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Distance or location? How the geographic distribution of kin networks shapes support given to single mothers in urban Kenya
Abstract
With increasing urbanisation and mobility underway across sub-Saharan Africa, kin groups are becoming spatially dispersed. The extent of support provided by kin to one another is likely to vary with this geospatial positioning. Because most data collection is restricted to the co-residential household, we have little knowledge of the geospatial dimensions of kin groups of which a large part is beyond household boundaries, and even less insight into how spatial variation might impact on intra-familial support patterns. Drawing on recently collected data on single mothers and their kin in Nairobi, Kenya, we describe the geospatial positioning of non-residential kin; examine the relationship between objective and subjective measures of distance and location of kin and support for single mothers; and analyse the relationship between kin clustering and receipt of support. Our results show several important findings. First, financial support from non-residential kin is geographically quite dispersed but emotional support is more concentrated among kin living near the mother. Second, whereas there is no effect of the objective measures on financial or emotional support, we find strong effects of subjective measures. Third, we find that the clustering of kin around the mother by distance has no effect on either outcome but having the majority of kin living in rural areas has a negative effect on emotional support even after controlling for distance between kin and kin location.
... Recent studies, however, suggest that such support can strain relatives' economic resources (Mtshali, 2015). Moreover, extended kin support may be weakening in response to increased rural-to-urban migration (Madhavan, Clark, Araos, & Beguy, 2018) and the prolonged HIV/AIDS epidemic in several African countries (Smith, 2011). Immediate family members, such as older siblings, also provide regular child care throughout sub-Saharan Africa (Blanc & Lloyd, 1994). ...
... About a third of these mothers moved from another area in Nairobi, while the majority (about 60%) moved directly from their rural homelands (Beguy et al., 2010). Hence, many mothers with young children are likely to live too far from their extended kinship networks to receive assistance with childcare (Madhavan et al., 2018). ...
As a growing number of women across sub-Saharan Africa engage in paid work, they face the challenge of finding suitable child care arrangements. Drawing on survey data from over 1,200 mothers and in-depth interviews with 31 of these women, we find that mothers living in a slum of Nairobi, Kenya, employ three main strategies to balance their work and child care responsibilities: (1) combine work and child care, (2) rely on kin and neighbours, or (3) use centre-based care. Mothers reported numerous disadvantages to either bringing their children to work or depending on others for child care assistance. In contrast, mothers highlighted several perceived benefits of centre-based child care for themselves and their children, while noting that costs were often prohibitive. These findings suggest that providing affordable centre-based child care could be a key strategy to improving the lives and welfare of women and children living in African slums.
... By entering into voluntary contractual arrangements with migrants, nonmigrant kin may take care of young children of migrants with the expectation of receiving remittances from migrants. Extended kin have long played a critical role in supporting a socially dispersed model of childrearing (Caldwell & Caldwell, 1987;Madhavan et al., 2012;Parker & Short, 2009) sometimes institutionalised in child fosterage (Cotton et al., 2022;Isiugo-Abanihe, 1985;Madhavan et al., 2018). At the same time, however, scholars have suggested that the To address this gap, we draw from parenting stress theory to conceptualise the ways in which children's coresidence in the context of mobility affect migrant sleep health. ...
Migration research tends to treat childrearing as a secondary role for migrants. By prioritising the economic objectives of migration, most models present migrants as either delaying childbearing or, if they have young children, not living with them. However, migration has become increasingly feminised, the types of mobility more varied, while the returns to migration remain uncertain at best. At the same time, norms around childrearing are shifting, and the capacity of kin to take care of children may be weakening. In such contexts, migrants may not want to or be able to be separated from their children. Confronting such difficult decisions and their consequences may be reflected in poor sleep health for the migrant parent. We draw on data from the Migration and Health Follow‐Up Study (MHFUS) in South Africa to examine the following questions: (i) To what extent is children's coresidence associated with sleep health for migrant parents? (ii) Do effects vary by sex of migrant? and (iii) Do effects vary by location of migrant? Results from propensity score matching confirm that migrants who coreside with all their young children are more likely to experience healthy sleep compared to those who have nonresident or no young children. However, stratified analysis shows that these effects are only significant for women and those not living in Gauteng province. The value of these findings is underscored by the need for research on the well‐being of migrant parents who are negotiating multiple agendas in economically precarious and physically insecure destinations.
... Women have especially relied on kin support for responsibilities related to child care and other areas that are considered female domains (Clark et al., 2017). Therefore, being away from kin significantly reduces kin support for women (Madhavan et al., 2018). This disadvantage may increase the impact of the opportunity costs related to visiting the healthcare facility (Recall Chapter 2) or limit the networks of care and support for pregnant women, as seen in Nyakang'o and Booth (2018). ...
The main objective of the study was to explain how mHealth utilization behavior emerges within the healthcare-seeking socio-cultural context. To achieve the objective, the study identified the socio-cultural characteristics of the maternal healthcare-seeking context and analyzed the user-technology interaction within this context. The study drew upon Activity Theory as a lens to understand the maternal mHealth utilization phenomenon. Hence, we theorized healthcare-seeking as an activity whose cultural aspects were further understood using Hofstede typology of culture. We employed semi-structured interviews, focus group discussions, observations, informal discussions and document review to gather data. The sample
was purposively selected and comprised various maternal health stakeholders: maternal health clients, their partners, project implementers and healthcare professionals. The results of the study show that the healthcare-seeking socio-cultural context which is characterised by socio-cultural attributes such as high-power distance, high uncertainty avoidance, gendered relations, and collectivism shapes mHealth utilisation behaviour in a dialectical process. This process takes place as maternal health clients shape and are shaped by mHealth within their healthcare-seeking socio-cultural context through a process of internalisation and externalisation.
From an internalisation perspective, uncertainties and risks in the maternal healthcare-seeking context resulted in hesitated adoption. Contextual perceptions of usefulness of the intervention resulted in the use of mHealth to substitute other healthcare structures while having different perceptions of the role of mHealth created dissonance among the maternal health clients. With regards to externalisation, maternal health clients adopted legitimisation strategies to reduce uncertainties and to develop trust required for initial and continued use of the intervention. They
legitimised both the intervention artifact, and the information. Since the mHealth intervention presented appropriate social cues, being accompanied by the expected health provider's persona, maternal health clients readily humanised the intervention. The contextual social norms around pregnancy also presented a need for the maternal health clients to make their mHealth use an ‘appropriate behaviour’ by negotiating use with relevant stakeholders in the context. Finally, in response to mHealth technology paradoxes that challenged the very motive of healthcare-seeking, maternal health clients coped by abandoning mHealth, or otherwise accommodating it.
... The wider geographic distribution of the social networks of more religious women might also help to explain why they receive emotional support from more relatives as geographic distance is expected to be less disruptive for emotional connections between kin than it is for non-kin 83 . A study of single mothers in urban Kenya, for example, showed that the road distance to their own mother had no effect on the amount of emotional support they received 84 , and other studies have suggested that it is less costly to maintain emotionally close relationships with relatives [85][86][87] . If religion increases social cohesion 53,54 and strengthens social networks overall 56 , then it may also make it easier to maintain emotional connections with increasingly physically distant relatives. ...
Human social relationships, often grounded in kinship, are being fundamentally altered by globalization as integration into geographically distant markets disrupts traditional kin based social networks. Religion plays a significant role in regulating social networks and may both stabilize extant networks as well as create new ones in ways that are under-recognized during the process of market integration. Here we use a detailed survey assessing the social networks of women in rural Bangladesh to examine whether religiosity preserves bonds among kin or broadens social networks to include fellow practitioners, thereby replacing genetic kin with unrelated co-religionists. Results show that the social networks of more religious women are larger and contain more kin but not more non-kin. More religious women’s networks are also more geographically diffuse and differ from those of less religious women by providing more emotional support, but not helping more with childcare or offering more financial assistance. Overall, these results suggest that in some areas experiencing rapid social, economic, and demographic change, religion, in certain contexts, may not serve to broaden social networks to include non-kin, but may rather help to strengthen ties between relatives and promote family cohesion.
... These dysfunctional healthcare structures included the strained doctor-patient relationships, the healthcare-seeking barriers presented by the healthcare system, and the traditionally dysfunctional system from the women's spatial separation from their kin. The latter may be explained by the fact that traditionally, trusted older female relatives are responsible for providing support during pregnancy (Madhavan et al., 2018). Having moved away from their kin to the urban areas, the women in the study did not have the benefit of these support structures. ...
Context contributes to how a repertoire of Information Systems are used. In mHealth, some studies have explored use in light of contextual realities, and fewer considered unintended use of the interventions. This paper presents an analysis of maternal health clients' technology sense-making against the backdrop of the implementers' goals, and how these perceptions may result in unintended use. The study adopted a cross-sectional case study method using a purposive sample of 38 participants. Data was collected using interviews, focus group discussions, observations, informal discussions, and document reviews. The findings show that maternal health clients interacted with the mHealth intervention based on their perceptions of its value as constructed within their healthcare-seeking context. Their divergent perceptions on the role of the intervention as intended by the mHealth implementers resulted in incongruence. The subsequent unintended use that ensued based on these perceptions include (1) using technology as a substitute for visiting the healthcare provider (2) humanizing technology (anthropomorphism). Subsequently, in the empirical context considered in this study, the unintended use led to undesired outcomes: (3) dissonance in use, and (4) technology coping strategies. Our findings offer insights to mHealth designers and implementers to consider how context may affect use; and how these interactions may influence the usage experience.
... Costs associated with migration (e.g., transportation to new community, time without income as a woman seeks new employment and housing, etc.) may prohibit a woman from taking her child to be vaccinated on the recommended schedule and instead delay doses until she can finance indirect vaccination costs [14,16]. Additionally, moving away from friends and family who provide childrearing advice, including information about where and when to vaccinate, emotional support, financial assistance, and help with childcare may hinder a woman's ability to access vaccination services in a timely fashion [17][18][19]. Given these potential disruptions, a period of adaptation to a new environment may be necessary before a woman can effectively navigate her community and the healthcare system [15,20]. ...
Introduction
Timely receipt of recommended vaccines is a proven strategy to reduce preventable under-five deaths. Kenya has experienced impressive declines in child mortality from 111 to 43 deaths per 1000 live births between 1980 and 2019. However, considerable inequities in timely vaccination remain, which unnecessarily increases risk for serious illness and death. Maternal migration is a potentially important driver of timeliness inequities, as the social and financial stressors of moving to a new community may require a woman to delay her child’s immunizations. This analysis examined how maternal migration to informal urban settlements in Nairobi, Kenya influenced childhood vaccination timeliness.
Methods
Data came from the Nairobi Urban Health and Demographic Surveillance System, 2002–2018. Migration exposures were migrant status (migrant, non-migrant), migrant origin (rural, urban), and migrant type (first-time, circular [previously resided in settlement]). Age at vaccine receipt (vaccination timeliness) was calculated for all basic vaccinations. Accelerated failure time models were used to investigate relationships between migration exposures and vaccination timeliness. Confounding was addressed using propensity score weighting.
Results
Over one-third of the children of both migrants and non-migrants received at least one dose late or not at all. Unweighted models showed the children of migrants had shorter time to OPV1 and DPT1 vaccine receipt compared to the children of non-migrants. After accounting for confounding only differences in timeliness for DPT1 remained, with the children of migrants receiving DPT1 significantly earlier than the children of non-migrants. Timeliness was comparable among migrants with rural and urban origins and among first-time and circular migrants.
Conclusion
Although a substantial proportion of children in Nairobi’s informal urban settlements do not receive timely vaccination, this analysis found limited evidence that maternal migration and migration characteristics were associated with delays for most doses. Future research should seek to elucidate potential drivers of low vaccination timeliness in Kenya.
... During pregnancy, women especially rely on family support for responsibilities related to childcare and other areas that are considered female domains [52]. Therefore, being away from family significantly reduces family support for women [53]. The increased need for support may, therefore, promote the success of novel interventions where maternal health clients are brought together to offer group support with the direction of a trained health care provider, as seen in the study by Patel et al [38]. ...
Background:
The growth of mobile technology in developing countries, coupled with pressing maternal health care challenges, has led to a widespread implementation of maternal mobile health (mHealth) innovations. However, reviews generating insights on how the characteristics of the interventions influence use are scarce.
Objective:
This study aims to review maternal mHealth interventions in Kenya to explore the influence of intervention design and implementation characteristics on use by maternal health clients. We also provide a starting inventory for maternal mHealth interventions in the country.
Methods:
Using a systematic approach, we retrieved a total of 1100 citations from both peer-reviewed and gray sources. Articles were screened on the basis of an inclusion and exclusion criterion, and the results synthesized by categorizing and characterizing the interventions presented in the articles. The first phase of the literature search was conducted between January and April 2019, and the second phase was conducted between April and June 2021.
Results:
A total of 16 articles were retrieved, comprising 13 maternal mHealth interventions. The study highlighted various mHealth design and implementation characteristics that may influence the use of these interventions.
Conclusions:
In addition to elaborating on insights that would be useful in the design and implementation of future interventions, this study contributes to a local inventory of maternal mHealth interventions that may be useful to researchers and implementers in mHealth. This study highlights the need for explanatory studies to elucidate maternal mHealth use, while complementing existing evidence on mHealth effectiveness.
... Migration can also disrupt a migrant's social and economic networks. Extended family members may provide emotional, financial and logistical support crucial to child health that may be compromised by distance and isolation from family Madhavan et al., 2018). This disruption may directly influence vaccination by impeding maternal knowledge of vaccination programming or the ability to finance indirect costs (e.g., transportation), resulting in decreased vaccination of migrant children compared to their non-migrant peers (Kiros and White, 2004;Kusuma et al., 2010). ...
Objectives
Kenya has substantially improved child mortality between 1990 and 2019, with under-five mortality decreasing from 104 to 43 deaths per 1,000 live births. However, only two-thirds of Kenyan children receive all recommended vaccines by one year, making it essential to identify under-vaccinated sub-populations. A potentially vulnerable group is internal migrants, who are at risk of decreased access to healthcare. This analysis explored how maternal migration within Kenya influences childhood vaccination.
Methods
Data were from the 2014 Kenya Demographic and Health Survey, a nationally representative cross-sectional survey. Logistic regressions assessed relationships between maternal migration and full and up-to-date child vaccination using inverse probability of treatment weighting. Two exposure variables were examined: migration status and stream (e.g. rural-urban). Multiple imputation was used to impute up-to-date status for children without vaccination cards to reduce selection bias.
Results
After accounting for selection and confounding biases all relationships between migration status and migration stream and both full and up-to-date vaccination became statistically insignificant.
Conclusions
Null findings indicate that, in Kenya, characteristics enabling migration, rather than the process of migration itself, drive differential vaccination behavior between migrants and non-migrants. This is an important deviation from previous literature that did not rigorously address important biases.
... During pregnancy, women especially rely on family support for responsibilities related to childcare and other areas that are considered female domains [52]. Therefore, being away from family significantly reduces family support for women [53]. The increased need for support may, therefore, promote the success of novel interventions where maternal health clients are brought together to offer group support with the direction of a trained health care provider, as seen in the study by Patel et al [38]. ...
BACKGROUND
The growth of mobile technology in developing countries, coupled with the pressing maternal healthcare challenges has led to wide implementation of maternal mHealth innovations. However, reviews generating insights from implementations incorporating those from grey sources are few.
OBJECTIVE
We seek to review maternal mHealth implementations in Kenya with the aim of shedding light on the status of mHealth in developing countries.
METHODS
Using a systematic approach guided by a search strategy, a total of 1,085 citations were retrieved from both peer reviewed and grey sources. Citations were screened guided by an inclusion/exclusion criterion, and the results synthesized by categorizing and characterizing the implementations. The literature search was conducted between January and April 2019.
RESULTS
From a total of 16 citations comprising 17 maternal mHealth implementations, 59% were in maternal education and behaviour change communication while 24% were applied in health worker decision support. Though 65% of the implementations had some evidence of scholarly work to determine effectiveness, 27% of these were study protocols. Qualitative studies examining how mHealth is accessed and used were few and a large majority (76%) of interventions showed no evidence of theory to support their studies.
CONCLUSIONS
The study highlights the need for more rigour in generating empirical evidence as well as qualitative studies to complement randomized controlled trials.
... Proximity to parents-in-law has a substantial effect on the childcare support (Compton & Pollak, 2014). The low feelings of solidarity that women tend to experience with their in-laws because of geographic proximity (Gillespie & van der Lippe, 2015;Silverstein & Bengtson, 1997) contribute to emotional detachment in intergenerational relationships (Madhavan, Clark, Araos, & Beguy, 2018). The low level of identity as a unified family shared by daughters-in-law with her in-laws (Song & Zhang, 2012) reflects the weak connection between daughters-and parents-in-law. ...
The transition to parenthood is one of the most stressful intra‐ and interpersonal adjustment periods for new parents. Bidirectional associations among intergenerational relationships during the transition to parenthood have received limited attention, and the complexity of reciprocal relationships varies in accordance with living arrangements. The objectives of this study were to explore (1) the bidirectional associations between marital relationships and conflicts with in‐laws during the transition to parenthood and (2) the moderation of patrilineal coresidence on the aforementioned relationships. A three‐wave prospective longitudinal design was adopted for 359 married mothers. The Dyadic Adjustment Scale and Stryker Adjustment Checklist were used to assess marital relationships and conflicts with parents‐in‐law. Cross‐lagged panel analysis was applied to examine reciprocal relationships, and multigroup analyses were employed to determine whether these relationships exhibited different patterns in accordance with the individuals’ living arrangements. The two cross‐lagged models revealed the presence of a bidirectional relationship between marital distress and conflicts with parents‐in‐law during the mid‐ to late pregnancy stages. Meanwhile, the multigroup analyses suggested that conflicts with parents‐in‐law triggered marital distress during pregnancy in the coresidence group, whereas conflicts with fathers‐in‐law could intensify marital distress during late pregnancy to the postpartum period in the noncoresidence group. These findings shed light on cross‐lagged associations with intergenerational conflicts. Healthcare professionals need to ensure that intergenerational relationships are positive during the transition to parenthood. This study enriches our understanding of the effect of patrilineal coresidence and can guide the future development of interventions based on culturally specific multidimensional approaches.
The African kinship system facilitates the movement of children and adults between households to mitigate hardship, yet few studies have documented membership changes in rural African households over time and addressed the effects of these household dynamics on the developmental outcomes of children. We used a household inventory instrument to document the number of changes in household membership experienced by 93 households in rural Zambia between two timepoints (∼2 years apart). We then used multilevel models to evaluate the effects of migration and household change on the academic learning of the children affected by HIV residing in these households, positing migration between households as a proxy for household connectivity and a potential protective factor for children. Our inventoried households experienced on average 4.12 changes in membership over the measured period. About half of these changes were due to children under 10 moving between relatives' households. No effects of these migration-related variables were found on children's academic progress at the family level. Household connectivity, as operationalized by the movement of individuals between households, may be typical to these children's home life and were not shown to be detrimental to their academic learning.
In sub‐Saharan Africa, child out‐fostering is a traditional social practice, and research suggests stable levels of out‐fostering over time, yet the underlying demographic and socioeconomic factors driving this stability have remained largely unexplored. To gain insight into the prevalence and associations of child out‐fostering and mothers’ individual and household characteristics, we analyzed nine rounds of Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) data of Senegalese mothers of children aged 0–14, collected between 1986 and 2019. Child out‐fostering has remained stable, with nearly one‐third of mothers of children aged 0–14 living apart from at least one child. Our findings indicate that at the macro‐level, counteracting fertility and child mortality dynamics contribute to this stability. At the micro‐level, out‐fostering is influenced by a complex interplay of maternal demographic, socioeconomic, and household characteristics. The role of demographic macro‐level factors demands further research attention in the context of persisting child fostering across sub‐Saharan Africa. The results further suggest that changes, such as postponement of motherhood, as well as further declines in fertility and infant mortality, could affect fostering arrangements in the future.
Child fostering—children living apart from their biological mothers—is an established strategy to support children and families throughout Africa. Little is known about how fostering decisions might be influenced by maternal migration and place of residence when women move to urban slums, which are home to a sizable proportion of Africa's urban population. Using a mixed-methods approach, we triangulate in-depth interviews with birth histories collected in two slum settlements in Nairobi, Kenya, to explore the interconnections between maternal migration experience, slum residence, and child fostering decisions. Our quantitative results reveal substantial fostering of children among women in slum contexts, with fostering being significantly higher among children of migrant women, particularly those who have recently arrived. Qualitative findings suggest that migration acts as an important impetus to foster, as do transitions in women's romantic relationships, economic uncertainty, poor slum conditions, and desires to send children to rural areas for schooling. This novel finding on children's schooling is supported in quantitative analyses, which show that older school-age children are more likely than younger children to be fostered. This study highlights the central roles of maternal migration, economic and social precariousness, and place of residence in determining the fostering of children among mothers living in informal settlements.
Introduction
In Africa, migrants are more likely to be living with HIV and HIV viremic than non-migrants but less is known about HIV outcomes among non-migrants living in households with migrants. We compared HIV outcomes in non-migrating persons in households with and without migration.
Methods
We analyzed cross-sectional data collected between August 2016-May 2018 from non-migrating participants aged 15–49 in the Rakai Community Cohort Study in Uganda. Migrant households were classified as those reporting ≥1 member moving into or out of the household since the prior survey. HIV serostatus was determined using a validated testing algorithm, and viremia defined as >1,000 copies/mL. Modified Poisson regression was used to estimate prevalence ratios (PR) between household migration and HIV outcomes. Analyses were stratified by gender, direction of migration (into/out of household), and relationship between non-migrants and migrants (e.g., spouse).
Results
There were 14,599 non-migrants (52% women) and 4,415 (30%) lived in a household with ≥1 migrant. Of these, 972 (22%) had migrant spouses, 1,102 (25%) migrant children, and 875 (20%) migrant siblings. Overall, HIV prevalence and viremia did not differ between non-migrants in households with and without migration. However, in stratified analyses, non-migrant women with migrant spouses were significantly more likely to be HIV seropositive compared to non-migrant women with non-migrant spouses (adjPR:1.44, 95%CI:1.21-1.71). Conversely, non-migrant mothers living with HIV who had migrant children were less likely to be viremic (adjPR:0.34, 95%CI:0.13-0.86).
Conclusions
Non-migrating women with migrating spouses are more likely be living with HIV, and may benefit from additional HIV support services.
A body of scholarship has demonstrated that grandmothers provide critical support to their adult children and grandchildren across Africa. We examine the extent to which grandmothers provide support in a low-income, urban context where grandmothers are employed and do not live in intergenerational arrangements. We (1) describe the composition of living grandparents and the type of support their adult daughters and grandchildren received from them; (2) analyze the extent to which grandmother’s employment and residence affect the odds of receiving support; and (3) examine the relationship between support from grandmothers and adult daughters’ mental health. We use three waves of data from 1181 young mothers enrolled in the JAMO project, a longitudinal study of family connectivity in Nairobi, Kenya. Logistic regression models show that grandmothers being employed and co-residing significantly increase the odds of daughters receiving support from them and that this support can protect these young mothers’ mental health.
This study examines the familial ties in the social support network of refugees in Germany. It investigates whether distance to family plays a role in the provision of emotional and informational support and how this relationship is moderated by social network services (SNS). Using data from the IAB-BAMF-SOEP Survey of Refugees (N = 5237), the paper provides evidence for a family-centred network. Increasing distance to family is generally negatively associated with receiving support. However, the strength of support from the partner and sibling is less affected by distance than support from parents. Findings indicate that emotional support can generally be conveyed across greater distances, while informational support, often entailing location-bound aid, is not as easily transmittable. This study contributes to the understanding of refugee networks as transnational families with intergenerational differences in support. It also refines the depiction of support dynamics as being multifaceted and potentially limited due to fragmented contacts.
Adolescence is a key period of biological and social development and household living arrangements in adolescence in sub-Saharan Africa has been shown to be associated with multiple biosocial outcomes. Household is a commonly used term across a wide range of disciplines, however traditional, western-centric definitions are often used which may not capture important, context-specific differences in household membership (who belongs to which group) and composition (how the household members are related). This study used data on adolescents from rural northern Malawi from 2004-2016 to create context-relevant household composition variables using latent class analysis (LCA) with two household membership definitions, ‘immediate’ (as defined within the dataset) and ‘expanded’ (created to include relatives living close by). The extent to which different definitions of household composition alter observed associations with biosocial outcomes was investigated. LCA identified household compositions with greater complexity than those represented in western-centric definitions (LCA classes included ‘brother’s family’, ‘sister’s family’, ‘maternal’ and ‘paternal’), with few individuals living in ‘nuclear’ families. Using the ‘expanded’ household definition created classes which, for example, distinguished between ‘single mother’ households and those with a single mother but living very close to maternal family. LCA was found to be most useful for guiding the creation of manual ‘LCA-guided’ variables to produce household composition definitions which were suitable for use as predictor variables. Compared to western-centric definitions, LCA-guided household composition definitions using both ‘immediate’ and ‘expanded’ definitions provided greater detail about the contribution of household composition to variation in associations with biosocial outcomes: for example female adolescents in ‘maternal’ households had higher odds of a poor educational outcome, while for male adolescents this effect was found in ‘paternal’ households. While potential drawbacks in terms of generalisability and statistical power are recognised, other researchers are recommended, where appropriate, to consider using context-specific household definitions.
Background: Childrearing in sub-Saharan Africa is often viewed as collaborative, where children benefit from support from kin. For single mothers living in informal settlements, kin networks may be highly dispersed and offer little day-to-day childrearing support, but may provide opportunities for child fostering. Objective: Our study uses a linked lives approach, where single mothers' connections with kin and romantic partners may influence whether - and what type of - kin are relied on to support child fostering. Methods: We leverage an innovative survey on the kin networks of 404 single mothers and 741 children, collected in 2016, and 41 in-depth interviews conducted in 2011 and 2013, to explore fostering among single mothers in Korogocho and Viwandani, two slums in Nairobi, Kenya. Results: Quantitative findings show 6.2Š of single mothers' children are fostered, with provision of emotional support associated with lower likelihood of fostering. Both quantitative and qualitative results reflect strong reliance on maternal kin. Maternal kin play a key role in fostering to protect children, to fulfill traditional lineage obligations, and due to their willingness to foster when others will not. Contribution: This study contributes to a growing body of research on the role of kin in contemporary fostering arrangements in sub-Saharan Africa. In particular, we highlight fostering among a potentially highly vulnerable group: the children of single mothers in slum settlements. Sending children to live with kin may be an important coping strategy for single mothers, both to reduce the burden of raising children alone and to provide children with opportunities to grow up outside the slums.
Child fostering has been documented over time in many parts of sub‐Saharan Africa. We know little, however, about how the prevalence of fostering differs across countries and broad regions, nor about how fostering—and its predictors—has changed within countries over time. To explore prevalence, trends, and predictors of child fostering, I leverage Demographic and Health Survey data of mothers of children aged 0–15 from 139 surveys in 36 countries collected between 1986 and 2019, representing all regions of sub‐Saharan Africa. Results suggest striking variation in the prevalence of contemporary fostering, ranging from 11.5 percent of mothers in Burundi to 45.7 percent in Namibia in the most recent survey. Fostering trends have fluctuated over time in the majority of countries, but have remained broadly stable, with random and fixed‐effects models indicating that the key correlates across and within countries over time have remained stable, with the prevalence of never‐married motherhood playing a key role in fostering. Together, results suggest child fostering remains an enduring institution in family life throughout sub‐Saharan Africa.
This paper contributes to studies of care practices and care ethics beyond the Minority world by analysing informal caringscapes after a family death in urban Senegal. Based on the findings of a qualitative study in the cities of Dakar and Kaolack, we explore exchanges of care by the living for the living in the period immediately following the death, and changes in these care practices over the longer term. We focus on mobilities and changing care roles in family lives over time. We demonstrate the central significance of family commitments and concern for the wellbeing of the ‘family’ in caring exchanges. We suggest that a deeply relational understanding of personhood as bound up with family and community underlies many current caring practices in urban Senegal and challenges current conceptualisations of care interdependencies.
In most contexts, emotional support is crucial for the well-being of low-income single women and their children. Support from women may be especially important for single mothers because of precarious ties to their children’s fathers, the prevalence of extended matrifocal living arrangements, and gendered norms that place men as providers of financial rather than emotional support. However, in contexts marked by economic insecurity, spatial dispersion of families, and changing gender norms and kinship obligations, such an expectation may be problematic. Applying theories of emotional capital and family bargaining processes, we address three questions: What is the gender composition of emotional support that single mothers receive? How does gender composition change over time? Does the gender composition of emotional support affect the self-reported stress of single mothers? Drawing on data from a unique data set on 462 low-income single mothers and their kin from Nairobi, Kenya, we uncover three key findings. One, whereas the bulk of strong emotional support comes from female kin, about 20 percent of respondents report having male-dominant support networks. Two, nearly 30 percent of respondents report change favoring men in the composition of their emotional support over six months. Three, having a male-dominant emotional support network is associated with lower stress. These results challenge what is commonly taken for granted about gender norms and kinship obligations in non-Western contexts.
There is widespread recognition of the importance of family stability for child development. South Africa presents an interesting context in which to study the consequences of family instability because of the traditionally fluid nature of household composition due to labor migration, child fostering, and non-marital fertility. More recently, the HIV pandemic has added another source of instability. Within South Africa, however, patterns of instability differ markedly across racial groups. We use the Cape Area Panel Study (CAPS) data to examine the implications of changes in parent-child coresidence for educational and sexual development of young South Africans. We show that changes in maternal and paternal coresidence have implications for the timing of sexual initiation for both black and coloured adolescents. Maternal and paternal transitions also lead to poorer educational outcomes for coloured adolescents, but parental disruptions are not significantly related to educational outcomes for blacks. These findings suggest that the implications of coresidential instability vary by race, reflecting racial differences with respect to cultural, social, and economic conditions.
Adaptability is emerging as a key issue not only in the climate change debate but in the general area of sustainable development. In this context, we examine the link between household resilience and connectivity in a rural community in Botswana. We see resilience and vulnerability as the positive and negative dimensions of adaptability. Poor, marginal rural communities confronted with the vagaries of climate change, will need to become more resilient if they are to survive and thrive. We define resilience as the capacity of a social-ecological system to cope with shocks such as droughts or economic crises without changing its fundamental identity. We make use of three different indices of household resilience: livelihood diversity, wealth, and a comprehensive resilience index based on a combination of human, financial, physical, social, and natural capital. Then, we measure the social connectivity of households through a whole network approach in social network analysis, using two measures of network centrality (degree centrality and betweenness). We hypothesize that households with greater social connectivity have greater resilience, and analyze a community in rural Botswana to uncover how different households make use of social networks to deal with shocks such as human illness and death, crop damage, and livestock disease. We surveyed the entire community of Habu using a structured questionnaire that focused on livelihood strategies and social networks. We found that gender, age of household head, and household size were positively correlated with social connectivity. Our analysis indicates that those households that are more socially networked are likely to have a wider range of livelihood strategies, greater levels of other forms of social capital, and greater overall capital. Therefore, they are more resilient.
The examination of co-residential household arrangements has been a mainstay in demographic analysis, based on the assumption that those with whom one lives are the most important influences in one's life. In contrast, we know far less about the spaces not shared but none the less crucially important in the lives of children. In this analysis, we bring together detailed ethnographic data on kin connectivity with geographical information system (GIS) data in a rural area of South Africa, in order to: 1) describe the spatial distribution of kin from a child's perspective, with special attention paid to the role of circular migrants who constitute a critical point of spatial dispersion; 2) examine how type of kinship (maternal vs paternal) and 3) socio-economic status intersect with spatial distribution. Our analysis uses a three-category typology of kin spatial arrangement that reflects employment constraints, patterns of union formation and norms of kin obligation. Specifically, we find that 1) the high-density rural node with extensive dispersion is associated with economic and union stability and access to maternal and paternal kin; whereas 2) the rural node with limited dispersion faces greater economic vulnerability and often operates in the absence of formal unions; and 3) the rural node with minimal dispersion offers the least amount of economic security and is almost always dominated by single mothers reliant on maternal kin.
This article investigates how transnational familial links and socio-cultural dynamics shape migrants' remitting behavior and inform their relationships. It shows that most research on remittances fails to capture migrants' personal and social significance of remittances embedded not only in their transnational social relations, but also in cultural contexts. Drawing on new empirical qualitative research amongst Congolese migrants in South Africa, the article argues that migrants remit primarily in a bid to escape social death by fostering familial belonging and sustaining social status. It finds that socio-cultural influences and internalized social stereotypes about economic effects of emigration shape migrants' awareness of their role expectations in communities of origin. These role expectations exercise on them such a social pressure that migrants often feel a compelling need to be perceived as financially "successful" as well as "valid" and "good" family members not only in their communities of origin but also among other migrants. As such, remittances become fundamentally the measures and criteria shaping migrants' sense of belonging and social and familial inclusion or exclusion. In this sense, for individual migrants, remittances play an essential instrumental role portraying such images and at the same time are seen as a means to avoid social stigmatization and exclusion.
There is now a substantial body of research suggesting that social cohesion, a collective characteristic measured by the levels of trust, reciprocity and formation of strong social bonds within communities, is an important factor in determining health. Of particular interest is the extent to which factors in the built environment facilitate, or impede, the development of social bonds. Severance is a characteristic of physical environments which is hypothesized to inhibit cohesion. In the current study we test a number of characteristics of spatial networks which could be hypothesized to relate either to severance, or directly to community cohesion. Particular focus is given to our most promising variable for further analysis (Convex Hull Maximum Radius 600m).
In the current study we analysed social cohesion as measured at Enumeration District level, aggregated from a survey of 10,892 individuals aged 18 to 74 years in the Caerphilly Health and Social Needs Cohort Study, 2001. In a data mining process we test 16 network variables on multiple scales. The variable showing the most promise is validated in a test on an independent data set. We then conduct a multivariate regression also including Townsend deprivation scores and urban/rural status as predictor variables for social cohesion.
We find convex hull maximum radius at a 600m scale to have a small but highly significant correlation with social cohesion on both data sets. Deprivation has a stronger effect. Splitting the analysis by tertile of deprivation, we find that the effect of severance as measured by this variable is strongest in the most deprived areas. A range of spatial scales are tested, with the strongest effects being observed at scales that match typical walking distances.
We conclude that physical connectivity as measured in this paper has a significant effect on social cohesion, and that our measure is unlikely to proxy either deprivation or the urban/rural status of communities. Possible mechanisms for the effect include intrinsic navigability of areas, and the existence of a focal route on which people can meet on foot. Further investigation may lead to much stronger predictive models of social cohesion.
The paper extends the model of intergenerational solidarity (Silverstein and Bengtson, 1997) to the analysis of kinship relationships (mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers and the respective in-laws) and culturally diverse society types. A common typology of solidarity patterns is used to compare societies, and each pattern is traced back to relational, individual, and societal conditions within a multilevel framework. The empirical analysis was based on standardised interviews with N = 7,869 mothers from different areas in China, India, Ghana, South Africa, Palestine, Israel, Turkey, Russia, Estonia, Poland, Germany, France and the United States, comprising a total of N = 40,316 kinship relationships. The societies under study differed systematically in regard to the institutional structure of their kinship systems (i.e., matri- vs. patrilinearity) and in measures of general welfare. A latent class analysis based on associational, affective, and functional solidarity yielded four patterns that were consistently replicated across different kin relations and regions. These relationship dimensions were labelled "tight-knit," "intimate but distant," "obligatory," and "detached." A cross-national multilevel multinomial logistic regression analysis suggested strong independent effects of both the kinship system and national wealth on kinship solidarity. Compared to relational and societal determinants, individual-level characteristics generally had a small impact.
It is widely believed that urbanisation is occurring faster in sub-Saharan Africa than anywhere else in the world, as migrants move from rural to urban settlements. This is a fallacy. While the populations of numerous urban areas are growing rapidly, the urbanisation levels of many countries are increasing slowly – if at all. Natural increase, rather than net in-migration, is the predominant growth factor in most urban populations. African governments, policymakers and international donors need to acknowledge fundamental changes in urbanisation trends, and respond to the irrefutable messages these impart about urban employment, incomes and economic development.
Ethnographic studies in West Africa show that the practice of sending children away to be raised by relatives and non-relatives is widespread among many ethnic groups. Attempts to explore the demographic relevance of the practice. The results are indicative of high incidence of child fosterage in Ghana, Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Nigeria. Child fostering facilitates female labour force participation, and may affect the fertility decisions of both natural and foster parents, mainly because it serves to reallocate the resources available for raising children within the society. It may also have consequences for child survival, depending partly on how the culture treats children outside of their maternal homes.-from Author
In this analysis, we draw on qualitative data to examine the management of non-marital fertility among young women in two rural, Black communities situated in different provinces of South Africa: KwaZulu-Natal and Mpumalanga. While the two communities share a history of economic and social disadvantage and limited access to the labour market, there are, nonetheless, distinctive features that are evident in the management of non-marital fertility. We show that young women in both communities aspire to an ideal ordering of events that places finishing education before getting married and having children, but this is not easily attained. However, there are important differences in the ways young women and their families respond to union formation and childbearing that often occurs outside of a recognised union. In Hlabisa, KwaZulu-Natal, formal processes for legitimising non-marital pregnancies through union recognition are still in place whereas, in Agincourt, Mpumalanga, more emphasis is placed on securing support and paternal recognition for the child rather than on cementing the union between the young woman and her partner. We also find that the older generation in Agincourt at times views education as a threat to marriage while this is not common in Hlabisa. Our findings have important implications for intervention programmes that often treat Black communities as homogeneous wholes.
In post-apartheid South Africa, it may have been expected that circular or temporary internal labour migration would have been replaced by the permanent settlement of Africans at places of employment. However, the evidence suggests that temporary internal labour migration in the country has not declined; rather it appears to have increased, particularly because of the rise in female labour migration. Africans continue to migrate, mostly from households in rural areas, to work or to look for work and they continue to retain ties with, and membership in, their households of origin. These findings resonate with those from recent research on cross-border migration into South Africa: many people entering South Africa do not see themselves as immigrants who wish to settle permanently in the country, but as circular migrants. More research is needed to understand the nature of, and reasons for, this temporary labour migration in and into the country.
This study contributes to the debates on both spatial mismatch and “social-network” mismatch by considering the independent effects of spatial and social accessibility on the unemployment of less-educated native-born black and immigrant women. These groups experience relatively high unemployment yet differ in their residential patterns and the hypothesized capacities of their social networks. Using detailed geographic census data matched to travel data, I calculated an accessibility index to measure spatial job accessibility and used information on neighborhood characteristics and household composition to assess social accessibility. The results indicate that better spatial accessibility to jobs is associated with lower unemployment among native-born black and foreign-born Mexican and Vietnamese women; no association was detected among the remaining immigrant groups. The analysis yielded no empirical support for the advantages that residence in an enclave may provide female immigrant residents in the form of access to employment through social networks. In fact, the results point to detrimental effects of residence in an ethnic enclave for foreign-born Mexican and Vietnamese women. Finally, among all groups, living with other employed adults significantly and substantively decreased a woman's likelihood of unemployment, indicating the importance of household-based social accessibility for less-educated native-born black and immigrant women's employment outcomes.
This article examines the influence of maternal status, socioeconomic status of the household, and household composition on the mobility of children aged 0-14 in Mpumalanga Province, South Africa, from 1999 to 2008. Using data from the Agincourt Health and Demographic Surveillance System, we found that children whose mothers were temporary migrants, living elsewhere, or dead had higher odds of moving than children whose mothers were coresident. Older children and children living in richer households faced lower odds of mobility. For children whose mothers were coresident, there was no effect of maternal substitutes on child mobility. However, among children whose mothers were temporary migrants or living elsewhere, the presence of prime-aged and elderly females lowered the odds of mobility. For maternal orphans, the presence of elderly women in the household lowered their odds of mobility. The results underscore the importance of examining the conditions under which children move in order to strengthen service delivery targeted at safeguarding children's well-being.
We present results from a qualitative study examining how professionals living and working in Nairobi, Kenya regularly use ICT in their everyday lives. There are two contributions of this work for the HCI community. First, we provide empirical evidence demonstrating constraints our participants encountered when using technology in an infrastructure-poor setting. These constraints are limited bandwidth, high costs, differing perceptions of responsiveness, and threats to physical and virtual security. Second, we use our findings to critically evaluate the "access, anytime and anywhere" construct shaping the design of future technologies. We present an alternative vision called deliberate interactions—a planned and purposeful interaction style that involves offline preparation—and discuss ways ICT can support this online usage behavior. Author Keywords HCI4D, Kenya, urban computing, everyday technology
This study uses data from KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, to examine the factors associated with schoolgirl pregnancy and subsequent educational pathways. We find that prior schooling discontinuities--defined as instances of non-pregnancy-related grade repetition or temporary withdrawals from school--are strongly associated with a young woman's likelihood of later becoming pregnant while enrolled in school, dropping out of school if she becomes pregnant, and not returning to school following a pregnancy-related dropout. Young women who are the primary caregivers to their children are also significantly more likely to leave school than are those who have help with their childcare responsibilities. Given the increasing importance of female school participation in sub-Saharan Africa, programs must be designed to reach girls and their families early to increase incentives for ensuring their timely progression through school and to increase their access to reproductive health information and services.
This article investigates how transnational familial links and socio-cultural dynamics shape migrants’ remitting behavior and inform their relationships. It shows that most research on remittances fails to capture migrants’ personal and social significance of remittances embedded not only in their transnational social relations, but also in cultural contexts. Drawing on new empirical qualitative research amongst Congolese migrants in South Africa, the article argues that migrants remit primarily in a bid to escape social death by fostering familial belonging and sustaining social status. It finds that socio-cultural influences and internalized social stereotypes about economic effects of emigration shape migrants’ awareness of their role expectations in communities of origin. These role expectations exercise on them such a social pressure that migrants often feel a compelling need to be perceived as financially “successful” as well as “valid” and “good” family members not only in their communities of origin but also among other migrants. As such, remittances become fundamentally the measures and criteria shaping migrants’ sense of belonging and social and familial inclusion or exclusion. In this sense, for individual migrants, remittances play an essential instrumental role portraying such images and at the same time are seen as a means to avoid social stigmatization and exclusion.
In post-apartheid South Africa, there has been a significant rise in women's out-migration from rural areas and across its territorial borders for economic purposes resulting in gender reconfiguration of migration streams. Alongside, there has been a simultaneous increase in the participation of women in the labor force. However, this has mostly grown in the informal sector,¹ which is often associated with low earnings and insecure working conditions. One consequence has been the increasing reliance of migrant women on survivalist activities such as informal sexual exchanges that increase their risk of contracting HIV infection. Insecure working environments also expose migrant women to sexual abuses. This article is based on the author's work in South Africa's major urban centers and examines the nature of the relationship between the increased migration of black African women in South Africa, the nature of their work, and their resultant vulnerability to HIV/AIDS.
Single mothers often turn to their extended kin for financial assistance and to help with child care. Such support may be especially important in areas of high poverty and poor environmental conditions. Using novel kinship data, this article assesses the extent of support given by more than 3,000 relatives to 462 single mothers living in a slum area of Nairobi, Kenya. Contrary to stereotypes about families in sub-Saharan Africa, the active kin network of single mothers is relatively small, and nearly a fifth of mothers do not receive any financial or child-care assistance. Different types of kin offer different kinds of support according to culturally proscribed roles. However, support also depends heavily on kin's employment status, geographic proximity, and age. These findings offer a nuanced picture of how single women living in slum areas draw on their kin network to cope with their daily demands as mothers.
Across settings, it has been shown that the co-residential household is an insufficient measure of family structure and support. However, it continues to be the primary means of population data collection. To address this problem, we developed a new instrument, the Kinship Support Tree (KST), to collect kinship structure and support data on co-residential and non-residential kin and tested it on a sample of 462 single mothers and their children in a slum community in Nairobi, Kenya. This instrument is unique in four important ways: (1) it is not limited to the co-residential household; (2) it distinguishes potential from functional kin; (3) it incorporates multiple geospatial measures; and (4) it collects data on kin relationships specifically for children. In this paper, we describe the KST instrument, assess the data collected in comparison to data from household rosters, and consider the challenges and feasibility of administration of the KST.
City Life from Jakarta to Dakar focuses on the politics incumbent to this process - an "anticipatory politics" - that encompasses a wide range of practices, calculations and economies. As such, the book is not a collection of case studies on a specific theme, not a review of developmental problems, nor does it marshal the focal cities as evidence of particular urban trends. Rather, it examines how possibilities, perhaps inherent in these cities all along, are materialized through the everyday projects of residents situated in the city and the larger world in very different ways.
Recent urban studies in western Europe and the United States have shown the continued importance of kinship ties, contrary to the hypothesis that they tend to disappear in the city. To test this hypothesis on different types of societies, an examination of research done in the West African cities of Brazzaville, Congo; Dakar, Senegal; Lagos, Nigeria; and Leopoldville and Stanleyville, The Congo, was made. It showed that here too kinship ties continued to exist. The extended family served as a source of shelter as well as providing for the economic, religious, legal and recreational needs of its urban members.
The article examines the determinants of children's school enrollment and completion of primary grade four--one of UNICEF's key indicators of social progress--in seven countries of sub-Saharan Africa, focusing on the role of parents and other household members in providing children with educational and residential support. While in most of these countries a substantial majority of 10-14-year-old children are currently enrolled in school, many fewer children by this age have attained a minimum of a fourth grade education, primarily due to late ages of entry into school and slow progress from grade to grade. The resources of a child's residential household--in particular the education of the household head and the household standard of living--are determining factors in explaining variations among children in these aspects of schooling. By contrast, a child's biological parents appear to play a less critical role, as demonstrated by comparing the educational record of orphans with that of children whose parents are still living. Furthermore, children living in female-headed households have better school outcomes than children living in male-headed households, when households with similar resources are compared.
The internet has become a major research focus across disciplines and studies report both risks and benefits of use. However, less research explores family technology dynamics from an ecological perspective and how internet use occurring within and outside the family microsystem relates to individual and family well-being. This study explores parents’ and adolescents’ use of the internet and other technology in terms of family connectedness and parent–child dynamics. Data are derived from the Pew Internet & American Life Project’s Networked Families 2008 surveys (n = 386) and Parents & Teens 2006 (n = 696). Results illustrate how social media technology has the potential to strengthen family bonds. In addition, how parents and adolescents negotiate the role of the internet in their families has implications for adolescent exposure to potential harm from outside the family system. Future directions are offered for exploring families and technology from a dynamic and multisystemic perspective.
Like many African rural-to-urban migrants, Igbo-speaking migrants to cities in Nigeria maintain close ties to their places of origin. 'Home people' constitute a vital core of most migrants' social networks. The institution of kinship enables migrants to negotiate Nigeria's clientelistic political economy. In this context, dichotomous distinctions between rural and urban can be inappropriate analytical concepts because kinship obligations and community ties that extend across rural and urban space create a continuous social field. This paper presents ethnographic data to suggest that fertility behavior in contemporary Igbo-speaking Nigeria cannot be understood without taking into account the ways in which rural and urban social and demographic regimes are mutually implicated and dialectically constituted (anthropological demography; migration; kinship; reproductive behavior; Nigeria).
By focusing on old people in sub-Saharan Africa, the author illustrates the need for comparative analyses of how culture, sociopolitical systems, and sweeping social change shape lives, interconnections, opportunities, and constraints among older people. In such work, gender contrasts are critical. Because of their position in reproduction and marital patterns, women in sub-Saharan Africa have tended to use lineal strategies, focused on children and grandchildren, in contrast to the more lateral, partner-oriented strategies followed by men. Migration into urban areas and the AIDS pandemic have left many older women in charge of grandchildren in rural areas with inadequate resources and infrastructure. Shaped by traditional values, norms, and roles in their early lives, they currently find many expectations unmet. Indeed, some of the traditional norms that ensured respect, support, reciprocity, and embeddedness may now leave many older people, especially women, isolated, weakened, and victims of illness and violence.
This essay uses a 1977 survey of social networks to describe "modern" California kinship. Respondents' active relations with kin outside the household— relations involving existing or likely exchanges-tend to be geographically dispersed and focused on immediate kin, especially parents and adult children; extended kin ties are largely latent. The degree of dispersion varies systematically with respondent characteristics; notably, the more educated respondents tended to have the most dispersed networks and to be least dependent on kin. Assuming that this pattern is indeed a "modern" development, the article examines alternative explanations for its appearance and speculates that it may have been most stimu lated by twentieth-century developments in space-transcending technologies.
Just as the beginning of Western civilization is marked by the permanent settlement of formerly nomadic peoples in the Mediterranean basin, so the beginning of what is distinctively modern in our civilization is best signalized by the growth of great cities. Nowhere has mankind been farther removed from organic nature than under the conditions of life characteristic of great cities. The contemporary world no longer presents a picture of small isolated groups of human beings scattered over a vast territory, as Sumner described primitive society1. The distinctive feature of the mode of living of man in the modern age is his concentration into gigantic aggregations around which cluster lesser centers and from which radiate the ideas and practices that we call civilization.
Building on African migration as a household survival strategy; urban–rural linkages as critical for migrants' continued engagement with origin communities; reintegration in case of return; and safety net for supplementing precarious urban incomes; we examine the role of family ties in rural origin linkages among 1,693 older migrants living in Nairobi informal settlements. Despite the grim of slum residence, 80% of older migrants in Nairobi slums maintained contact with their rural origin homes during a full year of observation. Family-related factors, especially members of the nuclear family residing in rural origin, explained 45% of explained linkages. Religion, ethnicity, land ownership at origin, and current health and economic statuses are other key predictors. The patterns and reasons of linkages are consistent with migrants' positive contributions to the upkeep of rural origin households. Our findings are well-anchored in the larger continental literature that has shown the urban migrant as not a ‘disembedded individual’ but instead part of rural origin collectives. Against the weakness of state safety net system, the study sheds crucial light on the enduring importance of sociocultural networks in people's everyday lives, particularly the importance of family ties for older migrants. To the extent that poor health status, being aged 60 years or older, and long duration of residence in the slums, which are predictors of low propensities to maintain contacts with rural origin, are also indicators of diminished social engagement, policy interventions among the urban poor may need to include efforts to enhance rural origin reintegration of the most-aged individuals. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Using a representative national sample of personal networks, this article explores how the spatial dispersion of networks, residential mobility and social support are linked. Three issues will be addressed here. Firstly, how is the spatial dispersion of personal networks related to individuals’ social characteristics, network composition and residential mobility? Secondly, how do the spatial dispersion of networks, residential mobility and their combined effect influence the number and (thirdly) the structure of emotional support ties? Results showed that the extent of the support was affected neither by the geographical distribution of the networks nor by residential mobility. Living far from one's birthplace, however, exerted two distinct, and opposite effects on the support network structure. On the one hand, mobility led to high spatial dispersion of personal contacts, which in turn favored a sparsely knit network centered around the mobile individual. On the other hand, by controlling for the effect of distance between the contacts, we found that individuals that cited long-distance ties tended to be part of more transitive support networks than those that cited local ties. We interpreted the latter effect as evidence that transitive ties may survive greater spatial distances than intransitive ones. These findings are discussed in view of spatial mobility and social network research.Highlights► Residential mobility increases spatial dispersion of personal networks. ► Degree of personal support is not affected by network spatial dispersion. ► Residential mobility exerted two opposite effects on support network structure. ► Distance between personal contacts fosters sparsely knit and centralized networks. ► Distance from the mobile individual and personal contacts fosters transitive networks.
Abstract The welfare of rural families in many African countries depends on their solidarity ties with urban kin. These ties often channel remittances from urban workers and support the education and economic mobility of children from rural families through fosterage into urban families. The continued operation of these rural-urban solidarity networks, however, is challenged by recent economic downturns and increased urban poverty. Using Cameroon as a case study, we examine the effects of economic downturns on child fosterage as a component of changes in rural-urban solidarity. Results show a net decline in rural outfosterage rates during the years of economic decline. Such findings raise concern for the economic mobility prospects for children from rural families, especially in a climate of increased competition for limited formalsector employment.
This paper examines the spatial arrangement of social and economic networks among villages in Nang Rong district, Thailand. We use spatial information from a geographic information system (GIS) for the district to help interpret the patterns of movement of agricultural equipment (large tractors) between villages, of people into villages for temporary labor, and of people to village temples and to elementary and secondary schools within the district. Once social networks have been incorporated into the GIS they can be mapped in relation to geographic features of the district, such as topography, landcover, and locations of roads, rivers, and villages. Not only does geographic information about village locations allow us to properly orient the graphs of these networks, but the resulting visual displays reveal strikingly different spatial arrangements for the five networks. Networks of shared temples and elementary schools link small sets of villages in close geographic proximity whereas tractor hiring, labor movement, and secondary school networks bring together larger sets of villages and span longer distances. Information on landcover from satellite digital data provides insights into the patterns of network ties throughout the district and shows a clear relationship between tractor hiring networks and type of agricultural activity in the district. The spatial analytic capabilities of the GIS also allow us to assess the impact of the administratively defined district boundary on our measured relations and to evaluate whether rivers and perennial streams create barriers to network ties between villages.
In the last few decades physical mobility has become one of the key elements of contemporary societies. This centrality of mobility also means the development of a new kind of social exclusion caused by the problems of living in a social context in which one has to be increasingly “on the move” to access goods and services. In this article, based on fieldwork conducted with 20 low-income family inhabitants of the city of Santiago, Chile, we study the role that mobile phone usage has in relation to physical mobility in the everyday lives of these individuals. Through an analysis of the pattern of usage and mobility of these devices, we arrive at the conclusion that rather than giving rise to an experience of constant mobility and “anytime–anywhere” availability, the individuals studied face limitations and exclusions that profoundly constrict the potential “mobility” afforded by these devices.
Since recording its first AIDS cases in 1983, Tanzania has reported nearly 90,000 more to the World Health Organizationâmore than any other country in Africa. As AIDS spread, the devastating syndrome came to be known simply as ugonjwa huo: "that disease." The AIDS epidemic has forced Africans to reflect upon the meaning of traditional ideas and practices related to sexuality and fertility, and upon modernity and biomedicine. In A Plague of Paradoxes, anthropologist Philip Setel observes Tanzania's Chagga people and their attempts to cope with and understand AIDSâthe latest in a series of crises over which they feel they have little, if any, control. Timely and well-researched, A Plague of Paradoxes is an extended case study of the most serious epidemic of the twentieth century and the cultural circumstances out of which it emerged. It is a unique book that brings together anthropology, demography, and epidemiology to explain how a particular community in Africa experiences AIDS.
Despite being told that we now live in a cosmopolitan world, more and more people have begun to assert their identities in ways that are deeply rooted in the local. These claims of autochthonyâmeaning âborn from the soilââseek to establish an irrefutable, primordial right to belong and are often employed in politically charged attempts to exclude outsiders. In The Perils of Belonging, Peter Geschiere traces the concept of autochthony back to the classical period and incisively explores the idea in two very different contexts: Cameroon and the Netherlands. In both countries, the momentous economic and political changes following the end of the cold war fostered anxiety over migration. For Cameroonians, the question of who belongs where rises to the fore in political struggles between different tribes, while the Dutch invoke autochthony in fierce debates over the integration of immigrants. This fascinating comparative perspective allows Geschiere to examine the emotional appeal of autochthonyâas well as its dubious historical basisâand to shed light on a range of important issues, such as multiculturalism, national citizenship, and migration.
Although changing in size, structure and function, the African family has persistently maintained its place as the central human social unit. Beyond the traditional African family--whether in the nuclear or the extended form--is a network of people, most of whom are connected by kin or blood relationships, termed the clanship system. Patterns of family treatment and care are deeply embedded in this wider kinship system. The AIDS epidemic has caused adverse psychosocial and economic consequences leading to change in the family structure, and thus disturbed the capacity of the nuclear and extended family to respond to the needs of members afflicted by HIV and AIDS. Hence, the clanship system could become the locus of AIDS activity designed to ensure the well-being and continuity of the family where its leadership undertakes to sustain, to reorganize, or to create wholly new families or structures among populations being devastated by AIDS. New associations based on common emotional bonds of caring beyond kinship ties will be necessary to support some vulnerable members. However, for such to prove durable in the troubled socio-economic context of Sub-Saharan Africa, these will need strong links to or derive their legitimacy from the resilient traditional social network, the African kinship system.
I use data on the hiring practices and spatial location of firms in four cities to model the process of interfirm racial segregation. When I control for the spatial location of the firm, the use of employee referrals reduced the probability of hiring a black worker by 75% in firms that are less than 10% black. Among all firms, the results suggest that employee referrals are just as important as the geographic location of the firm in generating employment segregation: both increase the predicted level of interfirm racial segregation among blue-collar workers in the cities studied by about 10%.
Much of the authors' knowledge of kin interaction and exchange in Britain is partial, in that it is based on studies of co-resident groups and excludes consideration of kin "beyond the household". It is known that there have been large declines in intergenerational co-residence, raising fears that family bonds have weakened. It is also commonly assumed that family members are less likely to live in close proximity than in the past. In this paper the authors examine one important aspect of kin relationships--proximity of adult children to their parents--using nationally representative data from 1986, 1995, and 1999. The analyses presented focus on: differences between 1986, 1995, and 1999 in proximity of adults to their parents; sociodemographic characteristics associated with variations in proximity, and temporal differences in the pattern of these variations. The paper concludes with an assessment of some of the policy implications of the findings.
In 1912 it was provisionally arranged between the Development Commission and the Scottish Education Department that an Institute for Research in Animal Nutrition should be established in Scotland under the supervision of a Joint Committee representing the North of Scotland College of Agriculture and the University of Aberdeen. This Joint Committee was constituted in 1913 and research in animal nutrition was begun in April 1914, when Dr J. B. Orr—now Lord Boyd-Orr, the first official appointed by the Committee—commenced work in temporary accommodation obtained in the Agricultural and Physiological Departments of the University, surely a fitting cradle. Since 1946 the Governing Body has been expanded to include persons nominated by the Secretary of State for Scotland, the Royal Society, the Royal Society of Edinburgh, the Agricultural Research Council and the Medical Research Council. Its chairman is the Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Aberdeen. Under the direction of Orr the work grew, and through the generosity of the late Dr John Quiller Rowett there were erected central buildings thereafter called the Rowett Research Institute, which were opened in 1922. The Duthie Experimental Stock Farm, which extends to over 500 acres, was also made possible through a benefaction to commemorate a world-famous Shorthorn breeder.
Contemporary empirical literature on family resource flows in developing countries focuses on vertical flows between parents and children. Using data from the 1999 Family Transfers Project in Malawi this article examines a broader set of flows between adult respondents and their surviving parents, and paternal and maternal aunts and uncles. It compares the frequency and value of material and monetary flows, and the frequency of provision of other services, among these relatives. It also explores variation on these parameters across three ethnic groups, each of which has discrete normative patterns of descent, inheritance and postmarital residential arrangements. Results suggest that: (i) intergenerational support networks in Malawi are both vertical and lateral; (ii) in their transfer relationships, working aged adults have a net loss to parents, but a net gain to uncles and aunts, implying the existence of an institutionalized network for the transfer of resources among branches of the family; and (iii) lineal structures privilege kin of certain gender for certain roles. Maternal and paternal aunts are the largest source of material transfers among the matrilineal Yao, and paternal and maternal uncles are the largest source among the patrilineal Tumbuka.