Expanding formal education is a universal and uncontested aim of development policy.
The last several decades have ushered in dramatic shifts in access to schooling, particularly
at the primary and secondary level. Gross enrollment ratios in primary school in low‐income
countries, for example, grew from 46 percent in 1970 to over 100 percent in 2015 (World
Bank 2017).1 Alongside its intrinsic value, the social benefits of widening access
to formal education are well known: education tends to expand economic opportunity,
promote health, and contribute to greater gender equality (Benavot 2006). However,
the impact of rising access to formal education on migration has received comparatively
little attention. Migration, unlike income, health, or gender equality, is often not
perceived as a universal good. On the contrary, increased political interest in migration
focuses on reducing the internal and international mobility of the world's poor. Governments
and non‐governmental institutions alike, across a wide variety of contexts, perceive
growing rural‐urban migration as a challenge to rural futures and urban sustainability,
the international emigration of skilled workers as a loss for national development
(the so‐called “brain drain”), and the emigration of unskilled workers as a threat
to security and national identity in destination countries. This paper considers the
mobility consequences of expanding formal education in Ethiopia. In particular, it
examines the impact of primary and secondary education on the migration aspirations
of young people.
Disentangling the links between migration, education, and aspirations is important
for Ethiopia and other countries in sub‐Saharan Africa that place agriculture at the
center of strategies for inclusive economic growth and poverty reduction. Excitement
about the future of agriculture in Africa exists alongside a growing concern for whether
young people desire to be a part of it (Leavy and Smith 2010; Tadele and Gella 2014).
Africa's agrarian workforce is aging, and more and more young people aspire to urban,
non‐agrarian livelihoods. Although opportunities in industry and services are increasing
across the continent, the capacity for these sectors to employ significant shares
of the population remains limited. There may be a mismatch between development strategies
that focus on agricultural development and the actual livelihoods young people wish
to pursue (Anyidoho et al. 2012).
The most common explanations for the reluctance of young generations to pursue agricultural
livelihoods are structural and include: population growth and land scarcity; lack
of government investment in small‐scale agriculture or rural infrastructure; economic
shifts that make small‐scale agricultural less and less viable, even if more productive
than for previous generations; insufficient rural job creation; and environmental
degradation (White 2012; Leavy and Smith 2010; Sumberg et al. 2014; Tadele and Gella
2012; Bezu and Holden 2014; Mohammed 2016). These explanations, contested as they
may be, paint the shift away from agriculture as resulting from negative forces that
“push” young people out of agrarian lives.
We argue that alongside these structural explanations is an underappreciated change
in young people's aspirations and expectations for the future, influenced by what
is generally regarded as a positive development: the rise of formal schooling. Sociologists
have long argued that modern education is an “agency of socialization” through which,
in addition to learning knowledge and skills, children are taught particular norms
and attitudes toward work and society (Durkheim 1956; Parsons 1964). White argues
that formal schooling, as it is currently practiced in rural areas, “teaches young
people not to want to be farmers” (White 2012: 12). Others suggest formal education
tends to inflate aspirations and expectations for the future, creating a gap between
young people's professional aspirations and the opportunities that are available to
them in rural areas (Sumberg et al. 2014). The International Fund for Agricultural
Development (IFAD) has called for a new type of curriculum, arguing that “agriculture
must be accorded prestige, and sustainable agricultural intensification must be recognized
and presented as modern and profitable, so that the aspirations of rural youth—girls
as well as boys—can converge around it” (IFAD 2011: 171). Changing aspirations, shaped
by schooling, appear to be a significant force shaping migration trajectories toward
urban centers or abroad.
Ethiopia provides a particularly interesting case to study the influence of formal
education on changing aspirations. The current generation of Ethiopian youth is the
first to receive access to primary education on a wide scale; net enrollment rates
increased from 21 to 93 percent over the last two decades (UN 2014). This rapid educational
transformation seems to coincide with another important shift: an aspirational orientation
away from rural, agrarian livelihoods toward urban, professional futures (see Abebe
2008; Tadele and Gella 2012; Camfield 2011; Maurus 2016). Although Ethiopia remains
one of the least urbanized countries in Africa—with some 80 percent of its population
living in rural areas, compared to an average of 62 percent in sub‐Saharan Africa—the
country is urbanizing quickly, at a rate of 4.9 percent (2010–2015 estimate), and
the economic, educational, and demographic transitions unfolding in Ethiopia augur
significant shifts for the movement of its populations.
This paper proceeds in three parts. First, we examine how aspirations and education
have been treated within migration theory to date and the explanations offered about
why participation in formal education may increase the likelihood of migration. Second,
we review the development context in Ethiopia and, using Labour Force Survey data,
provide an overview of internal migration over the past two decades and the educational
backgrounds of recent migrants. Third, we use survey data from the fourth round of
the Young Lives study conducted in Ethiopia in 2013–2014 (Boyden et al. 2016) to map
the internal and international migration horizons of rural and urban youth. We explore
how educational attainment—alongside other potentially related development indicators,
such as wealth, employment, and levels of self‐efficacy—relates to the aspiration
to live elsewhere.
Aspirations and education in migration theory
Research on aspirations has recently come in vogue in both the migration and development
fields, largely because the concept extends our understanding of decision‐making beyond
the limitations of rational choice assumptions. Rather than being the outcome of simple
cost‐benefit analyses, aspirations are better understood as the subjective hopes and
goals that guide decision‐making processes, setting the horizons within which life
choices are made. Aspirations are not formed in isolation; they are fundamentally
social, shaped by our experiences and observation of others within a cultural context
(see Appadurai 2004; Bandura 1977; Sherwood 1989).
In the field of development, researchers study aspirations in relation to economic
decision‐making, levels of self‐efficacy (i.e. one's confidence in one's ability to
succeed; see Bandura 1997), and, using an old but increasingly relevant term today,
“achievement motivation” (McClelland 1961; Ray 2006; Dalton, Ghosal and Mani 2015;
World Bank 2015). Some of the most explicit development interventions aimed at shaping
aspirations have been carried out in Ethiopia, where researchers suggest low aspirations
and fatalistic beliefs are obstacles to development (Bernard et al 2011; 2014; Korten
and Korten 1972; cf. Tafere 2014). In migration studies, researchers approach aspirations
from two angles: people's broader life aspirations that directly or indirectly affect
migration decision‐making; and migration aspirations per se, referring to the conviction
that migration is preferable to staying (Carling 2014; De Haas 2014). Growing interest
in the latter is signaled by the rise in surveys that seek to capture migration aspirations
in origin countries (Gallup 2008; Van Dalen et al. 2005; Wood et al. 2010; Becerra
2012; Creighton 2013), though not without some conceptual difficulties (see Carling
and Schewel 2018). One limitation to these surveys—something we overcome in our analyses
here—is the almost exclusive focus on international migration aspirations, which misses
the diversity of migration trajectories considered by potential migrants, within their
country or without.
Before considering how education influences migration aspirations, it is worth reviewing
how migration theories treat education more generally. Though patchy and somewhat
scattered, migration theories generally hypothesize that rising educational attainment
should increase the likelihood of migration. These theoretical explanations may be
viewed from three related perspectives. The first set of perspectives focuses on migration
decision‐making and describes education as a form of human capital that increases
the potential gains available to an individual at a potential destination. When decision‐making
is presented as a cost/benefit analysis—in which potential migrants weigh the economic
costs and benefits of movement and then migrate where expected net returns are greater
than estimated costs over a period of time—this perspective predicts that higher education
levels should boost the expected benefits and thus likelihood of migration (see Sjaastad
1962; Schwartz 1976; Borjas 1990; Massey et al. 1993).
The second set of perspectives focuses on the structural dynamics of modern labor
markets, which concentrate skilled labor in urban areas. The more specialized the
skill set, the narrower the economic opportunity available and the greater the geographic
spread of the labor market an individual must consider. As Lee (1966: 53) hypothesized:
“The aim of prolonged education is to create specialists, for many of whom the demand
is small in any one place but widespread. For them, migration is a concomitant of
their vocations. Thus, engineers and professors have become peripatetic, but so have
business executives and actors.” Nevertheless, some research finds important differences
between internal and international labor markets. Higher educated individuals may
be less likely to migrate internationally if their credentials do not transfer fluidly,
due to differences in language, culture, and economic and educational systems (Taylor
1987).2 This suggests that while we may expect internal migration to present a positive
linear relationship with education, international migration may have different dynamics.
A third perspective, overlapping with the previous two, presents expanding formal
education as a potential driver of both the aspiration and capability to migrate.
A growing number of studies, referred to as “two‐step approaches” to migration (Carling
and Schewel 2018), separate the migration process along two dimensions: the evaluation
of migration as a potential course of action and the realization of actual mobility
or immobility at a given moment (e.g. Carling 2002; Docquier, Peri and Ruyssen 2014;
Koikkalainen and Kyle 2015; Creighton 2013; Coulter et al. 2011). In this regard,
De Haas (2007; 2014) proposes one hypothesis about the influence of education on each
of these “steps” within the migration‐development nexus. Detailing an “aspiration‐capability
approach,” he argues that in the short‐to‐medium term, processes of development—particularly
growing access to formal education, information, and the media—tend to increase the
aspiration to migrate, while greater infrastructure development, connectivity, and
access to financial, social, and human capital increase potential migrants’ capabilities
to leave, whether for internal or international destinations (De Haas 2007; 2014).
According to De Haas (2014), aspirations are a function of people's general life aspirations
and perceived spatial opportunity structures; in other words, if people have broader
life aspirations that cannot be fulfilled at home, the aspiration to migrate emerges.
He suggests that education in rural areas tends to increase pupils’ awareness of “alternative,
consumerist, and urban lifestyles”—potentially changing their notions of the good
life and introducing the aspiration to migrate (2014: 24; see also Mabogunje 1970;
Rhoda 1983). As long as aspirations grow faster than the livelihood opportunities
available in sending regions and countries, migration will likely continue or increase.
One limitation to the theoretical perspectives cited above is the assumption that
formal education is something that is attained in origin areas, shaping the migration
decision‐making process before migration occurs. This perspective neglects the well‐documented
but little theorized reality that accessing education is often the first reason for
rural‐urban migration in poorer countries. While primary schools are increasingly
accessible to rural areas, secondary and tertiary schools may require a move to towns
or cities. Complementing a broad literature on “student mobility,” Crivello (2011)
refers to this movement as “migration‐for‐education” and highlights that young people
often migrate at very young ages. It is after a young person (and potentially their
family) moves to a more urban area for education that further movement or return is
renegotiated. Thus, rather than the pursuit of work being the impetus for urbanward
movement, as is often assumed, the pursuit of education drives the first migration
experience of many young people.
The Ethiopian context
Economic, demographic, and educational transformations
Economic, demographic, and educational transformations in Ethiopia are unfolding at
a rapid pace. Since the fall of the communist regime and the rise of a more market‐oriented
state in the 1990s, the Ethiopian government embarked on an ambitious growth and transformation
agenda that achieved economic growth rates averaging 10.8 percent per year from 2003/2004
to 2014/2015. During these years, the government shifted from an agricultural development‐led
industrialization strategy, which focused primarily on increasing the productivity
of rural farmers, to a strategy that gives greater emphasis to free enterprise, foreign
investment, and the creation of industrial parks (Lefort 2015). Some 73 percent of
the population remains engaged in agriculture, but with the gradual rise of the industry
and service sectors (accounting for 7.4 and 19.9 percent of employment in 2013, respectively;
UN 2017), formal and informal employment opportunities outside agriculture are increasing.
Alongside these economic shifts, investment in infrastructure has increased connectivity
and accessibility of urban areas. The number of people residing in or within three
hours of a city of at least 50,000 rose from 15.5 percent of the population in 1984
to almost half in 2007 (Dorosh and Schmidt 2010)—and likely much higher today. Furthermore,
Ethiopia is in the early stages of a demographic transition. Infant, child, and maternal
mortality have fallen sharply over the past decades, while total fertility rates declined
more slowly (today averaging 4.6 live births per woman). With a population now over
100 million, the median age is 18 years (UN 2017).
This sizable young generation is also the first to receive formal education on a wide
scale. Although Haile Selassie focused on introducing “modern schools” to Ethiopia,
particularly from the 1940s onwards, only the urban elite or lucky few had access
to them. The communist Derg regime expanded formal education more widely during the
1970s and 1980s, with particular emphasis on building schools in rural areas, yet
the numerical reach remained limited. Today's federal government has vigorously pursued
the achievement of universal primary education since the 1990s. Reflecting ambitious
policies and programs to expand the number of schools in rural areas, abolish school
fees, and train new cohorts of teachers, education as a percentage of total government
expenditure increased from approximately 12 percent in 1980 to 27 percent in 2013
(World Bank 2017; UNESCO 2011; World Bank/UNICEF 2009). The share of GDP spent on
education, around five percent during 2003–2008, is high by international standards
(Ravishankar, Kello and Tiruneh 2010). As a result of these investments, the number
of primary schools increased from 9,900 in 1995 to 32,048 in 2014, and primary school
net enrollment jumped from 21 percent in 1996 to 93 percent in 2014 (UN 2014). Nevertheless,
with rapid expansion comes questions about declining quality related to resource constraints
and teacher‐training (Akalu 2014).
Secondary and tertiary enrollment rates remain lower, at just 40 percent and 9 percent
in 2014, respectively (FDRE 2016). The government has given what some describe as
unbalanced attention to the growth of its tertiary education system, the sub‐sector
that expanded most rapidly in recent years (Ravishankar, Kello, and Tiruneh 2010).
One reason for this emphasis on higher education is to form actors for the national
development process. In an effort to re‐align its higher education curricula to national
development strategies, the Ethiopian government decreed in 2008 that 70 percent of
all students should study science and technology subjects and asked all universities
to modify their curricula accordingly (Rayner and Ashkroft 2011).
Education is widely perceived as a pathway to success through which rural and urban
families alike must pass to achieve a better future (Mains 2013). As a result, young
people and their families increasingly invest in education instead of agricultural
or trade livelihoods (Tadele and Gella 2014). Investment in education for rural families
often means supporting the rural‐urban migration of their children. Secondary and
particularly tertiary schools are almost always found in urban areas, leading to “migration‐for‐education”
(Crivello 2011) of rural students who pass qualifying regional and national exams.
Additionally, when young women or men are unable to continue their education, or when
their education fails to translate into the professional futures they desire, migration
arises as an alternative pathway to achieve their aspirations (Mains 2013; Kuschminder
2017).
These social transformations foreshadow rising rates of internal and international
migration in the years to come (see Zelinsky 1971; Skeldon 1990; De Haas 2010). Yet,
at the same time that the Ethiopian government pursues rapid economic growth, infrastructure
development, and the expansion of formal education, it fears a large influx of rural
youth to urban centers, where livelihood opportunities remain limited. In urban Ethiopia,
conservative evaluations of youth unemployment rates estimate 17.5 percent, with higher
rates in large cities like Addis Ababa (23.0 percent) and Dire Dawa (22.7 percent)
(Kibret 2014). To avoid growing urban unemployment, rural development policy proposed
that at least 70 percent of rural students should be absorbed in agricultural labor
(FDRE 2003). Dorosh and Schmidt (2010) suggest that land rights policies are designed
to dissuade leaving rural areas through, for example, regulations prohibiting sale
of land, loss of land rights for those who leave rural areas, and registration requirements
for new migrants. Nevertheless, many researchers continue to highlight a strong resistance
among rural youth in Ethiopia—particularly those with education—to “end up like their
farmer parents” (Tadele and Gella 2012: 6; Camfield 2011; Abebe 2008).
Migration within and from Ethiopia over the past decades
The first significant movement of international migrants from Ethiopia took place
in the 1970s and 1980s after the rise of the communist Derg regime, when hundreds
of thousands of political refugees sought asylum elsewhere. Emigration has continued
under the current federated state yet shifted from a primarily refugee‐driven migration
to a diversifying set of labor migration trajectories: within Africa, to the “Global
North,” and to the Middle East (Kuschminder et al 2012). Most of those leaving for
the Middle East—found to be half of those migrating in one study (Kuschminder and
Siegel 2014)—are young, single, and female, responding to economic opportunities as
domestic workers (Carter and Rohwerder 2016). Overall, total emigration rates from
Ethiopia remain relatively low, hovering around one percent of the population since
2000 (UN 2015). Yet, this percentage becomes more significant when viewed from the
lens of education levels: in 2000, 10 percent of the tertiary‐educated population
had emigrated (World Bank 2011), with top destinations including the United States,
South Africa, Sweden, India, and Finland (UN 2013).3
Internal movement is greater than international migration, although statistics remain
scant due to the limited availability of nationally‐representative data. To set some
context for internal migration, then, we use three rounds of Labour Force Survey data
(1999, 2005, and 2013) to explore intra‐regional movement of recent migrants, aged
15 and over, who changed residence within the last five years.4 Ethiopia is divided
into some 63 zones, which are further divided into approximately 660 rural and 100
urban districts (woreda).5 These data are nationally representative, but only capture
migration across zonal borders, not movement within zones and woredas, thus underestimating
the extent of internal migration and missing important processes of small‐scale urbanization
happening within traditionally rural, agrarian areas.6 Nevertheless, these data provide
an initial sketch of internal mobility patterns over the last two decades, to complement
a small but growing literature on internal migration in Ethiopia (see Blunch and Laderchi
2015).
Approximately six percent of the Ethiopian population aged 15 and over had migrated
across zones within the five years prior to 2013. The literacy and education levels
of internal migrants generally increased since the late 1990s and were consistently
higher than those of non‐migrants (Table 1). While rural‐rural migration has typically
been the primary mode of movement within Ethiopia, rural‐urban and urban‐urban migration
replaced migration between rural areas as the most common migration trajectory of
internal migrants in the last decade (See Appendix, Table A1).
Table 1
Characteristics of internal migrants over time
1999
2005
2013
Migrant characteristics
Internal migrants
Non‐migrants
Internal migrants
Non‐migrants
Internal migrants
Non‐migrants
Age (mean)
27.22
34.70
22.56
25.63
22.72
25.43
Sex (1 = male)
0.44
0.48
0.49
0.49
0.44
0.50
Marital status (1 = married)
0.49
0.61
0.39
0.41
0.36
0.39
Literacy (1 = yes)
0.48
0.28
0.49
0.32
0.64
0.44
Years of schooling (mean)
3.40
1.45
3.18
1.48
4.74
2.35
No school attainment (1 = yes)
0.54
0.74
0.54
0.70
0.31
0.49
Primary school attainment (1 = yes)
0.29
0.21
0.31
0.26
0.48
0.44
Secondary school attainment (1 = yes)
0.13
0.04
0.10
0.03
0.18
0.06
Higher education attainment (1 = yes)
0.04
0.01
0.05
0.01
0.02
0.01
NOTES: Based on LFS data. Recent migrants are individuals who moved less than five
years prior to survey data collection. Based on the population aged 15 and over. Sample
sizes range between 134,000 and 199,000 per survey year.
John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
In general, those moving to or leaving urban areas tend to be more highly educated
than rural‐rural migrants and non‐migrants (Table 2; Figure 1). Other studies in Ethiopia
have found that internal migrants tend to be more highly educated than non‐migrants
(Tegegne and Penker 2016; Bezu and Holden 2014), and Blunch and Laderchi (2015) found
that migrants obtain higher returns to their education than non‐migrants. These authors
note that in, addition to economic opportunity, educational facilities in urban areas
can be an attractive factor.
Table 2
Migrant characteristics by migration pattern
Migrant characteristics
Rural to rural
Rural to urban
Urban to rural
Urban to urban
Age (mean)
27.07
25.34
28.16
26.47
Sex (1 = male)
0.48
0.40
0.56
0.40
Marital status (1 = married)
0.58
0.38
0.48
0.44
Literacy (1 = yes)
0.44
0.70
0.76
0.84
Years of schooling (mean)
2.88
5.77
7.14
7.82
NOTES: Based on LFS 2013 data. Recent migrants are individuals who moved less than
five years prior to survey data collection. Based on the population aged 15 and over.
The sample includes 146,198 individuals.
John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Figure 1
Education attainment of non‐migrants and internal migrants by migration pattern
NOTES: Based on LFS 2013 data. Recent migrants are individuals who moved less than
five years prior to survey data collection. Based on the population aged 15 and over.
The sample includes 146,198 individuals.
After the search for work (59 percent men, 39 percent women), education was the most
common reason given for rural‐urban migration (15 percent men, 15 percent women).
While the Labour Force Survey data present migration motivations for all internal
migrants over the age of 15, a study by Erulkar et al. (2006) of young people (ages
10–19) in poor areas of Addis Ababa found that around half of all boys and girls moved
there primarily in pursuit of educational opportunities.
The Labour Force Survey data present an illuminating, nationally‐representative overview
of internal migration patterns and the relationships between education levels and
migration trajectories. To better understand how education shapes the aspiration to
migrate among young people in Ethiopia, we now turn to the Young Lives survey data.
Education and migration aspirations: Young Lives data
We use the Young Lives survey data to explore the determinants of migration aspirations
among rural and urban youth in Ethiopia. In contrast to most migration aspiration
surveys to date that ask only about international migration aspirations, the Young
Lives data asks whether young people would like to move in the next 10 years, and
if so where they would be most likely to move.7 By allowing for a range of responses
across administrative boundaries, the survey provides a unique opportunity to consider
internal and international destinations at the same time.
The Young Lives study is a longitudinal study on child and youth poverty funded by
the UK Department for International Development (DfID). This project collected panel
data over a fifteen‐year period in four countries—Ethiopia, India, Peru, and Vietnam—among
a younger cohort (2,000 in each country) and an older cohort (1,000 in each country)
of children. The first round of data collection in Ethiopia started in 2002. It is
important to note that the Young Lives survey is not nationally representative but
sampled to capture a wide variety of circumstances (Young Lives, 2014). In line with
the overall focus of the study on childhood poverty, districts with higher food shortages
were, for example, oversampled to ensure the inclusion of poor children, and urban
and rural areas were purposively sampled so that children from both areas were included.
Finally, the sampling of areas aimed to reflect the diversity of Ethiopia's population
in terms of ethnicity and region of residence.8
We use the fourth round of data collected among the older cohort in Ethiopia between
October 2013 and March 2014. Because of attrition, the 2013/2014 data include 909
of the original 1,000 participants. After eliminating missing observations, our analyses
proceed with a final sample size of 823 individuals. Most of the participants in our
sample were 18 or 19 years of age and a slight majority of the respondents (54 percent)
were male. Around half of the participants (48 percent) resided in urban areas at
the time of the survey, and the respondents were more or less evenly spread among
the five survey regions: Addis Ababa, Amhara, Oromia, Tigray, and Southern Nations,
Nationalities, and Peoples’ Region (SNNPR).
Approximately two‐thirds of the youth who participated in the Ethiopia Young Lives
study expressed an aspiration to migrate (see Table 3). Of these, 58 percent had a
destination in mind, which in most cases was an urban location in Ethiopia. In fact,
a clear gradient emerges in the migration horizons of young people surveyed, with
larger urban centers attracting more young people (Figure 2). A minority of those
with a migration aspiration (26 percent) expressed a wish to migrate abroad. Table
3 depicts the main motivations underlying the aspiration to migrate or to stay: the
most common motivations for migration were related to employment and education, and
the desire to stay was most often related to family and community considerations.
Table 3
Migration aspirations: descriptive statistics
Variable
Categories
Freq.
Perc.
Migration aspiration
No
262
31.83
Yes
561
68.17
Know migration destination
No
234
41.71
Yes
327
58.29
Main reason for wanting to migrate
Employment purposes
339
60.86
Educational purposes
158
28.37
Health care facilities/housing/public services
18
3.23
Family reasons
17
3.05
Broaden horizons/seek independence
8
1.44
Other reasons
17
3.06
Main reason for not wanting to migrate
Have family/community here
118
45.38
At school/studying here
43
16.54
Have a job I like here
32
12.31
Happy here/have a good life
26
10.00
Have house/land/property here
10
3.85
Other reasons
31
11.92
SOURCE: Young Lives study Ethiopia, fourth round, 2013/2014, older cohort (n = 823).
John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Figure 2
Type of most likely migration destination
SOURCE: Young Lives study Ethiopia, fourth round, 2013/2014, older cohort (n=823).
Education and other development‐related, independent variables
To better understand the determinants of migration aspirations, we explored several
variables from the Young Lives data (see Table 4). First, educational attainment was
divided into four levels: no education certificate, primary education, secondary education,
and those with a higher education entrance certificate.9 Most youth surveyed fell
into the first category (37 percent), suggesting that despite rapid expansion in primary
education across Ethiopia, many of the young people surveyed for the Young Lives project
did not finish primary education. To distinguish current enrollment from attainment,
we added an additional variable “currently in school” to capture ongoing participation
in formal education (60 percent of our sample).
Table 4
Descriptive statistics of the main explanatory variables
Variable
Mean
Standard deviation
Min.
Max.
Age
18.50
0.55
16
20
Sex (1 = male)
0.54
0.50
0
1
Urban residence
0.46
0.50
0
1
Highest educational attainment
No certificate
0.37
0.46
0
1
Primary school completion
0.31
0.46
0
1
Secondary school completion
0.26
0.44
0
1
Higher education entrance certificate
0.06
0.25
0
1
Currently in school
0.60
0.49
0
1
Wealth index
0.36
0.16
0.01
0.88
Relative wealth
2.89
0.90
1
5
Worked on own farm in the past 7 days
0.30
0.46
0
1
Worked on own business in the past 7 days
0.16
0.36
0
1
Worked in a paid job in the past 7 days
0.19
0.39
0
1
Moved for education since 2009
0.16
0.37
0
1
Moved for work since 2009
0.12
0.32
0
1
I can solve most problems if I invest the necessary effort
2.27
0.55
1
4
Aspired educational attainment
14.06
2.81
0
16
Aspired employment skill level
3.28
1.00
1
4
SOURCE: Young Lives study Ethiopia, fourth round, 2013/2014, older cohort (n = 823).
John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Second, to study the relationship between household wealth and migration aspirations,
we include a wealth index and a subjective measure of wealth. The wealth index was
included in the dataset and is composed of three indices measuring housing quality,
consumer durables, and access to services.10 We also include a squared term of the
wealth index to test if the relationship between wealth and migration aspirations
is nonlinear. Relative wealth was measured with the question “Compared to other households
here in your [locality], how would you describe your household?” with answer categories
from 1 (the poorest) to 7 (the richest). Because few youth had chosen the extreme
categories, we recoded the variable into a five‐point scale, ranging from 1 (the poorest/among
the poorest) to 5 (the richest/among the richest). The relative wealth indicator correlated
slightly with the wealth index (r = 0.14) and both variables are therefore included
simultaneously in the regression models.
Educational attainment and wealth levels are substantially correlated (r = 0.43).
Wealth levels ranged from below average for those with no education certificate (Mean
= 0.28) and rose for each subsequent education level to a mean of 0.52 for those with
the higher education entrance certificate. In other words, children from wealthier
families attained higher levels of education. This is not surprising as these children
may be less likely to be pulled out of school to help with economic needs at home.
Furthermore, secondary education is most often located in urban areas in Ethiopia;
for rural families, it can require significant resources to send a child to an urban
area for schooling.
Third, we study how employment is related to migration aspirations by including indicators
for work: (a) on their own or family‐owned farmland, (b) for a self‐owned business,
or (c) in a paid job, in the seven days prior to the survey.11 A key motivation for
migration is to seek work opportunities (Table 3), and this indicator allows us to
see whether existing engagement in different types of employment diminishes migration
aspirations.
Fourth, previous migration experiences for education or employment were included with
the hypothesis that previous experience with migration may increase the likelihood
of aspiring to migrate again. More young people moved for education (16 percent) than
for employment (12 percent) since 2009 (round 3 of the survey). Further data explorations
(available upon request) revealed that those who had previously moved for education
were on average more highly educated, wealthier, and more often enrolled in school
than those who had not moved for education, while those who had previously moved for
work had lower levels of education and were less often in school, with little difference
in wealth levels.
Fifth, we include measures of educational and occupational aspirations as well as
feelings of self‐efficacy, to understand how more general aspirations for the future
and the confidence to achieve them relate to the aspiration to migrate. We chose three
questions to reflect this interest. First, we include a measurement of education aspirations,
which asked what level of education the youth aspired to attain imagining they had
no constraints, ranging from 0 (no education) to 16 (a post‐graduate degree). Interestingly,
the youth surveyed aspired to very high levels of education, averaging over 14 years,
equivalent to a university education. Second, we include a measurement of aspired
employment skill level, which asked what type of job the youth aspired to do in the
future, given there were no constraints. Based on the International Standard Classification
of Occupations (ISCO) scale (ILO 2012), the average here (3.28) reflects work at the
skill level of professionals, managers, and technicians, among others. The last indicator
relates to feelings of self‐efficacy, measured by the statement “I can solve most
problems if I invest the necessary effort,” with answer categories ranging from 1
(strongly disagree) to 4 (strongly agree). Because few respondents opted for the “strongly
disagree” category, we combined this category with the “disagree” category. Levels
of self‐efficacy were in fact not low, but nor were they exceptionally high, averaging
2.27.
Although the subsequent analyses focus on those with the aspiration to migrate, it
should be noted that youth who preferred to stay were slightly more likely to be male
(52 percent male) and to come from a rural setting (53 percent rural). They had lower
education levels (46 percent with no education certificate) than those with migration
aspirations (32 percent with no education certificate) and were less often enrolled
in school (50 percent versus 64 percent).
At first glance, education seems to be significantly and positively related to the
aspiration to live elsewhere, with those who completed primary school or higher more
often aspiring to migrate than those with no educational certificate (see Table 5).
There are less significant but nuanced differences in the aspiration to migrate internally
or internationally that suggest education may influence these imagined destinations
differently. For example, internal migration aspirations were highest among those
who completed primary school. International migration aspirations, however, were highest
among those with the highest educational attainment and among those with no education
certificates. Those with intermediate educational attainment less often expressed
the desire to migrate abroad. Students who were currently enrolled in school were
more likely to aspire to live elsewhere, but less likely to know their destination.
Among those who had a clear destination in mind, however, young people who were no
longer in school were more likely to aspire to migrate abroad. The following regression
analyses reveal to what degree internal and international migration aspirations differ
according to educational attainment and status when controlling for other variables
(for further descriptive analyses of key indicators, see Table A2 in Appendix).
Table 5
Migration aspirations and education: descriptive statistics
Variable
Migration aspiration (n = 823)
Destination is known (n = 561)
Internal migration aspiration (n = 561)
International migration aspiration (n = 561)
Educational attainment
No certificate
0.59
0.62
0.44
0.17
Primary school completion
0.75
0.61
0.49
0.12
Secondary school completion
0.72
0.50
0.35
0.16
Higher education entrance cert.
0.74
0.62
0.41
0.21
F‐value
6.19***
1.85
2.54*
1.19
Currently in school
No
0.62
0.67
0.47
0.21
Yes
0.73
0.53
0.41
0.12
T‐value
–3.37***
3.35***
1.32
2.78***
***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1.
SOURCE: Young Lives study Ethiopia, fourth round, 2013/2014, older cohort.
John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Regression results
To explore how educational attainment, enrollment, and other development‐related factors
relate to the aspiration to migrate, Table 6 shows the regression results for general
migration aspirations (meaning the desire to migrate regardless of destination) in
a step‐wise approach. Education (Model 1) and wealth indicators (Model 2) are included
separately to check robustness of the results. In a third model, we include previous
migration experience, the measurement of self‐efficacy, and education aspirations.
Previous migration and self‐efficacy may be related to educational attainment or wealth
and were therefore included separately as well. In Table 7 we apply a multinomial
logit to test how youth with internal migration aspirations, international migrations
aspirations, and those with migration aspirations but without a destination in mind,
differ from youth who prefer to stay (the reference group).
Table 6
Migration aspirations (internal or international)
Variable
Model 1
Model 2
Model 3
Model 4
Age
–0.03
–0.10
–0.07
0.00
(0.15)
(0.15)
(0.15)
(0.15)
Sex (1 = male)
0.24
0.12
0.10
0.15
(0.16)
(0.16)
(0.16)
(0.17)
Educational attainment. (ref. = no certificate)
Primary school completion
0.67***
0.53**
(0.20)
(0.22)
Secondary school completion
0.57***
0.42*
(0.21)
(0.24)
Higher education entrance cert.
0.66*
0.80*
(0.36)
(0.43)
Currently in school
0.43**
0.49**
(0.17)
(0.20)
Wealth index
5.34***
5.17***
(1.91)
(1.98)
Wealth index squared
–5.95***
–6.42***
(2.19)
(2.25)
Relative wealth
–0.00
–0.04
(0.09)
(0.10)
Worked: farm in past 7 days
–0.09
–0.12
(0.20)
(0.21)
Worked: business in past 7 days
0.20
0.21
(0.23)
(0.25)
Worked: paid job in past 7 days
–0.08
0.11
(0.21)
(0.23)
Previously moved for educ.
–0.22
–0.53**
(0.24)
(0.26)
Previously moved for work
0.39
0.68**
(0.26)
(0.27)
Feel able to solve most problems
0.43***
0.41***
(0.15)
(0.16)
Aspired education
0.13***
0.08**
(0.03)
(0.03)
Aspired employment skill level
0.21***
0.21**
(0.08)
(0.08)
Urban residence
–0.13
–0.05
–0.08
–0.40
(0.18)
(0.23)
(0.18)
(0.24)
Constant
0.08
1.20
–2.13
–3.85
(2.78)
(2.72)
(2.84)
(2.94)
Number of observations
823
823
823
823
Pseudo R‐Squared
0.05
0.04
0.07
0.09
***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1. The region of residence is controlled for.
John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Table 7
Internal and international migration aspirations (multinomial logit)
Internal migration aspiration
International migration aspiration
Don't know location
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
(8)
(9)
(10)
(11)
(12)
Age
–0.00
–0.09
–0.06
0.03
–0.35
–0.28
–0.32
–0.35
0.12
–0.03
0.07
0.20
(0.17)
(0.17)
(0.17)
(0.18)
(0.25)
(0.24)
(0.24)
(0.24)
(0.18)
(0.17)
(0.18)
(0.19)
Sex(1 = male)
0.39**
0.24
0.25
0.31
–0.73***
–0.70***
–0.95***
–0.89***
0.53***
0.34*
0.38*
0.48**
(0.19)
(0.19)
(0.19)
(0.20)
(0.27)
(0.27)
(0.28)
(0.28)
(0.20)
(0.20)
(0.20)
(0.22)
Educational att. (ref. = no cert.)
Primary school completion
0.85***
0.69***
0.37
0.08
0.59**
0.56**
(0.24)
(0.26)
(0.35)
(0.39)
(0.25)
(0.27)
Secondary school completion
0.48*
0.30
0.45
0.03
0.68**
0.71**
(0.26)
(0.29)
(0.37)
(0.41)
(0.27)
(0.31)
Higher education entrance cert.
0.92**
1.00**
0.85
0.48
0.30
0.71
(0.43)
(0.51)
(0.56)
(0.63)
(0.45)
(0.52)
Currently in school
0.31
0.39
–0.42
–0.33
0.94***
0.92***
(0.20)
(0.25)
(0.29)
(0.36)
(0.22)
(0.25)
Wealth index
4.37**
4.48*
3.65
5.42*
7.88***
6.63**
(2.19)
(2.35)
(3.09)
(3.26)
(2.71)
(2.76)
Wealth index squared
–4.57*
–5.39**
–3.03
–5.18
–9.80***
–9.17***
(2.56)
(2.70)
(3.64)
(3.85)
(3.20)
(3.26)
Relative wealth
–0.02
–0.03
0.18
0.21
–0.09
–0.19
(0.11)
(0.12)
(0.16)
(0.17)
(0.11)
(0.12)
Worked: farm in past 7 days
–0.10
–0.13
–0.54
–0.62*
0.11
0.08
(0.23)
(0.24)
(0.34)
(0.34)
(0.26)
(0.28)
Worked: business in past 7 days
0.22
0.23
–0.02
–0.26
0.24
0.40
(0.27)
(0.29)
(0.38)
(0.40)
(0.28)
(0.30)
Worked: paid job in past 7 days
0.14
0.30
0.42
0.26
–0.60**
–0.27
(0.24)
(0.27)
(0.32)
(0.34)
(0.26)
(0.29)
Previously moved for educ.
–0.20
–0.50*
0.42
0.20
–0.53*
–0.87***
(0.28)
(0.30)
(0.38)
(0.40)
(0.28)
(0.32)
Previously moved for work
0.58**
0.78**
1.15***
1.13***
–0.47
–0.01
(0.29)
(0.31)
(0.34)
(0.37)
(0.36)
(0.38)
Feel able to solve most problems
0.41**
0.39**
0.66***
0.68***
0.33*
0.28
(0.17)
(0.18)
(0.25)
(0.25)
(0.18)
(0.19)
Aspired education
0.13***
0.09**
0.06
0.06
0.17***
0.09*
(0.04)
(0.04)
(0.04)
(0.05)
(0.05)
(0.05)
Aspired employment skill level
0.33***
0.33***
0.02
0.09
0.16
0.11
(0.10)
(0.10)
(0.13)
(0.14)
(0.10)
(0.10)
Urban residence
–0.06
–0.03
–0.02
–0.37
–0.13
–0.41
–0.10
–0.47
–0.22
0.07
–0.10
–0.36
(0.21)
(0.26)
(0.21)
(0.28)
(0.34)
(0.39)
(0.31)
(0.39)
(0.23)
(0.28)
(0.22)
(0.30)
Constant
–1.16
0.35
–3.45
–5.50
5.90
3.59
2.80
2.05
–4.98
–2.11
–6.56*
–8.91**
(3.23)
(3.15)
(3.32)
(3.43)
(4.70)
(.4.65)
(4.57)
(4.63)
(3.40)
(3.30)
(3.45)
(3.67)
Number of observations
823
823
823
823
823
823
823
823
823
823
823
823
Pseudo R‐Squared
0.08
0.07
0.09
0.12
0.08
0.07
0.09
0.12
0.08
0.07
0.09
0.12
***p<0.01, **p<0.05, *p<0.1.
NOTE. The reference group includes those without migration aspirations. The region
of residence is controlled for.
John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
The findings in Table 6 on general migration aspirations suggest that the desire to
move elsewhere is significantly influenced by educational attainment, such that those
who completed primary school or higher are more likely to aspire to migrate than those
with no education certificate. Furthermore, those enrolled in school at the time of
the survey were more likely to aspire to move elsewhere. Household wealth levels (and
its squared term) also have a strong effect on the desire to migrate, with youth who
are “in the middle” of the wealth distribution showing the greatest aspirations to
leave. This bell‐shaped relationship between wealth and migration aspirations challenges
common assumptions in public and popular discourse that it is the poorest who are
“pushed” to migrate, but neither is it the wealthier who likely have greater capabilities
to leave. Relatedly, youth engaged in recent employment—in agriculture, business,
or paid work—were no different than unemployed youth in their migration aspirations,
challenging an associated development assumption that generating employment in local
areas should reduce the desire to leave.
Youth who had greater feelings of self‐efficacy, as well as those with higher education
aspirations and an orientation toward more professional forms of work, were more likely
to aspire to move elsewhere. These findings suggest that more general aspirations
for the future, and the confidence to achieve them, are forces driving the aspiration
to migrate. Previous experience with migration varied in its influence on the aspiration
to do so again. If youth had already migrated for education, they were less likely
to aspire to leave again, perhaps because they were already in an urban area where
they could envision further education and livelihood opportunities. However, youth
who had previously moved for work were more likely to aspire to leave again.
Finally, general migration aspirations do not appear to differ significantly across
age groups or sex, though youth currently living in rural areas are more likely to
aspire to leave their location than their urban counterparts. Mapping aspired destinations
by current location suggests that youth in urban areas tended to imagine moving to
larger urban destinations, particularly the capital city Addis Ababa, while youth
in rural areas often looked to local or regional urban centers (see Figure 3).
Figure 3
Type of most likely migration destination, by current residence
SOURCE: Young Lives study Ethiopia, fourth round, 2013/2014, older cohort (n=823)
These findings hold for the desire to leave at a general level, but as Table 7 shows,
some of these findings shift when we distinguish between aspired destinations. The
trends regarding internal migration aspirations largely confirm those found in Table
6. Youth who completed primary school are more likely to want to move within Ethiopia
than those without primary levels. In addition, youth with greater feelings of self‐efficacy,
higher education aspirations and those who aspire toward work at higher skill levels
are more likely to aspire to move internally. The bell‐shaped relationship between
migration aspirations and wealth also holds for internal migration aspirations, confirming
that those youth in the middle of the wealth distribution show the greatest aspirations
to leave.
International migration aspirations show more varied trends. It should be noted that
only 16 percent of the sample aspired to migrate abroad, which is an important finding
when much of the public and policy discourse on migration assumes that all those in
poor countries want to move to rich ones. Interestingly, education (at the primary
and secondary level) is not a significant predicator of an international migration
aspiration, nor were aspired education or employment levels, current employment or
enrollment, or rural/urban residence. Rather, the strongest predicators of the aspiration
to migrate abroad were sex, previous experience moving for work, and feelings of self‐efficacy.
While sex did not predict the general desire to migrate (Table 6), men appear to be
more likely to aspire to move within Ethiopia or simply “elsewhere” without a clear
destination in mind, whereas women are more likely to want to migrate abroad. Of all
youth in the sample, 22 percent of women aspired to migrate internationally, whereas
only 10 percent of men aspired to do so. This finding likely reflects current migration
trends, where opportunities to migrate internationally are gendered; an increasingly
common international trajectory, for example, is women migrating as domestic workers
to the Middle East or to Sudan (Kuschminder et al 2012).
The consistent influence of feelings of self‐efficacy is notable. The belief that
one can overcome obstacles if one invests the necessary effort is a strong predictor
of the aspiration to migrate internally and internationally. Migration aspirations,
then, likely reflect greater confidence in one's self and one's future and represent
a key strategy that young people use to navigate their way to a better future. Separate
analyses show that feelings of self‐efficacy significantly increase with each education
level (results are available upon request). The consistent influence of this variable
points to the fact that beyond socioeconomic circumstances, individual characteristics
and beliefs are important factors influencing the aspiration to migrate.
Discussion
Participation in formal education affects where young people in Ethiopia see their
futures, and more often than not it is elsewhere—an urban center, and for a minority,
abroad. Over two‐thirds of young people surveyed in the Young Lives study desired
to leave their current location, most often with the hope of achieving professional
work or further educational opportunities within Ethiopia. Even though our aspirations
data are not nationally representative, the observation that young people increasingly
eschew rural, agrarian livelihoods is supported by our findings.
The nationally‐representative Labour Force Survey data confirms that, even across
longer distances within Ethiopia and taking older adults into account, education is
one notable reason for migration, and those with higher levels of education migrate
more. The Young Lives data suggest that this trend is not only a reflection of differing
capabilities or household wealth. Participation in formal education is one notable
force shaping the aspiration to live elsewhere. Taking migration aspirations as a
whole, clear patterns emerge; most relevant to this study, higher educational attainment—even
simply the completion of primary school—increases the likelihood of aspiring to move
elsewhere. Wealth, economic and occupational aspirations, and feelings of self‐efficacy
also shape the desire to leave, yet their influence varies depending on the aspired
migration trajectory: whether it was to a destination within Ethiopia or abroad.
For those looking toward destinations within Ethiopia, youth who had completed primary
education were more likely to aspire to migrate compared to those with less or no
education. Furthermore, youth who aspired to higher levels of education and more professional
forms of work—and believed that they could overcome obstacles that arose in their
path toward achieving those—were also more likely to aspire to leave. These findings
challenge assumptions about the motivations behind rural‐urban and international migration
in poor countries. While public and policy discourse paints migration as driven by
poverty, desperation, or other “push factors” to be remedied through development aid
(see Clemens and Postel 2017), there is a more nuanced relationship between wealth,
education, future hopes, and the aspiration to migrate. Concerning wealth, for example,
the poorest were more likely to prefer to stay where they were than those with medial
levels of wealth. Likewise, those with little or no education were also more likely
to prefer to stay. These findings lend support to the hypothesis proposed by De Haas
(2007) that higher levels of development—here referring to higher levels of income
and education—may increase the aspiration to migrate. Nevertheless, it is intriguing
that those with the highest wealth levels (and likely the greatest capability to leave)
are less likely to aspire to migrate internally than those “in the middle.” Some reasons
may be that those with greater wealth are more content, have more location‐specific
economic ties or advantages (Fischer et al 1998), and/or have the capability to achieve
their broader life aspirations where they are (Schewel 2015).
The aspiration to migrate abroad was, surprisingly, less clearly influenced by education,
wealth, or occupational and education aspirations, yet sex had a powerful influence.
This may be explained in part by the diversifying set of international migration trajectories
pursued by young people in Ethiopia today. The demographic characteristics of migrants
seeking further education or high‐skilled work in destinations across Europe or North
America is likely very different from those looking toward domestic work in the Middle
East or irregular migration to South Africa, for example (Kuschminder et al 2012).
Our findings would benefit from the ability to distinguish between the desired international
destination, to understand the varying influence of education and wealth on these
different types of migration aspirations.
Our findings both confirm and extend the explanations migration theories offer about
the relationship between education and migration, particularly the general prediction
that higher levels of education should increase the likelihood of migration, at least
internally. Classical migration theories generally explain that, through the lens
of migration decision‐making, education boosts the expected economic returns and thus
likelihood of leaving; and from the angle of labor market structures, the skilled
work that higher levels of education promise are generally dispersed across urban
areas. However, our finding that migration aspirations increase after completing the
primary level is perhaps surprising, because students remain low‐skilled. This may
be explained by the fact that Ethiopia has relatively high returns to schooling. A
World Bank report found that each additional year of schooling leads to an 18.5 percent
increase in labor market earnings in Ethiopia, with the highest returns for completing
primary education (32.7 percent), followed by tertiary (17 percent) and then secondary
(16.2 percent) (Montenegro and Patrinos 2014). It is also likely that formal schooling
contributes to a more profound shift in aspirations that extends beyond rational economic
calculations. For example, Maurus’ (2016) research among agro‐pastoral societies in
southern Ethiopia suggests that through “the influence of schooling, young people's
concept of time shifts from a cyclical one, concentrated on the reproduction of the
social world, towards a linear one, focused on personal and ‘national’ development”
(2016: abstract). Tadele and Gella's (2014) work in two rural sites of Amhara and
SNNPR showed that boys and girls came “to see how backward and traditional the lives
of their parents are, as a result of their education” (2014: 37). Such explorations
beyond the economic frame—to the forces that shape notions of the good life and good
work more broadly—can further illumine our understanding of the impact of education
on changing aspirations and migration trajectories.
Finally, a note on the still somewhat nebulous links between aspirations and behavior.
In contrast to the development literature on “low aspirations” and “aspirations failure”
in poor countries and in Ethiopia (see Bernard et al 2011; 2014), young people in
our sample expressed high future ambitions—reflecting the spirit of optimism we tend
to associate with the period of youth (Tafere 2014). Most young people surveyed believed
they could solve the problems they faced if they put in the necessary effort, showed
remarkably high educational aspirations, often to university degrees, and the desire
for professional work thereafter. Nevertheless, despite significant progress in the
expansion of Ethiopia's public education system, over one‐third of youth surveyed
had not completed primary levels. This disparity highlights the tension inherent in
survey questions that ask about aspirations for the future and the objective constraints
people face to realize those aspirations.
Concerning migration, there is inevitably a discrepancy between those who express
an aspiration to migrate and those who actually do. The degree to which the aspiration
to migrate translates into actual migration depends on context‐specific obstacles
and opportunities, which vary across social groups (Carling and Schewel 2018). Many
of those who aspire to migrate may not realize their aspirations—perhaps because they
lack the capability to move or develop other conflicting aspirations, desires, and
goals. Individual aspirations are also mediated by family contexts; the decision to
leave or stay may be taken at a household rather than individual level (Stark 1991).
Further, many who do not aspire to migrate may find themselves on the move in response
to an unexpected opportunity or change in circumstance (Lu 1999; De Groot et al 2011).
Two‐step approaches to migration research, which distinguish the evaluation of migration
and the realization of mobility or immobility at a given moment (Carling and Schewel
2018), hold promise for disentangling the links between aspirations and actual migration
behavior. Docquier, Peri, and Ruyssen (2014), to give one example, in a cross‐country
analysis of the determinants of “potential” and “actual” international migration,
find that tertiary education levels are one strong predictor of whether “potential”
migration becomes realized. As research on aspirations develops in the migration and
development fields, the links between aspirations and behavior is an important area
for further conceptual and empirical consideration.
Nevertheless, we argue that aspirations remain relevant subjects of inquiry in their
own right; capturing the aspirational horizons of these youth illumines the hopes
and goals that guide their life choices and signals where young people envision their
futures. It is one lens into broader shifts in a population's social imaginary (Taylor
2002; Steger and James 2013). And practically, if widespread migration aspirations
remain unfulfilled and lead to “involuntary immobility,” this can have negative consequences
for the development of individuals and communities (see Carling 2002; Carling and
Schewel 2018).
Conclusion
This paper asks where young people in Ethiopia envision their futures and how the
experience of formal education shapes the desire to live elsewhere. Unique in its
ability to reveal gradients of internal and international migration aspirations, the
Young Lives data shows that most youth aspire to an urban future within Ethiopia,
and that these aspirations are shaped at the level of primary and secondary schooling.
For a country where some 80 percent of the population still live in rural areas, the
overwhelmingly urban aspirations of young people surveyed in this study are striking.
Many countries worldwide are pursuing the expansion of formal education at unprecedented
levels. This paper proposes that this admirable development accomplishment has mobility
consequences. Formal education is one force, among others, shaping the migration trajectories
of young people in two important ways: (1) structurally, because secondary and higher
education is often only found in urban centers and thus the pursuit of higher education
requires migration for rural youth; and (2) aspirationally, because the experience
of formal education and the professional opportunities it promises shape young people's
notions of the good life, good work, and expectations about where these might be achieved.
While the aspiration to migrate requires certain capabilities to be realized (see
Carling 2002; De Haas 2014; Carling and Schewel 2018), these aspirational shifts signal
an important transformation in the social imagination of Ethiopia's young people.
Our findings have important implications for migration research and development policy.
First, our findings challenge assumptions behind development strategies to “address
the root causes of migration” (e.g. European Council 2017; ILO 2017; see also De Haas
2007; Clemens and Postel 2017). Development agendas that aim to keep people “on the
farm” (Rhoda 1983; Bakewell 2008) and at the same time provide higher levels of education
are in tension. This study shows that widening access to formal education, even at
the primary level, tends to increase the aspiration to leave. Relatedly, we find that
the migration aspirations of youth with some form of recent employment were no different
than their unemployed peers, calling into question the idea that generating employment
in local areas should reduce the desire to leave (see, for example, ILO 2017). We
also find that the poorest are actually more likely to prefer to stay where they are,
challenging the (often implicit) notion that poverty levels and the aspiration to
migrate are somehow linearly correlated. To better understand the nuanced relationship
between migration and development, research should explore the determinants of the
gap between aspirations and local livelihood options. We argue that the rapid expansion
of mass formal education in the modern period is one significant but overlooked factor
shaping this gap and thus migration trends, trajectories, and imaginaries the world
over.
Second, our analyses show that the general aspiration to migrate and more specific
internal or international migration aspirations have different determinants. For example,
while sex did not predict the general aspiration to migrate in our first analysis,
it did significantly predict migration aspirations when differentiating internal versus
international destinations. Women were more likely to aspire to migrate abroad, while
men were more likely to want to move, without knowing exactly where. As King and Skeldon
(2010) argue, to study only internal or international migration lends a partial analysis
of the drivers of migration. Empirical studies that examine the determinants of internal
and international migration together can enrich our understanding of the dynamics
of each.
Finally, the relationship between formal education and migration aspirations we find
in this study is not necessarily fixed. Unaddressed here, but certainly relevant for
further research, is how different forms of schooling influence conclusions about
the relationship between education and migration. Different kinds of education—for
example, rural education initiatives (see Kwauk and Robinson 2016); vocational, trade,
or technical diplomas; certifications and continuing education—likely shape migration
aspirations and trajectories in different ways. Also relevant is how education shapes
migration aspirations and behavior over the life‐course, or even across generations.
Our conclusions suggest that expanding opportunities for secondary schooling to rural
areas might decrease the immediate need to migrate for education; however, the gradual
accumulation of human capital among rural residents may also increase the likelihood
of their out‐migration in the long‐term (see Massey et al 2010). How different forms
of education influence aspirations and capabilities to migrate over time is an important
question for future studies to consider.