Paper short abstract:

With the focus on determinants of migration, the research on migration has undermined the agency of migrants. Using a capabilities approach, this paper captures the agency of seasonal migrants through the relationship between aspirations and migration decisions of rural households in India.

Paper long abstract:

Under the prominent scholarly pursuit of determinants of rural-urban migration, the agency of migrants continues to be underresearched. The priorities of rural migrants are overshadowed by explanations of rural-urban migration through aggregated indicators of economic growth. This dissertation project extends the capabilities approach to understand the agency of a rural migrant household under conditions of economic distress. With a case study of migrant households in rural Odisha, India, this project pursues two key objectives. First, it tests the human capital and human security arguments that emphasize the improvement in well-being, and mitigation of risk as to the underlying reasons for rural-urban migration. However, seasonal migration in Odisha is an instance where entire families migrate during the agricultural lean season without any substantial improvement in well-being, or risk mitigation. Second, this project looks towards the agency of the household characterized by their aspirations, priorities, and decision-making process to understand the persistence of seasonal migration. This project uses mixed methods to pursue these objectives. The focus group discussions in the first phase corroborate the priorities and aspirations from existing theoretical and empirical work. The first phase of household surveys that will reflect these priorities will capture the household level data about well-being indicators, risk indicators, aspirations, and priorities. As an intermediate component, focus group discussions will be used to corroborate the initial findings from the surveys. Finally, using quantitative methods the paper substantiates the relationship between aspirations and migration decisions of rural households in the sample.