Translocal Lives

Abstract

We generally associate civil wars with flows of refugees. We tend to give much less consideration to the way in which patterns of migration that arise as a result of violent conflicts, especially long-lasting ones, take on their own dynamics. Using the conflict in Afghanistan as a case-study, different forms of migration and their significance for an on-going conflict will be examined here. As different factors driving migration are closely interrelated, modern and pre-modern ways of life overlap; this is starkly at variance with the portrait of the “medieval” character of Afghan society so often painted by politicians and the media. Continuous translocal migration of Afghans into neighbouring states and the Gulf States means that nation-state border control regimes are scarcely workable in this case.