The role of remittances in times of socio-political unrest: Evidence from Tunisia

The Tunisian political system is still in process of transitioning, causing high uncertainty and political instability. As remittances have long been perceived as a buffer against uncertainty surrounding unusual events, this study seeks to assess the role of remittances in times of rising socio-political unrest. To do so, we conduct an in-depth analysis of the behavior of remittances during troubled political transition. Specifically, detailed investigation of rescaled range(R/S) analysis to test whether remittances follow a long-memory process is carried out. Our findings tend to confirm the stable behavior of remittances. We can therefore characterize Tunisian migrants as regular customers in the future. This would affect positively both the balance of payments and the families who receive them. But this situation seems to be exogenous and is not related to the implementation of any policy to attract remittances. Hence the Paramount importance of designing a comprehensive strategy that enables remittances to play a more potential role in post-revolution periods and that renders emigration an integral part of growth strategies.