Abstract
Since the migration and development promise has made its inroads into the debates of the global development community, remittances have become heralded as a key tool to promote development and reduce poverty. The gender dimensions of remittances have long been ignored but have come into focus with media and policy voices emphasising the empowerment potential of remittances for women. More recently, remittances have become linked to development financing through the international financial inclusion agenda, which has led to the financialisation of remittances (FOR). One key novelty of the FOR is its explicit emphasis on empowering women and reducing gender inequality through linking remittances to financial inclusion. This chapter focuses on the ways in which gender is implicated within the FOR by analysing its three main gender tropes: women sending and receiving remittances as financial customers and untapped resources, as entrepreneurs and as part of the ‘remittance family’. We explore how these tropes form different subjectivities in deeply gendered, classed and racialised ways; discipline subjects through prescribed roles and norms and promote financial and economic forms of empowerment that silence other forms of empowerment.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
- 1.
Official numbers do not include ‘informal’ remittances, thought to be substantial. Yet, the increase in official remittances figures is also influenced by the increased capacity to register such flows.
- 2.
https://refugeesmigrants.un.org/sites/default/files/stocktaking_ifad.pdf (all websites were accessed in March 2020).
- 3.
Financial technology (Fintech) refers to technology that seeks to automate and transform the delivery and use of financial services, e.g. through specialised software and algorithms used on computers smartphones.
- 4.
We would like to thank our interview partners. All interviews have been anonymised for confidentiality. The fieldwork in Kenya was carried out by Julia Maisenbacher.
- 5.
This term has been used mostly to refer to the quantitative increase in women migrants as well as qualitative changes in migration flows due to the increase in women migrating independently.
- 6.
The family currently receives sustained attention within the international community, as illustrated in the Global Family Initiative (see http://www.globalfamilyinitiative.org) or the 2019 title of UN Women’s flagship report ‘Progress of the World’s Women 2019–2020: Families in a changing world’.
- 7.
- 8.
For a more critical reading see for example (Bateman, Duvendack, & Loubere, 2019).
References
AFI. (2018). Innovative cross-border remittance services: Experiences from AFI member countries. Guideline Note No. 30.
Allon, F. (2014). The feminisation of finance: Gender, labour and the limits of inclusion. Australian Feminist Studies, 29(79), 12–30.
Bateman, M., Duvendack, M., & Loubere, N. (2019). Is Fin-Tech the new panacea for poverty alleviation and local development? Contesting Suri and Jack’s M-Pesa findings published in science. Review of African Political Economy, 46(161), 480–495.
Bedford, K. (2009). Developing partnerships: Gender, sexuality, and the reformed World Bank. Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press.
Bourguignon, F. (2006). Women on the move: Magnitudes, trends and impacts of the international migration of women. UN, New York, September 14. http://www.mtnforum.org/sites/default/files/publication/files/5212.pdf.
Calkin, S. (2015). “Tapping” women for post-crisis capitalism: Evidence from the 2012 World Development Report. International Feminist Journal of Politics, 17(4), 611–629.
CARAM Asia. (2010). Remittances: Impact on migrant workers’ quality of life. https://www.ilo.org/dyn/migpractice/docs/141/Remittances.pdf.
Central Bank of Kenya. (2019). 2019 FinAccess Household Survey. https://www.centralbank.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/2019-FinAcces-Report.pdf.
Chant, S. (2006). Re-thinking the “feminization of poverty” in relation to aggregate gender indices. Journal of Human Development, 7(2), 201–220.
Chant, S., & Sweetman, C. (2012). Fixing women or fixing the world? “Smart economics”, efficiency approaches, and gender equality in development. Gender & Development, 20(3), 517–529.
Datta, K., & Guermond, V. (2019). Financialization and/of migrant labor. In The Routledge international handbook of financialization. London: Routledge.
De Bruyn, T., & Kuddus, U. (2005, January). Dynamics of remittance utilization in Bangladesh. IOM Migration Research Series 18. https://hiva.kuleuven.be/resources/pdf/publicaties/R1065.pdf.
Demirgüç-Kunt, A., Klapper, L., Singer, D., Ansar, S., & Hess, J. (2018). The Global Findex Database 2017: Measuring financial inclusion and the Fintech revolution. Washington, DC: World Bank. https://globalfindex.worldbank.org/.
Elson, D. (2010). Gender and the global economic crisis in developing countries: A framework for analysis. Gender and Development, 18(2), 201–212.
G20. (2017). G20 Leaders. Hamburg: Declaration: Shaping an interconnected world.
Gabor, D., & Brooks, S. (2017). The digital revolution in financial inclusion: International development in the Fintech era. New Political Economy, 22(4), 423–436.
GPFI. (2016). 2016 update to leaders on progress towards the G20 remittance target. https://www.gpfi.org/sites/gpfi/files/documents/2016%20Update%20to%20Leaders%20on%20Progress%20Towards%20the%20G20%20Remittance%20Target.pdf.
Griffin, P. (2013). Gendering global finance crisis, masculinity, and responsibility. Men and Masculinities, 16(1), 9–34.
GSMA. (2013). Unlocking the potential: Women and mobile financial services in emerging markets. https://www.gsma.com/mobilefordevelopment/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/GSMA-mWomen-Visa_Unlocking-the-Potential_Feb-2013.pdf.
GSMA. (2018). State of the industry report on mobile money.
Guérin, I., Morvant-Roux, S., & Villarreal, M. (Eds.). (2014). Microfinance, debt and over-indebtedness: Juggling with money. Oxford and New York: Routledge.
Guermond, V. (2019). Financialising migration? Remittances, algorithms and digital finance. Developing Economics. A Critical Perspective on Development Economics (blog). 2019. https://developingeconomics.org/2019/03/22/financialising-migration-money-algorithms-and-digital-finance/.
Hennebry, J., Holliday, J., & Moniruzzaman, M. (2017). At what cost? Women migrant workers, remittances and development. UN Women.
Hudson, D. (2008). Developing geographies of financialisation: Banking the poor and remittance securitisation. Contemporary Politics, 14(3), 315–333.
IFAD. (2017a). International Family Remittance Day endorsements. IFAD. https://www.ifad.org/documents/38714170/40313865/International+day+of+family+remittances.pdf/ec2d0b5f-5a6d-49fe-b2d5-870330991832.
IFAD. (2017b). Sending money home: Contributing to the SDGs, one family at a time. IFAD.
IFAD. (2018). International Day of Family Remittances. June 16. Endorsements 2018. http://www.un.org/en/events/family-remittances-day/assets/pdf/IDFR%20_Endorsements%202018%20Brochure_final-17072018.pdf.
IFAD., & Financing Facility for Remittances (FFR). (2018). RemitSCOPE: Remittance markets and opportunities, Asia and the Pacific. RemitScope.Org. IFAD. https://www.ifad.org/documents/38714170/40286666/2018-05-01_RemitSCOPE_web_final.pdf/1c454276-4fd3-4feb-a8d8-24b4ef9353df.
Inter-American Development Bank. (2010). Ten years of innovation in remittances lessons learned and models for the future. New York: Inter-American Development Bank. https://publications.iadb.org/bitstream/handle/11319/3652/Ten%20Years%20of%20Innovation%20in%20Remittances%3A%20Lessons%20Learned%20and%20Models%20for%20the%20Future.pdf?sequence=1.
Joseph, M. (2013). Gender, entrepreneurial subjectivity, and pathologies of personal finance. Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State & Society, 20(2), 242–273.
Ketkar, S., & Ratha, D. (2009). Innovative financing for development. Washington, DC: World Bank.
Kunz, R. (2011). The political economy of global remittances: Gender, governmentality and neoliberalism. RIPE Series in Global Political Economy. London: Taylor & Francis.
Kunz, R. (2015). “Moneymaker and mother from afar”: The power of gender myths. In Women, gender, remittances and development in the global south (pp. 207–228). Farnham and Burlington: Ashgate. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781315546629/chapters/10.4324/9781315546629-22.
Kunz, R. (2018). Remittances in global political economy. In R. Elias, A. Roberts, (Eds.), Handbook on the international political economy of gender (pp. 265–280). Cheltenham, Northampton: Edward Elgar.
Kunz, R., Maisenbacher, J. & Paudel, L. N. (2020). The financialisation of remittances: Governing through emotions. RIPE Review of International Political Economy. https://doi.org/10.1080/09692290.2020.1785923
Kunz, R., & Schwenken, H. (2014). MigrantInnen Als HoffnungsträgerInnen in Der Entwicklungszusammenarbeit? Geschlechterspezifische Subjektivitäten Im Migration-Development Nexus. Politische Vierteljahresschrift, 48, 328–356.
Lee, S., & Piper, N. (2017). Migrant domestic workers as “agents” of development in Asia. European Journal of East Asian Studies, 16(2), 220–247.
Loomis, J. (2018). Rescaling and reframing poverty: Financial coaching and the pedagogical spaces of financial inclusion in Boston, Massachusetts. Geoforum, 95(October), 143–152.
López-Anuarbe, M., Cruz-Saco, M., & Park, Y. (2016). More than altruism: Cultural norms and remittances among Hispanics in the USA. Journal of International Migration and Integration, 17(2), 539–567.
Mahapatro, S. (2017). Why do they remit? Examining factors influencing migrant remittances in India. Journal of Development Policy and Practice, 2(2), 225–235.
Mateo Diaz, M., & Rodriguez-Chamussy, L. (2013). Childcare and women’s labor participation: Evidence for Latin America and the Caribbean. Inter-American Development Bank. https://publications.iadb.org/publications/english/document/Childcare-and-Women-Labor-Participation-Evidence-for-Latin-America-and-the-Caribbean.pdf.
Meltzer, J. (2013). “Good Citizenship” and the promotion of personal savings accounts in Peru. Citizenship Studies, 17(5), 641–652.
Mohanty, C. T. (1984). Under Western eyes: Feminist scholarship and colonial discourses. Boundary, 2, 333–358.
Montgomerie, J., & Young, B. (2010, February). Home is where the hardship is: Gender and wealth (dis)accumulation in the subprime boom (CRESC Working Paper Series 79). 19.
Morrison, A., Schiff, M., & Sjöblom, M. (2007). The international migration of women. Washington, DC: World Bank.
Paerregaard, K. (2015). The resilience of migrant money: How gender, generation and class shape family remittances in Peruvian migration. Global Networks, 15(4), 503–518.
Pfeiffer, L., Richter, S. Fletcher, P. & Taylor, J. (2008). Gender in economic research on international migration and its impacts: A critical review. In A. R. Morrison, M. Schiff, & M. Sjöblom (Eds.), The international migration of women (pp. 11–49). The World Bank.
Piper, N. (2011). Toward a gendered political economy of migration. In N. Phillips (Ed.), Migration in the global political economy. International Political Economy Yearbook Series, v. 17 (pp. 61–82). Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers.
Pollard, J. (2013). Gendering capital: financial crisis, financialization and (an agenda for) economic geography. Progress in Human Geography, 37(3), 403–423.
Rankin, K. (2013). A critical geography of poverty finance. Third World Quarterly, 34(4), 547–568.
Rayiyan K., & Klugman, J. (2019). Women’s financial inclusion in a digital world: How mobile phones can reduce gender gaps. Washington, DC. http://giwps.georgetown.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Womens-Financial-Inclusion-in-a-Digital-World.pdf.
Roberts, A. (2015). Gender, financial deepening and the production of embodied finance: Towards a critical feminist analysis. Global Society, 29(1), 107–127.
Roberts, A., & Mir Zulfiqar, G. (2019). The political economy of women’s entrepreneurship initiatives in Pakistan: Reflections on gender, class, and “development”. Review of International Political Economy, 26(3), 410–435.
Roy, A. (2012). Subjects of risk: Technologies of gender in the making of millennial modernity. Public Culture, 24(1), 131–155.
Scharwatt, C. (2019). Mobiel money: A product of choice for women to send and receive remittances. IFAD Blog (blog). https://www.ifad.org/en/web/latest/blog/asset/41410919.
Suri, T., & Jack, W. (2016). The long-run poverty and gender impacts of mobile money. Science, 354(6317), 1288–1292.
Tiwari, J., Schaub, E., & Sultana, N. (2019). Barriers to “last mile” financial inclusion: Cases from Northern Kenya. Development in Practice, 29(8), 988–1000.
Totolo, E., & Gubbins, P. (2018). Digital credit in Kenya: Evidence from a demand-side surveys. Nairobi: FSD Kenya. https://fsdkenya.org/publication/digital-credit-in-kenya-evidence-from-demand-side-surveys/.
UNCDF. (2015). Women on the move. Harnessing the economic force of cross-border mobility in ASEAN. SHIFT Report. Asia Pacific Regional Office: UNDP. https://www.uncdf.org/article/813/women-on-the-move-economic-force-cross-border-mobility-asean.
UNCDF. (2017). Remittances as a driver of women’s financial inclusion in the Mekong region. UNCDF. https://uncdf-cdn.azureedge.net/media-manager/75322?sv=2016-05-31&sr=b&sig=1vr1i%2F08UYoN%2FqAK1%2FsVS%2BbHNTQ2SC2XiO4uiMIx%2FsU%3D&se=2018-09-06T06%3A53%3A10Z&sp=r.
UN General Assembly. (2018). Resolution Adopted by the General Assembly on 12 June 2018. In: New York: UN. https://undocs.org/A/RES/72/281.
United Nations Population Fund. (2006). State of world population 2006: A passage to hope: Women and international migration. New York: UNFPA.
Wandibba, S., Nangendo, S., & Mulemi, B. (2014). Gender empowerment and access to financial services in Machakos Country, Eastern Kenya. Institute for Money, Technology and Financial Inclusion, 16.
Weber, H. (2004). The “new economy” and social risk: Banking on the poor? Review of International Political Economy, 11(2), 356–386.
Weekley, K. (2006). From wage labourers to investors? Filipina migrant domestic workers and popular capitalism. In K. Hewison & K. Young (Eds.), Transnational migration and work in Asia (pp. 193–212). Oxford and New York: Routledge.
World Bank., & KNOMAD (2019). Migration and development brief 31. Washington, DC: World Bank. https://www.knomad.org/sites/default/files/2019-04/Migrationanddevelopmentbrief31.pdf.
Young, B., Elias, J., &Roberts, A. (2018). Financialization, unconventional monetary policy and gender inequality’. In Handbook on the international political economy of gender (pp. 241–251). Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.
Zapata, G. (2018). Transnational migration, remittances and the financialization of housing in Colombia. Housing Studies, 33(3), 343–360.
Acknowledgement
This chapter draws on findings from a research project on the Financialisation of Remittances (https://www.unil.ch/crhim/en/home/menuinst/recherche/recherche-en-cours/the-financialisation-of-remittances.html). Funding by the Swiss National Science Foundation (10001A_172945) is gratefully acknowledged. We would like to thank Lekh Nath Paudel for his comments on an earlier version of the chapter, and the editors Claudia Mora and Nicola Piper for their patience and constructive comments.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2021 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Kunz, R., Maisenbacher, J. (2021). Gender and Remittances. In: Mora, C., Piper, N. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Gender and Migration. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-63347-9_20
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-63347-9_20
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-63346-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-63347-9
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)