scieee AI-readable full text Open interactive document viewer

On the Same Wavelength? Differing Geopolitical Positionalities and Voluntary Return and Reintegration in Ghana

Serra-Mingot, Ester,Rudolf, Markus

Abstract

EconStor is a publication server for scholarly economic literature, provided as a non-commercial public service by the ZBW.

Full text

Serra-Mingot, Ester; Rudolf, Markus Article — Published Version On the Same Wavelength? Differing Geopolitical Positionalities and Voluntary Return and Reintegration in Ghana Journal of International Migration and Integration Provided in Cooperation with: Springer Nature Suggested Citation: Serra-Mingot, Ester; Rudolf, Markus (2022) : On the Same Wavelength? Differing Geopolitical Positionalities and Voluntary Return and Reintegration in Ghana, Journal of International Migration and Integration, ISSN 1874-6365, Springer Netherlands, Dordrecht, Vol. 24, Iss. Suppl 2, pp. 485-502, https://doi.org/10.1007/s12134-022-00958-x This Version is available at: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/305796 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your personal and scholarly purposes. You are not to copy documents for public or commercial purposes, to exhibit the documents publicly, to make them publicly available on the internet, or to distribute or otherwise use the documents in public. If the documents have been made available under an Open Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Vol.:(0123456789) https://doi.org/10.1007/s12134-022-00958-x 1 3 On theSame Wavelength? Differing Geopolitical Positionalities andVoluntary Return andReintegration inGhana EsterSerra‑Mingot1 · MarkusRudolf2 Accepted: 7 April 2022 © The Author(s) 2022 Abstract This paper explores the range of experiences of “voluntary” return to Ghana, based on the different positionalities of migrants set against migration and return regimes and broader socio-economic inequalities. The cases illustrate how geopolitical relations shape migrants’ mobilities, highlighting the unequal relations between different actors in the countries of origin and destination; primarily these are the migrants, their relatives, and communities of origin. Conflicting interests and expectations of these actors, as much as differing return policies, create unequal options and expectations of mobility. Migrant journeys, regardless the age, gender, legal status or social class, are always geopolitical journeys. The diverging experiences of return, thus, depend not only on the individual situations, but also on the broader politicized relations and interests between stakeholders in the migration and return processes. Keywords Return migration· Reintegration· Ghana· Assisted voluntary return and reintegration (AVRR) Introduction To commemorate the 400th anniversary of the arrival of African slaves in America, in September 2018, Ghana’s President, Nana Akufo-Addo, declared 2019 as the Year of Return. It was intended to encourage people of African descent (mostly African-Americans) to return to their home and reclaim their identity (Yeboah, 2019). It was evident, however, that the initiative also had financial implications, in that it encouraged people in the diaspora to settle and invest in Ghana and contribute to the country’s development (Rabaka, 2020). The * Ester Serra-Mingot ester[email protected] 1 Faculty ofSociology, Bielefeld University, Postfach 10 01 31, 33501Bielefeld, Germany 2 Bonn International Centre forConversion, North Rhine-Westphalia, 53121Bonn, Germany / Published online: 26 April 2022 (Suppl 2):S485–S502 Journal ofInternational Migration and Integration (2023) 24 E.Serra-Mingot, M.Rudolf 1 3 year-long campaign, which included a full calendar of events (e.g. art exhibits, visits to heritage sites, creative economy and trade conferences) was considered a great success by the Ghanaian government. According to the Ghana Immigration Service, the total numbers of visitors from the USA (26% of the visitors) the UK (24%), Germany (22%), and Liberia (14%) grew considerably (Yeboah, 2019) from levels recorded in preceding years. In the same year, the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) commissioned the “Migration and Diaspora Programme” to harness the positive impact of regular migration and diaspora engagement to drive forward social and economic development in partner countries (Ghana being one of them).1 This programme was the successor of the previous one "Migration for Development"2 (2017–2020), which was part of BMZ’s “Returning to New Opportunities” programme. It aimed at improving the prospects for economic and social participation in selected countries of origin for the local population and returning migrants (with focus on those in an irregular situation). These programmes reflect the goal of the German Government’s migration policy to leverage the economic potential of regular migration to strengthen partners’ governance capacity to shape migration processes, to address the causes of irregular migration and to support migrants who are trying to return and reintegrate into the labour market (Biehler etal., 2021). Whereas the main goal of the campaigns of the governments of both host and origin countries is to foster return migration to encourage some kind of development,3 domestic political discourses around these issues widely differ. Perceptions of migration, return and reintegration among the countries of origin and destination furthermore vary between and within the destination countries according to the social, political and economic position of the migrants and their relations with the respective receiving communities. The particular developmental impact of migration and return for the larger society is seen differently by migrants and returnees, hosting communities, and various non-governmental organizations in the countries of origin and respectively of return. Against this backdrop, the paper examines the challenges of “voluntary” returnees in Ghana that result from these often conflicting individual and institutional geopolitical positionalities with regard to “voluntary” return. Based on qualitative fieldwork conducted with Ghanaian voluntary returnees (with and without the support of Assisted Voluntary Return and Reintegration [AVRR] programmes) from the USA, Libya and Germany, this paper shows how a lack of consensus, as much as differing interests and expectations of the actors involved, undermines different reintegration initiatives. The article contributes to the 1 https:// www. giz. de/ en/ downl oads/ giz20 19enprogr ammmigra tionglobal. pdf 2 https:// www. giz. de/ en/ world wide/ 62318. html 3 It is important to highlight that this framing is the prevailing political discourse from the traditional South to North migration perspective. This, however, does not reflect a more nuanced reality in which people also move along the axis from the Global North to the Global South. Destination countries are therefore not only found in the Global North and countries of origin not necessarily located in the Global South. S486 1 3 On theSame Wavelength? Differing Geopolitical Positionalities… current debates on return and reintegration by delivering empirical examples of, firstly, the contrasting narratives prevailing in the Global North and South, secondly by setting the resulting approaches and policies in relation to the de-facto impact of AVRR, and thirdly by assessing the outcomes of reintegration initiatives from a bottom-up perspective. After pointing at the benefits of applying a geopolitical perspective on migration and return and shortly laying out our methodology, we discuss the everyday experiences of return referring to three individual cases that set the stages for analysing the relation of return, development of the place of origin and the importance of circular movements. Our main argument is that migrant narratives illustrate how relations and negotiations between states influence every step of the migration process thereby manifesting the role of geopolitics in their trajectories. The expectations of migrants, returnees, and stayees are embedded and conditioned by the wider context of perspectives on migration and return that prevail in the respective societies. They differ between the countries of origin and destination in regard to the social, political and economic position of the persons transcending national borders and the relations with respective receiving communities. Migration andReturn asMulti‑stakeholder Geopolitical Processes In the Global North and Middle East, labour migrants and refugees from the Global South, including Ghana, are typically categorized as mostly unskilled and cheap labour needed for construction, agriculture, and the domestic service sector (especially in the Middle East) – or as criminals. In the EU, a particularly prevalent narrative circles around concerns regarding the cost that migrants cause for the social welfare system (Borjas, 1999; Razin & Wahba, 2015). Hans Lucht, for instance, has shown how Ghanaian migrants get trapped in circumstances where such notions have effectively halted individual aspirations and created frustrations. The fact that virtually only low-skilled jobs at the fringes of the host societies (e.g., the underground informal economy in the case of his ethnographic research in the South of Italy) are available lead to unmet expectations (both of the migrants and their families) and rising frustrations also on both sides (Lucht, 2012). From a Global South perspective, migration—regular or not—is often a viable financial strategy for development. Both individual households and governments benefit directly from the transfers of goods, ideas and resources (Mouthaan, 2019). In Ghana, the communities abroad are mostly regarded as income providers (BobMilliar, 2009; Bob-Milliar & Bob-Milliar, 2013a; Kandilige & Adiku, 2019). Another difference is related to citizenship, nationality and residence. Citizenship in the Global North refers mostly to a community of loyal taxpayers entitled to state services through residence, nationality or both. In Ghana, in contrast, the community of citizens is foremost defined by direct or assumed kinship—sometimes, as in the case of the diaspora, regardless of residence or nationality. When it comes to return and reintegration, migration policies in the Global North have become more and more influenced by domestic politics. In the last five years a more-or-less global tendency has emerged that aims at lowering the S487 E.Serra-Mingot, M.Rudolf 1 3 number of irregular migrants staying or coming into the NAFTA or EU. For politicians and policy makers in the Global North, sustainable return is often synonymous with the returnee not re-migrating (ICMPD, 2015; Kuschminder, 2017). Successful reintegration, from this point of view, is achieved when irregular migrants leave the chosen destination to return to the place of origin and stay there permanently. The EU, for example, defines sustainable return as “the absence of migration after return [emphasis by the author] because the returnee is fully integrated socially and economically in the home community” (Publications Office of the European Union, 2013, 7). According to this logic, re-emigration, becomes an indicator for unsustainable return processes (European Migration Network, 2016). This is however slowly changing. Re-migration, according to IOM’s 2017 definition of sustainable return and reintegration, only represents a “failure” if it occurs through necessity rather than choice. Scholars have likewise shown that, for return to be sustainable, returnees need to retain access to the wider international professional and social network in the places where they have worked and lived (Black & King, 2004). This argument resonates with Ghanaian concepts on return where returnees are typically seen as investors bringing in skills, resources and innovations. The national Ghanaian migration policy, thus, encourages the return of the diaspora in order to contribute to national development (Kandilige & Adiku, 2019; Kleist, 2015) and political leaders are increasingly held accountable by the constituencies if they fail to advocate in the interest of their fellow-country people abroad.4 Ghana’s interest to support exclusionary and permanent return measures or deportations by OECD countries is therefore often limited. In regard to migration and return policies, in sum, two-dimensional perspectives prevail. In the Global North spatial (moving outside space A) and time criteria are combined negatively (remaining outside A) to define sustainable migration regimes. Social, economic, and psychological aspects are side-lined and only come into the equation when causing re-migration (to A). In the Global South, assessments of migration are at first glance the exact opposite of those from the destination countries. Yet also in the countries of origin a bipolar model prevails on a policy level, in which migration and return are evaluated by their economic benefits or costs, disregarding the non-economic causes and impacts of migration. The idea to migrate or to return is not static, as numerous academics have shown.5 Nowadays, return migration is seen as a stage in ongoing cycles of mobility rather than a final end-point of a previous migration (Kleist, 2018). 4 Recent example: “Most Gambians have accused the government of abdicating its responsibilities. ‘This government is not serious about the plight of Gambians both at home and abroad’…" (Takambou 2021). 5 Ever since the transnational turn in migration studies, migration is not regarded as a one-way movement between a point of origin and point of destination anymore. Attention shifted to the ongoing interconnections of migration processes (Vertovec, 2009). It has different meanings and resonances that depend on place, history and circumstances (Rabaka, 2020). S488 1 3 On theSame Wavelength? Differing Geopolitical Positionalities… Methodology The findings of this paper are based on qualitative fieldwork conducted in Ghana from September 2019 to June 2020. In-depth qualitative interviews, informal conversations and observations were conducted with 35 Ghanaian returnees that autolabelled their return as voluntary (11 of whom were beneficiaries of AVRR support, 18 women, and 17 men. The age ranged from persons in the twenties to their sixties, and the sample covered 3 that went to neighbouring countries, 3 that headed to the middle East, 4 to North America and the rest—including multiple transit countries—that had been to Europe), as well as with members of the local communities in Greater Accra, Ashanti Region and Central Region. The interviews were conducted by the two authors together with two Ghanaian assistants in English and Twi. Respondents were selected through purposive sampling and systematic serendipity. For those with AVRR support, access to respondents was facilitated by international organizations, such as the IOM and the Ghanaian German Centre, while those without were found with the help of informal contacts, local community organizations and through the snowball method.6 Our participative research provides representative, ideal–typical cases without claiming statistical representativeness. The study tried to adhere to the principles of approaching the field in the most unbiased and reflective manner as possible. We paid attention to differences of ethnicity, gender, age and diversity, guaranteed the anonymity of all respondents, tried to establish an atmosphere of trust and sought an open dialogue. All respondents were informed orally and on paper about the study’s content, objectives, conditions of confidentiality, and the opportunities to withdraw their consent at any time. The cases illustrate the interactions of Ghanaian returnees with the current structures of return and reintegration. Returnees came from three main destination countries, Germany, Libya7 and the USA, which have been traditional destinations for Ghanaians of all class and age ranges. To understand how returnees navigate the geopolitical context of migration governance, we borrowed from feminist geopolitical scholarship, which stresses the relevance of understanding the “everyday and embodied sites and discourses through which transnational economic and political relations are forged and contested” (Williams & Massaro, 2013: 753). This approach allowed us to address both the reproduction of geopolitical relations and the individual’s resistance to them (Ashutosh & Mountz, 2012). Feminist scholars argue that traditional analyses of geopolitical 6 This study is part of a larger 3-year long research project, where six researchers and over 10 assistants in the field, investigate the living conditions and livelihood strategies of voluntary returnees (with and without formal assistance) to different countries across West Africa, the Western Balkans and the Middle East. The title of the project is ‘Trajectories of reintegration: the impacts of displacement, migration and return on social change’, and it is funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). The study takes into account the socio-political contexts in countries of origin, transit and destination, the demographic, social, economic and legal characteristics, as well as different framework conditions in the reintegration context. 7 Whereas the general number of migrants heading to Libya slowed down after the war broke out in 2011, male Ghanaian migration from specific regions of the country such as Brong Ahafo to Libya continues to be remarkably high (Darkwah, etal., 2019). S489 E.Serra-Mingot, M.Rudolf 1 3 relations fail to address the lived realities of individuals and communities, offering only a “disembodied critical practice” (Williams & Massaro, 2013: 753). Looking at returnees’ experiences is, thus, relevant to address both the reproduction of geopolitical relations and the resistance to them. It is furthermore essential to connect the political representation to “geographies of everyday life” and to look at the manner “in which the nation and the international are reproduced in the mundane practices we take for granted” (Dowler & Sharp, 2001: 171). This perspective allows us to scrutinise the “uneven ways in which geopolitical processes shape the lives of differently situated populations, drawing attention to how even the most intimate and everyday aspects of life are key sites where geopolitical power is (re)produced and negotiated” (Williams & Massaro, 2013: 753). Setting theContext: Migration, Return, andReintegration inGhana Ghana has a long tradition of both voluntary and forced outward migration, at a national, regional and international level (Akyeampong, 2000). Whereas historically, most migration flows from Ghana were regional due to commerce, forced labour and circular nomadic routes (Grillo & Mazzucato, 2008), over recent decades migration patterns have extended geographically. Nowadays, out of 31 million Ghanaians, around 1.5 million are living outside Ghana, of whom about 70 per cent live in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) zone, followed by OECD countries in a much smaller scale (Mouthaan, 2019). Migration thus emerged as a strategy for dealing with economic and social challenges back home. In the early 1980s, political oppression and widespread poverty, coupled with the expulsion of almost two million Ghanaians from Nigeria, led large groups of educated and politically engaged Ghanaians to leave the country and seek asylum, mostly in Germany, the Netherlands, the UK and the US (Schans etal., 2013). Facing the economic crisis and widespread unemployment in Ghana, since the 1990s and up to today, a large number of primarily young Ghanaian men have migrated to Libya in search of better job opportunities (Bredeloup & Pliez, 2011; Hamood, 2006; Kleist, 2018). In some cases, after having worked for some time to save money for the onward journey, Ghanaian Libya-bound migrants try to reach Europe across the Mediterranean while others return repeatedly (Bob-Milliar, 2012; Mensah, 2016). Despite the ongoing conflict and associated human rights’ violations, this practice could still be observed in our field research in 2020. The different destinations and ways of migrating reflect the unequal access to safe and legal migration between Western countries and Africa, which at the same time result in different migration projects and trajectories of return (Kleist, 2018). What can also be implied is that Ghanaian migrants are far from being a heterogeneous group—there are highly skilled persons, students, traders and asylum-seekers next to low-skilled labour migrants (Kleist, 2018). Migration is, nevertheless, no one-way-street: remittances, investments, visits, circular migration and return to Ghana have considerable social and economic impacts (Hall, 2018). In fact, reasons to return are as diverse as reasons to migrate, and so is the motivation to remain in Ghana or plan further movements. Factors such S490 1 3 On theSame Wavelength? Differing Geopolitical Positionalities… as gender, age, social class, educational level, the existence and geographies of supportive social networks, the legal status during migration and after return, and the availability of state-based return schemes are some of the factors affecting the ways in which return and reintegration are experienced. Another important point to take into consideration is the question of “voluntariness” of return that these projects involve. In fact, despite technically being an important part of AVRR programmes, the extent of “voluntariness” and “choice” of returnees has been questioned (Salihi, 2021, Biehler et. al. 2019, 2021). Concluding that AVR returns are hardly voluntary at all, some authors have suggested to only speak of assisted return (Kuschminder, 2017: 14). Some of the cases we present here confirm that the label voluntariness is more often imposed than inquired. In other words; Return was not experienced as voluntary if the process lacked a certain degree of (mental and/or physical) preparedness and if the individuals felt that no alternatives existed. is It is due to these observations on the degree of free and unconstrained choice to return was for many not existent that we use the word “voluntary” with inverted commas. Studies show that returning empty handed caused family rejection or other reintegration problems and put returnees in a highly vulnerable position (Hall, 2018). Our results show that despite such returns being seen as disgraceful by both the returnees as their social contacts, many return migrants were able to count on the support from family members, friends, colleagues, and social organizations and networks. Our observation clearly indicated that this support is often directly related to remittances or migrants’ direct investments that fostered the development of the community into which they reintegrated. Vice versa, recent studies have shown that those who had “failed” abroad were usually considered more of a burden for their families (Hall, 2018). We observed this burden to directly correspond to the economic loss caused by the “failure.” If, on the contrary, economic costs were in balance, respondents reported that their families were happy to see them safe back home again. The warm welcome was reported even if all of the remittances meant for investments had been “eaten” and even though the return meant a loss of future remittances for the welcoming communities. This shows the interrelatedness of social and psychological dimensions of reintegration with economic aspects that, in turn, stretch back to the beginning of the migration process. Everyday Experiences ofReturn andReintegration In order to analyze in depth how returnees navigate the geopolitical context of migration governance, it is crucial to assess “… everyday and embodied sites and discourses through which transnational economic and political relations are forged and contested” (Williams & Massaro, 2013: 753). In the following sub-sections we, thus, scrutinize the geopolitical processes that frame the everyday experience of migrants and their positionalities, and concretize where power is produced, reified, and negotiated. The three presented cases were chosen to illustrate a bandwidth of trajectories stretching from officially recognized and supported returnees to those moving under the radar. The results in general confirm that involuntary return S491 E.Serra-Mingot, M.Rudolf 1 3 disrupts, slows and hampers migration projects but does not necessarily end them (Kleist, 2017, 2018; Mouthaan, 2019). They cases furthermore corroborate findings showing that return caused conflict and economic strain, especially for female family members in poor families where remittances play a central part (Kandilige & Adiku, 2019; Mensah, 2016). As described in the literature we found migration to be a means to become a proper and respectable adult man – manifested in extensive social relations that in turn reify hegemonic masculinity ideals. This relates to a wider ranging argument from studies on highly-skilled Ghanaian returnees from the Global North about return processes involving renegotiations of gender identities, roles and norms (Kandilige & Adiku, 2019; Mensah, 2016). Returning toSave One’s Life—Juliet After spending four years in Germany, Juliet (59) returned to Accra in September 2019 as part of an AVRR programme.8 Juliet had secondary education, and by the time she left for Germany in 2015 she was a widow and a mother of three children, all of them over 18. Juliet decided to migrate when her niece, who had married an elderly and well-off German man, asked her to come to take care of her husband. He took care of Juliet’s tourist visa and flight to Germany. When Juliet’s tourist visa expired, she remained in Germany as an undocumented person. As she was a full time in-house care worker, this was not problematic for some time. However, in 2017 Juliet fell out with her niece, and she was asked to leave the house immediately. Undocumented, by then sick, and not knowing what to do, Juliet spent time on the streets or at friends’ homes. As other returnees explained, hosting undocumented people in Germany is penalized, so they can only be hosted by friends and acquaintances for very limited periods of time, and often by accepting exploitative arrangements. For instance, several respondents reported being charged exorbitant rents, and especially women talked about being pushed to carry out sexual favours. At some point Juliet was offered to marry a Ghanaian-German man in order to get her papers, but she refused. It was then that she asked the pastor of her church in Germany for advice. Given her delicate health situation, the pastor advised her to ask for asylum in order to be, at least, taken care of. After her claim for asylum was rejected, she was offered the possibility to return to Ghana as part of the AVRR programme, which she accepted. This situation was experienced by most of our respondents who had benefitted from AVRR. Some of them also explained that the sooner one accepts the deal, the more support one can receive. In 2019, once Juliet’s health situation had stabilized, she returned to Ghana. The German government, through the IOM’s AVRR programme, paid for her flight and she received 300€ to buy clothes and other necessary things for the trip. She also got a document which entitled her to receive up to 2,500€ inkind support to set up her business upon arrival. Before boarding the plane in Germany, the IOM gave her an additional lump sum of 1,000€ in cash. 8 Pseudonyms have been used to ensure the respondents’ anonymity. S492 1 3 On theSame Wavelength? Differing Geopolitical Positionalities… exposed to higher risks to suffer human rights abuses – in transit and in the destination countries. It is furthermore important to bear in mind that also highly skilled migrants have to navigate the geopolitics of return and that their ideas of development do not always fit what might be defined as Ghana’s national economic interests in political discourses. While skills acquired abroad appeared to be helpful for reintegration, the importance of being able to resort to (pre-)existing social networks—and to combine both new skills and old networks—according to our observations, played an even bigger role in this regard. Moreover, skills obtained abroad were often not compatible with locally required skills and did not contribute to the country’s development as foreseen in AVRR policies: Our results show that highly skilled Ghanaians that were returning from the Global North had more difficulties to adapt to the everyday experience of corruption and favouritism than to develop ideas and businesses. Differentiating the ways in which migrants navigate governance regimes in their everyday life from a bottom-up perspective also underlines the relevance to look beyond political constraints and individual agency into the specific role of the communities involved: Beyond the characteristics of the individual migrant it is the educational background and social class of the remittance-receivers and the way both interrelate in managing transfers that is decisive: A feature common to migrants regardless of their different levels of skills concerns the sustainability of their remittances in building up reserves for their eventual return. In many cases where investments into real estate or businesses were remotely controlled, they evaporated into thin air once the sender came back. The way in which this affected the reintegration process on the social, economic or political level was yet again dependant on the respective characteristics and the social fabric of the receiving communities. This, in turn, finally illustrates the multidimensional impacts and the crucial role of the lack of legal pathways for transnational movements—such as trips home—in regard to individual, community and geopolitical aspects. Also the counter-example—those with a legal status abroad—proves the relevance of this matter. The common characteristic of the few returnees that we encountered who have managed to build and maintain houses and businesses in Ghana, was their ability to engage in cyclical return: these persons were able to uphold a stable amount of income from abroad, to personally check their investments in Ghana and to commute back and forth to their respective multiple places of residencies.12 Just as for the analytical challenges to define the sustainability of return and reintegration programs within a bipolar model – namely migration versus return – the solution might lie in reconceptualizing this normative and unrealistic model, replacing it with a more descriptive model of circular migration and transnational networks. Acknowledgements We would like to thank first and foremost all the participants in this study. Without their trust and honesty, this paper would not have been possible. Secondly, we would like to thank the 12 The positive impact on development and family sustenance of such cyclical return is only possible with a legal migration status, which allows people to circulate. Yet, based on the conditions of AVRR programs, for instance, circulation is not the goal of the states in the Global North, which directly questions their real interest in development. S499 E.Serra-Mingot, M.Rudolf 1 3 editors of this Special Issue for their patience and constructive feedback throughout all the steps of the publication. Thirdly, we are grateful to the reviewers for their comments and suggestions, as well as to Katie Kuschminder, Talitha Dubow, Michael Düker, and our field assistants in Ghana, Harriet and Richard, for their support and for sharing with us their views on this study. Finally, we would like to express our gratitude to our colleagues at BICC, whose feedback and overall support was invaluable throughout the way. Funding Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL. Declarations Conflict of Interest The authors declare no competing interests. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visithttp:// creat iveco mmons. org/ licen ses/ by/4. 0/. References Agunias, D. R. (2006). Remittances and Development: Trends, Impacts, and Policy Options: A Review of the Literature. Migration Policy Institute. Akyeampong, E. (2000). The Africans in the diaspora: The diaspora and Africa. African Affairs, 99(395), 183–215. Appleyard, R. (1992). Migration and development: An unresolved relationship. International Migration, 30(3–4), 251–266. Ashutosh, I., & Mountz, A. (2012). The geopolitics of migrant mobility: Tracing state relations through refugee claims, boats, and discourses. Geopolitics, 17(2), 335–354. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1080/ 14650 045. 2011. 56731 5Bieh ler, N. and Meier, A. (2019) Return and reintegration: conflicting priorities between political demand and development policy principles. Berlin: SWP. Available at: https:// doi. org/ 10. 18449/ 2019C 40. Biehler, N., Koch, A., Meier, A., & Stiftung Wissenschaft Und Politik. (2021). Risiken und Nebenwirkungen deutscher und europäischer Rückkehrpolitik: Ein außen-, sicherheitsund entwicklungspolitischer Beipackzettel. SWP-Studie, 12. https:// doi. org/ 10. 18449/ 2021S 12 Bilgili, Ö., & Fransen, S. (2019). Return, reintegration and the role of the state. In F. Altenburg, T. Pfeffer, L. Rössl, & M. Czaika (Eds.), Migration and Integration (pp. 129–139). Donau Universitaet Krems. Binford, L. (2003). Migrant remittances and (under)development in Mexico. Critique of Anthropology, 23(3), 305–336. Black, R., & Castaldo, A. (2009). Return migration and entrepreneurship in Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire: The role of capital transfers. Tijdschrift Voor Economische En Sociale Geografie, 100(1), 44–58. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1111/j. 14679663. 2009. 00504.x Black, R., & King, R. (2004). Editorial introduction: Migration, return and development in West Africa. Population, Space and Place, 10(2), 75–83. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1002/ psp. 318 Bob-Milliar, G. M. (2009). Chieftaincy, diaspora, and development: The institution of Nk suohene in Ghana. African Affairs, 108(433), 541–558. Bob-Milliar, G. M. (2012). Rescuing migrants in Libya: The political economy of state responses to migration crises. The case of Ghana. Copenhagen: DIIS Working Paper 16. S500 1 3 On theSame Wavelength? Differing Geopolitical Positionalities… Bob-Milliar, G. M., & Bob-Milliar, G. K. (2013a). Mobilizing the African diaspora for development: The politics of dual citizenship in Ghana. In K. Essien & T. Falola (Eds.), Pan-Africanism, and the Politics of African Citizenship and Identity (pp. 119–136). Routledge. Bob-Milliar, G. M., & Bob-Milliar, G. K. (2013b). The politics of trans-Saharan transit migration in the Maghreb: Ghanaian migrants in Libya, c. 1980–2012. African Review of Economics and Finance, 5(1), 60–73. Borjas, G. J. (1999). Immigration and welfare magnet. Journal of Labor Economics, 17(4), 607–637. Bredeloup, S., & Pliez, O. (2011). The Libyan Migration Corridor. Fiesole: European University Institute Research Repository. http:// www. eui. eu/ RSCAS/ Publi catio ns/. Collyer, M. (2018). Paying to go: Deportability as development. In S. Khosravi (Ed.), After Deportation: Ethnographic Perspectives (pp. 105–126). Palgrave Macmillan. Darkwah, A. K. et al. (2019) Good for parents but bad for wives: Migration as a contested model of success in contemporary Ghana. 61. Brighton. Available at: www. migra tingo utofp overty. org (Accessed: 17 August 2021). de Haas, H. (2005). International migration, remittances and development: Myths and facts. Third World Quarterly, 26(8), 1269–1284. de Haas, H. (2010). Migration and development: A theoretical perspective. International Migration Review, 44(1), 227–264. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1111/j. 17477379. 2009. 00804.x Dowler, L., & Sharp, J. (2001). A feminist geopolitics? Space and Polity, 5(3), 165–176. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1080/ 13562 57012 01043 82 European Migration Network. (2016). Guidelines for Monitoring and Evaluation of AVR(R) Programmes. Grillo, R., & Mazzucato, V. (2008). Africa < > Europe: A double engagement. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 34(2), 175–198. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1080/ 13691 83070 18238 30 Hall, S. (2018). Mapping and socio-economic profiling of communities of return in ghana (Synthesis Report), for the regional office for west and central Africa of the international organization for migration. Available at: https:// retur nandr einte grati on. iom. int/ en/ resou rces/ report/ mappi ngandsocioecono micprofi lingcommu nitie sretu rnghanasynth esisreport Hamood, S. (2006). African Transit Migration through Libya to Europe: The Human Cost. Cairo: The American University in Cairo. https:// www. migre urop. org/ IMG/ pdf/ hamoodlibya. pdf. ICMPD. (2015). Evaluation of the Medium-Term Effectiveness of the Reintegration Measures of the Projects “Reintegration in Kosovo-Cooperation with Microcredit Institutions and the Economy.” ICMPD. Kandilige, L., & Adiku, G. A. (2019). Returns of failure: Involuntary return migration and social change in Ghana. In M. Fauser, R. G. Anghel, & P. Boccagni (Eds.), Transnational Return and Social Change: Hierarchies, Identities and Ideas (pp. 63–81). Anthem Press. Kleist, N. (2008). In the name of diaspora: Between struggles for recognition and political aspirations. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 34(7), 1127–1143. Kleist, N. (2015). Pushing development: A case study of highly skilled male return migration to Ghana. In L. Åkesson & M. Eriksson Baaz (Eds.), Africa’s Return Migrants: The New Developers (pp. 64–86.). London: Zed Books. Kleist, N. (2017). Disrupted migration projects: The moral economy of involuntary return to Ghana from Libya. Africa, 87(2), 322–342. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1017/ S0001 97201 60009 8X Kleist, N. (2018). Trajectories of involuntary return migration to Ghana: Forced relocation processes and post-return life. Geoforum, 116, 272–281. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1016/j. geofo rum. 2017. 12. 005 Koser, K., & Kuschminder, K. (2015). Comparative Research on the Assisted Voluntary Return and Reintegration of Migrants. Geneva: IOM. https:// www. iom. int/ files/ live/ sites/ iom/ files/ WhatWeDo/ docs/ AVRRResea rchfinal. pdf. Kuschminder, K. (2017). Interrogating the relationship between remigration and sustainable return. International Migration, 55(6), 107–121. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1111/ imig. 12378 Lucht, H. (2012). Darkness Before Daybreak: African Migrants Living on the Margins in Southern Italy Today. University of California Press. Mensah, E. A. (2016). Involuntary return migration and reintegration. The case of Ghanaian migrant workers from Libya. Journal of International Migration and Integration, 17(1), 303–323. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1007/ s121340140407-8 Mouthaan, M. (2019). Unpacking domestic preferences in the policy- ‘receiving’ state: The EU’s migration cooperation with Senegal and Ghana. Comparative European Politics, 7(35), 1–20. S501 E.Serra-Mingot, M.Rudolf 1 3 Olivier-Mensah, C. (2019). ‘Be the change’: Action strategies and implicit knowledge in transnational return migration. In R. G. Anghel, P. Boccagni, & M. Fauser (Eds.), Transnational Return and Social Change: Hierarchies, Identities and Ideas (pp. 123–140). Anthem Press. Olivier-Mensah, C., & Scholl-Schneider, S. (2016). Transnational return? On the interrelation of family, remigration, and transnationality – An introduction. Transnational Social Review, 6(1–2), 2–9. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1080/ 21931 674. 2016. 11863 71 Plaza, S., Ozden, C., & Ratha, D. (2016). Migration and Development: A Role for the World Bank Group. World Bank Group. Publications Office of the European Union. (2013). Comparative study on best practices to interlink predeparture reintegration measures carried out in Member States with shortand long-term reintegration measures in the countries of return. Final report [Website]. Publications Office of the European Union. http:// op. europa. eu/ en/ publi cationdetai l/-/ publi cation/ a933c e1dc68e48cea2fc4a426 45e37 c0/ langu ageen Rabaka, R. (Ed.). (2020). Routledge Handbook of Pan-Africanism. Routledge. Razin, A., & Wahba, J. (2015). Welfare magnet hypothesis, fiscal burden, and immigration skill selectivity. Scandinavian Journal of Economics, 117(2), 369–402. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1111/ sjoe. 12092 Salihi, R. (2021) Working Paper Implementation of AVRR schemes in Afghanistan. 676. Schans, D., Mazzucato, V., Schoumaker, B., & Flahaux, M.-L. (2013). Changing patterns of Ghanaian migration. In C. Beauchemin (Ed.), Migration between Africa and Europe (pp. 265–289). Springer. Setrana, M. B., & Tonah, S. (2016). Do transnational links matter after return? Labour market participation among Ghanaian return migrants. Journal of Development Studies, 52(4), 549–560. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1080/ 00220 388. 2015. 11262 55 Sinatti, G. (2015). Return migration as a win-win-win scenario? Visions of return among Senegalese migrants, the state of origin and receiving countries. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 38(2), 275–291. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1080/ 01419 870. 2013. 86801 Takam bou, M. M. (2021, September 5). EU escalates row with Gambia over expelled migrants. DW.COM. https:// www. dw. com/ en/ euescal atesrowwithgambiaoverexpel ledmigra nts/a59072 367 Vertovec, S. (2009). Transnationalism. Routledge. Williams, J., & Massaro, V. (2013). Feminist geopolitics: Unpacking (in)security, animating social change. Geopolitics, 18(4), 751–758. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1080/ 14650 045. 2013. 816842 Yeboah, K. A. (2019). We need to talk about Ghana’s Year of Return and its politics of exclusion, African Arguments, 19 December. Publisher’s Note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. S502