Gender matters

Are remittance flows gender-neutral? Does it matter if the people involved in these transactions are male or female? Do remittances reshape gender relations?

Most studies examine how much money is sent home, how to lower transfer costs or what percentage of a country's Gross Domestic Product remittances represent. Remittances reflect and transmit power yet very little research exists on the gender issues involved.

The few studies that do exist offer some provocative findings. Survey data from senders and receivers of both sexes report that remittances are spent on basic family welfare such as food, clothing and education. However, in Latin American and the Caribbean slightly more women than men report using remittances for investments, savings and businesses.

Observational data from fieldwork offer additional insights:

• Women spend most of their remittances on their families' basic needs while men spend more on non-necessities.
• While a common household economy is often assumed, spouses frequently send remittances independently and for different purposes.
• Government officials in highly patriarchal societies such as Mexico often exclude female migrants from decision-making roles regarding how collective remittances should be invested in local development projects.
• Remittances increasingly finance poor countries that discriminate against females. The Filipino government used to require female domestic workers to remit 50 percent of their earnings. Today these workers are disproportionately blamed for family disintegration while their non-migrant husbands, who often squander remittances, are portrayed as sacrificing for their families.
• When female migrants send remittances home they improve their social standing in their families. This is important especially when they are excluded from 'traditional' means of increasing status enjoyed only by males. For example, in Thailand only sons may join religious orders or perform ancestral rites.
• Receiving remittances - particularly in the absence of other income - increases recipients' dependency upon remitters. However, in countries where males usually control household income, female recipients in particular become empowered as they control how remittances are spent. In rural El Salvador and elsewhere negotiations between remitting and recipient husbands and wives are a major strain on relationships and families in general.

Gender matters to remittances

Gender is often mistakenly seen as a synonym for women, when it should refer to the social forces that determine acceptable male/female behaviour and how men and women relate to each other. The research findings show that a truly gender-based approach to remittances is urgently needed.

• Governments and international organisations should commission studies that incorporate gender into their design and analysis and include work on how senders and recipients interact with financial institutions.
• Research should include surveys and direct observation.
• Research results must be widely disseminated particularly to policymakers who should incorporate them in planning and implementation.
• Female and male migrants and recipients should be involved in policy and decision-making.
• Gender policies must address men as well as women, a shift that is likely to motivate male policymakers to take gender more seriously.

Do financial institutions, or indeed the women themselves, know that migrant women dedicate a higher percentage of remittances than men to capital and asset-building? This finding could empower women to demand more access to finance - such as loans and insurance - and shows that incorporating gender is one of the most promising routes to improving policy.

Sarah J. Mahler
Centre for Transnational & Comparative Studies, DM 368, Florida International University, Miami, Florida 33199, USA
T +1 305 348 6561
F +1 305 348 6562
mahlers@fiu.edu

See also

Crossing Borders: Remittances, Gender and Development, United Nations International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women (INSTRAW) Working Paper, by Carlota Ramírez, Mar García Domínguez and Julia Míguez Morais, June 2005
Link (PDF)

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