1.2. TRENDS AND PATTERNS OF MIGRATION TO AND FROM
CARIBBEAN COUNTRIES
Elizabeth Thomas-Hope[1]
INTRODUCTION
Migration has become deeply embedded in the psyche of Caribbean peoples over the past century and a half. It has evolved as the main avenue for upward mobility through the accumulation of capital – financial and social. Thus the propensity for migration is high and there is a general responsiveness to the opportunities for moving whenever they occur. At times these opportunities have come from within the region itself or the wider circum-Caribbean region, as in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; in more recent times from North America and Europe.
The migration dynamic reflects the interplay of international, national and highly personal circumstances. Global changes affect the international economic order and the division of labour and, as a consequence, legislative controls and inducements to the movement of labour across selective national borders. At the national level, economic, social, demographic and political factors influence the variable access of people to economic rewards and social opportunities. But migration is not a passive reaction to internal ‘pushes’ and external ‘pulls’. Within this wider international and national context, migration is part of a dynamic set of negotiations at all levels. For whether ‘free’ movement or refugee, there is a selective process that operates at the interface of the needs of the immigration country on the one hand and the potential for migration in the emigration country on the other. Besides, these are complex and not solely determined by simple economic forces. Pressure, based on the social and political implications of the migration, is sometimes greater than the need for labour in the economy. Within the sending country, there are pressures from high propensity migrants to seek migration opportunities; yet their departure in large numbers is likely to create deficits in the reservoir of human resources with potential negative implications for national development. There are, therefore, a number of conflicts of interest within both receiving countries and sending countries at the national and local levels between the costs and benefits of migration.
The compromise between these conflicts in the receiving country is manifest in the immigration regulations and recruitment drives that emerge. The compromise in the sending countries is reflected in the system of obligations, responsibilities and expectations that the migrants and non-migrants establish. The sending country has a relatively poor negotiating position at the national level, even though, in many instances, the labour force and other recruits (such as students) are highly valuable at the destination. Only in the contract labour schemes has the Jamaican government, for example, been able to enforce a requirement of saving and foreign currency remittance. By and large the sending country has simply to accept the spontaneous benefits that accrue through migration. It is in this regard that policy should focus upon the development of mechanisms to channel the benefits into national productivity so that as much as possible value-added may be derived.
Types of Caribbean Migration
Caribbean migration reflects variations on the basis of the purpose for the movement –work, education, accompanying persons - combined with length of stay at the destination – long-term or short-term. It is difficult to establish rigid time-frames for what constitutes a long-stay migrant and there are many variations in all these migration activities that characterize the pattern of the overall movement. However, a classification would include the following general types of migration: long-stay residence (for work, study or as accompanying persons); short-stay (including contract labour/guest worker schemes); return migration.
A single migrant may engage in all three of these types of migration in his or her life-time and certainly a single household may have members engaged in any combination of types at the same time. Further, even migrations that are long-term do not necessarily reflect a total displacement of the migrants from their household and community but rather, the establishment of a transnational set of interactions and linkages that are associated with movements of people, money and goods and ideas in support of the expectations and obligations of the transnational household or family (Schiller et al, 1995; Thomas-Hope, 1986, 1988, 1992). The various types of migration are therefore incorporated into intra-regional, extra-regional and return migration, around which Caribbean migration trends and patterns are here discussed.
In addition, there is considerable circulation of people that is not recorded either in the censuses or in any systematic way through other types of migration statistics. It is an important form of mobility that includes legal, informal commercial activities of various kinds, as well as organized trafficking in drugs and people. This type of population movement is outside of the scope of the present paper so is not elaborated upon here. However, it is important to note that they are not only significant in their societal impact in both source and destination countries but that they are also part of the wider phenomenon of population movement, directly or indirectly associated with the international networks established by the formal migration process.
Data
Circularity in the pattern of movement and the complexity of who constitutes a migrant or what constitutes migration make the collection of, and consistency in the data difficult. The immigrant stock determined from population census statistics may record documented migrants involved in any one of these types of movement, though they principally record those that are long-stay residents.
Despite the difficulties in capturing all aspects of migration in official data, the CARICOM 1991 Census for Population and Housing (CCPHC) provides migration data for much of the region, excepting the Cayman Islands and the Turks and Caicos Islands. There are also no intra-regional migration data for Haiti. Data for extra-regional movements are compiled by the respective destination countries. These data do not include those national groups that, due to their citizenship, require no visas for entry. For example, people from the French Antilles moving to France, British Commonwealth migrants to Britain, and Puerto Ricans to the United States.
INTRA-REGIONAL CARIBBEAN MIGRATION
On the basis of the 1991 CARICOM Census, the figure for the total migration stock or numbers of persons living in the region other than in their country of nationality, was 104,669. (The data excludes Jamaica, Cayman and the Turks and Caicos Islands). Of this total, Caribbean nationals accounted for the majority, other immigrants were chiefly from the United States and Canada, United Kingdom and India. For example, in Trinidad and Tobago, 25.5% of the non-national population were from outside the Caribbean. In the U.S. Virgin Islands, the non-Caribbean migrants accounted for 27.6% of the migrant stock, for the British Virgin Islands, the figure was 27.5% and Antigua 32.7%. In the Bahamas, less than a quarter of the migrant stock was comprised of Caribbean nationals, the greater proportion (76%) having come from outside the region, chiefly North America and Europe. (Table 1).
The Caribbean countries with the largest concentrations of immigrants are Trinidad & Tobago, with 35.4 % of the total stock of Caribbean migrants in the region, the U.S. Virgin Islands with 22.2 %; and Barbados with 12.3 %. Antigua and Barbuda with 7.9%; and the British Virgin Islands with 5.5 % (Table 2). It is evident that the U.S. Virgin Islands, the British Virgin Islands and even Antigua are strongly supported by a high immigrant population, representing a heavy reliance on a non-national labour force.
The Caribbean countries representing the major sources of intra-regional migrants are Grenada, St Vincent and Guyana. The rate of emigration (calculated from the numbers of emigrants relative to the total population) gives an indication of the impact upon the sending countries. The out-migration rate was 19.1 for Grenada, 15.1 for St. Vincent relative to their population (1990). Emigrants from Guyana were third in the rank of intra-regional migrants but this represented a rate of only 1.9 in relation to Guyana’s population, whereas the British Virgin Islands, contributing only 5,812 intra-regional migrants had an out-migration rate of 26.8. (Table 2).
With few exceptions, notably Antigua, the countries with the highest immigration rates are not those with the highest emigration rates, though it should be pointed out that the situation is highly dynamic. There are the possibilities of change in the migration pattern, depending upon any emerging foci of growth in any specific economic sector and the attendant need for an increased workforce of a particular type. An additional factor that underlines the migration dynamic is that any major environmental hazard could lead to out-migration. This is exemplified by the situation in Montserrat. The migration pattern changed dramatically in the second half of the 1990s due to the volcanic eruptions. In 1990, this island had an immigration rate of 13.7 and emigration rate of 18.6. Currently, although data are not available, it is known that the immigration has virtually ceased and the emigration rate has increased significantly.
Trends in the Movement – Direction and Timing
In the first three decades of the twentieth century there were significant movements from the Anglophone to the Hispanic Caribbean and the Netherlands Antilles. By mid-century, the intra-regional movements were largely to and from Anglophone countries as well as from Haiti to the Bahamas and the Dominican Republic.
Most of the current immigrant stock had migrated prior to 1980 and much even before 1970. This was usually associated with specific development projects or periods of peak economic growth based on a particular industry – for example oil in Trinidad, tourism in the U.S.Virgin Islands, the Bahamas and Cayman Islands. In these situations, a specific kind of labour force was required and immigration of the relevant groups encouraged or facilitated. The intra-regional movements have subsequently continued at a steady rate with no recent major peaks in movement.
Characteristics of the Migrants
Age and Sex. The age and sex distribution among intra-regional migrants reflects the varied reasons which conditioned their migration in the first place. As the nature of the migration streams will show, many of the major movements in the region had occurred prior to 1980, indicating relatively stable and therefore mature migrant population profiles. The distribution by sex also varies from one country to another, depending on the initial occupational selectivity of the migrants and there is no major gender imbalance in any of the populations (CCPHC, 1994).
Education. The educational level of immigrants are, on average, higher than both the population that they leave and that which they enter, reflecting the selective nature of the migration process. In most cases there are significantly higher proportions of non-nationals with tertiary education than is the case for nationals. For example, in Antigua 16.5% of the non-national population have tertiary (pre-university or university) qualifications; only 5.5% of the nationals do. In the Bahamas, the figure is 19.4% of the non-nationals, 7.9% of nationals; in Barbados, 54.6% of non-nationals and 8.7% of nationals; the British Virgin Islands 17.4% of non-nationals and 7.5% of nationals (CCPHC, 1994). The exception, that indicates the significance of this particular trend, is the U.S.Virgin Islands where the situation is reversed: 18.1% of the non-national population have tertiary level education whereas 27.8% of the nationals are in this position. The significance lies in the fact that the U.S.Virgin Islands have relied to lesser extent on the in-migration of a highly qualified workforce (as this is mainly provided by the national population), and more on a semi-skilled immigrant labour force. This reflects the higher level of development in those islands relative to the region in general. This is further indicated by the occupational profiles of the regional migrants.
Occupation. Migrants invariably establish or move into niche occupations in response to the opportunities afforded by the economic and social structure of the host country. The distribution and concentrations of immigrants in specific occupational categories thus reflect the history of the economic growth sectors that encouraged immigration.
In the Bahamas and the British Virgin Islands, most non-nationals are involved in unskilled work. However, the second most significant category is professionals, followed by craft and service activities. This is a consequence of the thrust of the developments in tourism in which the migrants obtain work and indeed, have established a niche. Most of the non-nationals in Jamaica are in the professional (45.9%), managerial (16.3%) and technical (12.0%) categories. This is to large extent a replacement population for Jamaicans in these occupations who migrated to North America.(Table 3).
EXTRA-REGIONAL CARIBBEAN MIGRATION
The migrations to countries outside of the Caribbean region were dominated in the 1950s and 1960s by movements to the United Kingdom and the Netherlands from their former colonies. The decline in movements to the United Kingdom after 1962 was accompanied by a sharp increase in the movements to Canada and the United States. This was a trend coincidentally triggered by increased opportunities in the immigration legislation of Canada in 1962 and the United States while, at the same time, Britain started to restrict the entry of Commonwealth Caribbean migrants. Thereafter, North America became the major destination of British Caribbean migrants, streams that added to the already high volume of Puerto Ricans to the United States and that accompanied the increase in numbers from the Dominican Republic and Haiti.
Caribbean Migration to the United States of America
Trends in the Movements
The immigrant stock is chiefly composed of migrants from Cuba, the Dominican Republic the British Commonwealth Caribbean and Haiti that had largely occurred between 1962 and 1981. In the decade of the 1990s, the streams from these countries have also been very large, with the Dominican Republic ranking first in numbers of migrants, Cuba second and Jamaica third. Most Caribbean countries have been represented in the overall migration streams to the United States in the 1990s, in particular Trinidad & Tobago and Barbados. Even those countries with only small numbers of migrants, the numbers are sometimes quite significant in relation to the small populations of the Caribbean states (Table 4).
Refugee movements and guest worker schemes.
In addition to the regular visas issued to Caribbean migrants for long-stay residence in the United States for work and/or education, there have also been significant movements of refugees, principally from Cuba and Haiti. These persons become long-stay migrants. Similar streams will recur whenever events in the region, whether political or environmental, give rise to refugee movements.