Skilled Migrants Research Articles

Academic Displacement and the Multi-Dimensional Life of Migration Categories: Insights from Global South Migration

This article proposes academic displacement as a lens to analyse interconnections between skilled and forced migration, and discusses the policy, work and subjective dimensions of the phenomenon. The analysis suggests that policy construction of academic displacement is framed around a temporal oxymoron between short-term emergency intervention and long-term expectations around ‘rescued’ scholars’ capacity to engage in scientific excellence. It also rests on an individualistic interpretation of academic freedom. Differently, displaced scholars reassert the importance of the communitarian dimension of academic freedom. Being represented as exceptional/temporary guests risks bordering them from both their home academic community and their European ‘host’.

Thinking citizenship through lived experiences of highly skilled migrants in Budapest

This study aims to understand and explain the concept of citizenship by analyzing the lived experiences of highly skilled migrants reflecting on their everyday transnational lives in the urban setting of Budapest. Based on the discourse analysis of 30 semi-structured interviews conducted in Budapest in the Fall of 2022, the study thinks through lived citizenship experiences to understand how and why these experiences matter for the formation of subjective citizenship understanding. This study suggests that the concept of lived citizenship embodies a complex narrative of everyday socio-economic, socio-cultural, and emotional experiences that go beyond what the legal status depicts. Citizenship experiences of highly skilled migrants present a process of negotiating cultural and moral cosmopolitanism with constructive patriotism in everyday lives in the urban context. The study advances the thinking on the foundation, manifestations, and operationalization of lived citizenship as experiences of belonging and coexistence, presenting a unique contribution to the production of knowledge on highly skilled migration in Hungary. This article proposes that citizenship entails a complex relational dimension and includes a life-long learning process with continual meaning-making through life experiences that transcends the consequences of the legal status within a given nation-state.

Perks or burdens? Being “nearly (Im)mobile” as IT foreign professionals during the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan

ABSTRACT This paper investigates how Vietnamese IT professionals managed their daily work and family lives in Japan during the COVID-19 pandemic. Adapting the concept of “nearly mobile”, this study suggests a concept of “nearly (im)mobile”, which focuses on the tensions and opportunities between mobility and immobility in skilled migrants’ work and family life. Workers from Vietnam comprise the third-largest group of foreign IT professionals in Japan. Many worked remotely during the pandemic, like others in the IT industry. However, amidst the unmitigated expansion of remote work during the pandemic including among Japanese nationals, how these workers experienced this work style has remained under-researched. The findings are based on semi-structured online and in-person interview data from Vietnamese IT professionals. Similar to Japanese national employees, many Vietnamese professionals could work remotely. Moreover, the workforce needs in the labour market allowed some to change jobs. However, junior workers were forced to be immobile (at the office) or stay in on-the-job training, and some skilled workers were expected to commit to longer hours for online communication with staff in Vietnam. Additionally, border restrictions exposed the immobility of foreign IT professionals and family members in Japan and Vietnam, which prevented these professionals from receiving childcare support from their families. This paper argues that while Vietnamese IT professionals could be physically “nearly (im)mobile” by staying at home to work, they were simultaneously pressured to undergo “nearly (im)mobile” work practices in Japanese firms while constrained by managing their work and family lives.

Correction to: First Impressions Matter: Feeling Welcome and Onward Migration Intentions of Highly Skilled Migrants

Correction to: First Impressions Matter: Feeling Welcome and Onward Migration Intentions of Highly Skilled Migrants

Exit as voice, for the economically mobile: Russian migration to Central Asia & the Caucasus

ABSTRACT Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine triggered the immediate outmigration of its citizens, hundreds of thousands of whom fled to the Caucasus and Central Asia. Yet, extant theories of conflict-based migration offer limited insight into why so many Russians left suddenly in response to the war. Nor can they account for the reversal of flows of skilled labor migration, which had previously gone to the metropole. Drawing on in-depth interviews and focus groups with first-wave Russian emigres, we find that the domestic support for the invasion intensified opposition-minded Russians' sense of political alienation, while legal repression motivated their immediate exit. However, the globalization of white-collar labor shaped who left. Finally, migration policy and a lower cost of living, in conjunction with other colonial legacies, shaped legal and economic mobility in ways that drew Russians to Central Asia and the Caucasus.

Greener pastures: why Indian international students leave the US labor market

ABSTRACT This paper revisits conventional wisdom on US degree premiums for immigrant workers and shows that, despite the benefits of a US degree, migration policies and substandard labor conditions contribute to international student motivations to return home. Using two original datasets, I find that about a third of Indian-born US graduates leave the US, seeking employment opportunities abroad and a respite from US work visa restrictions. I draw on 105 in-depth interviews and 7,177 employment histories constructed from LinkedIn, and the analysis demonstrates the use of digital data to shed new light on under-studied patterns of return migration in institutional perspective. I find that US work visas are related to the underemployment of immigrant workers, and gaps in visa availability are associated with US labor market departure for Indian international students. At the same time, foreign employers reward skills and credentials developed in the US, and the results suggest that US degrees carry a higher premium in foreign labor markets. The paper emphasizes the role of institutions in the skilled migration system and identifies disjunctures in US migration policy. I identify opportunities for policy reform to improve immigrant labor conditions and increase the retention of US-educated migrants in the US labor market.

On the up and up: the job mobility of skilled return migrants

Abstract This paper examines the labor market incorporation of skilled Indian migrants returning home after working in the United States. I analyze a novel dataset of 7,177 time-varying transnational employment histories from LinkedIn using logistic regression and survival analysis. I find that skilled Indian migrants experience occupational upgrades when re-entering their home labor market, buoyed by foreign human capital and compensating for US legal status restrictions. While immigrants often face initial occupational downgrades and job mobility constraints in foreign labor markets, return migrants experience stability, promotions and accelerated rates of job mobility at home. The paper contributes to the literature on return migration, a significant but understudied dimension of international migration due to data constraints. I offer LinkedIn employment histories as digital data source to address these limitations and leverage their rich spatio-temporal information. These data help expand prior research on return migrant wages to broader questions about transnational migrant career trajectories. The findings shed light into where high-demand migrants might maximize their career growth, and have implications for understanding the policies shaping the recruitment and retention of skilled workers in the global labor market.

First Impressions Matter: Feeling Welcome and Onward Migration Intentions of Highly Skilled Migrants

AbstractIn the context of the global competition for highly skilled migrants, policy makers follow different approaches to attract and retain this highly sought-after group. One common assumption is that the establishment of a welcoming culture can facilitate the retention of highly skilled migrants. Relatively little is known, however, about the impact such policies can have on highly skilled migrants’ decisions to remain in the destination country. We address this gap by analysing the association between feeling welcome and highly skilled migrants’ spatial intentions. We use a mixed methods approach that combines a survey conducted among highly skilled migrants in the Euregio Meuse-Rhine (n = 410) and two rounds of semi-structured interviews (wave 1: n = 67; wave 2: n = 49). Our results suggest that respondents who feel welcome are more likely to have the intention to stay in the region permanently. This association is stronger for migrants with relatively more agency. The paper underlines the importance of early experiences in the host country and the role of subjective and intangible factors like feeling welcome in migration decision-making.

Increasing the chances of career success abroad: the role of cultural orientations in the relationship between international students’ protean career orientation, career competencies and perceived employability

ABSTRACT A successful school-to-work transition is a foundation for long-term career success. Yet, in an increasingly globalized world of work, there is still little understanding of this process in the context of international students – skilled migrants whose school-to-work transition may be complicated by the cross-cultural transition. This study aimed to answer the research question: to what extent are international students’ individualism/collectivism and acculturation orientations related to the indirect relationship between a protean career orientation and perceived employability via career competencies? To answer this question, we conducted a quantitative study among 302 international Master’s students in the Netherlands. Our findings showed that having a protean career orientation is related positively to perceived employability via career competencies. Contrary to our expectations, international students’ individualism/collectivism cultural orientation did not moderate this indirect relationship. However, surprisingly, high individualism was negatively associated with career competencies. Regarding acculturation orientations, we found that host culture orientation did not impact the indirect relationship between a protean career orientation and perceived employability, while high home culture orientation strengthened this relationship. Together, these findings show that both career and cultural orientations may play a role in international students’ career competencies development and employability and, thus, their career success abroad.

High-skilled migration and the knowledge society. Theories, processes, perspectives

The recent economic crisis has led to an upswing in migration from the Mediterranean countries of Europe towards its central and northern development hubs. This overall increase in migration also includes high numbers of the so-called skilled migrants, consisting mainly, though not exclusively, of young people moving within Europe for study or specialisation, or seeking employment that matches their skills profile. It is no coincidence then that this new trend for skilled migration within Europe forms the main thrust of the cognitive and research interests of sociologists, economists and migration geographers. The aim of this paper is to reconstruct the theoretical debate on skilled migration in the context of what is perhaps too hastily defined as a ?knowledge society?, through a broad and systematic critical analysis of the scientific literature.

Alternative career pathways of skilled migrants: looking for new meanings amid starting again

ABSTRACT This qualitative study aims to provide an in-depth understanding of skilled migrants’ lived experiences of alternative careers. We explore identity work and meaning-making processes of career actors for whom alternative career options often meant “beginning again”. While focusing on psychological, temporal, and contextual dimensions of alternative career transitions, our findings identify three unique alternative career pathways: provisional, experimental, and reformist; each characterized by a unique form of identity work and accompanying types of meaning-making. We find that alternative career pathways differ in terms of their temporary and at times provisional nature as well as career actors’ (in)ability to engage in the present search for meanings and purpose in alternative careers. This study advances existing literature on major career transitions and specifically migrant career trajectories inside of local organizations and through unique forms of alternative careers. We also build on the existing meaning-making literature by highlighting the career narratives of those who must search for new meanings while pursuing “less than ideal” career opportunities. Finally, our findings provide practical implications related to outcomes of alternative career opportunities on migrant career success but also more broadly for employers and policymakers.

‘Get back to where you once belonged’? Effects of skilled internal migration on Italian regional green growth

The paper investigates the effects of internal migration on green growth in Italian regions. We use employment in "sustainable" sectors to measure green growth, resorting to a novel measure based on the EU taxonomy for sustainable activities. Using data from 103 Italian regions (NUTS3) from 2008 to 2018, we find that highly skilled interregional migrants are positively related to green employment in their destinations. The effect is possibly due to return migrants to the Southern regions. Overall, the evidence emphasizes the importance of human capital migration in sustainable development.

Global Taiwanese: Asian skilled labour migrants in a changing world By FionaMoore. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2021. 184 pp.

Global Taiwanese: Asian skilled labour migrants in a changing world By FionaMoore. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2021. 184 pp.

Dressing up the place: Urban lifestyle mobilities and the production of “fashionable” tourism destinations in rural Japan

The past three decades of neoliberal structural reforms in Japan has established tourism policy favoring privatization, deregulation, and flexible mobility of capital to encourage decentralized markets. Within this system, attracting skilled urban migrants to rural regions has emerged as a central component of planning and development. Drawing on Kawamura's theory of fashion-ology, this study details the process of how rural tourism destinations are produced and (re)fashioned by urban-to-rural lifestyle migrants who bring new practices, aesthetics, and meanings to place. Based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2021/2022 in the rural coastal town of Aoshima, we outline the co-constitutive dynamic between “star migrants”, industry “gatekeepers”, and “consumers as producers” in the production and consumption of “fashionable” rural destinations. The article contributes to literature on how rural tourism destinations are governed in contemporary neoliberal societies and provides insights into the unequal urban-to-rural power relations that continue to define Japan's regional revitalization programs.

Who’s responsible for intellectual displacement? Objective representations of exiled professionals in Canada

The twenty-first century has brought an upsurge in intellectual exile due to protracted crises: important migrant flows from Afghanistan, Syria, Ukraine and Venezuela, to name a few, include professionals with huge integration challenges due to collective trauma, language and recertification barriers. Based on original research with intellectual exiles in Canada, underemployment provokes emotional and physical damage that can be avoided through a more encompassing approach to the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). I propose a model to redefine R2P in terms of hospitality and protection of people displaced by crises, including recognising their past credentials. Our model contributes to previous literature on skilled migration, bridging the fields of conflict resolution and the ethnography of forced displacement. I propose that credential recognition should be an integral part of R2P.

A Foot in the Australian Employment Door: A Qualitative Study of Highly Skilled Migrant Women

AbstractIn the recent years, Australia has been seeking highly skilled migrants to close the skill gap and increase economic participation in the labour market. Although women are predominant among recent migrants in Australia, they experience higher unemployment rates than male migrants. Previous research has shown that one key challenge they face is their family responsibilities that hinder them in the employment market. In this study, factors in gaining Australian employment for highly skilled migrant women are highlighted. Drawing on 27 semi-structured qualitative interviews with such women, the analysis identified three main factors in gaining employment in Australia: (1) leveraging social capital; (2) accumulation of human capital; and (3) prior, home-country work experience. These factors are not mutually exclusive but interplay to assist highly skilled migrant women in obtaining employment in Australia. These findings have contributed to the migrant employment literature in filling an empirical gap and supporting human capital theory, as well as presenting micro, meso, and macro implications for policy.

Categorie discrete e percezioni continue: per un lessico delle nuove migrazioni

This article investigates 20 qualitative interviews collected with new migrants of Italian origins settled in Toronto (Ontario) and in London (UK). The aim of the study is to identify the identity markers used by migrants to express their feeling of belonging to Italy and to Canada/UK and to position themselves into two different categories, ex­pat and migrants. According to previous quantitative studies, these two labels refer to two different patterns of immigration: expat in fact in­cludes contemporary skilled and temporary migrations, while migrant deals with unskilled migrations. So, the study of identity markers used in qualitative interviews is crucial in order to investigate how migrants position themselves in the host Country. The results provide evidence of a deep distinction of two different groups of speakers: the first one is composed of those Italians who con­sider themselves as expats and this is evident since they report in their interviews all those identity markers discussed in the literature as typical of this kind of migration (level of education, social status, use of English). The second one is, instead, composed of those Italians who consider themselves as migrants using those markers already reported in the bibli­ography for migrants (and not for expats, such as the poor use of English, the low level of education and the temporary job).

Spatial spillover effects of skilled migration on innovation in China

Despite the importance of interregional skilled migration to regional development, few studies have explored its spatial spillover effects and their changes over time. Thus, employing the Spatial Durbin Model, we investigate the presence of regional spillovers of skilled migration at both national and sub-national levels in China. Especially, we focus on the regional difference and change in the spatial spillover. Although our results confirm positive spillover effects at the national level due to the strong mobility characteristic of skilled migrants, developed regions benefit more from spillovers of skilled migration than developing regions, and such effects are divergent in different regions over time. Our findings also indicate that changes in spatial spillovers among regions are closely associated with the mobility of economic factors in geography. Theoretically, by considering the spatial effects of skilled migration on the innovation output of recipient regions, we extend the labour economics literature into geographical economic agglomeration, especially innovation economic geography. Methodologically, we examine the spatial effects at both national and sub-national levels, and capture the spatial externalities; we also apply Maximum Likelihood estimation to assess the endogeneity issues to understand the mechanisms of spillover change over time. The study can be of significance for municipalities in the policy-making of attracting talents and promoting regional innovation.

Ambivalent presents, open futures: Affective constructions of the future among highly qualified Turkish migrants in Germany

Turkish migrant professionals in Germany are valued as highly skilled individuals. They describe their lives in Germany mostly in positive terms. Their social, cultural and mobility capital enables them to imagine the future as including favourable circumstances for them such as exciting job opportunities. At the same time, heightened anti-migrant discourses and uncertainties about the future create potential risks. By bringing together the sociological literatures on ambivalence and the future, I analyse how highly skilled Turkish migrants make projections about their future in Germany under this ambivalent atmosphere. Based on interviews conducted with 29 highly qualified Turkish migrants in Germany in 2022, the article identifies openness as an affective mechanism, which can be deployed both to embrace opportunities and navigate instabilities that might emerge in the future.

Negotiating entry to the professional labour market among Vietnamese skilled migrants in Australia: The impact of cultural distance

This study investigates the employment transition among Vietnamese skilled migrants in Australia and examines the cultural factors that influence this transition. Employing a qualitative approach, we conducted fifty semi-structured interviews with Vietnamese skilled migrants who migrated to Australia within the last five years and twelve interviews with Australian recruiters to gain further insights into the barriers skilled migrants face. The findings highlighted the cultural challenges encountered by Vietnamese skilled migrants as they moved from Vietnam to Australia, two countries of great cultural distance. Without cultural adaptation support, most skilled migrants had to experience career setbacks before recognising and devising strategies to overcome these hurdles. This study emphasises the need for specialised human resource management (HRM) interventions and strategies that account for the cultural dimensions influencing employment outcomes for this international mobile workforce. Additionally, it calls for future research to expand beyond the examination of skilled migrants’ human and social capital and incorporate various contextual factors in investigating the employment journey of skilled migrants.