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Back to Hong Kong: Return Migration or Transnational Sojourn?
Abstract
Abstract In this article we reconsider the meaning of return migration in a period of growing transnational practices. In its conventional use, return migration conveys the same sense of closure and completion as the immigration-assimilation narrative. But in a transnational era, movement is better described as continuous rather than completed. Focus groups held in Hong Kong with middle-class returnees from Canada reveal that migration is undertaken strategically at different stages of the life cycle. The return trip to Hong Kong typically occurs for economic reasons at the stage of early or mid career. A second move to Canada may occur later with teenage children for educational purposes, and migration at retirement is even more likely when the quality of life in Canada becomes a renewed priority. Strategic switching between an economic pole in Hong Kong and a quality-of-life pole in Canada identifies each of them to be separate stations within an extended but unified social field.
... For example, Algerians also experienced marginalization in France, even after their country had been its colony for 130 years (De Haas, 2003). The experience of marginalization can present migrants with an ongoing choice of whether to stay in the new country or return to the country of origin (Ley and Kobayashi, 2005). ...
... This is The diasporic organizations in which philanthropists are active provides a needed platform. The experience of marginalization could confront migrants (and subsequent diasporas) with an ongoing choice of whether to stay or return (Ley and Kobayashi, 2005). ...
... My conclusions are contrary to Ley and Kobayashi (2005), who state that the experience of marginalization can confront migrants with an ongoing choice of whether to remain or return. Such ongoing choice can persist even if the choice to stay is not made explicit. ...
... Differing from traditional international migration studies that view migration from less-developed countries to developed countries as a permanent and unidirectional process, recent scholarship has viewed international migration as a temporary and multi-directional process (Dustmann et al., 2011;Ley & Kobayashi, 2005;Wang et al., 2015). ...
... Since overseas talent have international experience, more advanced knowledge, and better language skills, they typically obtain higher positions in their home countries (Cassarino, 2004;Li et al., 2020). Some studies have indicated that skilled migrants might consider returning to their home countries due to various constraints in their host countries (e.g., the "glass ceiling" in the workplace) (Dustmann & Görlach, 2016;Ho & Ley, 2014;Ley & Kobayashi, 2005). Other motives to return include the pursuit of housing benefits, tax exemption, and better-equipped laboratories (Lu & Zhang, 2015;Yang, 2020;Zweig & Wang, 2013). ...
... Household life-cycle was found to impact migrants' locational choices (Ley & Kobayashi, 2005;Whisler et al., 2008). For example, younger migrants were more likely to consider educational and job opportunities, while older migrants might focus on amenities for retirement (Chen & Rosenthal, 2008;Jeffery & Murison, 2011). ...
While Chinese national and local governments have made every effort to attract high‐level overseas talent, limited scholarly attention has been paid to their decision of where to stay in China. Using resume data of 3372 individuals involved in the “Thousand Talent Program”, this study makes the first attempt to identify both regional and personal factors that affect locational choices of overseas talent in China. Descriptive results show that returned talent are unevenly distributed and are mostly concentrated in a few coastal provinces. Results from conditional logit models show that both academic career prospects and (natural and man‐made) amenities play an important role in shaping overseas talent's choices of where to work, but regional prosperity exerts no effect. Alumni social networks, scientific collaboration networks, and educational trajectories are found to greatly influence their locational choices. Results from mixed models suggest that the effect of these provincial factors may vary by age, time spent abroad, the type of talent, the location of undergraduate study, and the country of stay before return. This study enhances our knowledge of the international return migration of the highly skilled by focusing on state‐led academic migration and by challenging the conventional wisdom that high‐level global talent are rootless and cosmopolitan elites with similar locational preferences.
... Previous studies have suggested that transnationalism and return migration are two closely related concepts, with the assumption that the latter is a form of transnationalism, in terms of, for example, temporary foreign workers or millionaire global commuters (Bryceson, 2019;Ley, 2010;Ley & Kobayashi, 2005;Yan et al., 2014). However, some scholars, such as Fong (2012), are skeptical about the claim that return migration is part of the transnational migration process because return migrants move only twice and also have a stronger desire to reestablish and maintain active economic and social activities in their home country. ...
... Before the British government handed over Hong Kong to communist China in 1997, many middle-class entrepreneurs emigrated to other countries to avoid political uncertainty. From the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, there was a vast influx of HKIs (over 380,000) to Canada (Ley & Kobayashi, 2005). Many HKIs who are relatively young, highly educated professionals (Chan, 2014;Johnson & Lary, 2016) traded off their economic prosperity in Hong Kong for political stability for their families. ...
... Indeed, life-course factors were important in many HKIs' decisions to migrate (Kobayashi and Preston, 2007). However, due to the economic recession in Canada in the late 1980s, many breadwinners engaged in a transnational commute between Hong Kong and Canada, leaving spouses and children in Canada to financially sustain their families (Ley & Kobayashi, 2005). Some decided to return to Hong Kong after they had earned their citizenship. ...
Post-return migration has been seen as a linchpin that conceptually connects return migration and transnationalism. However, little is known about why return migrants embark on the journey to return to the host country after resettling back in their home country. In recent years, there has been a growing number of Hong Kong Canadians who have returned to Hong Kong, only to resettle back in Canada again. Drawing on the findings of a biographic narrative study of 20 post-returning migrants, this study attempts to explain how the interplay of the changing life-course needs of family and societal contexts influence decision-making processes in post-return migration. This paper reveals how the accumulation and maintenance of transnational resources, such as social networks and cultural experience, intergener-ationally provide options for the future migration of migrant families. Based on the findings, we offer a tentative conceptual map for the understanding of the possible pathways of intergenerational transnational migration.
... Here, I define this period as having spent at least three months abroad. Additionally, return migration is neither permanent nor the end of the migration cycle (Black & King, 2004;Cassarino, 2013;Ley & Kobayashi, 2009). ...
... A transnational conceptualisation of return migration views this latter as part of an on-going itinerary, not a permanent move detached from earlier migratory experiences. We should see return migration not as the end of a process but as another stage in a continuing itinerary (Ley & Kobayashi, 2009). ...
... Return migrants often engage in other migratory processes, making return an impermanent settlement (Black & King, 2004;Cassarino, 2004). A return does not constitute the end of the migration cycle as it is part of a circular system of social and economic relationships and exchanges facilitating the reintegration of migrants and transmitting knowledge, information and membership (Cassarino, 2004;Ley & Kobayashi, 2009). Return migration is not a sufficient description of the diversity of the current movement trajectories. ...
This chapter sets out the epistemological lenses and the central theoretical concepts guiding this research. Given the many theories and models regarding the intersection of gender and migration, it is important to highlight those that inspire this research and help to investigate and better understand how gender affects migration processes and, vice versa, how migration impacts gender relations. The first section of this chapter presents the main perspectives adopted here: feminist and constructivist epistemology. The next section discusses patterns of various migration trajectories. The third section gives a brief historical overview of the debate on gender in migration studies and clarifies the theorisation of gender and migration in this book. The analytical Chaps. 10.1007/978-3-030-92092-0_4 , 10.1007/978-3-030-92092-0_5 , 10.1007/978-3-030-92092-0_6 and 10.1007/978-3-030-92092-0_7 include other essential concepts and findings.
... A returning migrant mobilises various ways to prepare for the return. Particularly for these women who are also moving to a new and unknown place, this requires a process of adjustment to a new location (Ley & Kobayashi, 2009) that is often anticipated through previous transnational relations with people in the home country. Let us explore in detail some of the patterns of this new adjustment process. ...
... This section focuses on women's projects to migrate again, showing that for most of them, Tirana is only a phase in their migration project. Similarly, other researchers (Black & King, 2004;Ley & Kobayashi, 2009;Sondhi, 2013;Sondhi & King, 2017) see return migration not as a permanent move but as part of a broader, continuing migration process. Everyday informal practices and insecure jobs drive returnees' projects to migrate once again. ...
... Paradoxically, re-emigration means seeking stability in migration. More concretely, the cases analysed in this chapter reveal that return migration is not a permanent move but more often is part of a continuous migration process, confirming the findings of Ley and Kobayashi (2009) and Sondhi and King (2017). Although these women have more opportunities to find better jobs than highly educated women who have migrated only internally within Albania, these groups have in common the fact that their jobs are precarious. ...
In this chapter, I explore the experiences of female migrants who migrated to undertake undergraduate or graduate studies rather than specifically for economic or work reasons. I analyse a group of female student migrants who returned to Tirana after their international migratory trajectories. Unlike the other group of international migrants introduced in Chap. 10.1007/978-3-030-92092-0_5 all the women in this group migrated with regular student visas and documents, and their destination countries are not limited to Greece and Italy but encompass a wider area.
... In addition, except for a few studies (Aliaga et al., 2017;Botina, 2020;Cavalcanti & Parella, 2013;Cortés & Oso, 2017;Riaño, 2013), little is known about migrant return to Latin American countries. Most publications focus on Europe (King & Christou, 2014), Africa (Sinatti, 2019), and Asia (Ley & Kobayashi, 2005). Similarly, few studies explore the reintegration of individuals with return mobilities between two countries in the Global South (Tapia Ladino, 2015), as is the case of migrants moving between Colombia and Venezuela. ...
... A conceptualization of return migration as the movement of migrants from the country to which they migrated to their place of origin as the final stage of the migration process has been the subject of criticism (Ley & Kobayashi, 2005). Based on previous work (Riaño, 2013), it is argued that combining the theoretical perspectives of transnational migration (Glick Schiller et al., 1992) and spatial mobility (Sheller & Urry, 2006) can provide a deeper understanding of return and reintegration. ...
This paper explores the entrepreneurship and reintegration of Colombians who migrated to Venezuela around 2000 and were arbitrarily deported to Colombia in 2015 by the Venezuelan government. It asks to what extent their cross-border spatial mobilities and social networks help develop their microenterprises and how the geopolitical context influences their socioeconomic reintegration. The
methodology includes multi-sited ethnographic observation, biographical interviews, mental maps, and participatory Minga workshops carried out with 18 individuals. It is concluded that, despite their remarkable resilience, these individuals and their business ventures face constant precarity due to a lack of state support, prevalent geopolitical conflicts, a weak local economy, and the trauma of deportation. At the same time, in an attempt to improve their socioeconomic reintegration, returning
migrants deploy cross-border mobility strategies to take advantage of the opportunities offered by different localities in Colombia and Venezuela.
... Many immigrants from Hong Kong may have adopted this strategy. They sometimes alternate between Hong Kong and Canada to capitalize on Hong Kong's economic conditions and Canada's quality of life (Ley and Kobayashi 2005). In addition, some immigrants may plan to emigrate from Canada as soon as they are admitted. ...
... More recently, immigrants born in Hong Kong or Taiwan are also more likely to leave Canada (Chen 2009;Lebel 2015). Ley and Kobayashi (2005) studied the phenomenon for Hong Kong. This region experienced a period of major geopolitical upheaval in the 1980s and 1990s following its retrocession to China. ...
This paper examines the emigration of immigrants using the Longitudinal Immigration Database (IMDB). An indirect definition of emigration is proposed that leverages the information available in the IMDB. This study found that emigration of immigrants is a significant phenomenon. Certain characteristics of immigrants, such as having children, admission category and country of birth, have a strong correlation with emigration.
... Además, a excepción de algunos estudios (Aliaga et al., 2017;Botina, 2020;Cavalcanti y Parella, 2013;Cortés y Oso, 2017;Riaño, 2013), poco se conoce sobre el retorno a países latinoamericanos. La mayoría de las publicaciones se centran en Europa (King y Christou, 2014), África (Sinatti, 2019) y Asia (Ley y Kobayashi, 2005). A la vez, pocos estudios examinan la reintegración de personas con movilidades de retorno entre dos países del sur global (Tapia Ladino, 2015), como es el caso de Colombia y Venezuela. ...
... Para contribuir con estas lagunas de investigación, en el presente artículo se plantean las siguientes preguntas: a) ¿en qué medida pueden los/as retornados/as reintegrarse con éxito por medio de la creación de pequeños emprendimientos?; b) ¿a qué tipo de limitaciones y oportunidades se enfrentan a la hora de movilizar sus habilidades y recursos para crear negocios sostenibles?; c) ¿qué papel desempeñan las redes sociales y las movilidades espaciales entre países: oportunidad o limitación?; d) ¿qué dinámicas geopolíticas potencian o dificultan estas redes y movilidades espaciales? Se ha criticado la conceptualización de la migración de retorno que describe el traslado de los migrantes desde un país de destino al lugar de origen como la etapa final del proceso migratorio (Ley y Kobayashi, 2005). Con base en estudios previos (Riaño, 2013), se sostiene que la combinación de las perspectivas teóricas de la migración transnacional (Glick Schiller et al., 1992) y de la movilidad espacial (Sheller y Urry, 2006) puede profundizar en la comprensión del retorno y la reintegración. ...
Se estudia el emprendimiento y la reintegración de personas colombianas que migraron a Venezuela hacia el año 2000 y fueron deportadas a Colombia en 2015 por el gobierno venezolano. Se investiga hasta qué punto sus movilidades espaciales transfronterizas y sus redes sociales contribuyen al avance de sus microemprendimientos, y cómo el contexto geopolítico influye en su reintegración socioeconómica. La metodología comprende la observación etnográfica multisituada, las entrevistas biográficas, los mapas mentales y los talleres participativos Minga realizados con 18 individuos. Se concluye que, pese a su notable resiliencia, las personas en retorno y sus emprendimientos se enfrentan a una precariedad
constante debido a la falta de apoyo estatal, los conflictos geopolíticos prevalentes, la débil economía
local y el trauma de la deportación. Así mismo, buscando mejorar su reintegración socioeconómica, los
migrantes que retornan efectúan estrategias de movilidad transfronteriza para aprovechar las
oportunidades ofrecidas por diferentes lugares en Colombia y Venezuela.
... The continuous interaction between social and governmental actors (in both sending and receiving counties) does not end in one or more rounds of flows. Among HK's previous exoduses (e.g., the huge migration waves from the 1980s to 1990s), the majority of the emigrants had returned to HK for family reunion and better career development by 2000 (Ley & Kobayashi, 2005;Ma, 2011;Sussman, 2010). To attract more migrants to return, the HK government launched the "Admission Scheme for the Second Generation of Chinese Hong Kong Permanent Residents" in 2017. ...
... We may call these studies the 1997 literature. Some of these studies were related to HK migrations, including outflowing and returning (Ley, 2010;Ley & Kobayashi, 2005;Ma, 2011;Skeldon, 1994Skeldon, , 1995Sussman, 2010). As mentioned above, HK has always hosted an agile and mobile population, with continuous inflows and outflows of people. ...
This Special Issue examines various issues concerning the outmigration waves of Hong Kong after 2019, the year when Hong Kong witnessed a series of social protests. In this introduction, we consider Hong Kong as a city of flows: not only because the city continues to receive immigrants and remigrants and produce emigrants, but also because of people's common practice of sojourning between home bases in and beyond Hong Kong. We suggest that the governance and politics of migration often revolve around power relationships between state and non-state actors and the changing climate of global politics.
... The continuous interaction between social and governmental actors (in both sending and receiving counties) does not end in one or more rounds of flows. Among HK's previous exoduses (e.g., the huge migration waves from the 1980s to 1990s), the majority of the emigrants had returned to HK for family reunion and better career development by 2000 (Ley & Kobayashi, 2005;Ma, 2011;Sussman, 2010). To attract more migrants to return, the HK government launched the "Admission Scheme for the Second Generation of Chinese Hong Kong Permanent Residents" in 2017. ...
... We may call these studies the 1997 literature. Some of these studies were related to HK migrations, including outflowing and returning (Ley, 2010;Ley & Kobayashi, 2005;Ma, 2011;Skeldon, 1994Skeldon, , 1995Sussman, 2010). As mentioned above, HK has always hosted an agile and mobile population, with continuous inflows and outflows of people. ...
This Special Issue examines various issues concerning the outmigration waves of Hong Kong after 2019, the year when Hong Kong witnessed a series of social protests. In this introduction, we consider Hong Kong as a city of flows: not only because the city continues to receive immigrants and remigrants and produce emigrants, but also because of people’s common practice of sojourning between home bases in and beyond Hong Kong. We suggest that the governance and politics of migration often revolve around power relationships between state and non-state actors and the changing climate of global politics.
... In all instances, these migration trajectories entailed a strategic deployment of mobility where global inequalities were locally reshaped, and relative privilege ascertained-what I identify as practices of 'strategic ageing'. This concept takes inspiration from discussions of 'strategic switching' (Ley & Kobayashi, 2005) and 'geographic arbitrage' (Hayes, 2014) that illuminate how migrants navigate different national systems and strategically make use of transnational migration at different stages of the life cycle. Such life-course strategies reveal, as manifest in the participants' accounts, different cultural understandings of active ageing and the varying paths towards achieving a 'good life'. ...
... It also captures how return migrants made use of their 'foreignness', salient in the economic and socio-cultural capital acquired through transnational migration, to attain a better later life in the Azores. In his considerations of healthcare that included the United States, the Azores and the Portuguese mainland, Jorge's experience adds an additional layer of complexity to Ley and Kobayashi's (2005) concept of 'strategic switching', applied to return migrants who negotiate their lives between Hong Kong and Canada. It does so by placing the Portuguese mainland as an intermediate spaceboth physically and emotionally-between, in this case, the 'home' and 'host' societies. ...
This chapter asks: how are practices of active ageing embodied and deployed by older migrants? How are cultures of ageing reconfigured in migration and transnational contexts? By answering these questions, the chapter shows how Western ideas about maintaining a busy ethic and specific bodily aesthetics shape experiences of ageing across locales. It discusses the significance of social and economic positioning, relative privilege and transnational inequalities in access to healthcare, aged care and other age-friendly amenities. This is shown with reference to migrants’ diverse and uneven experiences of ageing in the Azores. In this chapter, I introduce the concept of ‘strategic ageing’ that captures how older migrants move between places and utilise resources accrued in one place to benefit from a better (later) life in another, and explore the role of transnational exchange in producing transnational hybrid cultures of ageing that borrow from more than one social and cultural field.
... Recent years have seen a lively debate on the notion of 'return'. Researchers have criticised the simplistic conceptualisation of 'return migration' which depicts migrants' move from a 'destination country' back to the 'place of origin' as the final stage of the migratory process (Ley & Kobayashi, 2005). Transnational migration moves beyond this narrow understanding by viewing returnees as socially and economically connected not only with their country of origin but also with the country of destination (King & Christou, 2014;Vathi et al., 2018), thus acknowledging 'the increased interconnectedness between home and host countries engaged in by migrants' (Sinatti, 2011: 154). ...
... The concept of transmobilities conveys the idea of 'return' not only as a singular and bi-directional movement between two geographical points (cf. Cassarino, 2004;Cavalcanti & Parella, 2013;Cortés & Oso, 2017;Ley and Kobayashi, 2005;Sinatti, 2011) but also as a set of multi-directional movements between different places and at different moments in life -an idea that I illustrate in Fig. 1, thus viewing return as a continuous rather than a completed movement across the globe. Return migration does not necessarily close the migration cycle (King & Kuschminder, 2022) but is always 'a new beginning' (Pauli, 2021, p.104). ...
Returnee entrepreneurs are often represented in migration and development discourses as agents of development. This assumes that they acquire valuable socio-economic resources abroad which help them to create successful businesses upon return. However, we have scant knowledge of the impact of the geopolitical context on returnee entrepreneurs or their coping strategies. Latin American returnees in particular have received little attention and few studies focus on migrants with ‘South-to-South’ return trajectories. Emphasising the role of territorial conflicts and the agency of individuals, I use a feminist geopolitical perspective to address these gaps. I contribute to migration, mobility, and development studies by studying whether Colombian migrants returning from Venezuela can reintegrate as successful entrepreneurs. Further, I offer the concept of transmobilities to study the cross-border nature of strategies of reintegration. The 30 returnees studied have a trajectory of repeated forced mobilities, ranging from internal displacement in Colombia, subsequent emigration to Venezuela, and final deportation to Colombia by Venezuela’s government. I combine the qualitative methods of multi-sited ethnography, biographical interviews, mental maps, and participatory Minga workshops. The analysis shows that Colombian returnees face intense difficulties in reintegrating despite their strong motivation and entrepreneurial spirit. The geopolitical context of armed struggle, an absent Colombian state, and territorial conflicts between Colombia and Venezuela create an unfavourable environment for returnee entrepreneurs. Consequently, they develop transmobility strategies — including the movement of people, goods, and capital across national borders — at the risk of their own lives. The simplistic discourse of returnees as agents of development needs to be revised.
... Some therefore suggest that 'return' is actually another migration and therefore that the 're' prefix needs to be removed from terms like 'return' and 'readjust' (Hammond, 1999). This adjustment is related to evaluating the concept of return within theories of cyclical migration and transnationalism in which return emerges as a migratory journey in its own right -rather than simply the reversal or end of another one (Ley and Kobayashi, 2005). ...
... Other examples signal that this gap between the second generation's 'return' imaginings and the actual realities of 'return' may lead to considerations of further emigration (Ley and Kobayashi, 2005;Lidgard and Gilson, 2002;Tsuda, 2001). For instance, second-generation Turkish-German 'returnees' who relocated to their parental villages and home towns remobilised themselves to put their quest of having a better life into action and further resettled in Antalya, a Mediterranean tourism hub in Turkey which is associated with lifestyle migration (Kılınç and King, 2017). ...
This chapter offers an overview of the return migration phenomenon in the case of the second generation, descendants of the first-generation migrants. The chapter evaluates the second generation’s ‘return’ migration as a paradox, and further discusses this form of re-settlement as a counter-diasporic migration with diverse trajectories. Based on a literature review covering examples from Europe, America and Asia, the chapter presents the second generation’s ‘return’ reasons and the distinct experiences in different socio-geographical settings. These findings are then discussed in relation to the second generation’s re-integration processes in the ancestral homeland by pinpointing the similar experiences, challenges and expectations with regards to identities, belonging and transnational ties. Finally, the chapter recommends to go beyond an economic optic and a nationality-oriented reading of diasporas, and also pay attention to intersectionality of identities, translocality and lifestyle motivations in order to understand the nuanced and ongoing ‘return’ journeys of the second generation.
... The costs of emigration are the perceived difficulties in integration that involve acquisition of rights and status within the core institutions of destination country, such as employment, housing, and citizenship rights. Although our study focuses on people in residence in the country of origin, people who have left or re-enter their home country share their good and bad experiences abroad with people who have never migrated (Ley and Kobayashi 2005). Transnational experiences from self and others form a perception of the potential exit costs. ...
Does people's greater intention to migrate deter them from participating in protests? How does protest participation shape intention to migrate? How does the relationship between migration intention and protest change amidst Hong Kong's transition to authoritarianism? Drawing upon Hirschman's exit-voice theory, this study examines the relationship between protest and migration intentions against the changing context across time. We use a time-series dataset on Hong Kong's anti-extradition movement of late 2019 for our analysis. The results show that people who have greater intention to migrate are more likely to participate in protest, but this association wanes as state repression intensifies. We find that migration intention indicates the psychological preparedness to leave, and that the fallback plan emboldens people to speak out. Yet, as the state becomes more repressive, people who intend to migrate are also sensitive to the signals about the repression, which thus attenuates protest participation. This also explains the phenomenon that more active protestors intend to leave to escape repression. People with radical political affiliations are more inclined to emigrate but this relationship attenuates over time, indicating the importance of group effects in curbing migration intentions.
... Snel et al., 2015). Many scholars (King, 2000;Ley & Kobayashi, 2005;Sinatti, 2011;Oeppen, 2013) postulate, however, that return migration is embedded in transnationalism and therefore return is not the end of migration process or migration cycle but it is just a part or a stage of it. There are all kinds of temporary returns as showed by White (2014aWhite ( , 2014b who coined a term of 'double return migration' where post-accession migrants from Poland decided to return to their places of origin and, after a while, decided to return to the destination due to enduring lack of opportunities and economic constraints at home. ...
This introductory paper, reflecting the Thematic Cluster of four papers, brings together two themes that are important for migration studies: return migration and embedding. Beyond any simplistic assumptions of settlement and permanent integration back into the origin country, following return, or notions of ongoing unfettered mobility back and forth over time, this article knits together data from the cluster papers, focusing on Lithuania and Poland, to explore factors that lead to return, or indeed non-return, and subsequent experiences in the ‘home’ country for those who do return. Moreover, using mixed methods, including longitudinal research, we advance a theoretical framework facilitating an examination of how returnees negotiate their lives in the origin society and whether they intend to stay, or migrate again, through the conceptual lens of embedding. While emphasising agency and effort, embedding also recognises structural constraints that may impede migrants’ expectations and aspirations. Hence, return migration may involve parallel processes of re-embedding but also experiences of dis-embedding as the hoped for return project encounters unexpected obstacles and may result in further migration. In mapping the field of return migration, through the concept of embedding, we focus on the impact of Brexit as ‘an unsettling event’.
... Transnationalism theories emphasize that migrants maintain simultaneous engagement with both the sending and receiving countries (Basch et al., 1994;Glick Schiller et al., 1992;Levitt & Jaworsky, 2007;Portes, 2001;Tsuda, 2012). Some studies revealed how the migration trajectories shaped the transnational practices of return migrants (Carling & Erdal, 2014;Ley & Kobayashi, 2005), while others focused on the role of transnational connections in returnees' different aspects of migration, including their return intentions, readjustment in the country of origin (Carling & Erdal, 2014;van Meeteren et al., 2014), and identity (re)construction (Gu, 2015;Riccio, 2010). Halsall (2009) pointed out that with the growth of global systems and transnational cultures, there is an increasing discourse that emphasizes the necessity to adopt a cosmopolitan identity. ...
... The education-led migration of Chinese families is not a new phenomenon. The early literature on Chinese emigration (e.g., Ho 2002;Ley and Kobayashi 2005;Lin 2012;Ong 1999;Waters 2002;2006) discussed the long-term transnational migration patterns of wealthy Chinese families emigrating from developed regions in Asia (such as Hong Kong, mainland China, Singapore, and Taiwan) to North America, Europe, and Oceania for their children's overseas education while desiring cosmopolitan values and, especially, permanent residence in Western countries. These studies focused on childcare and flexible parenting patterns to understand the strategies adopted by these families in terms of childrearing, with the several patterns identified including the "astronaut family" (Ho 2002;Ong 1999), associated with "parachute kids," "satellite children" (e.g., Pe-pua et al. 1996;Tsang et al. 2003;Waters 2003;Zhou 1998), and the "sacrificial" or "study mothers" (peidu mama, 陪读妈妈, accompanying mothers) (Huang and Yeoh 2005), who accompany their children when the children are studying abroad. ...
This article explores education-led migration among Chinese families who pursue international education for their children in Thailand. A mixed-methods approach was adopted, with data collected from 220 Chinese respondents to a survey and by means of 12 semi-structured interviews. The Chinese families emigrating from China to Chiang Mai in Thailand are representatives of the largely urbanized, well-educated middle-class families that today practice a circulatory transnational migration for the purpose of obtaining an education for their children. The findings show that compared with the conventional pathway of upper middle-class Chinese families emigrating to Western developed countries, middle-class Chinese families in Chiang Mai have adopted transient migratory practices for enhancing their children’s international education. The article discusses the childcare arrangements, division of parental responsibilities, income-earning activities, and desire for a good personal lifestyle among Chinese parents with children undergoing education in Chang Mai.
... Transnational householding arrangements, as well as circular migration, between the two poles of the Western destination and the origin country 1. The emigrant's relative sense of cultural and social integration with their destination's society versus their birth country's society 2. The emigrant's sense of familial obligation to aging parents (who are often residing in the birth country) versus their sense of duty to the younger members of their family-namely, their spouse and children (if they have any) 3. The emigrant's personal and professional ambitions, which were either more individually focused versus more skewed toward their nation's development have also been studied as indicators of a growing transnationalism and cosmopolitanism on the part of the migrant (Ley and Kobayashi 2005;Waters 2003;Ong 1999). What has not been considered to date is how halfway-return may be an alternative option for emigrants who find themselves pulled in different directions along different axes of return. ...
Return migration is typically framed as migration back to familiar territory. In contrast, onward migration does not presume any type of prior connection that the emigrant has with their new destination. This article proposes a new category of migration—“halfway-return”—that sits between return and onward migrations. Halfway-return refers to an emigrant’s return to the broader geographical region from which they originated, rather than the specific country they were born or raised in. The ideal-typical halfway-return destination is a country that is more geographically proximate and also culturally similar to the emigrant’s birth country, compared to their previous overseas destination. But the halfway-return destination also offers lifestyle and/or career opportunities that are better than what is available in the emigrant’s birth country. In order to theorize the concept of halfway-return, this article draws from interview-based research conducted with thirty-four Asian-born, Western-trained bioscientists who, when they returned to Asia, chose to move to a different Asian country than their birth country. Most were Chinese- and Indian-born scientists who chose to move to Singapore rather than their birth country after spending several years training and working in the West. The concept of halfway-return helps shift the migration studies lexicon away from a methodological nationalism that assumes that an individual’s birth country is the only lens through which to determine what counts as return. It also acknowledges growing regionalization trends in Asia and elsewhere, within more-studied globalization patterns.
... Thus, they urge an understanding of transnational mobility as non-linear, reversible, and multidirectional (Robertson, Harris, and Baldassar 2018, 207). Scholars like Ley and Lynn Kobayashi (2005), and Ho (2011) have advocated for a "life-cycle approach" to transnational mobility as a means for capturing processes that include "multiple geographic trajectories, changing forms of status, and ongoing movement across time and space" (Robertson, Harris, and Baldassar 2018, 213). ...
Lives characterised by staggered, stepwise or “ongoing” mobility were ubiquitous in the Early-Modern Spanish world. However, individuals who repeatedly alternated long-distance relocation with prolonged periods of sojourn in different places have attracted limited attention from historians. Contemporary migration studies, by contrast, increasingly stress the importance of considering experiences of mobility from a longitudinal perspective. By doing so, they highlight how, over time and through repeated migrations, individuals and families often transcend official immigration categories, acquire and deploy skills, rely on, create and destroy relational networks, and produce narratives that allow them to make sense of both their trajectories and their experiences of social and place insertion. Drawing on insights from this scholarship and the “new mobilities paradigm,” adopting a narrative, biographical or life-cycle approach, to the mobile lives of enslaved individuals in the Atlantic and the Mediterranean, of mestizo children travelling to and from Spain, of Canarian migrants, royal officials and merchants, the contributors to this special issue aim to further our understanding of how the experiences of these individuals were central to the construction and transformation of religious ideas, personal and political identities, and familial, commercial and patronage networks that articulated the early modern Spanish world.
... However, these forms of transnational mobility have primarily been associated with people of working age (Bolzman et al. 2017). In this transnational era, as Ley and Kobayashi (2005) demonstrated using the case of Hong Kong returnees from Canada, migration was strategically undertaken at different stages of the lifecycle. ...
The Portuguese community in Toronto is the largest in North America; however, its immigrant population is now aging. This paper addresses senior immigrants who had a transnational “later life” and discusses this practice in the transatlantic context, using a lifecycle model of transnational migration. Later life is a life stage that is highly feasible for transnational migration, as seniors are mostly disentangled from various obligations, such as work, child rearing, and caregiving for parents. Transnational senior migrants in Europe and North America can be categorized into four groups: Intra‐Europe Rich, Intra‐Europe Immigrant, North American Snowbird, and Trans‐Atlantic Immigrant. Trans‐Atlantic Immigrant seniors, the target group of this paper, differ from the other groups on several points, including seasonal preference for transnational migration, motivations, and legal regulations. The paper considers the questions of why senior Portuguese immigrants choose to stay in Portugal for an extended period each year, while mainly living in Canada, and how their later life is structured between the two countries. Transnational later life is a strategic practice of senior Portuguese immigrants in Canada in the last stage of their lifecycle, allowing them to maximize government pension payments while simultaneously enjoying the highest quality of life possible in both countries. Immigration from Portugal to Canada accelerated in the 1960s and 1970s, and this immigrant population is now aging. The senior Trans‐Atlantic Immigrant is significantly different from other transnational senior groups in Europe and North America, in terms of seasonal preference for transnational migration, motivations, and legal regulations. Transnational later life is a strategic practice of senior Portuguese immigrants in Canada in the last stage of their lifecycle. Immigration from Portugal to Canada accelerated in the 1960s and 1970s, and this immigrant population is now aging. The senior Trans‐Atlantic Immigrant is significantly different from other transnational senior groups in Europe and North America, in terms of seasonal preference for transnational migration, motivations, and legal regulations. Transnational later life is a strategic practice of senior Portuguese immigrants in Canada in the last stage of their lifecycle. La communauté portugaise de Toronto est la plus importante d'Amérique du Nord. Cependant, cette population immigrante est aujourd'hui vieillissante. Cet article traite des immigrants âgés qui ont eu une « vie transnationale tardive » et étudie cette pratique dans le contexte transatlantique, en utilisant un modèle de cycle de vie de la migration transnationale. L'âge avancé est une étape de la vie qui se prête bien à la migration transnationale, car les personnes âgées sont généralement libérées de diverses obligations, telles que le travail, l'éducation des enfants et la prise en charge des parents. Les migrants âgés transnationaux en Europe et en Amérique du Nord peuvent être classés en différentes catégories. Les personnes âgées immigrées transatlantiques, le groupe cible de notre recherche, diffèrent des autres groupes à plusieurs égards, notamment en termes de saisonnalité des mouvements, de motivations inhérentes et de spécificité des réglementations. Ce texte analyse les raisons pour lesquelles les immigrants portugais âgés choisissent de rester au Portugal pendant une période prolongée chaque année, tout en vivant principalement au Canada, et comment leur vie est structurée entre les deux pays. Au final, la vie transnationale tardive s'avère une pratique stratégique qui permet de maximiser les paiements des pensions gouvernementales tout en bénéficiant simultanément de la meilleure qualité de vie possible dans les deux pays.
... Ils sont revenus en vue de poursuivre des ambitions professionnelles sur le court terme, mais, sur le long terme, le fait que leurs enfants grandissent dans un contexte stable et leur aspiration à vivre en famille est leur préoccupation majeure. Des recherches sur les migrants chinois et de Hong Kong de retour dont la famille était restée au Canada ont également souligné leur aspiration à vivre en famille, mais ont révélé que leur projet était de ne repartir au Canada qu'au moment de la retraite (Ho 2014 ;Ley et Kobayashi 2005). Dans le cas congolais, le retour semble être de plus courte durée, probablement en raison de l'absence de l' assurance d' une pension en rdc et de l'importance pour les parents de vivre avec leurs enfants quand ils ont besoin d'eux. ...
Résumé
The literature suggests that returns that were prepared and decided by migrants tend to last on the long term and do not lead to new departures. What happens when these returns take place in an unstable context ? This article focuses on the case of migrants who decided to return to Kinshasa, the capital city of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a country that has experienced deep economic and political crises, and where returns have become rare. Using qualitative interviews, we analyse the intentions of returnees to settle permanently or to go back abroad according to their family situation. Our results reveal that individuals implement migration and family strategies that take into account the context and the way they foresee the future, not only for themselves but also for their children.
... These views, similar to those shared by Malam and Cesária in the previous chapter, mirror those of North and West African migrants in France who, despite having reached retirement age, decided to remain in worker hostels instead of returning permanently to their countries of origin. Also, in these cases, the availability of (comparatively better) social support in older age was an important reason for staying, or at least not returning permanently (Hunter, 2016a Ageing-in-place labour migrants' choices of emplacement, such as Liliana's, emphasise the multiple geographies of 'strategic switching', to refer back to Ley and Kobayashi's (2005) concept, for it reveals migrants' ability to navigate different national systems and strategically make use of transnational (im)mobilities at different stages of the life cycle to attain a more comfortable later life. ...
This chapter discusses how age, ability, class, gender, attachment to place and relationships shape ideas about mobility and emplacement over the life course and in later life. It focuses specifically on two dimensions. First, the shifting and provisional nature of decision-making in later life are illustrated in experiences of illness, bereavement and thoughts about mortality. And secondly, the complex and negotiative nature of transnational mobility as an older adult is captured in the desire to live in the present and reluctance to plan ahead. The chapter shows that individual aspirations and possibilities in later life, including access to good healthcare and social support in the more debilitated periods of life, are structurally enveloped in and shaped by social and cultural capital, networks and financial resources that produce remarkably different ageing experiences.
... As the existing scholarship has articulated, there often exists a direct link between short visits and return migration (Duval 2002(Duval , 2004Ley and Kobayashi 2005). These short visits provide prospective returnees both familiarity and social networks, which motivate more permanent settlement in the homeland. ...
This article examines the concept of ethnic return migration in the permanent settlement of Iranian Armenians in the Republic of Armenia. Scholarship on ethnic return migration (or diasporic “homecoming”) almost exclusively focuses on mobility to or from affluent Western multicultural democracies in North America, Europe and Oceania. This article therefore provides a new opportunity to test the generalizability of existing models on return migration. Iranian Armenians fit within what the scholarship refers to as ethnic or diasporic return migrant – that is, migrations motivated, largely, by affective orientation to ethnicity and perceived home country. However, these migrations are not primarily motivated by ethnic or national longing for an ancestral homeland, but rather a variety of economic and political reasons sit behind these migrants’ decisions to choose Armenia instead of moving to a Western country or remaining in Iran.
... Climate change itself is not easily remedied, so a migrant who sees climate change as a cause of water access, quality, and affordability problems may assume the situation is not likely to change soon, thus making their migration more permanent. In the case of Hong Kong migrants in Vancouver, Ley and Kobayashi (2005) found that more than half of their respondents noted polluted water and air in Hong Kong as the reason why they planned to stay permanently in Vancouver. Water quality was not the reason for the migrants' initial move to Vancouver, but it was a significant factor in the decision not to return home. ...
Water has always been a driver of human mobility, migration, and displacement. But water is increasingly central to explaining environmental migration in the context of climate change. Most studies of the relationship between water and environmental migration are framed around punctuated, extreme weather events and disasters that either limit agricultural or livestock productivity or make a community physically unlivable. The chronic experiences of household water insecurity and poor water governance also shape migration decision‐making through a variety of social, political, and economic factors, but these relationships have received considerably less attention. This article provides an overview of punctuated and chronic water‐related triggers of environmental migration at the household level. We also offer a conceptual framework based on multiphasic response theory that highlights water's multiple roles in migration decision‐making. We close by reflecting on key gaps in the climate‐water‐migration literature, identifying research questions that might help us better understand these relationships, and considering the implications for sustainable development policies that could potentially ease pressures on water‐related displacement. A livestock trough beside a shrinking watering hole during a drought in southwest Uganda. Photo by Amber L. Pearson.
... Ethnographic studies increasingly evaluate the second generation 'return' as a migratory journey in its own right, rather than the reversal or end of another one (Ley and Kobayashi 2005). Accordingly, the second generation's "inbetweenness" is argued to push them to become reflexive actors who can craft their own "positioned belongings" vis-à-vis the two socio-cultural and geographical components of their hyphenated identities (Brocket 2020). ...
The paper explores how second-generation Turkish-German ‘returnees' benefit from their “inbetweenness” in their ancestral homeland and initiate a process of re-inventing themselves as ‘transcultural mediators'. A thematic-narrative analysis was undertaken on 43 in-depth interviews with second-generation Turkish-German ‘return' migrants to Antalya who had acquired jobs in the tourism sector. The paper unpacks how this tourism hub provides “third spaces” distanced from prominent national and diasporic identities, and the ways in which these liberating spaces encourage the lifestyle-oriented, cosmopolitan second-generation ‘returnees' to re-position themselves in their translocal social fields. The findings illustrate how the second generation, who formerly endured “being twice a stranger” in Germany and Turkey, undertake a process of transculturation in Antalya, and utilize their “transcultural capital” (i.e. bilingual skills, bi- multilingualism, translocal habitus) to perform different aspects of their multiple and hybrid identities, gain economic independence and build social relations.
... In view of this, it is important to understand ageing in transnational contexts as a process during which older people can be involved in different family constellations and interactions and be subject to different jurisdictions and social security systems. Ley and Kobayashi (2005) have shown how throughout their life course older people strategically switch between different countries in order to take advantage of the benefits of each location. However, older people's scope of action is significantly structured by their personal and families' resources (e.g. ...
When transnationalism emerged in the 1990s as an alternative approach to the study
of contemporary migration (Glick Schiller et al. 1992), its relationship to ageing and
the later life course was not of particular scholarly concern. With a few exceptions
(Da 2003; Lamb 2002; Treas 2008), most research focused on relatively young
labour migrants and/or their children in the country of origin. Nearly three decades
later, we find a rapidly growing literature focusing on older people within diverse
transnational contexts and configurations. In the last few years, several monographs
(e.g. Hunter 2018; Yarris 2017), edited books (e.g. Dossa and Coe 2017; Horn and
Schweppe 2016; Karl and Torres 2016; Walsh and Näre 2016), special issues (e.g.
Horn and Schweppe 2017; Näre et al. 2017; Nedelcu and Wyss 2019) and journal
articles in the intersecting fields of ageing, transnational family and migration studies
have been published. Altogether, this literature indicates that transnational ageing
and the later life course are linked in many ways. This chapter aims to explore these ways as well as to point future directions of research in the growing field of transnational ageing.
... Wealthier, more educated and globally mobile ethnic Chinese also plan retirement migration as part of the life course, but the literature suggests this is generally in the opposite direction. Both working-class and more privileged migrants consider traditional migrant-receiving countries like Australia, New Zealand and Canada good places to raise children, but professionals may prefer to expand their careers in Asia, sometimes as astronauting fathers who work away from the main family home, and then retire to a quieter setting (Ho 2019, 33-34;Ley and Kobayashi 2005;L Liu 2011L Liu , 2014L Liu , 2018Mak, 2006;Pe-pua et al. 1998 ...
This ethnography of contemporary trade-skilled labour migrants from China to Australia proposes migration literacy and national class frames in motion as new lenses to theorise social class and international mobility under selective migration policy. National dimensions of class are critical to transnational analyses as they move and are reformed and reinterpreted in new contexts. Case studies of Chinese migrants offer particular insights as new Chinese social class and suzhi discourses are imbricated with spatial mobilities. Dimensions of class are evident in citizenship choices, migrant temporalities and return migration imaginaries.
This study investigates the career paths of 33 graduates from Swiss Hospitality Management schools in China and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), exploring the nuances of international credential valuation. It identifies two key factors influencing access to management positions: (1) the degree of internationalization in major cities, which impacts the significance of international versus local skills and (2) individual cosmopolitan capital's role in shaping local career opportunities. The paper introduces a post‐colonial conceptualization of cosmopolitan capital, encompassing institutionalized, embodied and objectified forms, challenging Western‐centric views. By doing so, it reveals how mechanisms of racialization influence the assessment of international qualifications. In Hong Kong and Shanghai, returning Chinese are prospering in corporate head offices by mobilizing both local/national and international capital, challenging the white privilege of Western managers in this sector. Meanwhile, in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, the competition is for a pool of ‘international talent’, even though being perceived as ‘Arab’ or ‘white’ seems to improve career prospects.
Research on return migration has tended to focus their analyses on two imagined places: a host country where they used to live, and an origin country where they must reintegrate after a long period of being away. This paper reveals how spaces within the city can undermine the reintegration of former migrants seeking to reestablish themselves in their home countries. Based on in-depth interviews with 25 Singaporean academics, we discuss how the priorities of globally oriented universities can impact the reintegration of highly skilled returnees within their home city. Specifically, this paper reveals how returnees face the challenge of negotiating two conflicting demands upon their return home. As academics, they must adhere to the needs of their fast-changing universities, where the pressures of world rankings demand "global impact" through research and publications. Yet, as Singaporean citizens, they also face expectations to fulfill the responsibilities of being "home" in their city, juggling calls for national service and community outreach among local university faculty. We examine the conflict between these two demands as an understudied factor that shapes migration flows into Asia's global cities.
This article examines the transnational engagement of the Gujarati Patidar diaspora with its village of origin—Dharmaj, India—through return visits. ‘Dharmaj Day’ is a homecoming event that demonstrates how return visits shape and are shaped by migrant subjectivity concerning the Patidar diaspora. It analyzes the emergence of Dharmaj Day, the experiences of the Gujarati Patidar diaspora regarding this day, and Dharmaj Day as a transnational field based on a phenomenological approach. In-depth interviews with transmigrants and Dharmaj residents revealed that Dharmaj Day originated from the return visits of the transmigrants, strengthening transnational networks established between the two groups to share difficulties faced abroad and to reminisce about the home or the ‘gam’ (village). Simultaneously, Dharmaj day highlights the status of the Gujarati Patidar diaspora in transnational networks and strengthens their hold over Dharmaj, thereby deepening social divisions. Concurrently, it also makes the village and residents ‘transnational’.
This paper discusses the gendered mobility aspirations, decisions and experiences of fresh Chinese graduates of Dutch universities. Our analysis draws on semi-structured interviews and the “story completion” method with 25 Chinese graduates of Dutch universities, complemented with three interviews with the parents of such students in China. We use three vignettes to show the complexity of gendered mobility aspirations in the study-to-work transition, an interphase between student mobility and skilled migration that has been less studied. Our analysis reveals how gender intersects with other social factors (such as sexuality, age, and race) and processes at individual, interpersonal and institutional levels to shape these graduates’ mobilities, careers and life aspirations. Our findings also highlight how multiple gender identities and roles across different life stages have an impact on students’ post-graduation mobility trajectories.
Purpose: Kerala has seen a considerable influx of migrant workers from various parts of India in recent years. Kerala is an attractive job market for workers from outside the state because of higher earnings, plentiful employment options, and a scarcity of local labourers. The goal of this article is to look at the availability of casual migrant workers in Kerala's labour market as well as their impact on the state's economy. Also looked at how migrants' financial and social status improves as a result of migration. Design/Methodology/Approach: Descriptive Research was used in this study, which is focused on secondary data sources. Secondary data is gathered through books, newspapers, journals, articles, and government websites. Originality: The influences of migrant workers in the rationalization of the economy are discussed. Value: The study will aid in assessing the financial and social upliftment of migrant workers owing to migration by looking at the availability of migrant workers, labour force participation rate, worker population ratio, and wage rate. Findings: There has been a whopping increase in the number of migrant workers in the labour market of Kerala, it figured out that there were 4,12,849 migrants in 2001 and it soared to 31,50,000 migrants in 2020. It is mostly owing to increased job availability and high remuneration rates, which can be seen even in Kerala's unorganised industry. 60% of migrant workers are employed in construction, 8% in manufacturing, 7% in hotels and restaurants, 2% in trade and 2% in agriculture, with the remaining 23% engaged in other occupations. As a result of migration, people's quality of life increases. By educating people about different cultures, traditions, and languages, it enhances their social lives and encourages intergroup harmony, which in turn helps society as a whole. Paper Type: Descriptive study
This study examines how Hong Kong returnees negotiate and construct their transnational identities in their post-sojourn period via two indexical cues, stance taking, and self-labelling. Based on the narratives about remigration, this study investigates how returnees construct their identities discursively by taking stances to evaluate and align with sociocultural values and using self-labelling to index their transnational identities in their post-sojourn period. In doing so, this study hopes to contribute to the existing migration studies on Hong Kong returnees in terms of language and identity construction.
The article advances understanding of the relationships between diplomacies and governance and the role of non-state actors in them, through a case study of migrant norm-making. Drawing from 50 interviews, the analysis examines how Canadian residents of Hong Kong during the 2014 Occupy Central and Umbrella Movement protests enacted through their diplomatic practices what Wiener calls the “meanings-in-use” of norms—specifically, respect for democracy and human rights, as well as foreign non-interference. These NSA diplomatic practices made visible world order's contested multi-level normative frames within a local democratization struggle. The analysis provides starting points for research on how transnational lives, liminal identifications, class, denizenship, and state power shape NSA diplomacies. It advances the theorizing of norm-making within diplomacy, using insights from critical diplomacy studies, including the “other diplomacies” approach.
The focus of this paper is to explore the literary portrayal of transnational identities, transculturalism and transracial marriages as presented by two expatriate female writers who have made their niche in the postcolonial Namibian autobiographical (sub) genre, namely, Taming My Elephant by Amulungu (2016 Amulungu, T. 2016. Taming My Elephant. Windhoek: University of Namibia Press. doi:10.2307/j.ctvh8r31c.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) and Undisciplined Heart by Katjavivi (2010 Katjavivi, J. 2010. Undisciplined Heart. Cape Town: Modjadji Books CC. [Google Scholar]). The paper explores the different challenges faced by two migrant and transracial couples from different backgrounds which include issues of communication breakdown, a lack of understanding of the partner’s background, racial differences and indifference in the communities. The couples’ families hesitated to welcome the spouses into their families, whereas the couples’ relationships and motivations varied and are couched in shifting arenas, yet their interactions created opportunities for the circulation, promotion, and adaptation of a wide range of cultural, political, and social influences. Amulungu and Katjavivi are tracing their interactions within and among liberation movements, being hosted as a transmigrants, whilst facing a wider set of external actors, revealing the lasting legacies that have too often been eclipsed by dominant national histories. The paper postulates that the selected autobiographers allied with more than a single culture, and are pioneers as transracial couples in a newly independent Namibia as well as persistent beings who are portrayed as compassionate, assertive, and enduring people.
As Russel King wrote ‘return is the great unwritten chapter of migration’ (2000). Accordingly, very little is known about how returning migrants experience their return, especially in the context of a post-socialist Central European country. The thesis thus presents an inquiry into the lived experiences of high-skilled Hungarian returning migrants. As theoretical engagement with return has rather been fragmented and often marginal to migration theory, the thesis presents a novel Integrated Theoretical Framework, which draws on the insights of four key research areas: integration, re-integration, social networks and cultural identity. By combining the insights of the matrix of attachments, multi-dimensional re-embedding, social capital and support, and the Cultural Identity Model into a single framework, the thesis does not only address their individual shortcomings but enables a comprehensive analytical approach to understanding returnees’ experiences as a multi-faceted process within the broader migration cycle. To do so, it takes a mixed-methods personal network approach, where it utilises personal network data and in-depth qualitative information from thirty-four returnees. As part of the data analysis, it combines Thematic Analysis, fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis, and descriptive social network measures as well as multi-level modelling techniques.
It finds that migrants’ experiences vary greatly from highly positive experiences to ambivalent or even hugely negative experiences. The thesis demonstrates that these experiences can be conceived as returnees re-embedding process on five dimensions, including their living standards, social, cultural, professional and political re-embedding, and that their social re-embedding plays a particularly important role. Moreover, returnees’ experiences are directly and positively linked to their social capital, which can be understood as the function of their positive and negative social ties, where negative ties have a disproportionately strong negative effect. As the multi-level social network analysis reveals, networks with several emotionally close ties to Hungarians who also reside in the country provide the most social support to returnees. Additionally, based on their network compositions, returnees demonstrate five distinctive network trajectories throughout their migration cycle: transnationalism, ethnic maintenance, ethnification, host country attachment, and dispersion. These trajectories are underlined by different integration patterns and cultural identity changes, leading to markedly different re-embedding processes, social capital and consequently return experiences.
When refugees’ access to economic, political, and social rights cannot be guaranteed in one locale, individuals make pragmatic choices about what relationships to sustain with authorities elsewhere, even with those that caused their flight in the first place. This process of return is rarely akin to conventional repatriation, understood as the full re-establishment of the rights and responsibilities associated with citizenship (Bradley, 2013). In this paper, the authors instead propose the concept of retreat to capture the process initiated by those who are seeking to escape protracted displacement through a partial return to their country of origin, and through which individuals hope that they can assemble multiple sources of rights across several locations. Drawing from recent ethnographic research in Eritrea, the authors analyze the stories of individuals, mostly refugees, who have decided to retreat despite the lack of political change. Neither exclusively citizens nor refugees in countries of origin or asylum, research participants’ “dually absent” socio-legal position is analyzed in this article. The authors show that this rests on stratified forms of citizenship and the relational nature of different rights and statuses and argue that this position should be recognized as an additional dynamic in the literature on flight, return, and transnational citizenship.
This chapter focuses on the group of women who migrated internationally. To distinguish them from the women who migrated abroad for education (Chap. 10.1007/978-3-030-92092-0_7 ) but to avoid limiting this group to only women who migrated for work purposes, I refer to them as international migrant women . Common to this whole group is that after their international migration experience, they returned to Tirana instead of their hometowns. The majority of the women in this group are married, while two are single, and two are divorced. The women who form the core of this chapter are the following:
The experiences of Chinese transnational families in Chiang Mai are a product of the historical changes of class, family and kinship network, and individuality during the 20th century in Chinese society, influenced by Confucian culture and socialist political ideology. Until the economic reform and urbanization in the 1980s, the emergence of the middle class and the phenomenon of Chinese transnational mobilities to foreign countries in search of life opportunities. The research suggests that such experiences are conditions for the global citizenship practices of Chinese individuals and families. The cosmopolitan self of a Chinese transnational family is characterized by the selection and design of life to fulfill the desire for self-determining life goals under the neoliberal socio-economic competitive mechanism that operates with the ideal of success. In the case study of Chinese transnational families whose goal is to enhance consumption to maintain class status, individuals at school and working age tend to be the center of family mobility. In addition, the ideological gender role is a continuous experience with individual practices in conditions of transnational mobility, particularly in post-migration adaptation, which reproduces specific experiences to produce gender-based ideology. However, the lifestyle of Chinese transnational families in Chiang Mai is in a “suspended state” (according to Biao Xiang’s concept) from the local society. The research has proposed mechanisms for the development of social welfare and transnational human capital to be a guideline for planning policy or projects for government agencies and private sectors, to create a transcultural society in Chiang Mai, and support the trend of a diversity of transnational family mobility in the future.
The growing scientific research output from Asia has been making headlines since the start of the twenty-first century. But behind this science story, there is a migration story. The elite scientists who are pursuing cutting-edge research in Asia are rarely 'homegrown' talent but were typically born in Asia, trained in the West, and then returned to work in Asia. Asian Scientists on the Move explores why more and more Asian scientists are choosing to return to Asia, and what happens after their return, when these scientists set up labs in Asia and start training the next generation of Asian scientists. Drawing on evocative firsthand accounts from 119 Western-trained Asian scientists about their migration decisions and experiences, and in-depth analysis of the scientific field in four country case studies - China, India, Singapore and Taiwan - the book reveals the growing complexity of the Asian scientist migration system.
The growing scientific research output from Asia has been making headlines since the start of the twenty-first century. But behind this science story, there is a migration story. The elite scientists who are pursuing cutting-edge research in Asia are rarely 'homegrown' talent but were typically born in Asia, trained in the West, and then returned to work in Asia. Asian Scientists on the Move explores why more and more Asian scientists are choosing to return to Asia, and what happens after their return, when these scientists set up labs in Asia and start training the next generation of Asian scientists. Drawing on evocative firsthand accounts from 119 Western-trained Asian scientists about their migration decisions and experiences, and in-depth analysis of the scientific field in four country case studies - China, India, Singapore and Taiwan - the book reveals the growing complexity of the Asian scientist migration system.
Cet article présente une analyse d’un mécanisme de promotion et de recrutement de candidats potentiels à l’immigration canadienne, soit l’événement Destination Canada Forum Mobilité, outil essentiel pour la Stratégie en matière d’immigration francophone et l’épanouissement et le développement des communautés francophones en situation minoritaire (CFSM). L’analyse de ce dispositif va permettre de préciser trois choses : que Destination Canada représente le contexte d’une migration Nord-Nord ; que l’événement s’inscrit dans un paradigme économique de la migration à la recherche de candidats pouvant répondre aux besoins du marché de l’emploi ; et que cette activité de promotion et de recrutement est centrale dans le projet de l’immigration francophone au sein des CFSM.
While accepting that the migration–development nexus is best understood from a transnational perspective, recent studies analyse this nexus in a partial way rather than holistically. We review the literature, then attempt an enriched account of the complex and rapidly evolving relationship between diaspora and development in China – a country undergoing profound demographic, economic and social changes. Using in‐depth interviews with a variety of key informants or stakeholders and a transnationally oriented framework, we analyse features across three core policy dimensions that incorporate both international and domestic dynamics: citizenship, top talent recruitment and soft power. Our findings contribute to the literature on Chinese‐state‐diaspora relations. They show that China's approach to its diaspora policy and development, practice and outcomes reaches with powerful new effects across national borders. The transnational–relational perspective gives an optimal paradigm for researchers and policymakers to understand changing strengths and complexities in interactions (contestation, conflict, negotiation, cooperation) between multi‐scalar and multi‐dimensional linkages, and to form diaspora policy and engagement programmes responsive to unprecedented global political, economic and social disruption.
The main aim of this article is to examine some of the sociocultural dimensions of contemporary globalization processes, especially in a "Pacific Rim" context. This broad subject is approached by using the Can$3 billion Pacific Place urban mega-project (UMP) in central Vancouver as a vehicle through which to explore the social processes structuring a trans-Pacific property transaction. I examine the key factors leading the Li Group from Hong Kong to extend their "reach" over space into Vancouver at this particular time in history. Addressing this topic entails attempting to understand (1) the business and personal dynamics of the key actors involved with such global flows of property capital, set within a broader geopolitical and geoeconomic context; (2) the meaning and significance of Vancouver to the actors, especially in the context of immigration flows to the city; and (3) the significance and multiple functions of this type of property development project—the urban mega-project—to the actors. And while this case study is not designed to be representative of the overall nature of the trans-Pacific property development process, it does highlight some important characteristics about Vancouver's changing social and political structure, as well as the need (in theoretical and methodological terms) to produce more modest and provisional accounts about the "global space of flows."
Roger Rouse is assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He is currently a visiting research fellow at the University of California, Davis, Center for Comparative Research, where he is completing a book on the topic of his 1989 Stanford dissertation, "Mexican Migration to the USA: Family Relations in the Development of a Transnational Migrant Circuit."
The first version of this paper was written in early 1988 while I was a visiting research fellow at the Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies, University of California, San Diego. It draws on fieldwork carried out between 1982 and 1984 under a doctoral fellowship from the Inter-American Foundation. I am grateful to both organizations for their support. Many of the ideas contained in the paper were developed in a study group on postmodernism organized with colleagues from the center. My principal thanks—for comments, criticisms, and immensely pleasant company—go to the group's members: Josefina Alcazar, Alberto Aziz, Roger Bartra, Luin Goldring, Lidia Pico, Claudia Schatán, and Francisco Valdés. I have also benefited from Khachig Tölölyan's sensitive reading of the text.
1. See Lockwood and Leinberger 35. The assertion of a false point of origin is apparently used so that the manufacturers can participate in foreign delivery contracts. See Soja 217.
2. "Hoy, ocho años de mi partida, cuando me preguntan por mi nacionalidad o identidad étnica, no puedo responder con una palabra, pues mi 'identidad' ya posee repertorios múltiples: soy mexicano pero tambien soy chicano y latinoamericano. En la frontera me dicen 'chilango' o 'mexiquillo;' en la capital 'pocho' o 'norteno' y en España 'sudaca.' . . . Mi compañera Emilia es angloitaliana pero habla español con acento argentine; y juntos caminamos entre los escombros de la torre de Babel de nuestra posmodernidad americana." Gómez-Peña (my translation).
3. See, for example, Clifford 22; and Rosaldo, Culture and Truth 217.
4. Jameson 83. Like Jameson, I find it useful to follow Ernest Mandel in arguing for the emergence since the Second World War of a new phase in monopoly capitalism, but I prefer to label this phase "transnational" rather than "late" partly to avoid the implication of imminent transcendence and, more positively, to emphasize the crucial role played by the constant movement of capital, labor, and information across national borders.
5. See Davis, "Urban Renaissance"; and Lipsitz, esp. 161.
6. It is important to stress that I am concerned not with the various meanings of this particular term but instead with the image itself. The term serves merely as a convenient marker.
7. See Williams 65-66.
8. Williams 65-66.
9. The combination of these images is readily apparent in the classic works on rural social organization by Robert Redfield and Eric Wolf (The Little Community and Peasant Society and Culture and "Types of Latin American Peasantry"), both of whom draw heavily on Mexican materials, and can also be seen in Immanuel Wallerstein's tendency (in The Capitalist World Economy) to use nation-states as the constituent units of his world system, at least in the core.
10. This approach has been used in two related but different kinds of study. In work focusing on migration itself—especially on migration within Mexico—changes have commonly been gauged by comparing the forms of organization found in the points of destination with arrangements revealed by detailed research in the specific communities from which the migrants have come. See, for example, Butterworth; Kemper; and Lewis. In work on communities known to contain a significant number of migrants and descendants of migrants—and especially in work on Mexican and Chicano communities in the United States—it has been more common to compare forms of organization found in these communities with arrangements discovered...
ABSTRACTS
In this paper I examine the political manipulation of the meanings of “race” and nation in the context of increasing Pacific Rim ties and multinational capitalist development in Vancouver. As many wealthy Hong Kong Chinese move to Vancouver in advance of 1997, racist incidents and urban social movements aimed at preserving neighborhood “character” have increased, thus discouraging international business activity and blocking capital flow into and through the city. As racism and localism hinder the social networks necessary for the integration of global capitalisms, businesspeople and politicians interested in increasing Vancouver's integration have sought to counter these processes through ideological production. The liberal doctrine of multiculturalism has become linked with the attempt to smooth racial friction and reduce resistance to the recent changes in the urban environment and experiences of everyday life in Vancouver. In this sense, the attempt to shape multiculturalism can be seen as an attempt to gain hegemonic control over concepts of race and nation in order to further expedite Vancouver's integration into the international networks of global capitalism.
As have a growing number of political leaders of emigrant-sending countries, Haitian government officials and immigrant leaders have envisioned Haiti as a transnational nation-state. This article explores the ways in which the vision of Haiti as a transnational nation builds upon the experiences, needs and aspirations of both persons living in Haiti and those who have settled in the United States. Using a concept of 'transnational social field', we examine how family obligations and the experiences of immigration are understood through a language of blood and descent that links individuals to broader concepts of a transnational homeland. Rather than celebrating transnational connections, this essay concludes by warning that the ideologies which undergird 'long distance nationalism' are problematic.
"An emphasis on skills in Australian immigration policy in the past decade has led to the increase of highly skilled Hong Kong immigrants. However, Australia has not been able to retain all of them.... This paper reports the results of an in-depth study on intention to repatriate and work in Hong Kong, conducted in Australia with 111 professional and managerial Hong Kong immigrants. Correlational and loglinear analyses on prediction of such an intention are presented. Research findings on the career-family dilemma experienced by a number of immigrants are likewise discussed."
"This study, based on 273 face-to-face interviews with students, scholars, and former residents of China in the United States in 1993, uses both qualitative and quantitative methods to explain people's views about returning to China. Although less than 9 percent of interviewees had concrete plans to return, over 32 percent were positively disposed to returning in the future. Key background variables that affect that decision are people's age, sex, social background in China, and their views about returning when they first left China. Concern about children's future was not significant, but having a wife abroad greatly increased the desire to stay abroad. Why people chose not to return varied significantly between people [who had] children and those who didn't."
This paper examines business migration to Australia, Canada and the United States by integrating the concepts of a global immigration marketplace and the commodification of citizenship into global political economy theory. It finds that state business migration policies constitute “offers” to potential businesspersons, in a discourse of “competition” and simultaneously regulate the process. In the sorting process of potential migrants across countries many businesspersons have a rational “choice” of the country they want to emigrate to. This competition and choice provide evidence of a global immigration marketplace and data show that only Australia and Canada are active competitors with Canada having an advantage. An analysis of Chinese business migration from China, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, Malaysia and Singapore indicate substantial numbers in the tens of thousands in the early 1990s but this has decreased in recent years due to several economic and political factors. Currently there are moderate levels of Chinese business migration with China now as the major source country. Since businesspersons are not a homogenous group the paper concludes with some suggested policy changes to make business migration more accessible and transformative.
Alison Mountz is a Research Assistant in the Geography Department at Dartmouth College and at New York's Hunter College, where she is at work on a project concerning transnational Salvadoran-U.S. migration. She received her BA with majors in Latin American/Caribbean Studies and Sociology from Dartmouth in 1995.
Richard Wright is Professor of Geography at Dartmouth College. His research has focused on transnational organizations and migration systems, and also involves the study of links between the internal migration of the native born and of new immigrants in the U.S. labor force, on which topic he has recently published in Economic Geography (1997). He is currently researching Salvadoran transnational migrants, network dynamics, and the effects of networked migration on the ethnic division of labor in Los Angeles.
1. Our border crossings were supported by grants from the Dickey Endowment, Rockefeller Center, and the Senior Fellowship Program at Dartmouth College. Thanks go to Adrian Bailey, Jack Corbett, Sheila Culbert, Victoria Lawson, and Khachig Tölölyan for providing very helpful criticism of some of the ideas in this paper.
2. This is an account constructed from data gathered from recorded interviews and from field notes. Other similarly indented quotes later in the essay were constructed in the same fashion.
3. We intentionally continue to use the Spanish word fiesta, rather than the direct English translation: party. A "fiesta" in the village is much more than a party. It is a religious and cultural celebration of great magnitude. Some, such as weddings, last up to a week. Sponsorship may cost up to two to three years of migrant savings.
4. This centers on a Zapotec practice called guelaguetza, which is a system of reciprocal exchange extended over several years. When a family plans to sponsor parties of all types, from funerals to birthday parties, to Christmas and other religious celebrations, during the weeks before the party, neighbors, friends, and family come to their home and offer what they can to help. Guelaguetza includes material items such as flour, corn, chickens, beer, and soda, in addition to less material contributions of time and energy in the form of labor.
5. This term comes from Bourdieu (168).
6. We translated directly from the Spanish word robar.
This paper examines the recent emergence of the 'astronaut family' as a migration strategy, practised by Hong Kong and Taiwanese business and professional families and manifest in immigrant gateway cities such as Vancouver, Sydney and Auckland. Exemplifying transnationalism as 'social morphology' (Vertovec 1999), the household is literally split across the Pacific Ocean, as the male head pursues his career in Asia, while his wife and children are relocated overseas. Based upon in-depth interviews with 'astronaut wives' in Vancouver, Canada, I examine these circumstances, challenging a prevalent representation of powerful and cohesive Chinese migrant families. In so doing, I hope to contribute to a much broader literature on transnationalism and transnational social forms. In addition, in light of research on household migration and patriarchal relations, I consider women's distinctive experience of this arrangement. This paper demonstrates the context dependency of female oppression, and highlights the enduring relationship between spatial distance and social relations within a profoundly transnational setting.
A number of trends in recent immigration to Canada are discussed: the scale of contemporary movement; the transformation of national origins over the past generation; the diversity of entry classes and the lack of any singular immigrant condition; the remarkable contraction of immigrant destinations to a few large cities; the contribution of immigration to population growth and housing demand in these metropolitan areas; and the distinctive geography of the various entry classes, with higher-status arrivals disproportionately located in Vancouver. The remainder of the paper considers and rejects two common myths in the discussion of immigration: first, the myth of an immigrant underclass, and second, the myth of an immigrant overclass. Using research from Vancouver associated with the Metropolis Project, the first myth is challenged from an analysis of Census data that emphasizes the social context of immigrant life and upward mobility; the second myth is shaken by a qualitative methodology that reveals the unexpectedly fragile experience of a number of business immigrants.
In this article I focus on ways in which the postwar generation of British migrants to Canada and Australia construct their stories as epic struggles with family themes of both loss and triumph at the centre. While, during the postwar years, there is among some migrants evidence of the emergence of a more adaptable, sojourning ‘mobility of modernity’, most life stories told by the migrants suggest a more traditional pattern in which family themes dominate. In these narratives postwar migrants structure their accounts along traditional ‘epic story’ lines reminiscent of Oscar Handlin's long superseded thesis about dislocation in the old country, alienation in the new and ultimate triumph over material and cultural obstacles. But the ‘epic’ quality of these stories is deeply attached to family themes; the disruption of family networks and attempts to rescue the old or create new ones are central to the way the migration experience determines the structuring of life memories. The very act of migration focuses attention on its impact on kinship. The predominantly urban, nuclear family form of postwar British migration does contrast sharply with more traditional rural patterns based on extended family movements and ‘chain migration’. But British migrants' emphasis on the ‘quest for family’ and the refashioning of migrant identity in their narratives underlines the coexistence of traditional themes within countervailing trends towards the mobility of modernity.
Using information collected in a questionnaire survey, this study investigates the factors influencing the housing tenure of Ghanaian immigrants in Toronto. The study finds that Ghanaian immigrants have a low home‐ownership rate compared to the Canadian‐born population and other immigrant groups. This is partly attributable to the recency of their migration, their relatively low incomes, and their small household sizes. Analysis also shows that social and personal factors, notably the initial motives of the immigrants, their back‐home ties, their desire for home ownership back home, and their intention to return there permanently, are critical in shaping their decisions with respect to home ownership in Canada.
Dans cette étude, nous examinons, à l'aide d'un sondage, les facteurs portant sur les modes de logement des immigrants ghanéens à Toronto. Nous démontrons que les Ghanéens sont propriétaires de leurs logements moins souvent que ne le sont les personnes nées au Canada ou les membres d'autres groupes d'immigrants. Le sondage révèle que la taille inférieure des ménages, les faibles revenus, et les dates d'immigration récentes des immigrants ghanéens sont parmi les causes principales de ce phénomène. L'analyse démontre aussi que des éléments sociaux ou personnels, tels les raisons initiales de l'immigration, les liaisons avec le lieu d'origine, le désir d'être propriétaire dans le lieu d'origine et l'intention ou non des immigrants de retourner au Ghana, sont d'une importance fondamentale lorsque les immigrants ghanéens prennent une décision à l'égard de l'achat d'un logement.
This article examines the responses of established residents to contemporary physical and social changes in Richmond, British Columbia, a Vancouver suburb that has received a considerable number of ethnic-Chinese immigrants over the past decade. In the metropolitan Vancouver context, recent considerations of immigrant reception at the neighbourhood level have focused on the critical reactions of ‘white’, European-origin residents in upper-middle class areas to local immigrant settlement and housing stock transformations. These studies have given rise to conflicting interpretations of the relationship between immigration and neighbourhood landscape change, the motivations behind resident protest and, in particular, the definition of their responses as racist. Drawing from extended interviews with fifty-four long-term Richmond residents, I attempt to provide a broader account of immigrant reception as a supplement to works that have revolved around housing issues and ‘white’ resistance. I also critique the way that the term racism has been used to describe resident reactions to immigration-related changes, calling for researchers to be more reflexive and explicit in their application of the concept.
Taiwan-born business and skilled migrants who settle in Australia have high unemployment rates despite being well educated and fairly affluent. This phenomenon, commonly found in Australia among new Asian immigrants, has seldom been researched. Using qualitative methodologies, including ethnographic interviews and participant observation, this paper examines economic integration of recent Taiwanese business and skilled migrants in three Australian cities: Sydney, Brisbane, and Melbourne. The results indicate that Taiwanese immigrants find it difficult to secure employment, start profitable businesses, and adapt to the host society. The integration challenges include: lack of fluency in English, different social and cultural milieu, lack of familiarity with Australian business culture and labour relations, complex rules and regulations governing the establishment of business enterprises, small size of the market, high taxes, and lack of willingness to take up work not commensurate with their education and economic background. Policy recommendations to foster early integration of skilled migrants from Taiwan are included.
Abstract In this article I explore a theoretical link between return visits and return migration using ethnographic data obtained through fieldwork among members of the broader Commonwealth Eastern Caribbean community in Toronto, Canada. Return visits are periodic but temporary sojourns made by members of migrant communities to their external homeland or another location where strong social ties exist. As a result, the conceptual framework in this article revolves around transnationalism as the return visit is shown to be a transnational exercise that may facilitate return. Using data from ethnographic fieldwork, three themes highlight the link between return visits and return migration: (1) the need to facilitate ties such that relationships are meaningful upon permanent return; (2) the functional nature of the return visit, such that changes are measured and benchmarked against what is remembered and internalized by the migration after the migration episode; and (3) the knowledge that return visits aid in reintegration.
Through a policy study, this article examines the active but compromised authority of the state as it engages the global “space of flows.” Business immigration programs in close to thirty countries announce the state's intent to domesticate the unruly forces of globalization by enticing its principal agent, homo economicus. With the objective of priming economic development using immigrant capital and proven entrepreneurial skills, the Canadian business program has permitted the entry of nearly 300,000 immigrants, primarily from Hong Kong and Taiwan. Government statistics have emphasized program success in terms of capital invested and jobs created. However, census data and tax-filer returns suggest modest income generation and limited entrepreneurial endeavor by business immigrants. Interviews with government managers reveal that the pressures to meet high immigration targets were accompanied by inadequate monitoring resources that have compromised the state's due diligence. Annual statistics produced under these conditions become an all-too-human text, representing as much the desires of government and immigrants as they do a reliable assessment. The study emphasizes this social embeddedness of immigration at all levels and the passion and persuasion in a fully social context that lie behind the often suprahuman problematic of globalization.
Kris Olds provides a grounded analysis of globalization and urban change in the late twentieth century. Based on field work carried out in Vancouver, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Paris, and London, the author highlights the role of two transnational cultures - ethnic Chinese property developers and 'brand name' arthitects - in the planning and development of urban mega-projects. Case studies from Vancouver and Shanghai are used to analyse the nature of the transnational practices and networks that facilitate the production of new urban spaces on the Pacific Rim. This reflexive, situated, and interdisciplinary account offers an alternative perspective to the abstract and economistic analyses that dominate our understanding of globalization and urban change.
This article examines the economic impacts of immigrants in the Toronto Census Metropolitan Area through an analysis of their
income tax contributions and welfare or unemployment benefit receipts in 1995. Our analyses show that despite their lower
income, immigrants admitted between 1980 and 1995 who settled in Toronto did not obtain social assistance in excess of the
income tax they paid. There is no evidence that these immigrants are an economic drain on Canadian society although internal
variations do exist among immigrant groups. Within the limitations of our analyses, the myths that family-class immigrants
and refugee immigrants pose a constant threat to the Canadian economy are unfounded.
Cet article donne un aperçu de la relation qui existe entre immigration et métropole au cours de son évolution dans le temps.
Nous avons brossé le tableau des aspects fondamentaux de cette relation historique, comme préambule à l’examen de trois aspects
différents de la scène d’aujourd’hui: les divers déterminants du flot contemporain de travailleurs; les sources de la résistance
politique à la migration internationale; et le renouvellement du rôle de protagoniste des zones urbaines comme nœuds stratégiques
du réseau international. À ce propos, nous avons brossé le tableau de la montée du transnationalisme comme nouvelle forme
d’adaptation à l’immigration et comme élément de contradiction à la logique prépondérante du capitalisme mondial. Les implications
d’une approche centrée sur la migration vers les concentrations urbaines sur les plans théorique et politique n’ont pas été
retenues.
This paper examines the political repercussions of large-scale immigration from Hong Kong on a pre-existing Chinese community in Vancouver, British Columbia. Through an examination of the context of these migration flows, and through a discussion of two case studies of political challenge and institutional transformation in Chinatown, the fieldwork reveals how internal political change and the reworking of the normative democratic values of Canadian society reflects not a linear movement of assimilation to the dominant values of the ‘modern’ nation state, but rather the historical context of a nonlinear transmigration network.
Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of British Columbia, 2004. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 318-336). Photocopy.
"The currently dominant element in the labour migration from the Caribbean to Britain and France is a return flow of migrants. This paper focuses on the migrations from the Commonwealth and the French Caribbean to Britain and France respectively. While these migrations are historically similar in origin, subsequent differences in the colonial and immigration policies of Britain and France have resulted in divergent migration trends and experiences. New sources of data are drawn on in this comparative study of return migration to the Caribbean, providing up-to-date information on the size and demographic characteristics of the returnee populations. Equally important to this study is the section of the migrant population who are likely to remain in Europe. The authors argue that a comprehensive model of labour migration would need to incorporate the non-return situation in its dynamic entirety."
In the last 15 years, anthropology and other disciplines have begun to treat migration as a system. The article reviews the findings of the growing body of literature on return migration, attempting to synthesise the various typologies of return migrants, reasons for return, adaptation and readjustment of returnees, and the impact of return migration on the migrants' home societies. -J.Sheail
Return migration to Jamaica is associated closely with the existence and nature of the transnational linkages established between migrants and their home country, especially at the level of the household and family. Remittances invariably precede, accompany and follow the actual return of migrants and comprise money as well as a range of consumer goods.
Data on the number of returning migrants to Jamaica have been collected officially only since 1992; other information is derived from field studies. The figures show that the US is the source of most return migrants to Jamaica, with the United Kingdom second.
Likewise, there are few official statistics on remittances, especially of those entering the country through informal channels. Nevertheless, data on the receipt of money through the Bank of Jamaica, indicate that during the 1990s remittances as a percentage of GDP exceeded that of the traditional foreign currency earners of bauxite and sugar.
Growing awareness of the potential of the Jamaican overseas community has led the Government of Jamaica to establish programmes, including The Return of Talent programme, supported by the International Organization for Migration (IOM), to encourage the return of nationals.
Different types of return migrants have the potential to make different kinds of contributions to national development – some through their skills, educational and professional experience, others through the financial capital which they transfer for investment or as retirement income. However, the most significant development potential of return lies in the social and economic conditions in Jamaica itself. If confidence levels are high, there will be little difficulty in attracting persons to return and financial transfers and investments will increase. Furthermore, the social and economic environment largely conditions the extent to which skills and talent as well as the financial capital are effectively utilized.
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