Moving for a ‘better welfare’? The case of transnational Sudanese families.

Ester Serra Mingot*, Valentina Mazzucato

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

The burgeoning literature on welfare migration, or on the likelihood of migrants moving to countries with more generous welfare states, yields mixed results. In this article, we aim to disentangle what kinds of considerations underlie the decisions that migrants and their families make to address their social protection needs when they move to certain places. We explain how Sudanese extended families, with members scattered across multiple countries, draw on formal and informal institutions to meet their needs for social protection. Through a transnational approach, we analyse the mechanisms guiding the access, circulation and coordination of resources to cover different but related social protection domains. We contribute to current debates on transnational social protection by drawing on the life stories of members of a Sudanese transnational family and by expanding on the concept of 'resource environment'. We based this article on 14 months of multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork with Sudanese migrants and their families in the Netherlands, the UK and Sudan.

Original languageEnglish
Article numberhttps://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/glob.12224
Pages (from-to)139-157
Number of pages19
JournalGlobal Networks-a Journal of Transnational Affairs
Volume19
Issue number2
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Apr 2019

Keywords

  • Transnational social protection;
  • Sudan
  • the Netherlands
  • UK
  • resource environment
  • migration
  • MIGRATION
  • CARE
  • EU
  • TRANSNATIONAL SOCIAL PROTECTION
  • RESOURCE ENVIRONMENT
  • SUDAN
  • MIGRANTS
  • SOCIAL PROTECTION
  • NETHERLANDS

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