Transnational Migration and Changing Care Arrangements for Left-Behind Children in Southeast Asia

Transcription

1 Transnational Migration and Changing Care Arrangements for Left-Behind Children in Southeast Asia HOANG Lan Anh Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore Theodora LAM Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore Brenda S.A. YEOH Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore Elspeth GRAHAM School of Geography & Geosciences, University of St Andrews, UK Recent increases in the volume and diversity of transnational labour migration within and beyond Southeast Asia and in particular the feminisation of these movements suggest that millions of left-behind children are growing up for part or all of their young lives in the absence of one or even both parents. Gender-differentiated transnational migration is no doubt an increasingly significant driver of contemporary social transformation of the family/household in sending communities, as clearly seen in its impact on changing arrangements and relationships of care around left-behind children. In this context, this paper first provides a selective literature review to tease out current understandings and debates on the dynamics of changing care arrangements for left-behind children. Second, it draws on preliminary findings from a large-scale multi-method project investigating child health and migrant parents in Southeast Asia (CHAMPSEA) to examine the care arrangements for left-behind children. Using the information collected through quantitative surveys with over 4,000 households in Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, the paper provides a descriptive analysis of the arrangement of care for children in both migrant and non-migrant households. The four case studies, one from each study country, that follow will complement the quantitative data by eliciting the complexities and nuances of the web of care relationships woven around the left-behind child. The stories, as told by left-behind carers, highlight the politics of and negotiations over care within Southeast Asian households coming to grips with balancing productive and reproductive work as they are drawn into transnational migration across the global stage. Third, we reflect on our study thus far to draw out some implications for discussion. HOANG Lan Anh received both her MA and PhD degrees in Development Studies from the School of International Development, University of East Anglia, UK. She is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the Asian Metacentre for Population and Sustainable Development Analysis, Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore. While at ARI she works on a research project entitled Transnational Migration in South-East Asia and the Health of Children left Behind funded by the Welcome Trust, UK ( ). Her research interests include migration, development, family and gender. Lan will be taking up lectureship in Development Studies at the University of Melbourne, Australia in January Theodora LAM is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Geography, National University of Singapore, and Research Associate in the Asian MetaCentre for Population and Sustainable Development Analysis. She is also the Research Assistant for the project titled CHAMPSEA Child Health and Migrant Parents in Southeast Asia analyzing the impact of parental absence due to migration on the health and well-being of left-behind children. Her research interests cover transnational migration, children's geographies and gender studies. She has co-edited two special journal issues, Asian Transnational Families in Transition: The Liminality of Simultaneity in International Migration (2008, with Shirlena Huang and Brenda Yeoh) and Asian Transnational Families in Global Networks (2005, with Brenda Yeoh and Shirlena Huang), and is also the co-author of articles in International Development Planning Review (2006, with Brenda Yeoh and Shirlena Huang) and Asia Pacific Viewpoint (2004, with Brenda Yeoh).

2 Brenda S.A. YEOH (D Phil Oxford) is Professor, Department of Geography as well as Dean, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, National University of Singapore. She is also the Research Leader of the Asian Migration Research Cluster at the University s Asia Research Institute. Her research interests include transnational migration and the politics of space in colonial and post-colonial cities. She is currently the Editor-in-Chief for Gender, Place and Culture as well as the Principal Investigator of research projects titled (a) CHAMPSEA: Transnational Migration in South-East Asia and the Health of Children Left-Behind (funded by the Wellcome Trust) and (b) State Boundaries, Cultural Politics and Gender Negotiations in Commercially Arranged International Marriages in Singapore and Malaysia. Professor Yeoh has published widely and her first book was Contesting Space: Power Relations and the Urban Built Environment in Colonial Singapore (Oxford University Press, 1996; reissued Singapore University Press, 2003). She also published Singapore: A Developmental City State (John Wiley, 1997, with Martin Perry and Lily Kong), Gender and Migration (Edward Elgar, 2000, with Katie Willis), Gender Politics in the Asia-Pacific Region (Routledge, 2002, with Peggy Teo and Shirlena Huang), Toponymics: A Study of Singapore Street Names (Eastern Universities Press, 2003, with Victor R. Savage), Theorising the Southeast Asian City as Text (World Scientific, 2003, with Robbie Goh), The Politics of Landscape in Singapore: Construction of Nation (Syracuse University Press, 2003, with Lily Kong), Approaching Transnationalisms (Kluwer, 2003, with Michael W. Charney and Tong Chee Kiong), State/Nation/Transnation: Perspectives on Transnationalism in the Asia-Pacific (Routledge, 2004, with Katie Willis), Migration and Health in Asia (Routledge, 2005, with Santosh Jatrana and Mika Toyota), Asian Women as Transnational Domestic Workers (Marshall Cavendish, 2005, with Shirlena Huang and Noor Abdul Rahman), and Working and Mothering in Asia (NUS Press and NIAS Press 2007, with Theresa Devasahayam). Elspeth GRAHAM graduated with an MA (Hons) in Geography and Economics from the University of St Andrews and a PhD in Social Sciences from the University of Durham before taking up a temporary post as Assistant Professor at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, USA. In 1980 she returned to a permanent lectureship at the University of St Andrews where she is now Reader in Geography. From 2004 to 2007, she served as Head of the School of Geography and Geosciences at St Andrews. She has also held appointments, in 2004 and 2008, as Senior Research Fellow at the Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore. Her research interests are in population and health geography, particularly in issues related to low fertility populations, both in Europe and Asia.

3 Educational Imperatives and the Compulsion for Credentials: Migration and Children s Education in East Asia Johanna L. WATERS Department of Geography, University of Liverpool, UK J.L.Waters@liverpool.ac.uk The aim of this paper is two-fold. First, I provide a critical examination of extant understandings of, and scholarship on, children s educational mobilities, with a particular focus on East and Southeast Asia. There has been surprisingly little academic work explicitly addressing the relationship between education and mobilities (at different scales, from the local to the transnational). A more consistent source of information on education and migration in Asia has been the media popular representations of the life or death status of school-level examinations and the immense pressures on children to achieve academically abound in press reports. A culture of migration has consequently developed around education, coinciding with the growth of education-related services and industries that provide parents with the means and ways of relocating family members. Most usually, migration occurs when children reach the age of 14 or 15 just prior to sitting for the crucial end-of-school examinations that determine entry into tertiary education and, subsequently, university. However, a special issue of Time magazine Asia once depicted pregnant women boarding planes from South Korea to the United States, embarking on what became dubbed the package childbirth tour with one primary aim to provide children born in the United States with a green card that would, 18 years hence, enable them to enter university in America, thereby freeing them from South Korea s unbearably pressured education system. There is a small, emergent body of academic literature addressing some of the complex and multifaceted concerns around the meanings of education in Asian societies and their implications for children s migrations. This paper reviews what is currently known, with the aim of developing a conceptual understanding of the relationship between migration, education, cultural capital and social reproduction. Second, I draw upon my own qualitative research on children and young people from Hong Kong and Taiwan in school and university in Canada to provide an in-depth look at the issues faced by families seeking the best educational opportunities the world has to offer. In some cases, children have been left behind in Canada whilst their parents have returned to Asia to work, as the perceived need to accumulate economic, social and cultural capital simultaneously and in different sites is weighed against the social and emotional needs of household members. Such decisions are often fraught with difficulties, and outcomes are frequently unintended. This example - the emplacement of children from Hong Kong and Taiwan with the explicit objective of obtaining particular educational credentials serves to underline the lengths to which families will go for education in the contemporary world, and the unremitting importance of accessing higher education in Asia today. Johanna WATERS is currently a lecturer in Human Geography at the University of Liverpool in the UK. For over ten years, she has researched issues around intra-household dynamics within transnational families, and the role of education in children and young people s migration, with a particular focus on East Asia. Her work has been published widely in Geography and inter-disciplinary journals (such as Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers; Antipode; Global Networks; Sociology; and Population, Space and Place). A recent monograph, entitled Education, Migration and Cultural Capital in the Chinese Diaspora (Cambria Press), focused on developing a conceptual understanding of the relationship between migration and education, theorised in terms of household accumulation of cultural capital. Her most recent project, jointly funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (in the UK) and the Research Grants Council (in Hong Kong) and in collaboration with Maggi Leung at the University of Hong Kong, is exploring the internationalisation of higher education in Hong Kong and the consequent (im)mobilities of local students. Overall, Johanna is keen to uncover the socio-spatial implications of international and transnational forms of education, with a particular focus on social inequalities arising from this.

4 Multiple Identities, Multiple Realities: Children who Migrate for Work in Indonesia and Vietnam Harriot BEAZLEY University of Queensland, Australia This paper focuses on the range of motives, choices and experiences of children who migrate for work in Asia, and explores the multiple complex reasons for child migration, either on their own or with family or friends. Child migration for work involves children and young people who travel away from their homes for short term, seasonal or long term work. By reviewing the recent literature on child labour, street children and children and migration in Indonesia and Vietnam/ Mekong Delta, the paper challenges the assumptions held by some international children s welfare agencies that children who migrate for work are passive victims of exploitation who are trafficked or forced do so, and that when they migrate it is for purely economic reasons (Hashim, 2006). The reality is that in Southeast Asia, children and young people migrate for work for a variety of complex reasons, including the fact that there is a culture of migration in their home village (Beazley, 2007), the desire to seek new life experiences, to access global consumer goods, to develop an independent (or new collective) identity, and to gain prestige and status back home (Beazley, 2007; Iversen, 2006; Hashim, 2006; Punch, 2007; Thorsen, 2005). Class, gender and social networks also play a significant role in children s migration processes. The review demonstrates that economic conditions of poverty and need are just some of the factors that influence the migration process. The paper then contemplates the theories used by international welfare agencies that claim to be rights-based in their approaches to working with child workers, and critiques the ways many of these agencies conduct contemporary research into child migration. This critique highlights a field of research that is directed by adult-dominated protectionist agendas, which are often dismissive of the agency and resiliency of many of the child migrant workers who are internal and international migrants (and return migrants). The paper contrasts this work with the literature on the geographies of street children and other child workers who migrate for work (Beazley, 2000;2001;2003; Bessell, 2009; Young, Punch,2002; 2003;2007; van Berk,2004 ), and research with children (Theis, 1990 Beazley, Ennew and Bessell, 2006; Ennew and Plateau, 2004). The paper points to the dearth of children s lived experiences of migration within research and makes the point that there is still much research to be done with child migrants in the Asia region, in order to understand what motivates them and what their experiences are - both positive and negative- and from the child s perspective. The paper advocates for the importance of participatory approaches to give children multiple ways to convey their migration stories easily, stressing that both methodology and methods into studying young migrant s lives must be undertaken in a systematic and scientific way. The paper ends with a call for further participatory rights-based research with child migrants to further understand the various motivations and experiences of migration in different contexts, and to ensure that children's rights are not being violated in the name of protection. Harriot BEAZLEY, BA (Hons), London; PhD (ANU), is a Lecturer in the School of Social Work, and a Research Fellow in the Australian Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, University of Queensland, where she teaches Children and Youth Studies, Gender and Society and Community Development in International Contexts (Masters of Development Practice), and supervises doctoral research focusing on marginalized children and young people. Dr Beazley s research interests are the geographies of children and young people in Southeast Asia and the Pacific, particularly Indonesia, Vanuatu and Australia, including street and working children, young women s resistance strategies, youth subcultures, children and young people s participation, and rights based research with children and young people. Dr Beazley regularly consults and advises on participatory approaches in community development and children-centered research, including Community Participation Advisor on an AusAID IMF project in Indonesia, technical advisor on a project exploring Children s Experiences and Views in Orphanages in post-tsunami Aceh (Save the Children US) and an evaluation of Save the Children s (US) Anti- Child-Trafficking program in Java and Kalimantan. She has worked closely in a technical advisory team with Sharon Bessell (ANU), Judith Ennew, (University of Malaya) and Roxana Waterson (NUS) in projects, funded by UNICEF and Save the Children Sweden, to train local research teams in rights-based research with children, seeking their knowledge and opinions on issues such as child labour, commercial sexual exploitation, and physical and emotional punishment. Dr Beazley is Commissioning Editor (Australia and the Pacific) for the Journal Children s Geographies (Routledge, London).

5 Trafficking in Children in South and South East Asia: More Degrees of Separation Needed Susan KNEEBONE Castan Centre for Human Rights Law at the Faculty of Law, Monash University, Australia The increase in trafficking of children in the 1980s and 1990s was a significant factor in bringing attention to the issue of human trafficking at both the international and regional levels. The normative framework laid down in the 1989 Convention of the Rights of the Child (CROC) recognises both the unique vulnerabilities of children in relation to different forms of trafficking and the state s responsibility to protect them. Studies conducted within South and South East Asia in the 1990s recognise the complexity of the causes of trafficking of children, and of various forms of trafficking. However, in the 2001 Trafficking Protocol, the issue of child trafficking was amalgamated into women and children as a global entity. Although the special position of children was recognised in the Trafficking Protocol through the provision that children are incapable of consenting to being trafficked, it is argued in this paper that the Protocol perpetuates the assumption of common dependency and inferiority (Bhaba) and has a negative effect on policy responses to trafficking of children. This follows from perceptions of the Protocol as an instrument of criminal justice which is predominantly focused upon prostitution. This paper will describe and analyse the background and policy response to trafficking of children in both South and South East Asia. In particular it will consider the causes of trafficking of children and demonstrate that they occupy a special position within households and cultures in the region. Research shows that the position and role of children are tied closely to the socio-economic status of the family. Many of the factors which lead to trafficking are also the direct result of state policies in relation to education and national status. The paper will also describe patterns of child trafficking in the region which include sexual exploitation, labour (including begging), forced \ early marriages and adoptions. In particular it will describe differences within the region, which arise from ethnic, religious and cultural factors. For example, in South Asia (India, Bangladesh and Nepal) trafficking of girls for prostitution is common and caste is an important factor. By contrast, boys are trafficked from Vietnam to China for labour and adoptions. The paper will contrast the causes and patterns of child trafficking in the region with constructions of children in policy responses. It will compare and evaluate the focus of recovery and reintegration programmes which are being operated within the region for child victims of trafficking in light of the requirements in CROC, in particular Article 39. It will be argued that some programmes are inappropriately focussed; for example, some are designated as rehabilitation programmes. Effective detention in shelters is one inappropriate response. It is argued that the failure to deal separately with the issue of trafficking of children in the Trafficking Protocol has tainted programmes for children with a criminal justice reform approach which affects reintegration into family and community. Susan KNEEBONE is a Professor of Law and a Deputy Director of the Castan Centre for Human Rights Law at the Faculty of Law, Monash University, Victoria, Australia. Susan teaches Forced Migration and Human Rights, International Refugee Law and Practice, and Citizenship and Migration Law. She has organized many conferences and workshops on these issues, made submission to public enquiries and frequently handles media enquiries. She is the author of many articles on these issues and co-author and editor of several books: Refugees, Asylum Seekers, and the Rule of Law: Comparative Perspectives (Cambridge University Press, 2009). New Regionalism and Asylum Seekers: Challenges Ahead (Berghahn, 2007 with F Rawlings-Sanaei). The Refugees Convention 50 Years On: Globalisation and International Law (Ashgate, 2003)

6 Susan is currently a sole Chief Investigator on two Australia Research Council (ARC) projects: Law, Governance and Regulation of Intra-regional Labour Migration in South East Asia: An Agenda for Protection and Development (ARC Discovery Project). Delivering Effective Protection to Victims and Prevention of Human Trafficking in the Greater Mekong Sub-Region. (ARC Linkage Project) The Partner Organisations on this project are AusAID, the United Nations Intra-Agency Project on Human Trafficking in the Greater Mekong Sub-Region (UNIAP), and the International Organisation for Migration (IOM). Susan is currently completing a book entitled Transnational Crime and Human Rights: Responses to Human Trafficking in the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) to be published by Routledge Ltd. This arises from research conducted under a previous ARC Discovery Project between 2006 to the present.

7 Transnational Adoption of Children from Asia in the Twenty First Century Peter SELMAN Newcastle University, UK The adoption of Asian children by Western parents dates back to the 1950s and the aftermath of the Korean War, since when over 160,000 Korean children have been adopted in the United States, Canada, Australia and Europe. Even before that many children were adopted from Japan to the USA in the aftermath of World War 2. From the late 1960s, children were also sent to the United States from the Philippines and in the 1970s from Thailand, Vietnam and India. The sharp rise in the number of transnational adoption from 1970 was a result of two interrelated factors:- a sharp decline in infants being made available for adoption in much of Northern Europe, and the rise of involuntarily childless couples in Western Europe and North America who wished to create a family. In the 1980s four of the seven countries sending most children were Asian, accounting for more than half of all international adoptions, the other major source being Latin America. In the 1990s the number of international adoptions rose sharply, initially as a result of adoptions from Romania, later with the growth of adoption from China and Russia. China and Korea have been among the top five countries sending children to the USA since 1994 and among the top ten worldwide in the 21 st century, alongside India and Vietnam. The global number of transnational adoptions peaked at over 45,000 in 2004, having doubled in the previous 10 years, but since then has been falling to 35,000 in 2008 with further reductions in The paper will present a detailed analysis of this decline with special attention to Asian states of origin. I shall also look in more detail at those countries where concerns have been raised about child trafficking and illicit procedures, such as. Cambodia, India, Nepal and Vietnam. The appendix to this abstract shows trends in the number of children sent for adoption abroad by ten Asian countries which sent more than 1,000 children each between 2003 and The issue of Asian receiving states such as Japan and Singapore will also be raised in discussion. The paper will conclude with a consideration of current issues in transnational adoption in the light of discussions at the Hague Special Commission in June It will also briefly review our current knowledge about outcomes of such adoptions, including a consideration of issues of ethnic, racial and cultural identity and the rising numbers of adoptees returning to their homelands as exemplified by the IKAA Gathering in Seoul this August.

8 Adoptions from Asia: Ten Countries Sending 1,000 or More Children for Inter-country Adoption between 2003 and 2008, ranked by number sent a - with ratio in peak year Country Ratio b in peak year China 64,596 11,228 14,494 10,741 5, Korea 11,166 2,287 2,101 1,899 1, Vietnam 7, ,195 1,367 1, India 5,794 1, Kazakhstan c 4, Philippines Thailand 2, Nepal 1, Taiwan 1, Cambodia 1, a) Numbers are calculated from data on country of origin provided by 23 Western receiving states - they do not include adoptions to Singapore, Japan or other Asian receiving states b) Ratio = Number of adoption per 1,000 live births c) Kazakhstan is seen as a part of Asia in many countries but as part of Europe in others such as the USA and Spain. Peter SELMAN is Visiting Fellow in the School of Geography, Politics & Sociology at Newcastle University, UK. His main areas of research interest are child adoption, teenage pregnancy and demographic change and public policy. He is currently Chair of the Network for Intercountry Adoption and a member of the Board of Trustees of the British Association for Adoption & Fostering (BAAF). He is editor of Intercountry Adoption; Development, trends and perspectives (British Agencies for Adoption and Fostering, 2000) and has written many articles and chapters on adoption policy.