Involuntary displacement will impact almost 2.3 billion people by the end of this decade. Displacement arises from a variety of factors including economic reasons. The United States sends significant amounts of foreign direct investment to Africa, exceeding $50 billion in 2012, and while many African governments welcome foreign direct investment as a mechanism to decrease poverty, development projects often displace local residents in ways that do not enhance their economic well-being. This can lead to increased civil conflict and social unrest. Incentivizing voluntary resettlement presents one way to diminish the negative outcomes of resettlement agendas. This project will: (1) develop theoretical insight into what incentivizes human behaviors promoting voluntary resettlement; (2) design new methodologies to measure how viewpoints of post-resettlement environments influence decision-making and outcomes at the household level; and (3) improve understandings of the dynamics at work in the trade-offs individuals make between wanting to remain in one's home and taking a chance on relocating for a possibly better future. Understanding how to minimize post-resettlement dissatisfaction among poor and marginalized populations, by theorizing what incentivizes voluntary resettlement, can greatly reduce the social conflict and civil unrest associated with many resettlement programs.
This study examines how decision-making about resettlement programs at the household level involves evaluations of the costs and benefits of resisting resettlement and the potential for a better life in the post-resettlement environment. The project explores the decision-making process employed by resettled households in Moatize, Mozambique, which have been displaced by rapid growth in the coal extraction industry. Three questions underpin this research: (1) What characteristics increase the likelihood a household will choose to voluntarily resettle?; (2) What criteria are important in the household's decision-making process to resist or accept resettlement?; and (3) How does the backdrop of a rapidly changing environment influence this process? This project employs a theoretical framework that analyzes the dynamic interface between aspirations about the post-resettlement site and attachment to one's previous home from the perspective of the person, the process, and the place. Qualitative data will capture the aspirational capacity and place attachment of households to compare with semi-structured survey data on the specific physical and social features of the pre- and post-resettlement sites. Using multivariate regression, ethnographic decision-tree modeling, and content analysis, this project will theorize how aspirations about one's future home and place attachment to one's previous home interact in rapidly changing environments to influence a household's willingness to voluntarily resettle. This relationship will be used to construct a place profile for policy makers to use in designing post-resettlement sites that meet household aspirations. Successful implementation of this project's policy recommendations has the capacity to significantly reduce post-resettlement unrest by anticipating and managing the conflict between place attachment and aspirations for a better future.
