Should I Stay or Should I Go?’ Exploring return migration and reintegration processes in Ghana

Abstract

The question of return migration and reintegration are central in many migrants’ lives and in migration policies. Returning for shorter or longer periods of time, perhaps after years abroad, requires consideration and preparation. In some cases, the return has been prepared for years, in other relocation to Ghana is sudden and involuntary, enforced by migration crisis or deportation. In others again, the return is temporary, followed by re-migration or extensive transnational mobility. In this talk, two MIASA Fellows, Dr. Nauja Kleist, Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS) and Dr. Mary Setrana, Centre for Studies, UG, bring together their extensive research on return migration to Ghana and reintegration processes. We explore the many meanings of return migration to Ghana, with focus on how different groups of Ghanaian return migrants articulate their migration, return experience and post-return life, with emphasis on the role of transnational and translocal links and networks in the return process and post-return. The paper spans several groups of returnees, from highly skilled experts who have become part of Ghanaian elite strata, entrepreneurs, and migrants who have engaged in precarious and high-risk migration projects and been forcefully relocated through deportation or flight or evacuation from migration crisis or conflict. We propose that inequality is reflected not only in the access to migration but also in the ways that migrants return and their post-return life, including ongoing mobility practices.