Rural-urban circuits of labour in the Global South: reflections on accumulation and social reproduction

This chapter situates the patterns of labour migration across ‘rural-urban’ spaces and indicates important contemporary processes of accumulation and social reproduction in the Global South. Evidence suggests that there has been a massive population shift from rural to urban areas in search of better livelihoods, but most of this population ends up scrounging for subsistence in an incomplete process of proletarianization. This confirms Marx’s theory of a relative surplus population, which today encompasses a circulating population in diverse economic activities, residing in informal urban settlements, while also maintaining multi-locational households, but typically failing to gain social security and proper access to public services. This population serves as a powerful wage depressor for capital, in active collusion with the State, while presenting significant challenges for household dynamics and social reproduction.