Remittances and Social Development

In the past few years there has been a remarkable renaissance of interest in remittances. This interest has undoubtedly been triggered by a striking increase in the levels of remittance flows. This often coincides with a certain perception that it concerns a ‘new’ issue. However, any suggestion that the topic is ‘new’ testifies to a striking level of amnesia of decades of prior research and policies on this issue. Lest we ‘reinvent the wheel’ (Russell 2003), we should therefore not lose sight of the findings of previous empirical work and policies on remittances, migration and development.