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An example of this tendency may be found in the imbalance between de 23 million euro budget that the [[EU]] plans on investing in the [[Schengen Information System]] and the [[Visa Information System]] (aimed at a further immigrant identification and control) with the 3 million euro budget (4 million in its second year) granted to codevelopment projects.
CODEVELOPMENT IN SPAIN
Since the late nineties, codevelopment has been the subject of postgraduate studies, specialist courses, discussions and forums among multiple actors, as well as calls for project grants by some local and regional administrations, beginning with the Municipality of Madrid. These authorities were quickly aware of the local impact of the presence of new immigrant communities, the importance of the links that bind them with their communities of origin, and the desirability of relating them in any future action to support the policies of cooperation. Codevelopment policies had a much stronger presence and development in the regional and local levels.
At the state level, in accordance with Tampere Summit on Migration, the GRECO Plan on migration management (Programa Global de Regulación y Coordinación de la Extranjería y la Inmigración 2000-2004), was launched by the Interior Ministry in 2001. This Plan devoted an important space for “joint development”, in line with the policies of Tampere and the French government. GRECO insisted on technical and educational cooperation, the voluntary return of migrants, the channelling of migrants’ remittances to development projects, and finally, on the cooperation with those governments that were ready to accept the returned illegal migrants, as well as to control the exit of their citizens with destination Spain. However, codevelopment was not even mentioned as a policy line in the Alien law passed in 2000, and did not receive proper funding within the GRECO’s framework.
Since ending 2004, codevelopment policies have been open to discussion, including the contents, limits, and plans. Two state agencies claimed their space in codevelopment actions: the State Secretary for International Cooperation, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the brand new General Directorate of Immigrants’ Integration, at the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs.
During 2005 there has been progress in the search for a consensus on competences and actors. A codevelopment line was mainstreamed in the Master Plans on Development Cooperation, and two years later, also in the new Integration Plan, called Strategic Plan on Citizenship and Integration 2007-2010, which was finally implemented in 2007, by the Ministry of Social Affairs.
Early in the 2000s’ the civil society organisations worked on a document called "The Social Consensus on Migration", which was developed by two non-governmental organizations --the Spanish Committee for the Aid of Refugees (CEAR) and Caritas Española-- together with the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces (FEMP). In this text, codevelopment was defined as "a line of work that favours the active participation of migrants in their commitment for the development of their home communities".
In the last five years, academic research on codevelopment increased, as a result of the strong immigration process experienced by the Spanish society from 2000 onwards (which represented nearly 80% of Spain’s demographic growth). A website devoted to codevelopment, with many useful resources and discussions papers, was set up by CIDEAL, a development cooperation think tank. Many universities decided to open up new learning courses on the matter, following the steps of the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. Several doctoral thesis are currently being carried out, focusing diverse aspects of codevelopment, including the impact of migration in the sending countries, mainly Ecuador and Morocco.
Current definitions of codevelopment in Spain
The Spanish viewpoint on codevelopment has been strongly influenced by the work of the Migration and Development International Network, based in the Universidad Autónoma de Zacatecas and El Colef (El Colegio de la Frontera Norte), in Tijuana, Mexico.
According to Graciela Malgesini , spontaneous codevelopment could be defined as the win/win effect, the linkage between migration and development, which generates mostly positive impacts on both the society of origin of immigrants, and the host society. This definition presumes the role of immigrants as actors and vectors of development, in "both sides", and the understanding of the relations between host countries (North) and sending countries (South) in a horizontal way. Codevelopment is directly related to Transnationalism.
Carlos Gimenez pinpointed other two characteristics of codevelopment: (1) The multiplicity of stakeholders (a network of actors that surpasses both quantitatively and qualitatively the traditional actors in the traditional development cooperation projects, as it includes authorities, social organizations, trade unions, universities, training institutes, businesses and immigrant associations). (2) The transnational citizenship (immigrants acting in codevelopment activities, embedded in a transnational dynamic, are also transnational citizens, to the extent that they have a dual presence. This dual space of belonging, in turn, encourages decision making, influences on the economic, political and social development, and allows the formation of a separate identity, based on two geographical areas, the country of origin and the country of destination)
== External links ==
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