Moving Through Social Networks: The Case of Armenian Migrants in the Czech Republic

This paper brings attention to the role of social networks in the migration of asylum seekers and explores how the embeddedness of the migrants in social networks both facilitates and constrains their mobility in different phases of the migration process. It reconstructs the migration paths of eight Armenian migrant families who arrived in the Czech Republic as asylum seekers during the 1990s and the beginning of the twenty‐first century. By examining the narrated stories of the Armenian migrants it shows that social networks formed an important context for employing various migration strategies in all phases of the migration process, and that the meaning and character of migrants’ social networks changed over time. In the initial phase of decision‐making about migration as well as on their journey, it was mainly weak ties of random acquaintances that played a dominant role. The position of the migrants in those networks was rather insecure. They held a little control over the information they received, but in these vulnerable situations they had to rely on their weak ties, which strongly influenced their mobility. In the arrival and settlement phases the social context of the refugee camp hindered the cultivation of social ties outside the migrants’ circle on one hand, and facilitated development of bonding ties among the migrants on the other. Bonding social networks enabled inclusion of the Armenian migrants into various social spheres especially at the beginning of the settlement process. However, the bounded character of these networks was also recognized as excluding them from access to resources of the dominant society and preventing their social mobility in later phases of their settlement. Thus, bridging networks that provide access to certain resources of the dominant society were sought.     

The Experience of Migration: Settlement and Adjustment in Milan*

We examine two perspectives on the management of migration, involving the distinction between settlement and adjustment. The latter refers to urban migration that involves significant personal maladjustment, while settlement emphasizes the importance of social networks and coping strategies in moderating the consequences of migration. Using a sample representing both rural and urban origins and differential length of residence in Milan, it is shown that (contrary to assumptions involved in the “maladjustment” perspective) neither prior urban experience nor length of exposure to urban life is associated with better adjustment. Various coping strutegies are explored (e. g., pre-migration and social-network help) as potential contributors to successful settlement. Finally, the “settler” (in contrast to the “maladjuster”) is shown to be more insulated from urban-oriented change in life style and ideology.     

The Economic Adjustment of Recently Arrived Bosnian,Afghan and Iraqi Refugees in Sydney,Australia1

Research on the early settlement experience of refugees from Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan is absent, both in Australia and overseas. The current study, based on questionnaire results and the application of SPSS results, explores the impact that pre‐migration and post‐arrival experiences have on the initial post‐arrival economic adjustment in Sydney, Australia of recently arrived refugees from these three countries. Guided by a summary of previous findings and surveyed results of key service providers in Sydney, two propositions based on pre‐migration and post‐migration background variables have been developed and tested with mixed results. As expected, there was a significant relationship between English language competency and the likelihood of being gainfully employed. However, there was, for example, no significant association between current employment status and the time spent in detention camp or the extent of negative exit conditions experienced, and there were no significant differences in employment outcomes for those with or without qualifications. This study concludes with a number of recommendations, in particular, the need for early intervention with adequate English language tuition, employment skills training and career counseling which could greatly assist humanitarian entrants in finding employment and reducing welfare dependence.     

Sponsorship of Relatives for Migration and Immigrant Settlement Intention

The paper examines how important family reunification is in immigrants' decision to settle permanently in their country of destination. Using longitudinal data for a cohort of recent immigrants to Australia, it examines whether migrants' permanent settlement intention reported soon after arrival is related to their family sponsorship patterns and intention to sponsor, and whether family sponsorship patterns and intention in turn have an effect on immigrants' permanent settlement/return migration decision. The results show that a significant relation exists between sponsorship of close family members for migration and immigrants' permanent settlement intention and that the relation is particularly strong among skilled migrants. The study demonstrates the importance of kinship ties in permanent settlement and return migration decisions and suggests that liberal policies on family reunion migration may minimize settle loss, especially among skilled immigrants.     

Forced migration and destination choice: Armenian forced settlers and refugees in the Russian Federation

Many analysts have criticized resettlement institutions for placing displaced people in inappropriate and desolate areas. This article seeks to determine the extent to which the Russian Federal Migration Service (FMS) plays an active, systematic role in the placement of dislocated peoples, focusing on refugees ( bezhentsii ) and forced settlers ( pereselentsii ) in the Russian Federation arriving from the Republic of Armenia.
Using data on regional-level forced migrations flows, we investigate structural- and choice-based models for the prediction of settlement patterns.
Findings indicate that variables associated with models of individual choice best predict the resettlement pattern for forced settlers and refugees from the Armenian Republic in the Russian Federation. Our findings question previously held assumptions regarding the meaning of refugee status and the influence of institutions on settlement location patterns.     

Governing the Armenian Question through Passports in the Late Ottoman Empire (1876–1908)

The literature on the history of passports has been generally discussed in the context of freedom of movement around the globe during the 19^th century. However, with its administrative regulations and practices, the Ottoman Empire offered a different view of passports and mobility controls. Through perceiving new threats from the political issues of the late 19^th century and directing its attention mainly at the Armenian and Macedonian Questions, one of the critical issues facing the Ottoman government during the Hamidian Era (1876–1908) was controlling the geographic mobility of the individuals who were perceived as a threat based on Ottoman security policies. This paper brings a particular case of this history into focus: the administrative control of the mobility of Armenians. Despite the fact that extensive research has been done on the Armenian Question, so far, little has been written on the policies restricting their mobility. This paper aims to explore the passport regulations and practices to shed light onto the relationship between state formation, Ottoman threat perceptions and the marginalisation of the Armenian community. I offer a new look at the securitisation of the Armenian Question.     

Between East and West: Jewish Secondary Migration through Ireland and Wales, 1900–1930

This paper compares and contrasts Russian Jewish migration through Ireland and Wales during the period 1900–1930. In doing so, this paper sets out to explore two key questions: (i) Did the Jews who settled in different parts of Britain and Ireland originate from specific provinces in Russia? (ii) Did the location of Jewish settlement in Britain and Ireland have any bearing on the rate of secondary migration to the USA?     

Lebanese migration and settlement in Sydney,Australia

"This article outlines the evolution of Lebanese settlement in Sydney, taking an ecological perspective and reports on a social survey of two Lebanese ethnic concentrations, undertaken in 1977-78 with the assistance of the Ford-Rockefeller Foundation of New York, with 256 Lebanese persons interviewed by bilingual interviewers."     

Migration Differentials in Women's Market Employment: An Empirical and Multicultural Analysis1

This paper examines the differences associated with the patterns and determinants of women's market employment by migration status and ethnic origin. Considering “ethnic employment” as an important issue in the immigrant labor market assimilation approach and migrants’ success in the labor market as a key indication of their settlement in the host country, the results of this paper provide a basis to reassess the patterns and determinants associated with the settlement of female migrants in the multiethnic and multicultural labor market of Australia as “a particularly interesting society in which to examine how immigrant women adapt to [a] new labour market” ( Evans, 1984 :1063).     

Engaging with Disability Services: Experiences of Families from Chinese Backgrounds in Sydney

People from Chinese backgrounds remain underrepresented in disability service use. This paper explores family experiences of using child disability support services to understand how migration and their cultural expectations about disability and service affect the way they use services. Qualitative semistructured interviews were conducted with 13 family carers in Sydney. They were striving to gain good support for their child from formal services. However, most of them were reluctant to express any dissatisfaction to service providers, which meant that assertively requesting different support was difficult and culturally inappropriate. In response, service providers can design nonconfrontational ways to elicit this vital information and support families to gain experience tackling conflict.     

Facing changes and making choices: unintended Turkish immigrant settlement in Australia

"This article considers Turkish migration and settlement in Australia from both the micro and macro levels of analysis. Migration and settlement of Turkish migrants in Melbourne is explored from the immigrants' viewpoint, including how settlement in that city has influenced their lives, both inside and outside their workplaces, over time. The article also addresses Turkish immigration to Australia within the global context of international migration. The Melbourne Turkish Migration (MTM) study was conducted by the author between 1987 and 1990." (SUMMARY IN FRE AND SPA)     

American Migrants in Australia: An Exploratory Study of Adjustment

Abstract

In the literature on American migration to Australia, there is a debate concerning the ease and degree of post-migration social-psychological adjustment. In this paper a model of migrant adjustment is derived from the literature; relationships among social psychological measures of adjustment (alienation, work orientations, amicability, isolation, and missing family and friends) and socio-demographic variables are analyzed using path analysis. Results tend to support a complex view of migrant adjustment based on differences in socio-demographic characteristics. Certain modifications to existing literature are recommended, and avenues for further research are suggested.     

Intergenerational Transnationalism: 1.5 Generation Asian Migrants in New Zealand1

This paper explores some of the issues associated with the nature of contemporary transnationalism and the particular experiences and strategies of a specific cohort of migrants, the 1.5 generation. Based on a study of East Asian migrant adolescents to New Zealand, we argue that the experiences and strategies of this generation differ from those of their parents, the original decision‐makers in the migration process, as well as from the historical experiences of earlier migrants. There is an ambivalence (in‐betweenness) about settlement and attachment that raises some key questions about the assumptions of the immigration literature and of policy/political communities. The paper suggests that the 1.5 generation represents a particular group that deserves more attention in the migration and transnationalism literature.     

Mexican Migration Networks in the United States, 1980–20001

Between 1980 and 2000, about 1.2 million Mexican immigrants settled in 47 new settlement states. In the past, these immigrants would have settled in California, Texas, or Illinois, the three traditional states for Mexican settlement. Explaining this dispersion, the network saturation theory claims that high‐volume migration of Mexicans finally saturated the housing and job opportunities of Mexicans in traditional states and especially in Los Angeles. High rents and low wages then encouraged Mexican immigrants to select new states for settlement. This article subjects the network saturation theory to a rigorous reanalysis using new evidence. The empirical results tend to confirm the network saturation theory.     

Migration between the United States and Canada: a study of labour market adjustment

"... The main purpose of this study is to examine population flows between Canada and the United States [from mid-1947 to mid-1972] in order to investigate the degree to which labour market adjustment is aided by such movements. [The author considers] several functional forms of the migration relationship in an attempt to empirically determine how the decision to migrate is formed. [He also compares the] results with those obtained by Courchene...for Canadian interprovincial migration in an effort to compare the effects of international and internal migration on labour market adjustment." It is found that "migration between the United States and Canada over the post-war period is an economic variable. In fact, [a] simple model employing differences in income levels and unemployment rates has been able to explain nearly ninety-five per cent of the variation in the migration rate." The author also notes that "although migration between Canada and the United States does occur in such a way as to aid labour market adjustment, it is not as efficient as internal migration." (summary in FRE, SPA)     

The Effect of Visas on Migration Processes

The effectiveness of migration policies has been widely contested. However, because of methodological and conceptual limitations, evidence has remained inconclusive. Moreover, prior studies focus on the effects of policies on inflows and fail to assess the simultaneous effect of policies on outflows. This is essential from a theoretical point of view as immigration restrictions may reduce both inflows and outflows and, hence, overall circulation. This renders the effect of immigration restrictions on net migration theoretically ambiguous. To fill this gap, and using unique migration and visa data from the Determinants of International Migration (DEMIG) project, this paper assesses the short‐ and long‐term effects of travel visa policy regimes on bilateral immigration and emigration dynamics. The results suggest that travel visa policies significantly decrease inflows, but this effect is undermined by decreasing outflows of the same migrant groups. This confirms that migration restrictions decrease circulation and tend to encourage long‐term settlement, and thereby sharply reduce the responsiveness of migration to economic fluctuations in destination and origin societies. We also identify asymmetric policy effects with migration flows declining only very gradually after a visa introduction but increasing almost immediately after visa removal.     

Migrant women,place and identity in contemporary women’s writing

While recent scholarship on migration has reflected growing attention to gender and to the intersectionality of race, gender and sexuality, there has been little focus on women’s emotional and bodily responses to migration in the context of larger structures of sexism, racism and the legacies of colonialism. In this paper, I examine some literary portrayals of how migrant women’s relationships with specific places of origin and settlement, both steeped in structural relationships of unequal power and experienced on an immediate, psychological and bodily plane, are fundamental to migrant women’s changing sense of belonging and identity. Jamaica Kincaid in her novel Lucy, Tsitsi Dangarembga in her novel Nervous Conditions and Dionne Brand in the opening poems of her volume No Language is Neutral evoke some of the complex ways in which migration can affect women’s lives and identities, thus both complementing and critiquing some contemporary theorisations of migration and migrant identities.     

Protestant exiles and their assimilation in early modern England

Recent published and unpublished studies of the protestant migration to England are surveyed in this article, written in the context of the commemoration of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes which occurred three hundred years ago this year. Conclusions about migration and settlement to England need to be set into the European context and various further directions for future research in England are suggested by the comparison. Detailed historical investigation has enabled us to be more precise about the chronology and extent of the migration to England. The study of the mentality of exiles and their assimilation is shown to be an important one for the understanding of early modern culture.     

Perceptual Disconnect: An Ethnographic Account of Immigrant Political Incorporation

Scholarship often assumes that there is a correlation between successful immigrant political incorporation and newcomers’ ability to make sustained claims and reallocate city or state resources. By influencing or nominating legislators, scholars assume immigrants become civically engaged and politically empowered. However, these assumptions have not been tested. This article explores the personal experiences and perceptions of Armenian immigrants in Glendale, California, where nearly 40 per cent of the city's 200,000+ population is of Armenian descent, 70 per cent of whom are first-generation immigrants. Furthermore, over 70 per cent of Glendale's elected officials claim Armenian ancestry. Nonetheless, many of Glendale's Armenian residents do not perceive the benefits of their electoral achievements. That is, there exists a perceptual disconnect between the city's ethnic-leaning reallocations and the residents’ recognition thereof. This article argues, therefore, that electoral incorporation may not, after all, prove the final step in the achievement and perception of inclusion.     

Remittances: The Impact on Families in Armenia

Armenian families have a long history of receiving remittances. Currently remittances are a major component of the Armenian economy and have a significant impact on families. Utilizing the results of in-depth semi-structured interviews conducted in the capital city of Yerevan, this article examined how remittances affected the lives, well-being, and family relationships of the people who received them. As families managed without their migrant family members, they developed systems and routines that helped them cope with the absence. In addition, they utilized networks of social capital that allowed them to persist despite significant interpersonal challenges. Insights from this study will inform specialists who serve migrant families, helping them better understand what their clients are experiencing and enabling them to provide strength-based approaches.