Longcuts in the global migration network

Abstract

Different from the regular migration some migrants want the opportunity to move further to a new country rather than settle down. However, this peculiar “transit migration” is only studied based on small-scale surveys, which is regional and always controversial. To reconcile the contradiction of the fact that systematic issues such as immigration analysis need global large-scale data, this paper constructs a multilateral migration network and studies its statistical characteristics to get the probability of being transit countries and routes. It is quantified by irregular triangle relationships in the global migration network, and shows some popular springboards mentioned in prior research studies, such as Canada and Australia acting as the global hubs, and some typical transit countries directing to Europe, as Russia, Turkey, France and Germany. Besides, it also reveals and quantifies several hidden possible transit stations that were seldom noticed before, like South Africa, Israel and some hubs of local refugee flows in Africa. Exploring these possible routes and key notes might shed light on policy development, and from the viewpoint of physics, these results provide an objective view to transit migrants and countries that is free of prejudice and political attitudes.