Introduction
… but who are the real development heroes? Is it OXFAM or the bus driver from Somalia who generally works three jobs a month so that maybe he can send £400 back to a family in Mogadishu? I know that it is a rhetorical point to make but I think it is still a valid one.
The epigraph above is an excerpt from an interview I had with the Engagement and Policy Manager for the African Foundation for Development (AFFORD) in 2018. It sums up the invaluable contribution of diaspora to non-migrant families in the face of livelihood precarity in the home country. Just like the imaginary Somali bus driver, many global diaspora members contribute to development in diverse ways that include remitting at the household level, investing in businesses, engaging in charity work, and ensuring a transfer of skills. The following discussion focuses on diaspora-led development with special reference to the Zimbabwean case.
For the past two decades, Zimbabwe has faced unprecedented economic, social, and political challenges, which culminated in mass emigration by Zimbabweans to different countries within and outside Africa. The Zimbabwean government has grappled with reconstruction and development questions for a long time with very little if any success. It previously tried to ‘developmentalise’ (McGregor and Pasura, 2010) the diaspora by incorporating them in the reconstruction process but these efforts failed mainly due to political factors, especially Mugabe’s[1] refusal to relinquish power.
Diaspora-led Development: An Overview
Though we intuitively seem to know what development is, the term remains elusive conceptually (Skeldon, 2014:1). Its meanings are subjective, multiple, and often subject to contradictory interpretations. Todaro and Smith (2020) define it as an ‘improvement in the quality of all human lives.’ This seems to suggest an all-encompassing definition – positive social change for everyone – but it evades the specificity that enables one to meet everyone’s standards of a good life. To this end, and taking after Orozco and Garcia-Zanello (2009:3), I loosely define diaspora-led development as the ‘activities, projects, investments or otherwise, that lead to a better living standard for people in the country of origin. These can be in different areas including health, education, and material asset accumulation-oriented projects (Orozco and Garcia-Zanello, 2009:3).
Scholarship on diaspora-led development began by focusing on diasporas as a source of social welfare for families and communities at a time when states stopped their welfare duties towards poor local communities (Burman, 2002). This holds true for Zimbabwe, where the Zimbabwean diaspora has created an internationalized, informal system of social welfare based on personalized migrant remittances (Bracking and Sachikonye, 2006:40). The initial focus on support for families by migration scholarship is quite understandable because the desire for diaspora members to help their homeland starts with their transnational, familial, and friendship connections (Joseph, Irazabal and, Desir, 2017:176).
Diasporas can contribute to their country of origin’s socio-economic and political development either as individuals or as organizations. For countries like India, Ghana, Lesotho, China, and Mexico, financial remittances are a major source of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), commercial contacts, technology transfer, and political connections (Higazi, 2005:4-7). In Mexico, remittances have become the main source of foreign income and public works that would be the responsibility of the government (Muzondidya, 2011:114). The reconstruction and development processes for Ethiopia and Eritrea were also driven by their diaspora organizations (Muzondidya, 2011:125). Skilled diaspora members have potential access to bring ‘lucrative business, knowledge and capital networks and their desire to direct them towards socially transformative ends’ to the country of origin (Mullings, 2012:406) and thus are potential development partners for developing countries.
Regardless of country of origin, the contributions of the diaspora can be summarised into five key resources, which can be used to help their countries and communities of origin. These resources are categorizable into economic, social (social status based on social roles or on complying with social valued criteria), political (the ability to influence and exercise authority) moral (perceived legitimacy of actions), and informational (Uphoff, 2005). These capitals are mainly present when the country of origin is democratic and economically productive. Democracy and economic productivity are usually rare in developing countries and they constitute the push factors for migrating in the first place (Brinkerhoff, 2012) thus perhaps partly explaining why remittances in most African countries have not had a significant development impact. However, not all diasporas are prevented from contributing by the absence of characteristics related to development and democracy (Brinkerhoff, 2012:79) though the potential of the democracy deficit to curtail efforts of the diaspora cannot be ignored.
The Zimbabwean Context and Challenges Militating against Diaspora-led Development
As a source of poverty alleviation, the Zimbabwean diaspora has been a major player, leading Mbiba ( 2012) to describe them as a source of emergency development aid to Zimbabwe. However, although remittances play an important poverty-alleviating role, policymakers advocate that some of them must be channeled towards productive investment for economic development (Bussolo and Medvedev, 2007). Productive investment from remittances has not been very successful for Zimbabwe, partly because of the preference by remitters to use informal remitting channels (Magunha et al, 2009). Most remittances in cases where they have driven successful productive investment, for instance in the Philippines, Mexico, China, and Israel are through formal channels (Muzondidya, 2011:145). In these countries, respective governments have also implemented clearly outlined supportive policies to entice the diaspora to participate in national development initiatives.
Over the years, remittances to Zimbabwe have steadily increased. For instance, international remittances received in Zimbabwe in 2020 (January to December) totaled US$1.7 billion in 2020, an increase of 43% from US$1.2 billion recorded during the same period in 2019. The Zimbabwean diaspora also contributes to community development through contributions to charity, the building of schools, churches, and hospitals (Mbiba, 2012). As such, there is a need for the Zimbabwean diaspora to be given an opportunity to contribute to the country’s development and reconstruction in terms of skills, education, health, commerce, investment, and international trade (Mbiba, 2012:81). However, Zimbabwe has not been able to harness the benefits of its diaspora (Makina et al 2010:18). Instead, it is traditional aid donors whose work continues to be overvalued despite the existence of many diaspora-led networks, businesses, and groups that have emerged to address Zimbabweans’ challenges abroad and in Zimbabwe (Mbiba, 2012:81). Like Mbiba’s (2012) argument, Libercier and Schneider (1996) argue that migrants’ role in the development of their home countries is not highly valued and this limits their role to that of completing small local projects. Thus, in practice, they are usually not at the forefront of designing and carrying out cooperation projects in their communities
In Zimbabwe, the government has implicitly and explicitly discouraged diaspora-led development through several of its policies and initiatives. For instance, some politically regressive policies such as Operation Murambatsvina in 2005 resulted in some members of the diaspora losing their investments as their properties were demolished by the government (Magunha et al, 2009:3) under the guise of cleaning up the city of Harare. It displaced thousands of Zimbabweans from Harare under the guise of cleaning up the city but, it was a politically motivated move (Potts, 2010) that sought to displace perceived members of the main opposition party from urban to the rural areas. Such a history generates distrust which stifles future diaspora willingness to invest in the country of origin. Other schemes such as the Homelink facility that sought to entice the diaspora to invest in properties in Zimbabwe also resulted in some members of the diaspora losing their money. Additionally, the Homelink facility was good on paper but it did not appeal to most members of the diaspora because of a lack of political trust (Muzondidya, 2011). The high risk of investing in Zimbabwe and the lack of trust between authorities and the diaspora has meant that the contribution of the diaspora has remained constrained (Muzondidya, 2011:130).
Zimbabwe has instituted policies that discourage diasporas from investing back (Muzondidya, 2011:129). In particular, the Zimbabwean diaspora has historically been perceived as supporters of the opposition (Muzondidya, 2011:129) and by extension ‘enemies’ of the state. In addition to a lack of a coherent migration and development policy, the Zimbabwean government under Mugabe put in place many ‘institutional bottlenecks’ (Muzondidya, 2011:143)– particularly economic and financial legislation policies – that stifle remittance flows and the involvement of diasporas in the reconstruction process. The country has stringent laws regarding remitting money and establishing businesses whether by foreigners or by Zimbabweans abroad. For instance, in 2011 and the period before that year, the time required to get a business licensed ranged between six to twelve months (Muzondidya, 2011:143) which in turn frustrated diaspora entrepreneurs who would have wished to invest in the country. Muzondidya (2011:1143-4) has noted that some entrepreneurs have ended up investing in other countries with flexible policies. It is not clear whether these policies have been revised.
In sum, the Zimbabwean diaspora is an important safety net for their non-migrant Zimbabwean family relations but there is a need for concerted trust-building efforts between the Zimbabwean government and its diaspora to entice the latter to participate in the country’s reconstruction and development significantly beyond household-level financial remittances.
[1] Zimbabwe’s former president who was deposed through a coup in 2017.
Felix Tombindo is a doctoral student in African Studies and Anthropology at the University of Birmingham, UK. He has ongoing research interests in migration and development, particularly the potential role of diasporas towards the reconstruction and development of their home countries. Here is his latest publication on migration and development: http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9781003026327-15.You can connect with him here: Felix Tombindo | LinkedIn