International Migration Experience Research Articles

Emotional problems and victimisation among youth with national and international migration experience living in Austria and Turkey

Young people with international migration experiences constitute an increasing proportion of the population in many European countries. In Austria, a substantial proportion of these international migrants come from Turkey. In Turkey, many adolescents are national migrants, having moved from the eastern part to the western part of the country. This study compares the impact of national and international migration experiences on the levels of emotional difficulties (depression, anxiety, loneliness and self-esteem) and peer victimisation, and tests whether emotional difficulties help to explain the associations between migration experiences and peer victimisation. In Austria, a total of 379 non-migrant Austrians, 82 first generation and 202 second generation international migrants from Turkey; and in Turkey, 990 non-migrant Turks and 501 national migrants participated; they were in two age cohorts (12 and 15 years). In line with the predictions of the acculturative stress model, national and first generation international migrants had higher levels of depression and social anxiety and lower levels of self esteem compared to non-migrant Austrians, while no differences were found for second generation international migrants. Unexpectedly, all four Turkish groups were less likely to be victimised compared to the non-migrant Austrian group. In line with the predictions, high levels of social anxiety and depression helped to explain high levels of victimisation, but only among youth who experienced resettlement (e.g. national and first generation international migrants), indicating that acculturative stress works as a risk factor for peer victimisation.

Making sense of migration: young Turks' experiences in the United Kingdom

Until recently, children and young people's experiences of international migration and mobility have received minimal attention. Young migrants are either neglected in migration and childhood/youth studies or depicted in theoretically essentialist frameworks as model or problem ethnic minorities. This paper focuses on a neglected issue with respect to an invisible ethnic group in the British context by examining the subjective meanings of crossing borders among young Turkish migrants into Britain. This study's empirical component is based on semi-structured interviews with 12 participants (six male and six female) between 16 and 21 years old. A narrative-based qualitative method was used to analyse interview transcripts, and particular attention is given to the content of participants' stories. The following three themes were chosen to re-present these young people's experiences on moving to the UK: the process of decision-making, initial experiences in the UK and family relationships after migration. The findings are discussed with reference to the relevant literature, policy-making and possible means of supporting young migrants.

The human capital characteristics and household living standards of returning international migrants in Eastern and Southern Africa.

Africa's experience with return migration is not new. However, few empirical studies have examined the social and economic characteristics of returning migrants within the continent. In this study, the human capital endowments and household living standards of returning migrants in Uganda and South Africa are examined using recently available data. The study compares returnees in both countries with immigrants as well as the native-born population with no international migration experience. It also investigates how factors such as previous country of residence, year of arrival, and other demographic factors predict levels of education and living standards among returning migrants. In Uganda, the results show that recently arrived returning migrants had better educational endowments than both immigrants and non-migrants. Migrants who returned to Uganda following the fall of Idi Amin's regime had the lowest educational levels and lowest living standards compared to other returnees. Furthermore, the results indicate that previous residence in countries in the West was associated with four additional years of schooling while returning migrants arriving from other African countries had the lowest levels of schooling among returning migrants. In South Africa, the study finds that returnees arriving almost immediately following the end of Apartheid had the highest levels of education compared to either immigrants or non-migrants. Returnees on average also had the highest household living standards in South Africa. Among South African immigrants, the results indicate that those arriving towards the end of the century had lower educational endowments compared to immigrants who arrived in the country two to four years after the end of Apartheid.

Moving Up the Ladder? The Impact of Migration Experience on Occupational Mobility in Albania

This study uses the 2005 Albanian Living Standards Measurement Study Survey and estimates the impact of international migration experience on the occupational mobility of return migrants vis-à-vis working-age Albanian residents that never migrated. Controlling for the non-random nature of international migration and return, the results show that past migration experience increases the likelihood of upward occupational mobility. Since such impact is likely to depend on differences in earning potentials and opportunities for skill acquisition across destination countries, we explore the heterogeneity of impact by host country. The results indicate that the positive effect of past migration experience on upward occupational mobility is driven by past migration experience in Italy and countries further afield, while past migration experience in Greece does not exert any significant impact on mobility outcomes.

THE POLITICAL CULTURE OF FACTIONALISM AMONG HINDU NATIONALISTS IN DENMARK

The experience of international migration is generally found to turn migrants into culturally hybrid communities. Yet, migrant communities often hold on to their religious moorings even as they relocate. From the 1970s onwards, the emerging leadership of Hindu settlers in Denmark consciously tried to transfer with them what they saw to be key aspects of Hinduism as they migrated to Denmark. In 1985, Hindus organized a major conference to position the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council) as the umbrella organization for Hinduism in Denmark. Later on they established a Temple of Indians called Bharatiya Mandir to provide a place of worship for local Hindus. The philosophy behind the temple conformed to the nondenominational Hindu nationalist vision of Hindus as a unified community. This article, which contrasts the aim of Hindu nationalism with the on-the-ground realities of Hindu mobilization in Denmark, reveals that two major factions spearheaded Hindu nationalist endeavors in Denmark from the 1980s until 2006. The two factions successfully launched several projects, and even collaborated in their execution, but the initiatives were beset with rivalries that hampered the communal unity they had set out to achieve. The authors analyze this factional rivalry as an expression of Indian political culture, arguing that tensions among Hindu activists in Denmark is an instance of the political factionalism prevalent in the Indian subcontinent. The unintended emergence of such factionalism represents the successful transfer of a core element of Indian political culture to a new locale through Hindu nationalist politics. The authors base their argument on field observations since the 1980s, recent interviews with key religious players, and more than two hundred pages of written materials that offer a rare entry point to the study of Hindu nationalism ex situ.

<i>Letters across Borders: The Epistolary Practices of International Migrants</i> (review)

Reviewed by: Letters across Borders: The Epistolary Practices of International Migrants Max Paul Friedman Letters across Borders: The Epistolary Practices of International Migrants. Bruce S. Elliott, David A. Gerber and Suzanne Sinke, eds. (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006. 320 pp.). Since the days of Oscar Handlin, scholars have agreed that migrants are not "uprooted" but nurture transnational communities. Until recent developments in communications and transportation technology, the substance of these webs [End Page 836] was spun from letters. Letters can be central to efforts to write social history from below, since they represent "the largest body of the writings of ordinary people of the past that historians and other researchers possess." (p.3) This collection presents the work of scholars who grapple with the limitations of the sources in form as well as in content. Taken together, these essays suggest that far from being a familiar and well-worn genre, migrant letters, and the epistolary practices that surround them, will continue to provide the impulse to new ideas in scholarship for some time to come. The introduction by the three editors offers some thoughtful observations on postal communications: The prepaid iconographic stamp serves as a symbol of nationalism, so that meaning can be gleaned before the envelope is even opened. Letters are usually written and read as part of a two-way exchange, but archives typically have access to only one side of the conversation, so that these sources automatically present difficulties of interpretation. And as valuable as these nuggets of writings from below may be, there remains the unresolvable problem of the representativeness of the writers. Wolfgang Helbich and Walter D. Kamphoefner confront this problem in the first essay, where they try to categorize a sample of letters from German immigrants according to push factors ranging from "family discord" to "misery." They then observe that any such formula will be unreliable because of the overrepresentation of highly educated persons among the donors to archives, as well as the tendency of letter writers to play down the factors that cast themselves in an unfavorable light. "Putting these findings of misrepresentation into hard figures is most difficult," they readily acknowledge (p. 50). But they defend the principle that a sample of emigrant letters large enough to yield frequently recurring themes will permit analytical claims, even if these claims must remain short of a "Gallup poll" of the immigrant community at large. Eric Richards also takes up this question in his essay, "The Limits of the Australian Emigrant Letter." Australia was a remarkably literate society by the 1880s, when Australians wrote and received more letters per capita than did North Americans. Ideally this would yield a democratic sample of letters in the archives, but Richards observes a bias toward the more affluent families, who preserved and donated their correspondence. He takes issue with some classic tropes about Australia, such as the tragic "convict gentleman" category. For example, Robert Hughes had presented the letters of Richard Taylor as an example of a despairing emigrant torn from his father's home. But Richards notes that reading the entire cycle of Taylor's letters shows that in later years he praised the colony, declared he would never return to England, and invited family members to join him. Thus, even within a small sample of correspondence, selection can drive interpretation. One of the interesting themes that emerges from this collection is the effort by some of the scholars to analyze the role of affective ties in the migration experience. Traditionally, analyses of push factors and pull factors have focused on the material conditions related to land and labor. Yet anyone who has first-hand experience of international migration, or who has read the writings of international migrants, can attest to the crucial role of emotions. Given that there is a labor shortage or rapid growth in population with limited land availability, why do certain people decide to leave? The answer can sometimes be as intangible as [End Page 837] love. Suzanne Sinke has studied two centuries of correspondence that can lead to betrothal. Since migration is gendered with men often being the first to move, producing a sex imbalance, mail-order bride services were in demand...

Boats, planes and trains: British migration, mobility and transnational experience

This paper discusses the paucity of scholarship on contemporary British international migration experience, and highlights why British nations are viewed as beyond detailed international migration and transnational scholarship. Resisting this closure, discussion invokes a transnational lens to explore three flows: post-war migration of British citizens to traditional destinations; British retirement migration to the Mediterranean; and British professional migration. The paper adds its voice to a growing body of work that argues for a widening of the migration agenda to include qualitative work and a transnational approach to enable British migratory experience to be fully investigated.

Pakistan

The collection and reporting of data on international migration into and from Pakistan have not kept up with the volume and diversity of the country's international migration experience. The Ministry of Labour and Overseas Pakistani, the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs are the three ministries which produce data on international migration from Pakistan. The census is the main source of information on the foreign population in the country. Several government agencies and international organizations are sources of data on refugees, mostly from Afghanistan. More coordination among government agencies dealing with international migration is needed in to improve the coverage, collation and dissemination of data.

海外就職の経験と日本人としてのアイデンティティ―シンガポールで働く現地採用日本人女性を対象に―

海外就職の経験と日本人としてのアイデンティティ―シンガポールで働く現地採用日本人女性を対象に―

International Migration and Infant Health in Mexico

This paper examines the flip side of the epidemiological paradox, namely the relationship between international migration experience and positive infant health outcomes in Mexico. Building upon past research that has explored the role of economic remittances in contributing to the positive relationship between international migration and birth outcomes in sending country communities, the present analysis focuses on the noneconomic effects of paternal migration experience on infant health. The data come from a hospital-based postpartum survey (HPS 2001) recently completed in two high-migrant sending states of Western Mexico. The findings demonstrate that the positive effect of international migration on infant health occurs in the context of considerable loss of social support and high stress levels. Socioeconomic improvements facilitated by the receipt of remittances, coupled with positive health behaviors, are two factors that contribute to this protective effect.

Migrants and Housing Investments: Theory and Evidence from Nigeria

The dominance of housing may reflect limitations in the menu of investment choices available to migrants in the country of origin. In many developing countries individuals face relatively few savings opportunities where productive assets (such as land farm assets) are associated with high risks and/or low rates of return. Housing investments offer unique advantages in that they are durable highly visible and associated with low risk and monitoring requirements. However there are some important drawbacks associated with housing investments. In particular where resale and rental markets for housing are not well developed migrants housing assets may be relatively illiquid and irreversible. In the next section I provide some background on general patterns of investment behavior among migrants. Here the evidence on housing investments is discussed for a rich set of migrant sending and receiving countries. In Section III I develop the conceptual framework for understanding migrants housing investment decisions. Section IV provides a description of the data sources. Section V outlines the empirical strategy. In Section VI I discuss the empirical findings. Section VII presents conclusions. (excerpt)

The role of family networks and migration culture in the continuation of Moroccan emigration: a gender perspective

About 1.5 million people of Moroccan origin live as legal migrants in the countries of the European Union. For several decades, emigration has affected various provinces of Morocco. In some regions, the process started more than 40 years ago; in others the migration experience is much more recent. This study seeks to portray from a micro perspective the ongoing migration processes from Morocco, in particular to Western Europe. Emphasis is placed on the effect of family networks and migration culture on the intention to emigrate of Moroccan men and women without international migration experience. We focus especially on gender differences since the position and the roles played by men and women both within the family and within Moroccan society are very different. This gender distinction reveals remarkable differences between men and women in the intention to emigrate, and in its explanation. For men, emigration intentions are stronger in regions having a migration culture, while at the same time the presence of family networks abroad has a negative but small effect on the emigration intention. For women, however, the existence of a migration culture has no effect on the intention to leave the country, whereas family networks abroad tend to increase this intention. Interestingly, women with a paid job and who judge their financial situation negatively have the highest emigration intentions. This may indicate that, among Moroccan women, the more modernised, especially, intend to migrate. The more conservative Moroccan women are not likely to express an intention to migrate on their own. Rather, they behave in a manner that suits the husband or family. This behaviour may, or may not, include an emigration decision.

International labour migration and quality of life: findings from rural Thailand

AbstractThis paper provides one of the few detailed case studies of the costs and benefits of international labour migration within the East Asian labour‐market system that developed rapidly in the 1990s. Analysis focuses on communities of migrant‐worker origin in Northeastern Thailand. The paper considers quality of life dimensions for households distinguished on the basis of differing participation in international labour migration. Although the highest quality of life, based on locally identified indicators, is found in households containing returned international migrant workers, the differences between the analytical groups are fairly subdued. The implication is that international migration experience has been so widespread in these communities that it has had a ‘demonstration and emulation’ effect on aspirations and achievement throughout the whole of these communities. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Out of Africa: What Drives the Pressure to Emigrate?

This paper evaluates the strength of social and economic forces that affect the pressure to emigrate 'out of Africa' for four distinctly different African countries (Morocco, Egypt, Senegal and Ghana). In general, great expectations about attaining a higher living standard and expected low job search costs abroad are strong forces that drive emigration intentions out of Africa, especially in Ghana and Senegal. Signs of positive selection with respect to the level of education of potential migrants are only present in Ghana and Egypt. The differences in intentions by age and sex are also quite noteworthy, although the influence of sex differs quite distinctly across countries. Return migrants are on average more set to emigrating judging from their stated intentions although there are signs of negative selection within the group of return migrants in Ghana and Egypt. The network effects of potential migrants turn out to be less important than one might expect from actual migration behaviour. Both ties within the household with household members who have international migration experience and ties with current migrants affect intentions only in Ghana and Egypt and it affects the intentions of women far stronger than that of men. The implication of these findings is that due to the slow growth prospects of these African countries the pressure to emigrate 'out of Africa' can be a long lasting phenomenon.

Emigration, return, immigration: a review and evaluation of Greece's postwar experience of international migration.

"This paper offers a review and evaluation of the Greek experience of international migration.... The analysis is based partly on available published data, and partly on qualitative appraisals. Three major international migration phases are analysed--emigration, return migration and immigration--and the main socio-economic and cultural effects of these migration trends are discussed. The paper pays particular attention to the recent mass immigration movements, noting their heterogeneity...and describing their impact on the Greek labour market. The article concludes with some comments on the difficulties of formulating a Greek migration policy in the light of the country's location, open borders and internationalized economy."

Government policies and international migration of skilled workers in Sub-Saharan Africa

Since a central concern of the geography of international migration is to consider how and why stocks and flows of migrants are variable from country to country, the study of skilled international migration must address policies of individual governments towards local and foreign skilled workers. These policies are most evident in immigration and emigration legislation, regulations and practice, but also, less directly but often of more fundamental significance, in policies in education, manpower planning and towards wages and salaries. In Sub-Saharan Africa there is a wide range of experience of recent skilled international migration, driven by direct and indirect policies pursued by individual governments since independence. At an intercontinental scale the deleterious effects of the global division of labour have not merely been passively accepted; within the continent new patterns of skilled-labour migration have been created by increasingly differentiated economic performance and political relationships. A case study of Kenya, a country of small current net immigration of skilled workers, is used to specify some of the processes that establish the relationships between immigration and emigration policies, and how these have been mediated by conditions for skilled workers. The concluding section of this paper sets the general experience and that of the Kenyan case study in the wider context of the role of the state as a factor in the geography of skilled international migration in the Third World.