Everyday Ruptures: Children, Youth, and Migration in Global Perspective

1. Children's Agency in Family Migration Decision Making in Britain

23 Chapter 1 Children’s Agency in Family Migration Decision Making in Britain Naomi Tyrrell Traditionally, studies of why families migrate tended to focus on economic motivations for migration (Fielding 1992; Halfacree and Boyle 1993; Halfacree 2004; Smith 2004). A flurry of gender-sensitive research into migration decision making over the past two decades has analyzed women’s involvement, in particular if the women “trail” men and make sacrifices for the family (Bielby and Bielby 1992; Bonney and Love 1991; Boyle 2002; Cooke and Bailey 1996; Green 1997). However, despite the potential for this work to open up the “black box” of family migration decision making and recognize the roles of different family members, much research on family migration tends to be “adultist” (see Ackers 2000). This means that analyses of family migration decision making are rarely sensitive to age; researchers focus on adults’ experiences of family migration without due consideration to the experiences of children in migrant families (McKendrick 2001). This is surprising given that concepts such as life stage and life course have significantly influenced the development of family migration theory (see Boyle, Halfacree, and Robinson 1998; Empez Vidal, this volume; Rossi 1955). In addition, the lack of attention to children as potential migration decision makers in families is surprising because children’s presence within families often is considered to influence motivations for family migration, to varying degrees (see Bailey and Boyle 2004; Henderson 2005; Khoo, Hugo, and McDonald 2008; Mazanti 2007; Ní Laoire 2007; Valentine 1997). Despite this, researchers have assumed that children have little involvement in family migration decision making. There has been a burgeoning of interest in the ways in which chil- 24 Everyday Ruptures dren participate in family migration in recent years (e.g., Young and Ansell 2003; Orellana et al. 2000; Orellana 2009; Thomson and Crul 2007; Schmalzbauer 2008; Waters 2005; Parreñas 2005), although discussion of how children specifically contribute to family migration decision making often is minimal. Therefore, exploring children’s agency in migratory situations is timely. Children’s agency in migration needs to be considered within the context of children’s rights within societies, as well as their everyday experiences of decision making within families. In this chapter, I discuss ways in which changing childhoods in a European context require us to rethink family migration decision making; I then go on to discuss children’s agency in family migration decision making using examples from a study in Britain. Changing Childhoods and Family Migration Decision Making: Britain in a European Context Structural changes within and between families are occurring in European societies, such as family dissolution and reformulation, singleparent and dual-earner households, lower marriage rates, higher divorce rates, increased cohabitation rates, and delayed childbirth. These changes have directly impacted migration and increased the mobility of families (Bailey and Boyle 2004; Flowerdew and Al-Hamad 2004). A related, but often overlooked, aspect of these changes is connected to children’s positioning within their families and broader society. Children’s rights, roles, and responsibilities as decision makers have been changing at a legislative level in Britain. The ways in which these changes interlink with social, cultural, and economic changes require further research, particularly how they influence and affect migrant children and their families. Children are one of the most governed groups by both the state and civic society in Europe, and in governing children, the state often dictates what is “good” for them (Hill et al. 2004). Within this context, parents are expected to care for their children and act in their best interests (Lansdown 1995). Simultaneously, adults are encouraged to promote and develop children’s agency by including them in decision making (UNCRC; Children Act 2004). There has been increased recognition of children’s rights within Europe (for example, individual EU states’ children acts) and globally (for example, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child or UNCRC, ratified by all member states except the United States and Somalia). Evidently, sociocultural changes in contemporary Children’s Agency in Family Migration Decision Making 25 constructions of childhood are also becoming influential in the political sphere. The right of children to be involved in making decisions that affect their lives is now broadly recognized as being in children’s best interests in formal decision-making procedures in Britain, such as when children are in government care or when their families fragment. Children ’s participation was an important tenet of the...