The dynamics of remittance behaviour among Senegalese men and women in Spain
| Published date | 01 February 2023 |
| Author | José Ignacio Carrasco,Ognjen Obućina |
| Date | 01 February 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12997 |
International Migration. 2023;61:239–255.
|
239
wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/imig
Received: 11 March 2 021
|
Revised: 4 Januar y 2022
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Accepted: 16 Februa ry 2022
DOI: 10 .1111/imig .12997
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
The dynamics of remittance behaviour among
Senegalese men and women in Spain
José Ignacio Carrasco1| Ognjen Obućina2
This is an open ac cess article und er the terms of the Crea tive Commons Attr ibution License, w hich permits use , distribution an d
reproduct ion in any medium, pro vided the origina l work is properly cit ed.
© 2022 The Auth ors. International Migration published by John W iley & Sons Ltd on behalf o f International Or ganization for
Migration
1Departme nt of Political and So cial
Sciences, Po mpeu Fabra Univers ity,
Barcelona, Spain
2Institut Nat ional d'études Dém ographiques
(Ined), Auber villiers, Fran ce
Correspondence
José Ignacio C arrasco, Depar tment of
Political an d Social Sciences , Pompeu Fabra
Universit y, 25- 27 Ramon Trias Fargas,
08005 Ba rcelona, Spain.
Email: joseignacio.carrasco@upf.edu
Funding information
Chilean Nati onal Agency of Rese arch and
Developmen t (ANID), grant "Pro grama
Formación C apital Humano Avan zado"
Abstract
This article explores the conditions under which Senegalese
immigrants in Spain se nd remittances hom e, beginning
with the premise that remittances are inter twined with
migration histories and migrants’ incorporation into host
societies. Given the strong gender norms in Senegal, we
perform separate analyses for men and women. We use
a longitudinal approach to analyse how remittance be hav-
iour is affec ted by immigrants’ characteristics, their eco-
nomic integr ation, and their ties to origin and destination.
Our d ata come from the MAFE and MESE sur veys, which
were implemented in 2008 and 2011, respectively. The
results indicate that remitte rs constitute a clear majorit y
among Senegalese immigrants in Spain. The Kaplan– Meier
analysis shows th at they rarely stop remit ting once they
start doing so, and the multivariate analysis reveals a strong
positive association between employment and remittance
sending. Although mos t coefficients in the full model are
similar for men and women, some important differences
emerge as well.
KEYWORDS
labour market in corporation, longitu dinal, remittances , Senegal,
Spain
240
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CARR ASCO And OBUĆInA
INTRODUCTION
Migrant remitt ances have grown steadily over recent decades . Not only have they surpassed official developmen t
assistance in low- to- middle inco me countries, b ut they were a lso larger than foreign direct investments in 2019
(World Bank, 2020). Although remittances to Africa c onstitute only 10 per ce nt of total remittances compared
to other reg ions such as Asia and Latin Amer ica, they constit ute a significant share of the GDP for some African
countries (O ECD, 2005). In Senegal , official mone tary remitta nces accounted for 10 per cent of the ir 2011 GDP
(Cisse, 2011), and a simila r figure (10.7 per cent of GDP) is obser ved for 2020 (UNDP, 2021). Research on the
impact of remittances on development indicates that remittances have contributed to a 30 per cent reduction in
Senegalese poverty (Diagne & Diane, 2008). F or scholars and policyma kers, however, the importance of remit-
tances extends beyond their economic dimension, as remittances and their determinants are intertwined wit h
migration histories and migrant s’ incorporation into host societies, and they are argua bly one of the central man-
ifestations of immigrants’ transnational ties. Remitta nces help sust ain pivotal conte mporary migr ation practices
such as transnat ional famili es and circular m igration, a nd they can als o encourage further migration flows (de
Haas, 2010; IFAD, 2017). B y drawing on the previous em pirical evidence of Senegalese migrants in Europe, this
article focuses on the Spanish context and aims to disentangle th e way in which migrant remittance behaviour
is affecte d by individual char acteristics (e.g., gender and educat ion), economic integrat ion (e.g., employment sta-
tus), and their ties to origin (e.g., f amily reunificat ion). Our main research quest ion is: Under what conditions do
Senegalese in Spain send remittances ho me? We address this question by usi ng a unique dat aset that combine s
two retrospec tive surveys, namely Migration between Africa and Europe (MAFE, conduc ted in 200 8) and Migrations
Between Senegal and Spain (MESE, conducted in 2011).
Although remitta nce behav iour amo ng Seneg alese in Europe has already been addressed in some re cent
studies (among others, Chort et al., 2012; Vickstrom & Beauchemin, 2016), we complement the previous re-
search in four ways. Fir st, we introduce a dynamic compo nent into the analysis of remitta nces by looking at when
Senegalese immigrants start remitting and for how long they co ntinue to do so. Second, w e focus on a s ingle
destination country: Spain. This can be of impor tance when working wit h small s amples, as our result s cannot
be biased by unobserve d heterogen eity due to selection into di fferent d estinations. Third, we introd uce into
our mode l a wide ra nge of variable s reflecting family and e conomic ties to the home and destinatio n countries.
Fourth, we add a gender pe rspective to the overal l analysis of remittance sending am ong Senegale se migrants
by performing s eparate analyses for men an d women. Given the main featu res of the paper, it can be argued th at
its contribut ion to the literature on rem ittances is not confine d strictly to the contex t of Senegalese migrati on. In
particular, this concerns the longitudin al nature of the study, as a large majo rity of stu dies on remit tances have
been cross- sectional. Additio nally, although the ge nder dimension of r emittances is n ot entirely absent from the
literature, it ha s been rarely addresse d in previous studies.
SOCIAL CONTEXT OF THE STUDY
Senegalese migration to Europe
With a population of around 17 million people, Se negal is a country characterized by low economic developm ent
and relative political stabi lity. Although an im portant destin ation for some neig hbouring West Afric an countries,
Senegal is also a country wit h a high level of emig ration. Accordin g to UN- DESA (2019), around 45 pe r cent of
Senegalese migrants live in another African country (with t he most important destinatio ns being Gambia and
Mauritania), whereas 48 per cent of Senegalese migrants have opted for a European country. In the latter group,
Franc e, Italy, a nd Spain ar e by far the most impo rtant d estina tions, wh ere the Se negale se popul ations ar e, respe c-
tively, 130,0 00, 104,0 00, and 52,0 00. Looking at the tr ends since 2010 (which roughly coincides with the time
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