Out of West Africa: Human Smuggling as a Social Enterprise

Abstract

Drawing on 18 months of ethnographic research in Senegal, this article focuses on the sociality of migrant facilitation. Although it has become relatively common in media and policy reports to suggest that irregular migrants are manipulated by greedy and unscrupulous human smugglers, this article shows how migrants in Senegal are often familiar with their handlers and are more likely to call them a friend ( ami) than a criminal. Also, most migrants do not see themselves as “smuggled,” which implies victimhood. Rather, they see themselves as making calculated choices to migrate based on a host of social factors. By exploring the relationships between handlers and migrants, this article reveals the social worlds of negotiation, assistance, and protection that feature prominently in West African migrant narratives and practices.

Labour trafficking in Chinese restaurants in the Netherlands and the role of Dutch immigration policies. A qualitative analysis of investigative case files

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Political and environmental risks influence migration and human smuggling across the Mediterranean Sea

“…Our analysis complements work on border enforcement by establishing ways that the transit environment drives migrant flows. Our work also complements qualitative research on transit and the importance of reputation and relational contracting within smuggling markets [5,15,16].…”

“…Economic theory provides a rationale for why smugglers have long term incentives to get their migrants into Europe. Specifically, Mediterranean human smuggling is built on repeated interactions [ 15 ]. With repeated interactions smugglers and intermediaries build reputations similar to firms with relational contracts in supply chains [ 29 , 30 ].…”

Beyond legality and illegality: Palestinian informal networks and the ethno-political facilitation of irregular migration from Syria

“…Studies have observed similar dynamics in Africa (e.g. Ayalew Mengiste 2018;Brachet 2018;Maher 2018), the Americas (e.g. Gonzalez 2018;Sanchez 2014;Stone-Cadena and Álvarez Velasco 2018;Vogt 2016), Asia (e.g.…”