long history of migration. As a consequence, migration has a significant impact on women’s

landscapes of fertility. It is also a contextual factor influencing fertility preferences and is a product of agency and resilience as well as a being product of structural violence.

Migration is the movement of people from one place to another. It can be a forced or voluntary movement, and is stimulated by push and pull factors. Migration can occur for many reasons, such as: poor environmental conditions in the home country, the

previous movement of family, famine, war, (un)employment and many others. Migration has occurred in regions for many centuries and has “’always been part of human endeavour” (Haour-Knipe 2009:27). Of particular relevance to this thesis, migration has been studied in conjunction with structural violence, gender and HIV.

Structural violence and migration

Historically, migration played an integral part in the shaping of personal identities, as the passage of migrants and experiences of migration is understood to contribute to identity development, as does the anticipated potential for mobility (Haour-Knipe and Rector 1996). However, this natural movement of people is today restricted by state sovereignty and border control (IOM 2010). Despite these new levels of control, migration, particularly that undertaken for labour purposes has increased throughout the world over recent years. With this increased movement of people, there are also large numbers of people who migrate without visas and passports. These people are known as undocumented migrants and tend to be subjected to high levels of disadvantage that is often structurally reinforced by the host countries resulting in the creation of

situations of structural violence.

In South Africa, however, the constitution enshrines migrant rights as natural rights. Civil, political, social, cultural and economic rights are extended therefore to include the needs of migrants, regardless of citizenship. The constitution allows for access to essential services such as health care, for all, rather than allocation in terms of

citizenship (South African Constitution: Chapter 2; South African Constitution Article 27.1.a). Despite these allowances, the exercise of the constitutional guidelines in the country is not always in accordance with the law, thus creating unconstitutional disadvantage for undocumented migrants and, in many cases, subjecting them to structural disadvantage or violence (IOM 2010).

Research addressing migration and structural violence has mostly extended knowledge about the health (and other) inequalities experienced by undocumented migrant workers in the USA (Queseda et al 2011; Ordonez 2012; Holmes 2011). Whilst knowledge has been extended about the personal experiences of inequality of these undocumented migrant workers, scholars such as Scheper-Hughes argue that studies of this kind have failed to acknowledge the agency of actors within situations of structural violence (Scheper-Hughes 2008).

This thesis, therefore, explores the intersection of migration and structural violence, agency and resilience as elements of landscapes of fertility.

Migration, gender and the association with HIV

Research on migration intersects with gender studies. Historically, migration was conceptualized as a male process that was disempowering towards women. Men were conceptualized as primary migrants, or migratory leaders with their wives or partners as secondary, migratory followers (Morokvasic 1984). Alternatively, it was proposed that women stayed behind in the home community whilst the men migrated alone (ibid.). It is, however, argued that this early conceptualization of the process of migration was gender blind, and ignored the migration of women independent of their male partners (Morokvasic 1984). As a consequence, Morokvasic inspired the study of migration in collaboration with gender studies, which led to the conceptualization of, particularly younger, women as empowered migratory leaders, or “birds of passage” (Morokvasic 1984; 1986). Through this reconceptualisation, it was accepted that women as well as men can be independent labour migrants. Consequently, it is argued that Morokvasic’s contribution to literature on migration stimulated a pivotal shift in the study of gendered migration (Botteril and Janes pers comms 2013).

The historical context of migration in South Africa fits within this early paradigm. During the Apartheid years (1948-1994) the local migrant labour system was

institutionalised, and subsequently meant that black African residents lived in situations of structural violence. This institutionalised migrant labour system was a corner-stone of separate living in the country. Black African people lived in rural Bantustans (for more detail see chapter two, which is about the setting of this research), and applied for passes to reside in designated black African areas that were adjacent to employment opportunities. The majority of accommodation provided close to employment was located on marginal land surrounding cities and towns, or on the edge of farms or mines. This accommodation was single sex, for men only. Women who worked away from the Bantustan were often provided with some sort of basic accommodation at the place of work, which was usually a clinic, school, or in the grounds of a private white- owned residence. However, in reality some families migrated away from the

Bantustans to live illegally with their working family member. These were usually women who were, consequently, migratory followers of their male partners. These female migratory followers stayed illegally and with constant fear of arrest in

overcrowded accommodation meant for single men, on burgeoning informal settlements on the edge of formally designated black African residential areas, known as townships (Dubow 1992; Ngcobo 1990).

More recent research about gender and migration has addressed women’s roles as empowered agents of migration and the gendered flows of people between and within countries (Boyle and Halfacree, 1999; Kofman et al., 2000; Pessar and Mahler, 2006; Piper, 2005; Pratt and Yeoh, 2003; Raghuram, 2004). However, it can be argued that this body of literature simplifies migration to its most basic level (Haour-Knipe 2006). As a consequence, it has since been acknowledged that the process of migration is far more complex than Morokvasic and others understood. More recent scholarship has

suggested that rather than migration affecting the migrant individuals only, it should rather be conceptualized as a “family affair” as all members of the migrant(s) household can be impacted by the movement (Haour-Knipe 2009).

Thus, migration is now understood to be a process located within the household. Scholarship about this topic has concentrated on study of overseas retirement, where older retirees follow children who have previously moved overseas (Williams et al 2000; Williams and Hall 2000). However, these studies have been located within the context of economic affluence and retirement, where the migrants’ home country is an economically affluent country, and the host country either a majority world country (for example, South Africa, Jamaica) or an economically affluent country in the Southern hemisphere.

The conceptualization of migration as an intergenerational phenomenon has been used to extend knowledge about the HIV pandemic in majority world countries (Berk et al 2003; Harris et al 2005; Clark et al 2007; Knodel and van Landingham 2003; Schatz 2007; Sengozi 2007). In particular, five studies, two of which were conducted in South Africa, identified that labour migrants who contract HIV whilst in the host country are likely to return to their families for care and support at the end of their lives. Thus, in circumstances of this kind, the whole family and household are involved in the migratory process (Haour-Knipe 2009).

This research will, therefore, explore intergenerational patterns of migration in the context of the need for care, as caused by the HIV pandemic (the South African experience of HIV is discussed further in section 2.2). Due to the nature of the HIV pandemic, this could extend understandings of migration and the household in the context of majority world countries that is relevant to women’s landscapes of fertility.

Section Conclusion

It has been demonstrated that understandings of the process of migration that are of relevance to this thesis have addressed the interrelation of the concept with structural violence, resilience, HIV and fertility preferences. This thesis will extend current debate about migration associated with the household by exploring the role of

intergenerational migration within the household and its intersection with landscapes of fertility.