Intra-European migration decisions and welfare systems: the missing life course link

Abstract

Welfare systems are often perceived as key for migration decisions. Yet traditional international migration theories usually include this factor as rather static in nature and do not acknowledge the dynamic interaction with the individual life course. This is unfortunate, as the impact of macro-level circumstances on individual migration decisions may vary over a person's life, particularly for factors that are intrinsically connected to the life course, as is the case with the welfare system. In this study, we propose an innovative conceptual model which fruitfully combines insights from migration theories with principles of the life course approach. Using qualitative interview data from 36 European citizens born in Poland, Spain and the UK and residing in the Netherlands, we investigated how welfare systems are perceived and experienced at the individual level, and how these perceptions, knowledge and practices may enter migration decisions. Our study empirically underpins the main premise of the theoretical model that migration decisions and the factors shaping them should be explained as connected through the life course. The proposed conceptual model is suitable to explain the influence of welfare systems on migration decisions, but also that of other structural factors.

Settling for Welfare? Shifting Access to Welfare, Migration and Settlement Aspirations of Filipina Single Mothers in Japan

“…Capturing the constitutive relationship between welfare systems and human migration, the concept of transnational social protection is useful for describing the ways in which migrants knit together their own and their families' social protection from different sources located across the borders of nation states (Levitt et al 2018). De Jong and de Valk (2019) likewise recommend paying attention to the welfare systems in the countries of both origin and destination. I argue that migration, along with the change in migrants' socio-economic status, legal status, residency and social networks, affects the welfare arrangements and the degree to which migrants participate in social reproduction and other obligations.…”

“…The analytical approach used for these data is that of the life course, giving salience to the intersectionality of life events, time, risk and uncertainty with interaction in the analysis of social and demographic change (Willekens 1999). Emerging from the field of developmental psychology, the life-course approach has gained traction in international migration research, recognising that migrants are embedded in societies and social processes across borders and that migration is integral to people's lives over time (Bailey 2009;De Jong and de Valk 2019;Wingens et al 2012). By examining the 'continuities, twists, and turns in individual lives' (Hutchison 2018, 8), a life-course approach in research emphasises the social agency of humans navigating systems of opportunities and risks while making life choices and constructing life journeys.…”

“Moving on” with gendered aspirations: Sudanese migrants navigating controlling welfare states, labour markets and migration regimes in the Netherlands and the UK

“…Such debates came hand-in-hand with negative connotations attached to the word "refugee" or "asylum seeker", who tend to be depicted as powerless victims in need of protection and highly dependent on welfare-state provisions (Ghorashi 2005). In fact, welfare systems are often seen as a key driver for migration decisions (Borjas 1999;de Jong and de Valk 2019).…”

Age of the oldest child and internal migration of immigrant families: A study using administrative data from immigrant landing and tax files

“…This gap exists, although the child development literature has long-established that residential mobility may have deleterious consequences for the academic performance and emotional well-being of school-age children (Alexander, Entwisle, & Dauber, 1996;Anderson, Leventhal, & Dupéré, 2014;Bailey, Blake, & Cooke, 2004;Gillespie, 2013;Goldberg, Tienda, & Adser, 2017;South, Haynie, & Bose, 2005). It exists although the migration literature has established that decisions to move are shaped by the life events of all family members (Bures, 2009;Clark, Deurloo, & Dieleman, 1984;De Jong & De Valk, 2019;Gambaro, Joshi, & Lupton, 2017). 1 To address this gap, we examine how the age of the oldest child influences internal migration patterns of immigrant families during their first 5 years in Canada.…”

“…Existing studies of immigrant internal migration document age‐specific migration rates or focus on the risk of migration for individual migrants (Findlay et al, 2015; Kaida et al, 2020; Kritz, Gurak, & Lee, 2011; Newbold, 1996; Nogle, 1994). These studies use cross‐sectional data to examine how the traits of migrants influence their likelihood of moving within the host country (Findlay et al, 2015), with a subset of studies including the presence and number of minor children among the adult migrants' traits (Clark et al, 1984; De Jong & De Valk, 2019; Gambaro et al, 2017; Newbold, 1996; Reher & Silvestre, 2009; Silvestre & Reher, 2014). To our knowledge, there has not been a longitudinal study that has described how immigrant families' likelihood of moving changes as children age.…”