Written by Bayram Kaya HISTORY OF MIGRATION CHAPTER 2
Türkçe English Deutsch Italiano Français Ελληνικά Kurdî Español MIGRATION DATE – 2
THORIES OF MIGRATION
We wrote about the characteristics of immigration. Today we will write Theories of Migration. All Migration History can be expressed in MIGRATION THEORIES and they become the most elemental element in our understanding of Migration History.
Theories
1- Theories of Economic Migration
The central concept of the neoclassical economic perspective model is 'human capital'; people decide to invest in immigration, just as they may decide to invest in education or vocational training. Because migration increases human capital – both earnings and surplus value – and this offers potential future gains in terms of earnings. People will migrate if the higher wages they hope to earn in their destination country are greater than the costs they will incur during migration. The economic theory of migration maximizes Benefit.
Individuals seek a country in which they can maximize their own well-being. The financial resources of the individual, the immigration regulations applied by the countries competing for immigration, and the internal immigration regulations of the source country limit this research. In the migration market, different pieces of information are exchanged and different options are compared. In this sense, individuals compare the information of the receiving countries that are competing in the way of making a 'migration offer' and choose one. The information gathered in this market place may also lead many individuals to think that it is more 'lucrative' to stay in their country of birth. On the other hand, some individuals conclude that it would be better to go to other countries. The Immigration market classifies these individuals non-randomly across receiving countries. Empirical studies raise doubts about the validity of neoclassical theory. Those who migrate from the least developed to the richest countries are rarely the poorest; in reality, the immigrants are mostly the social middle class living in areas undergoing economic and social change.
Neoclassical migration theory has been criticized as simplistic and incapable of explaining current migration movements or predicting future migration movements.
2- Migration Systems Theory (A New Interdisciplinary Trend)
As a result of such criticisms, a new approach has emerged that aims to encompass multiple disciplines and encompass all dimensions of the migration experience: migration systems theory.
Migration systems theory argues that migration movements often emerge through pre-existing links between the donor and recipient country, based on colonial, political interaction, trade, investment or cultural ties.
Therefore, immigration from Mexico to the United States is based on the southwestern expansion of the United States in the 19th century and the planned demand of American employers for Mexican workers in the 20th century.
3- Historical-Structuralist Approach (Or Center - Perimeter Relationship)
The approach that emerged in the 1970s and called the historical-structuralist approach was an alternative approach to explaining international migration.
This approach, which found its intellectual foundations in Marxist Political Economy and Vallerstein's World System Theory, emphasized the unequal distribution of economic and political power in the world economy. Migration was seen as a kind of cheap labor movement for capital. It perpetuated uneven development and the exploitation of poor countries' resources to make the rich even richer.
According to world-system theory, labor migration is one of the main ways of hegemonic domination, which is fraudulently established between the core countries of capitalism and their underdeveloped peripheries.
Migration was as important as military domination for the Third World's dependence on the First World, for controlling world trade and interests. This theory bears traces from Samir Amin's Center-Periphery Thesis and Wallerstein's World Empire Thesis'.
4- Ethnicity
While ethnicity, in its common usage, is often viewed as a characteristic of a minority group, many social scientists are of the opinion that everyone has ethnicity in the sense of belonging to a group based on a common origin, history, culture, experience and values.
Ethnicity continues to be discussed in terms of 'primitive', 'situational' and 'instrumental'. What is important is that ethnicity leads to the identification of a particular group, and its visible signs—phenotype, language, culture, tradition, religion, attitude—can be used as criteria for exclusion by other groups. Ethnicity acquires social and political meanings only when it is associated with the demarcation process between dominant groups and minorities. Being an ethnic minority is not a direct result of immigration, but rather the result of specific marginalization mechanisms that affect different groups in different ways. And is the most problematic area.
5- Racism
Racism against certain groups is found in almost all immigrant countries. It can be defined as the process of classifying other groups of social groups into different or inferior status on the basis of visible or cultural signs. This process encompasses economic, social and political power and is often intended to justify the exclusion or exploitation of the identified group.
In some countries, there is a reluctance to talk about racism, notably Germany and France. They're trying to paint racism pink. Veiling and euphemisms such as 'hostility towards foreigners', 'ethnocentrism' or 'xenophobia' are used. This strengthens them as a concession to racism. But arguing over labels is useless: It's more important to understand racism and its causes. Racism operates in different ways, depending on a society's particular history and the interests of the dominant group.
6- Cultural Racism
Culture is becoming more and more politicized in all destination countries. As ideas of racial superiority lose their ideological weight, exclusionary practices against minorities increasingly focus on the issue of cultural difference.
7- Culture, Identity and Community
In the context of globalization, culture, identity and community often serve as a point of resistance against centralizing and homogenizing forces. These have been central issues in new ethnic minority debates.
First, as already explained, cultural difference functions as a marker of ethnic boundaries. Second, ethnic cultures play a central role in community formation: When ethnic groups form a cluster, they establish their own neighborhoods, which are determined by the differential use of private and public spaces. Third, ethnic neighborhoods are seen by some members of the 'indigenous' social majority as a confirmation of their fear of 'the foreigner'. In other words, Ethnic Communities are perceived as an enemy threat to take over their country against the dominant culture and national identity. Fourth, dominant groups may view immigrant cultures as primitive, stagnant and reactionary. Linguistic and cultural continuity is considered as evidence of their inability to reach the level of advanced industrial societies. The non-assimilated 'they themselves bear responsibility for their marginal position'. Culture plays a key role as a source of identity and a point of resistance against exclusion and discrimination for ethnic minorities
The four phenomena seen here are empirically observed in contemporary European social policy. It is useful to look at the situation of today's immigrants from this theoretical point of view.
7- Citizenship
Defining who a citizen is, how newcomers can become citizens and the meanings of citizenship are discussed together with the phenomenon of migration. Immigrants and their descendants have relations with more than one state, although in principle the state only allows a single membership. They can be citizens of two states or they can be citizens of one state and live in another state. Such situations can lead to 'divided loyalty' and undermine the nationalist ideal of cultural homogeneity. Therefore, a large-scale settlement inevitably leads to citizenship debates. Citizenship refers to a set of institutions that guarantee these rights as well as the equality of rights of all citizens within a political community. However, formal equality rarely leads to equality in practice. For example, citizenship has always had a slightly different meaning for men than for women, because the concept of citizen is based on the male family man who represents women and children.
There are several citizenship models:
A- The Imperial Colonial Model:
Definition of belonging to the nation in the context of being a subject of the same power or ruler. This idea predates the French and American revolutions. It allows the integration of various peoples of multi-ethnic and multilingual empires (colonial governments such as the British, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires). This model continued to exist formally in the UK until the 1981 Nationality Convention, which created a citizenship in the modern sense. To some extent, this approach had different validity in the former Soviet Union. Almost always of an ideological character, this concept helps to veil the domination of a particular ethnic group or nationality over other peoples.
B- Folk or Ethnic Model:
Defining nationality in the context of ethnicity and culture (common ancestry, language and culture), meaning the exclusion of minorities from citizenship and the national community (Germany and France are close to this model) is).
C- Republican Model:
Defining the nation as a political community based on a constitution, laws, and citizenship. This model, which allows naturalization of newcomers, ensures their adherence to political rules and aims to adapt to national culture. This assimilationist approach goes back to the French and American revolutions. France is the most obvious recent example.
D- Multicultural Model:
This model, in which the nation is defined as a political community on the basis of a constitution, laws and citizenship, allows naturalization of newcomers in a way that they can live their cultural differences and form ethnic communities, and ensures their adherence to political rules. This pluralistic and multicultural model, which dominated Australia, Canada and Sweden in the 1970s and 1980s, has also been influential in other Western countries. All these ideal types of citizenship have one thing in common: they are all based on citizens' belonging to only one nation-state. Migrant resettlement is primarily considered as a process in which loyalty transforms from the country of origin to the country of residence. This process can take a very long time and even for generations, symbolically manifested through naturalization and acquisition of the new state's citizenship.
Used Source: Age of Migrations
