High Emigration Rates Research Articles

Understanding Left-Behind Places in a Contrastive Approach

Abstract How are left-behind places in a country compared to other types of places in an Eastern European country? A typology of local human development is designed and tested for the case of the Romanian society. The United Nations model of human development (structured by the three dimensions of education, economic development and health) is adapted to the local level and two contrasting measures are designed – an index and a typology of local human development. The typology resulted from a cluster analysis. It is validated by bi-variate and multivariate analysis (multinomial regression). High emigration rates, irrespective of the destination, do not bring lower development to the local origin in Romania: the destination of migration counts. There is a higher probability, in 2018, of left-behindness in localities with a higher number of emigrants to Italy in the years preceding 2011. Human development is highly differentiated by destination countries of emigration and by historical subregions. It is especially for such contexts that the quantitative approach could be misleading. Public policy targets could be better identified if qualitative and quantitative approaches are simultaneously used. The proposed approach could be adopted by keeping the same dimensions and measuring them by available and appropriate indicators.

The Role of Urban Green Spaces on Life Satisfaction and Migration Willingness in Tirana, Albania

In the framework of place attachment we explore how green spaces contribute to life satisfaction in a context of high emigration rates. We propose that green spaces affect life satisfaction of the population through the mediation of physical health and mental health, and this relationship is moderated by migration willingness. We conducted our study in March–April 2021 in the city of Tirana, Albania. Using physical and mental health indicators, our results demonstrate that urban green spaces directly and indirectly affect life satisfaction. The mediators with the highest impact on life satisfaction are psychological distress and well-being. Green space exposure plays a role in influencing health outcomes, but the relationship is not moderated by migration willingness, and it shows a higher impact on participants with better mental health. Designing more and improved urban green spaces is a pathway to positively affect the health and well-being of urban populations.

Adoption of Property Tax Expenditure and Limitations by U.S. States

Property tax expenditure and limitations (TELs) are key tools used by U.S. states to control local government spending and taxing authority. This paper employs a multiple events history analysis to understand the factors influencing the adoption of county-level property tax TELs by state governments. The findings show that external factors such as policy learning, competition, imitation, and coercion play crucial roles in this process. Notably, the study reveals that higher out-migration rates and the presence of voter-based ballot initiatives significantly increase the likelihood of TEL adoption. Additionally, the spread of TELs is influenced more by national trends rather than neighboring state actions, highlighting the saliency of these policies. These findings shed light on the dynamics of policy diffusion and provide insights into the interplay between state-level decisions and local government financial autonomy. The study’s implications extend beyond public finance, offering a nuanced understanding of policy adoption and diffusion in federal systems.

Fertility Trends and Population Policy in the Canton of Sarajevo

The demography of Bosnia and Herzegovina fits into the Southeast-European trends with sub-replacement fertility and high emigration rates. At the national level, natural decline started in 2007, while migration is influenced by the war and its aftermath, as well as several economic and political push factors (low wages, corruption, high unemployment, etc.), and also has a serious impact on birth and death rates. On the other hand, demographic trends in the Canton of Sarajevo differ from the national pattern. It reached sub-replacement fertility more than a decade later (2019), and migration still has a positive balance: besides significant emigration rates, immigration to the Canton, especially from the other parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina, is higher. Since migration involves younger generations, it is also a factor behind the more favourable fertility rates, and can be evaluated as a consequence of better socio-economic development in the capital and its gravitational area. In the Canton, there have been several factors that contributed to the decline of birth rates in the past decades. Changing functions of family and children in the society, increasing women's employment, educational level and career aspirations, growing individualism and rationality, the changing social climate in relation to children, higher personal standards, and other socio-psychological factors should be mentioned. Birth rates were also (positively) influenced by other factors. One of the most important points is that the Canton has certainly one of the best support policies in Bosnia and Herzegovina including financial support and allowances for newborn children, subsidies in preschool education, primary and secondary schools as well as scholarships for pupils and students. Positive economic trends such as new constructions of residential buildings, business, and shopping centres, as well as an even stronger concentration of attractive institutions and activities should be emphasised. In 2021, the total fertility rate accounted for 1.38 in the Canton, while it has shown a great variation among the municipalities. The municipality with the lowest total fertility rate (Novi Grad) had the highest total number of live births in the Canton, while the municipality with the lowest total number of live births (Trnovo) was the only one with total fertility rate values above the replacement level. Due to its demographic, economic and political significance, the Canton of Sarajevo is a key area for population revitalisation in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Therefore, local measures have national significance, and can act as a model for the rest of the country in terms of population policy as well.

Subjective Well-Being of NEET Based on Gender and Generation Survey in Moldova

NEET is an umbrella term for those who struggle with their school-to-work transition. It is a consensus today that NEET is an acutely heterogeneous group, and there are varying ways to classify its members. Some of them deliberately reject or postpone the school-to-work transition, for example, because they choose to fulfill their traditional gender role. In these cases, NEET is a conscious choice. In this article, the NEET classification was based on the individuals' well-being. Moldova gives a good opportunity to study NEET as this Eastern European country suffers from simultaneous socio-economic crises, including high emigration and poverty rates. The data were taken from the Gender and Generation Survey (GGS) conducted in 2020. Based on the previous research, the 15 - 29 age group was chosen (326 observations comply with the NEET conditions and are complete). The author chose the questions related to the following aspects of well-being: happiness, life satisfaction, and depression sentiments. The variables are categorical, and they were analyzed with a Latent Class Model. There are substantial correspondences between the NEET well-being classes and the causes of NEET. The results supplement the current knowledge on NEET heterogeneity from the side of self-assigned well-being rather than socio-economic inequalities.

Movement, not survival, differs between wild and hatchery‐reared imperiled desert fishes

AbstractObjectiveStocking streams with hatchery‐produced fishes is an increasingly common practice to restore native populations, but the fate of these fish is uncertain due to low survival or high emigration rates. Monitoring these vital population rates is needed to assess stocking and translocation of rare and endangered fishes to identify approaches that maximize persistence and survival and ultimately result in established populations.MethodsWe quantified survival, emigration, movement directionality, and long‐term (24 months) trends in apparent survival of stocked and wild‐caught fish implanted with passive integrated transponder (PIT) tags. We PIT‐tagged and tracked 1419 individuals, consisting of direct comparisons between two species of hatchery and wild fish, as well as four other wild‐captured species, from 2020 to 2022 in three desert streams in Arizona and New Mexico.ResultWe found that hatchery fish had high (>98%) estimates of survival after being released (<40 days) that was similar to all tagged wild fish. But hatchery fish had a fivefold higher emigration rate than wild conspecifics shortly (<40 days) after being released. Emigrating hatchery fish also tended to move downstream, whereas wild fish were more likely to move upstream. Additionally, apparent survival estimates were about 10 times higher for tagged wild fish than hatchery conspecifics 6 months after release; hatchery fish apparent survival approached zero after about 165 days but did not approach zero for wild fish until 690 days following tagging and release.ConclusionOur results suggest emigration, rather than reduced survival, might limit the success of stocking efforts. Thus, choosing optimal stocking locations and the time of year of the stocking, such as upstream reaches during times near the species reproduction season, might improve retention and establishment of stocked fish.

Returning from greener pastures? How exposure to returnees affects migration plans

Information and networks have long been hypothesized to be crucial elements of the formation of emigration intentions. Returnees are a prime source of information about life as a migrant. In this study, we contribute to an emerging literature on the influence of returnees on the formation of migration decisions using representative geolocated data from 5,000 respondents and more than 47,000 family members and relatives from Senegal and The Gambia, two countries with high emigration rates in the past. We demonstrate that the presence of return migrants in a respondent’s vicinity is exogenously conditional on the current number of emigrants. This allows us to circumvent the endogeneity of personal networks and to estimate the effect of returnees on individual emigration intentions. Migration intentions are substantially lower when emigrants who returned from Europe are present in the area. This does not apply to returnees from another African country. Further analyses reveal that migrants who returned from another African country improve the economic situation of families, while non-family returnees from Europe have no lasting economic impact but instead salter people’s negative perceptions of migration. We infer that exposure to returnees depresses emigration plans because potential migrants become more aware of the risks of the migration journey and the stigma attached to returning unsuccessfully.

In Memoriam: Mats Morell

In Memoriam: Mats Morell

More people too poor to move: divergent effects of climate change on global migration patterns

The observed temperature increase due to anthropogenic carbon emissions has impacted economies worldwide. National income levels in origin and destination countries influence international migration. Emigration is relatively low not only from high income countries but also from very poor regions, which is explained in current migration theory by credit constraints and lower average education levels, among other reasons. These relationships suggest a potential non-linear, indirect effect of climate change on migration through this indirect channel. Here we explore this effect through a counterfactual analysis using observational data and a simple model of migration. We show that a world without climate change would have seen less migration during the past 30 years, but that this effect is strongly reduced due to inhibited mobility. Our framework suggests that migration within the Global South has been strongly reduced because these countries have seen less economic growth than they would have experienced without climate change. Importantly, climate change has impacted international migration in the richer and poorer parts of the world very differently. In the future, climate change may keep increasing global migration as it slows down countries’ transition across the middle-income range associated with the highest emigration rates.

Return of Labour Migrants to Serbia: Realistic Expectations or Wishful Thinking?

Serbia has traditionally been a country with a high emigration rate. Numerous administrative obstacles and slow economic reforms have discouraged migrants from returning and making business investments. Over the last few years there has been a noticeable effort to provide concrete assistance, introduce benefits and reliefs and stimulate return migrations, particularly of entrepreneurs and highly educated persons, by means of different strategies, legal acts, and the establishment of government agencies and non-governmental organizations.
 Our decade-long research on migrations has primarily focused on the so-called Gastarbeiter, as well as their descendants. We have conducted research on migrants from North-eastern Serbia, which is one of the biggest emigration zones in the country, and field research was also conducted in Vienna, the city with the most numerous Serbian diaspora in Europe, a specific population which, due to the geographic proximity between Serbia and Austria, often engages in cross-border movement and is transnationally active. As regards the studied population, return migrations to Serbia and economic investment in the country’s development are unlikely and certainly insufficient. In this paper, we will look at the classification of returnees as at their motives for a possible return, but also at the numerous reasons for staying in the host country.

Population Analysis Using Gis Software Tools – Case Study of Romania

Population management is difficult and complex due to its dynamic and complexity. When we talk about demography, we talk about human population in a defined geographic area, meaning, demography is a spatial science. Geographic Information System (GIS) is a modern tool used in many fields, to manage attribute data and spatial data, including population management. The aim of this study is to present the size of population for each county and urban/rural area on two different years: 2012 and 2020, and the estimation of population growth until the year of 2050. Used for processing spatial data, ArcGIS package from ESRI, allows spatial and geostatistical analysis, mathematical calculations and the visualizations of data. Modern cartography is using GIS technologies to create maps in an easier and flexible way. GIS can use the existing analog maps after digitizing them. Using GIS, specialists can create maps at any scale, centered on any location and showing any selected information. ArcGIS tools permit to visualize, query and overlay the data bases related to the maps. Using ArcGIS applications, we determined the counties which present an increasing of population, and those presenting a decreasing of population, as well as the evolution of population in urban and rural area. In order to determine which counties are affected more by the population decline, we calculated the growth rate using the three major demographic variables: Birth, Death and Migration. In conclusion, we can say that the population in Romania has decreased in the past 8 years and is going to decrease even more in the next 30 years. This happened due to the low birth rate and high emigration rate.

The Electoral Consequences of International Migration in Sending Countries: Evidence from Central and Eastern Europe

This paper examines the political attributes of emigrants and how their departure affects the electoral outcomes in their home countries. I argue that emigrants are different from those who remain in their political preferences as well as economic attributes, such that large-scale emigration changes the distribution of voters in sending countries. Emigration can also directly affect the policy preferences of individuals who stay in their home countries. I test these arguments in seven Central and Eastern European countries, using individual-level surveys and region-level data on emigration and elections. To address potential endogeneity issues, I use instrumental variable analysis, leveraging the surge of Polish emigration to the United Kingdom after the EU enlargement. I find that emigrants from Central and Eastern Europe tend to be younger, highly educated, and politically more progressive and that the vote shares of far-right parties are larger in regions with higher emigration rates. Also, I find that exposure to large-scale emigration affects the vote choices of individuals who remain.

The impact of parental migration on psychological well-being of children in Ghana

ABSTRACT This study is the first to employ panel data to examine the time-varying effects of internal and international parental migration on the psychological well-being of children who stay behind in an African context. The analysis employs data collected in 2013, 2014 and 2015 from school going children aged 12–21 in two urban areas with high out-migration rates in Ghana – Kumasi and Sunyani. Using children’s self-reports, an analysis was conducted separately for boys (N = 781) and girls (N = 705). Results indicate that girls and boys with the mother away internally or internationally are equally or more likely to have higher levels of psychological well-being when compared to boys and girls of non-migrant parents. A higher level of well-being is observed amongst girls when parents migrate and divorce. However, parental migration and divorce are more likely to increase the psychological vulnerability of boys. In Ghana, the psychological well-being of children is nuanced by which parent has migrated, marital status of migrant parent and the gender of the child.

‘You can settle here’: immobility aspirations and capabilities among youth from rural Honduras

ABSTRACT A ‘mobility bias’ has been identified in the migration literature, whereby researchers have focused on the drivers of migration while neglecting factors that influence immobility decisions. Addressing this gap is important for developing a holistic understanding of human mobility patterns and effectively mitigating experiences of distress migration among populations experiencing marginalisation. This qualitative study explored (im)mobility aspirations and decisions among youth from two rural municipalities of Honduras. Thirty-two in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted in 2019. Analyses were guided by the aspiration-capabilities framework. Findings revealed retain and repel factors shaping immobility aspirations among rural youth. Respondents who were practicing immobility also identified the capacity to envision viable rural livelihood options as an important precursor to actualising their immobility preferences. They described creatively applying skills, leveraging resources, and engaging with enabling institutions in order to turn immobility aspirations into capabilities. They contested scarcity narratives driving outmigration among their peers and positioned themselves as active agents of their immobility decisions, claiming dignity in their livelihood choices. These findings enrich an understanding of immobility as an agentic livelihood choice in a context with high rates of outmigration, making both empirical and theoretical contributions to the (im)mobility literature.

An Emptying State? Demographic and International Migration Trends in Albania

The study examines demographic and migration trends in Albania within the framework of the concept of demographic transition. By outlining the historical-political-economic characteristics of the post-World War II period, the paper explains the factors that led to the population explosion in Albania and the rapid decline of the country’s population after the fall of socialism. As a specific feature of Central, East and Southeast Europe, Albania’s depopulation situation is exacerbated by the high rate of emigration from the country, particularly among the young, educated generations. As it currently stands, Albania has no incentives to encourage people to bear children or to stay in the country, but it also has no “migration hinterland” like Western European countries. The Albanian population, currently 2.8 million, is projected to fall to 2.1 million by 2060 as a result of all these developments.

Emigration and Political Contestation

Abstract How does migration affect global patterns of political violence and protest? While political scientists have examined the links between trade and conflict, less attention has been paid to the links between migration and conflict. In this paper, we show that greater emigration reduces domestic political violence by providing exit opportunities for aggrieved citizens and economic benefits to those who remain. Emigration also reduces non-violent forms of political contestation, including protests and strikes, implying that high emigration rates can produce relatively quiescent populations. However, larger flows of emigrants to democracies can increase non-violent protest in autocracies, as exposure to freer countries spreads democratic norms and the tools of peaceful opposition. We use instrumental variables analysis to account for the endogeneity of migration flows and find robust results for a range of indicators of civil violence and protest from 1960 to 2010.

Population Forecast with Focus on Emigration: Scenarios for the Case of Peripheral Region

Sustainable decision-making and policies for regional development need clear understanding of future trends in population change. Emigration as one of the core factors of population change causes the greatest uncertainty in the demographic forecasts. Population change due to emigration is bright especially in peripheral regions what strengthens their unfavourable socio-economic conditions. Within the present study, the authors forecast population change due to emigration in peripheral region with high emigration rates. The authors offer three scenarios – current, half of current, and zero emigration, which demonstrate how differentiated population change due to emigration may be in case of different suppositions. Such approach focuses on the issue at local level. For numerical expression of population change, the authors apply simulation model based on system dynamics methods. Forecast results of future population change due to emigration in each scenario may be as a basis for timely inclusion of issues in regional development policies.

Inheritance Institutions and Landholding Inequality in Nineteenth-Century Germany: Evidence from Hesse-Cassel Villages and Towns

This paper considers the German principality of Hesse-Cassel in the 1850s, comparing inheritance institutions and landholding inequality for roughly a thousand mostly agricultural villages and towns. The principality lay between impartible northern Europe and the partible southwest. Inequality in landholding size is measured, showing an average Gini of 0.615 and substantial variation across communities. Places with relatively larger populations and ones that practiced impartible inheritance had mostly higher wealth inequality. The main result is that inheritance norms played a role in causing higher landholding inequality. Higher emigration rates in the impartible communities helped to alleviate landholding inequality.

EU Transmigrants in Belgrade as Agents of Europeanisation from Below

Abstract Migration studies are usually concerned with involuntary or underprivileged migrants living in highly developed societies. In contrast, this article focuses on emigration from affluent to less developed countries, using the example of EU lifestyle women transmigrants living in Belgrade. Serbia is a Western Balkan EU candidate country with a high youth emigration rate. The aim of this study is to question whether EU migrants can be development actors in a Western Balkan country. The bulk of the ethnographic research was conducted in 2018 by way of a series of interviews. The findings show that by using their “transcultural capital” in Serbia, the interviewees have the development potential to act as agents of “Europeanisation from below” and avoid the negative public perception of Europeanisation as a tool of Western domination in the region. However, in order to fulfil their development roles, affluent migrants first need to be recognised in Serbian migration management policies and supported by the local authorities.

Population dynamics of sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus) in Guadeloupe, French Caribbean: A mark‐recapture study from 2001 to 2013

AbstractSperm whales are present along the Caribbean islands in family groups of mature females, juveniles, and newborns. Their abundance and demographic rates remain poorly known. Using photo‐identification data, we estimated the abundance and annual survival of sperm whales in Guadeloupe from January to April 2001–2013. A total of 1,492 photographs of tail flukes were scored (ranging from 1 to 5) in terms of quality (Q) and marking (M) level. A total of 789 photographs were selected with Q ≥ 3 and M ≥ 3, corresponding to 109 individually identified adult females or immatures of both sexes. Capture histories were built and analyzed using the Pollock's robust design capture‐mark‐recapture model. The study consisted of 13 primary periods sequenced in 5–8 secondary periods. Mean annual survival rate of residents was 0.945, 95% CI [0.864, 0.979]. Abundance varied between years from 75 to 35 individuals. The geometric growth rate over the period 2001–2013 was 0.938, 95% CI [0.878, 0.997], suggesting a population decline of −6.2%/year. Sperm whales are moving between Guadeloupe and Dominica, with a high temporary emigration rate (0.163) and 50% of the individuals of Guadeloupe resighted in Dominica. These results highlight the fragility of the population and the necessity to consider it as one unit.