Family, Neighborhood Relation and Personal Networks in Internal Migration

Soumya Mohanty, International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)

Family, friendship and community networks underlie much of the recent internal and international stream of migration to industrial and commercial centers. Current interests in these networks accompany the development of a migration system perspective and the growing awareness of the macro and micro determinants of migration. This article presents an overview of research findings conducted in different settings on the determinants and consequences of personal networks in migration. It is found that women are hardly visible in such research. Thus, taking this into consideration paper also presents the role of family and personal networks in the life of female migrants from a study conducted in low income community of a metropolitan city in India. It is hypothesized that duration of migration has effect on personal network and illiterate migrants have week personal network than literate. In addition, it calls for greater specification of the role of networks in migration research.