Stichproben 8/2005

This special issue has been long in the making. Already sometime in 2003, when the journal’s editorial board first decided to move towards special issues that would be devoted to a specific topic and which would be edited by guest editors, the idea to make a special issue on migration in Africa emerged, but at that time, was not further pursued. Instead, the first special issue was to be on racism, an issue which today (both in Africa and in Europe) is closely associated to migration. Indeed, the rising tide of racism and xenophobia in the late 1990s in Austria and elsewhere in Europe, predominantly directed at African immigrants and other “visible minorities” was an important impetus that led a group of university teachers and students to launch the journal Stichproben in early 2001. Accordingly, the first special issue on “Racist Dimensions in Africa’s Past and Present” (Stichproben Nr. 6/2004) contained several articles explicitly or implicitly dealing with migration.

Finally, during Summer 2004 the idea of publishing a special issue on migration, to be published in English and French eventually materialised. A call for papers was launched in early autumn 2004 which left a relatively broad scope to authors where to put their focus, only suggesting some broad themes which articles could address. The large number of responses to the call, as well as the high quality of the papers submitted took us somewhat by surprise. Very soon, the idea took shape to publish a book-length collection of essays instead of selecting only five or six articles for publication. Our suggestion not to limit the number of articles and not to refuse articles on non-substantive grounds and to publish an extended issue of the Journal was generously supported by the editorial board. 
We are indebted to the authors, reviewers, and the members of the editorial board for their support for this volume as well as their collective efforts which made this special issue happen. 

Why a special issue on African migrations? 
Apart from the fact that the idea of publishing a special issue on migration with a focus on Africa (and African migrants elsewhere) was attractive by itself, we were also motivated by the relative scarcity of publication exclusively devoted to migration and Africa, despite the fact that forms and dynamics of migration in Africa, the growing significance of migration from Africa in European receiving states, and issues related to this (xenophobia, racism, discrimination, the debate on migration and development, irregular migration from Africa, remittances, etc.), have been receiving increasing attention from mainstream migration research and the wider public alike. 
Thus, in our view the increased attention given to African migrations has not been adequately translated into corresponding publications, although some important edited volumes on migration in Africa (and African migrants elsewhere) have been published over the past decade or so (see for example Adepoju/ Hammar 1996, Appleyard 1998, Baker/ Akin Aina 1995, De Bruijn et al. 2001, Koser 2003). Similarly, edited books on migration or specialised journals (International Migration, International Migration Review etc.) rarely feature articles with a focus on Africa or African migrants. Only forced migration (refugee migration as well as internal displacement) has consistently drawn the attention of both academic and more policy oriented research and has been extensively dealt with in a great number of publications – in monographs, articles in specialised journals and edited books and increasingly, online papers,(An increasingly important outlet for research on refugee issues is the UNHCR series „New Issues in Refugee Research“, accessible over its website - www.unhcr.ch) 
Partly, the relative scarcity of publications on migration in and out of Africa reflects the continuing focus of much contemporary migration research on receiving countries, despite the fact that several theoretical approaches to the study of migration that have emerged since the 1980s (e.g. the New Economics of Labour Migration, World Systems Theory, transnational theory, the migration systems approach, etc.) have long called to pay more attention to sending contexts. 
The negligence of intra-African migration dynamics by mainstream migration research can also be seen as a reflection of a certain tendency to view migration dynamics in the developing world as underlying peculiar mechanisms that, as far as internal migration and rural-rural migration between developing countries are concerned, are not of relevance in the context of the study of international migration on a more global level. Thus, for example, internal migration is often portrayed as linked to more fundamental processes of “modernisation” (e.g. in the form of urbanisation and resulting rural-urban migration), akin to processes European societies have experienced in the 19th and early 20th centuries. This sometimes corresponds with a tendency to analyse intra-African migration and even more so, internal migration, with traditional methodologies and approaches, long since discarded or complemented by alternative approaches in research on international migration. Or, certain forms of mobility are interpreted as “traditional” (e.g. nomadism, transhumance, mobility linked to longstanding commercial relations and trading routes) which are thus put apart from “modern” labour migration and by implication, mainstream migration research (see for example Skeldon 1997, 173). 
At the same time, migration from Africa has also drawn increasing attention from the media and the wider public in Europe, in particular, what irregular migrants and asylum seekers from Africa is concerned. Thus, the large number of irregular migrants from Africa crossing the Mediterranean each year and the frequent tragedies resulting from failed attempts to cross the sea, are regular subject to extensive media reports, special features and TV documentaries. In addition, recurrent humanitarian crises involving massive displacement have long been a central element of media reporting on Africa. To be sure, these public discourses on migration in and from Africa are seriously flawed in many respects, but they also express a growing interest in migration from Africa and concomitant information needs.  
Against this background, we think that a book-length collection of essays on different historical and contemporary aspects of migration is certainly a worthwhile undertaking. Evidently, migration is too vast a topic to be comprehensively covered in any single publication. Therefore, also any discussion of migration in Africa must be limited to the exploration of certain aspects of migratory phenomena and cannot claim to be comprehensive. This special issue is no exception to this general rule. More importantly, we never aimed to achieve comprehensiveness. Accordingly, we consciously did not define issues to be addressed by authors to this volume in advance, nor did we aim to cover Africa comprehensively in geographical terms. Nevertheless, we belief that the various contributions in this volume also raise wider issues that make them relevant also for scholars of migration with a research interest in other regions of Africa that are not covered by this issue and indeed, migration scholars not specialised on Africa. Finally, we hope that despite the necessary selectivity and bias of this volume, it contributes to a broader understanding of migration in Africa and of migration of Africans to Europe and elsewhere. 

References
Adepoju, Aderanti; Tomas Hammar. 1996. International Migration in and from Africa: Dimensions, challenges and prospects. Dakar: Population, Human Resources and Development in Africa (PHRDA). Stockholm: Centre for Research in International Migration and Ethnic Relations (CEIFO)
Appleyard, Reginald (Ed.). 1998. Emigration Dynamics in Developing Countries. Volume I: Sub-Saharan Africa. Aldershot: Ashgate
Baker, Jonathan, Tade Akin Aina (Eds.). 1995. The Migration Experience in Africa. Uppsala: Nordiska Afrikainstitutet
De Bruijn, Mirjam; Rijk van Dijk, Dick Foeken (Eds.). 2001. Mobile Africa. Changing Patterns of Movement in Africa and Beyond. Leiden. Boston. Köln: Brill
Skeldon, Ronald. 1997. Migration & Development. A Global Perspective. Harlow: Longman
Stichproben Wiener Zeitschrift für kritische Afrikastudien. Nr.6/2004 Themenheft Rassistische Dimensionen afrikanischer Geschichte und Gegenwart. Edited by Bea Gomez, Veronika Bilger and Arno Sonderegger. 

Veronika Bilger and Albert Kraler