Between Origin and Destination: German Migrants and the Individual Consequences of Their Global Lives

Abstract

During the twentieth century, international migration was mainly understood as immigration into economically highly developed welfare states. This has changed over the course of recent decades because these countries are meanwhile also understood as important sources of international mobility. Whereas international mobility experiences have potentially far-reaching consequences for social inequalities and life chances, migration studies have only little experience in analysing international migration from those economically highly developed welfare states. This introduction frames the chapters in this volume that contribute to fill this gap by examining the individual consequences of global lives not only as a question of migrants’ integration into receiving societies (destination). Rather, the consequences of international mobility are also studied by comparing migrants with the non-mobile population of the country of origin (origin) and as results of specific trajectories (migration) in individual life courses during the migration process (Destination-Origin-Migration Approach). The introduction also provides an overview of how this approach is utilised by the different chapters of the book, all based on the German Emigration and Remigration Panel Study (GERPS), which provides a comprehensive empirical basis for studying the consequences of international migration along four dimensions of the life course: employment and social mobility, partner and family, wellbeing and health, as well as friends and social integration.

Who intended to leave? Patterns and impacts of Hong Kong's recent wave of migration

“…In their previously referenced study on emigrants from China to the United States, Liang and Morooka (2004) showed that approximately one‐third of the emigrant population were college graduates; more than 40% of the non‐emigrant population had only an elementary‐level education. A few other studies have identified a similar trend in which people with higher education levels are more likely to gravitate towards emigration (Atoyan et al, 2016; Canache et al, 2013; Erlinghagen et al, 2021).…”

“…Previous studies have investigated the demographic patterns and socioeconomic selectivity of emigrants, commonly adopting demographic factors, including age, education, income, gender, marital status and occupation, to identify emigrants’ specific demographic patterns (Findley, 1987; Massey et al, 1994). These studies have usually found that the typical emigrant is young, well‐educated, unmarried and male (Desai et al, 2001; Erlinghagen et al, 2021; Liang & Morooka, 2004). However, variations in the demographic patterns of emigrants have also been found, particularly when emigration is driven by various factors simultaneously (Ailenei et al, 2015).…”

Aetiological research on the health of migrants living in Germany: a systematic literature review

“…One of the gaps in migrant health research is low prioritisation of global health and public health training, unlike in the UK and the USA, where global health education is well established 76 77. Another methodological challenge identified by the German Emigration and Remigration Panel Study) for high-quality migrant health research constitutes the lack of detailed information on nationality, duration of stay and socioeconomic status in national registries, therefore, limiting reflections on diversity and heterogeneity in the German population 78. These factors may contribute to the observed lack of precision with regard to the effect estimates and generalisation of most of our findings 79.…”

International migration and its short‐term effect on partnership stability

“…Analyses are based primarily on the German Emigration and Remigration Panel Study (GERPS), which provides information on internationally mobile Germans (Erlinghagen et al, 2021). GERPS assembles longitudinal data on both German emigrants and remigrants to assess the consequences of migration in the life course.…”