A University of Sussex PhD thesis Available online via Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/ This thesis is protected by copyright which belongs to the author. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Please visit Sussex Research Online for more information and further details Migrant Livelihoods in a Complex Adaptive System: Investigating the Links between Internal Migration, Land Tenure, and Environmental Change in Brong Ahafo, Ghana DPhil Jonathan Sward University of Sussex September 2016 2 Statement I hereby declare that this thesis has not been, and will not be, submitted in whole or in part to another University for the award of any degree. Signature: ……………………………………. 3 Acknowledgements The topic of this thesis was inspired by working with Prof Richard Black as a research assistant at the University of Sussex in 2011 and 2012, as part of follow-up engagement activities with the World Bank and European Commission in the wake of the publication of the Foresight Report on Migration and Global Environmental Change in 2011 (a report which Prof Black chaired). It was during the course of helping to synthesise the report’s key messages for particular areas of policy that the need for more research on the relationship between environmental factors at migration destinations first became apparent to me. This forms the central focus of this thesis. The thesis’s key research themes and its theoretical focus have been heavily influenced by my supervisors, Prof Dominic Kniveton and Prof James Fairhead. Prof Kniveton’s previous work on conceptualising environmental migration in Burkina Faso as a ‘complex adaptive system’ inspired my own development of this theoretical framework in the thesis. Prof Fairhead’s expertise on land issues in West Africa proved invaluable in sharpening the focus of the thesis on land tenure, in particular. This thesis owes an enormous debt to colleagues in Ghana, in particular those at the Center for Migration Studies at the University of Ghana (Legon), which served as my host institution during field visits in 2013 and 2014. Meetings and discussions with a wide range of colleagues from the University of Ghana, including Prof Mariama Awumbila, Dr Joseph Teye, Prof Samuel Codjoe, Dr Mumuni Abu, Prof Delali Badasu, Prof Joseph Yaro, and Dr Kwadwo Owusu were instrumental in helping me to finalise field research preparations and subsequently interpret initial field research findings. Additionally, Rev Frank Twumasi, the head of the Scholars in Transit NGO in Nkoranza, Brong Ahafo Region, was instrumental in the field research itself, in terms of gaining access to field sites and providing skilled Twi interpreters. Additionally, Prof Kwasi Nsiah-Gyabaah of the Anglican University College of Technology in Nkoranza helped to arrange accommodation for me in one of the university’s hostels during the period of fieldwork proper in 2014. 4 More generally, the undertaking of this thesis was made possible by a studentship with the Migrating out of Poverty Research Programme Consortium, an international research partnership whose Secretariat is based at the University of Sussex. Although this thesis does not constitute part of the programme’s commissioned research, I have greatly benefitted from being part of this wider research partnership, which is focused on better understanding the relationship between internal and intra-regional migration and poverty reduction in Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. I’m particularly grateful for the support that Migrating out of Poverty RPC Research Director Dr Priya Deshingkar has provided over the course of the thesis, through numerous collegial discussions about how the research was progressing. Finally, I am immensely grateful for the opportunity to have conducted research with three migrant communities in Ghana who were gracious in welcoming my presence as an outsider, and for the many friendships I established during the time I was in Brong Ahafo. The migrant farmers I encountered were hard-working and good humoured – despite the significant difficulties many of them were facing. I hope that in some small way this thesis shines a light on their stories, which are often overlooked or simply ignored. This thesis is dedicated to my loving wife, Anna, and our young daughter, Zoe. Their love and support has made all the difference in helping me through the final phases of completing this work. Jon Sward September 2016 5 Thesis summary This doctoral thesis analyses the internal migration of farmers from Northern Ghana to Brong Ahafo Region’s agricultural frontier, theorizing this mobility as part of a wider ‘complex adaptive system’ made up of interlinked social and environmental processes. It draws on original qualitative research conducted in three migrant ‘settler’ communities in Brong Ahafo in 2014 in order to investigate local-level migration trends and histories, the relationship between in-migration and changing land tenure norms, and migrant farmers’ perceptions of environmental change at their migration destinations. Each of these research themes provides an entry point for scrutinising the relationship between in-migration and the local ‘social-ecological system’. Finally, the thesis introduces a typology of livelihood trajectories among migrant tenant farmers in Brong Ahafo based on research findings at the three case study sites, which accounts for livelihood differentiation among migrants. This thesis thus makes an original contribution to the literature on the climate-migration nexus and to debates about rural development in Sub-Saharan Africa. In the case of the former, much of the current literature on ‘environmental migration’ focuses on the extent to which environmental factors influence out-migration from communities of origin, and whether such migration can be thought of as a form of ‘adaptation’ to environmental change. Debates about rural development, meanwhile, are increasingly preoccupied with understanding rural transformations. This thesis illustrates the need to consider how environmental conditions can affect migrant livelihoods at rural destinations, where livelihoods are often highly sensitive to environmental factors, and to account for how in-migration can serve as ‘feedback’ which contributes to changing social and environmental conditions in such areas. Additionally, the stratified migrant livelihood trajectories encountered at my field sites show the diversity of migrants’ agency, which affects their capacity to adapt to climatic and other shocks in situ as well as to provide support for kin in Northern Ghana. 6 Table of Contents Thesis summary ........................................................................................................ 5 List of Abbreviations ................................................................................................ 11 List of Figures .......................................................................................................... 12 Chapter 1. Introduction: Understanding migration, land tenure and environmental change in Brong Ahafo, Ghana, as part of a ‘complex adaptive system’ (CAS) .......... 14 Section 1.1 Assessing internal migration from Northern Ghana to Brong Ahafo’s transition zone as part of a wider social and environmental context ............................................... 14 Section 1.2 Introducing existing debates on the ‘climate-migration nexus’ and rural development ................................................................................................................... 19 Section 1.3 Introducing the research questions of the thesis – key entry points for developing CAS theory in the context of migration to Brong Ahafo’s transition zone ....... 25 1.3.1 The emergence of local-level migration trends ........................................................ 27 1.3.2 In-migration and changing land tenure norms ......................................................... 29 1.3.3 Migrant perceptions of climate change in Brong Ahafo ........................................... 31 Section 1.4 CAS theory and in-migration, land tenure and environmental change in Brong Ahafo: Explaining the structure of the thesis ................................................................... 33 Chapter 2. Understanding migration from Northern Ghana to Brong Ahafo’s transition zone as part of a ‘complex adaptive system’: A novel theoretical approach ................................................................................................................................ 38 Section 2.1 Introduction: The relevance of complex adaptive systems theory for debates on the climate-migration nexus and rural development .................................................. 38 Section 2.2 Complex adaptive systems theory: Introducing key concepts of the framework ....................................................................................................................................... 40 Section 2.3 CAS theory, migration theory, and rural development debates – key intersections ................................................................................................................... 43 2.3.1 Migration studies and