[PDF][PDF] Women and migration: Incorporating gender into international migration theory

M Boyd, E Grieco - 2014 - dspace.stellamariscollege.edu.in
M Boyd, E Grieco
2014dspace.stellamariscollege.edu.in
Over the last 25 years, there has been little concerted effort to incorporate gender into
theories of international migration. Yet, understanding gender is critical in the migration
context. In part because migration theory has traditionally emphasized the causes of
international migration over questions of who migrates, it has often failed to adequately
address gender-specific migration experiences. Without clear theoretical underpinnings, it
becomes difficult to explain, for example, the conditions under which women migrate, or the …
Over the last 25 years, there has been little concerted effort to incorporate gender into theories of international migration. Yet, understanding gender is critical in the migration context. In part because migration theory has traditionally emphasized the causes of international migration over questions of who migrates, it has often failed to adequately address gender-specific migration experiences. Without clear theoretical underpinnings, it becomes difficult to explain, for example, the conditions under which women migrate, or the predominance of women in certain labor flows and not in others. Furthermore, traditional theory fails to help us understand the circumstances that encourage women to become transnational migrants, to enter into trafficking channels, or to seek refugee resettlement. Answering these questions and other more gender-sensitive inquiries requires showing how a seemingly gender-neutral process of movement is, in fact, highly gender-specific and may result in differential outcomes for men and women.
Today the question," How can gender be incorporated into our understanding of migration?" remains only partially answered for a variety of reasons. For example, understanding migration and constructing useful theories must take into account many different types of migration, including temporary, permanent, illegal, labor, and conflict-induced migration. Developing a gendered theory of migration has been difficult because the disciplines of anthropology, sociology, political science, economics, demography, law, and history have tended to focus on only a few types of migration and stress different explanations. Also, incorporating gender as an explicit part of migration theory has more recently been influenced by developments in feminist perspectives in North America, which continue to challenge more orthodox views.
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