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In this paper, we investigate the power of migration as a mechanism in the transmission of social norms, taking Mali and Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) as a case study. Mali has a strong FGM culture and a long-standing history of migration. We use an original household-level database coupled with census data to analyze the extent to which girls living in localities with high rates of return migrants are less prone to FGM. Malians migrate predominantly to other African countries where female circumcision is uncommon (e.g., Côte d’Ivoire) and to countries where FGM is totally banned (France and other developed countries) and where anti-FGM information campaigns frequently target African migrants. Taking a two-step instrumental variable approach to control for the endogeneity of migration and return decisions, we show that return migrants have a negative and significant influence on FGM practices. More precisely, we show that this result is primarily driven by the flow of returnees from Cote d’Ivoire. We also show that adults living in localities with return migrants are more informed about FGM and in favor of legislation. The impact of returnees may occur through several channels, including compositional effects, changes in return migrants’ attitudes toward FGM, and return migrants convincing stayers to change their FGM practices.

In this paper, we investigate the power of migration as a mechanism in the transmission of social norms, taking Mali and Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) as a case study. Mali has a strong FGM culture and a long-standing history of migration. We use an original household-level database coupled with census data to analyze the extent to which girls living in localities with high rates of return migrants are less prone to FGM. Malians migrate predominantly to other African countries where female circumcision is uncommon (e.g., Côte d'Ivoire) and to countries where FGM is totally banned (France and other developed countries) and where anti-FGM information campaigns frequently target African migrants. Taking a two-step instrumental variable approach to control for the endogeneity of migration and return decisions, we show that return migrants have a negative and significant influence on FGM practices. More precisely, we show that this result is primarily driven by the flow of returnees from Cote d'Ivoire. We also show that adults living in localities with return migrants are more informed about FGM and in favor of legislation. The impact of returnees may occur through several channels, including compositional effects, changes in return migrants' attitudes toward FGM, and return migrants convincing stayers to change their FGM practices.

In this paper, we investigate the power of migration as a mechanism in the transmission of social norms, taking Mali and Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) as a case study. Mali has a strong FGM culture and a long-standing history of migration. We use an original household-level database coupled with census data to analyze the extent to which girls living in localities with high rates of return migrants are less prone to FGM. Malians migrate predominantly to other African countries where female circumcision is uncommon (e.g. Côte d’Ivoire) and to countries where FGM is totally banned (France and other developed countries) and where anti-FGM information campaigns frequently target African migrants. Taking a two-step instrumental variable approach to control for the endogeneity of migration and return decisions, we show that return migrants have a negative and significant influence on FGM practices. More precisely, we show that this result is primarily driven by the flow of returnees from Cote d'Ivoire. We also show that adults living in localities with return migrants are more informed about FGM and in favor of legislation. The impact of returnees may occur through several channels, including compositional effects, changes in return migrants' attitudes toward FGM, and return migrants convincing stayers to change their FGM practices.

In this paper, we investigate how powerful a mechanism migration is in the transmission of social norms, taking Mali and Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) as a case study. Mali has a strong FGM culture and a long-standing history of migration. We use an original household-level database coupled with census data to analyze the extent to which girls living in villages with high rates of return migrants are less prone to FGM. Malians migrate predominantly to other African countries where female circumcision is uncommon (e.g. Côte d'Ivoire) and to countries where FGM is totally banned (France and other developed countries) and where anti-FGM information campaigns frequently target African migrants. Taking a two-step instrumental variable approach to control for the endogeneity of migration decisions, we show that return migrants have a negative and significant influence on FGM. We also show that adults living in villages with return migrants are more in favor of legislation against FGM.________________________________ Dans cet article, nous examinons dans quelle mesure la migration est un vecteur de transferts de normes sociales en étudiant le lien entre migration et excision au Mali. Alors que l'excision est fortement répandue au Mali, ce pays a une forte tradition migratoire vers les pays limitrophes et les pays du Nord où l'excision est soit moins pratiquée soit sanctionnée par la loi. Nous testons l'hypothèse que les migrants acquièrent des opinions différentes en la matière dans les pays d'accueil où l'excision est moins fréquente voire interdite et qu'une fois de retour ils induisent un changement de comportement dans leurs villages d'origine. Nous mobilisons une base originale de données sur l'excision des filles de 0 à 14 ans couplée avec des données de recensement qui permettent de mesurer les taux de migration (courante et de retour) des villages de résidence des personnes interrogées et mettons en oeuvre une méthode instrumentale pour contrôler de l'endogénéité de la migration. Nous montrons que les migrants de retour ont effectivement une influence négative et significative sur le risque d'excision et que ce résultat provient essentiellement des migrants de Côte d'Ivoire. Nous montrons également que les adultes vivant dans les villages avec des migrants de retour sont plus en faveur de la législation contre les mutilations génitales.

Background: Insecticide resistance challenges the vector control efforts towards malaria elimination and proving the development of complementary tools. Targeting the genes that are involved in mosquito fertility and susceptibility to Plasmodium with small molecule inhibitors has been a promising alternative to curb the vector population and drive the transmission down. However, such an approach would require a comprehensive knowledge of the genetic diversity of the targeted genes to ensure the broad efficacy of new tools across the natural vector populations. Methods: Four fertility and parasite susceptibility genes were identified from a systematic review of the literature. The Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNPs) found within the regions spanned by these four genes, genotyped across 2784 wild-caught Anopheles gambiae s.l. from 19 sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries, were extracted from the whole genome SNP data of the Ag1000G project (Ag3.0). The population genetic analysis on gene-specific data included the determination of the population structure, estimation of the differentiation level between the populations, evaluation of the linkage between the non-synonymous SNPs (nsSNPs), and a few statistical tests. Results: As potential targets for small molecule inhibitors to reduce malaria transmission, our set of four genes associated with Anopheles fertility and their susceptibility to Plasmodium comprises the mating-induced stimulator of oogenesis protein (MISO, AGAP002620), Vitellogenin (Vg, AGAP004203), Lipophorin (Lp, AGAP001826), and Haem-peroxidase 15 (HPX15, AGAP013327). The analyses performed on these potential targets of small inhibitor molecules revealed that the genes are conserved within SSA populations of An. gambiae s.l. The overall low Fst values and low clustering of principal component analysis between species indicated low genetic differentiation at all the genes (MISO, Vg, Lp and HPX15). The low nucleotide diversity (>0.10), negative Tajima’s D values, and heterozygosity analysis provided ecological insights into the purifying selection that acts to remove deleterious mutations, maintaining genetic diversity at low levels within the populations. None of MISO nsSNPs were identified in linkage disequilibrium, whereas a few weakly linked nsSNPs with ambiguous haplotyping were detected at other genes. Conclusions: This integrated finding on the genetic features of major malaria vectors’ biological factors across natural populations offer new insights for developing sustainable malaria control tools. These loci were reasonably conserved, allowing for the design of effective targeting with small molecule inhibitors towards controlling vector populations and lowering global malaria transmission.