Expectations abound: family obligations and remittance flow amongst Cameroonian “bushfallers” in Sweden. A gender insight

Abstract: In Cameroon, there is a tradition for heterosexual family system inherent in a patriarchal order of things; accordingly, this study shed light on how gender pervades into, and ‘force’ migrants to remit in order to fulfill family expectations at the country of origin. Contemporary academic studies and reports from various organizations have highlighted the active role of women as migrants and remitters. There is a growing stream of literature which demonstrates that men and women’s experiences of migration are gendered; accordingly, their remittance behavior is also gendered. However, an understanding of how socio-cultural (structural level) forces affects migrants remittances requires a comprehensive analysis in the context of the complexity inherent in contemporary international mobility and migrants transfers; that is, it requires an emphasis on how the combined effects of gender, legality and to some extent class shape remittance flow. This is because the market (employers and employer organizations/institutions), the state, and the family as socio-cultural and economic institutions that shapes migration and remittances are gendered; this genderedness is of a deterministic nature in influencing how and why migrants remit and to whom. This study employs a qualitative research method, it departs from the premise that international migration through remittances is a way to find work and support families in many developing countries including Cameroon where income opportunities are hard to come by. Through a review of related literature and theoretical framework, the phenomenon of transcontinental migration known in Cameroon as bushfalling are explored, the gender dynamics in migrants’ remittances behavior have also been looked at. The results of this study show that non-economic factors such as legality, gender, and class influence remittances flow. Most importantly, this study shows that everything being equal, being in a position to remit is sometimes a matter of luck, women remit more than men, documented migrants are more likely to remit more than undocumented migrants, and migrants’ class position in country of departure also affects remittance flow. I argued that socio-cultural variables such as migrant rank position within the family, photos, gestures influence family expectations for remittances.