View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by DigitalCommons@Macalester College Macalester College DigitalCommons@Macalester College Political Science Honors Projects Political Science Department 5-4-2009 The rP oblem with Eating Money: Remittances and Development within Senegal's Muridiyya Rebecca F. Sheff Macalester College,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/poli_honors Part of the Economics Commons, Geography Commons, International and Area Studies Commons, and the Political Science Commons Recommended Citation Sheff, Rebecca F., "The rP oblem with Eating Money: Remittances and Development within Senegal's Muridiyya" (2009). Political Science Honors Projects. Paper 18. http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/poli_honors/18 This Honors Project is brought to you for free and open access by the Political Science Department at DigitalCommons@Macalester College. It has been accepted for inclusion in Political Science Honors Projects by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@Macalester College. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. The Problem with Eating Money: Remittances and Development within Senegal’s Muridiyya Rebecca Sheff Advisor: David Blaney Department of Political Science Macalester College May 4, 2009 ABSTRACT Contemporary development theory is poorly equipped to understand remittance-based development occurring in transnational spaces that partially escape the control of the state. An extended case study of the Muridiyya, a Sufi brotherhood in Senegal, reveals how collective remittances from Mouride transmigrants become tools for community-level development when channeled through transnational religious associations. I argue that remittance-based development projects transform the political, economic, and social contexts in which they are embedded, including the relationship between the Muridiyya and the state.