A Double Divide: Gendered Views on Women’s and Men’s Labor Migration in Armenia

• In Event: 4355 - Regular Session: Immigration and Gender

Abstract

Globally, the share of women among international labor migrants has risen dramatically in the past several decades, but in many highly patriarchal settings the levels of women’s migration remain very low. Using data from a nationally representative survey conducted in one such settings, Armenia, I compare men’s and women’s perceptions of consequences of female and male migration. While overall female migration tends to be assessed more negatively than male migration, the analysis also points to instructive gender differences in such assessments: men are more critical of female migration and less critical of male migration, compared to women. These patterns, as well as other sociodemographic correlates of views on female and male migration, point to both the complexity of the migration phenomenon and of the changing gender landscape in this and similar transitional settings.

Author

• Victor Agadjanian, University of Kansas