The Political Economy of Migration from Southern Africa

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The Political Economy of Migration from Southern Africa: The Case of Medical Doctors Abel Chikanda lobalisation is constantly changing the nature of population movements in southern Africa. During the colonial period, population movements in the region were dominated by unskilled labour migration (Crush et al. 1991; Paton 1995). Migrant workers were drawn from relatively poor southern African states such as Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia towards the more prosperous ones such as South Africa and Zimbabwe. The migrant workers were employed in low paying jobs in sectors such as agriculture and mining but opportunities in these sectors have declined substantially in the postcolonial period. As a result, immigrant-receiving states in the region have tightened their immigration control measures in a bid to reduce the inflow of unskilled workers while at the same time introducing policies that explicitly favour the movement of skilled professionals. Although there has been considerable growth in the number of skilled professionals moving within southern Africa, there is growing evidence of a rise in international migration to overseas destinations. Contemporary population movements from and within southern Africa, whilst being driven mainly by economic, political and social factors, are also a product of improvements in transport and communication technologies. Today’s interconnected global economy favours a rel-

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atively free flow of goods, capital, technology and knowledge, but not of labour. While immigrant-receiving states act to regulate and restrict unskilled labour flows, they are keen to maintain relatively open borders and easy access for flows of certain foreigners whose admission is considered to be in the receiving country’s national interest. Thus, as Raghuram (2000) notes, skilled labour migration represents the only ‘acceptable’ face of migration today. Indeed, it is one of the greatest paradoxes of the contemporary world system that the potential for international migration has never been so great, yet at the same time the forces ordering, constraining, and channelling migration have never been so strong (Gould and Findlay 1994). As the rate of skilled labour migration from southern Africa continues to increase, analysts have expressed concern about the impacts of the movements on the region’s economies. For instance, Kapur and McHale (2004) have shown that a third of southern African states had at least 25 percent of their tertiary educated professionals working in Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries in 2000 (Table 1). Only three states had less than 5 percent of their tertiary educated professionals working abroad. This paper examines the movement of medical doctors from southern Africa in order to illustrate the complexity of migration patterns in the region. Southern Africa in this

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The Political Economy of Migration from Southern Africa: The Case of Medical Doctors

Table 1:

Percentage of tertiary educated southern African nationals living in OECD countries in 2000

Percentage

Source Country

>50 25-50

Seychelles Angola, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique DR Congo, Malawi, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia

5-25