Grimes Publishes Journal Article on International Remittances
William Grimes, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Professor of International Relations and Political Science at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, co-wrote a recent journal article on international remittance rails as infrastructures.
Grimes co-wrote the article, entitled “International Remittance Rails as Infrastructures: Embeddedness, Innovation and Financial Access in Developing Economies,” with Daivi Rodima-Taylor, a researcher at the BU African Studies Center.
From the abstract of the article:
Remittances to developing economies constitute one of their most important and consistent forms of capital inflow, but have long been limited by costs and risks associated with trans-border payments. New digital platforms lower these, with significant implications for financial inclusion and economic development. Constituting an important element of developing countries’ engagement with international finance, remittances engender new opportunities for empowerment and vulnerability. This article analyzes recent developments in international remittances to developing countries through the lens of infrastructure. The infrastructural perspective reveals important junction points between diverse money transfer pathways and institutions, depicting their spatial configuration and relationality as well as their potential to affect power differentials, and allowing for a socially embedded view of digital disruption. Drawing on examples in Africa and Asia, we show that the new generation of remittance infrastructures are best understood as assemblages of multiple elements, conjoining monopolistic trunks that depend on local innovations to traverse the ‘last mile’ to reach end-users. The vibrancy and indispensability of local networks and innovation, along with competition among core platforms, allow for significant agency and economic opportunity even among communities beset by poverty.
William W. Grimes is Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Professor of International Relations at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, where he has taught since 1996. He previously served as chair of the Department of International Relations and as the first director of the BU Center for the Study of Asia. He has also spent time as a post-doctoral researcher and as a visiting assistant professor at Harvard University.