Geographical characteristics of contemporary international migration in and into Europe

Abstract

The study offers a short geographical overview of migration studies and theories, doing so in the context of the European migration crisis of [2015][2016]. It outlines the history of international migrations affecting Europe (immigration, emigration, migration within Europe and between countries) and the demographic effects of such migration on the present European population. It then analyses and examines the global and regional causes of recent migration to Europe (the European Economic Area, EEA), the countries of origin of the migrants, the main routes of migration, and the destination areas in Europe. As far as intercontinental migration is concerned, Europe was characterised by emigration between the 16 th and mid-20 th centuries (partly in consequence of colonisation) and mainly by immigration thereafter. Immigration has principally affected Western Europe, the more developed part of the continent. In consequence of post-World War II reconstruction, dynamic economic development, local labour shortages, and the decolonisation process, Western Europe received many migrants, initially from the Mediterranean region and subsequently (i.e. after the collapse of communism in [1989][1990] from the post-communist European countries. Meanwhile, the core areas of the EEA became the main destination for migrants coming from predominantly Muslim regions in Asia and Africa (SW Asia, Muslim Africa). This decades-old process has recently accelerated and now constitutes mass migration. The global and regional causes of such intercontinental migration in the sending areas are as follows: the population boom, economic backwardness, unemployment, growing poverty, climate change, desertification, negative ecological changes, global political rivalries and local power changes (e.g. the Arab Spring, 2011), growing political instability, wartime destruction, multiple and cumulative crises, general hopelessness and despair.

Return migration and identity change: A Hungarian case study

“…Since the 1980s, the scientific research on return has become increasingly significant in migration studies (Glaser-Habers 1974, Gmelch 1980, Cassarino 2004, van Houte-Davids 2008, de Haas 2010, Nadler et al 2016. To date, the primary concern of Hungarian social geography has mainly focused on emigration in terms of several different migration processes, such as migration of refugees to Europe (Kocsis et al 2016, Farkas-Dövényi 2018. Studies on return migration, its individual and social aspects, and the practical, economic-development utilisation of this phenomenon (Kovács et al 2013, Lados-Hegedűs 2016, Csányi 2018) are even rarer.…”

Re-bordering of the Hungarian South: Geopolitics of the Hungarian border fence

“…In Central and Eastern Europe immigration did not cause problems that would have affected the everyday lives of people until very recently (Kocsis, K. et al 2016). Several researchers confirmed that until 2015 the citizens of Hungary did not consider immigration particularly dangerous.…”

Investigating the background of radical right-wing mobilization in Hungary with regional statistical methods

“…However, as a result of the migration crisis that has been centred since 2015 (Kocsis et al 2016), an anti-immigrant radicalism has begun that was only experienced in Western Europe previously. This topic was completely taken away by the mainstream right-wing Fidesz from the radical, but moderating Jobbik, thus the claims of Michael Minkenberg realised that proves the mainstream right-wing party have radicalised to curb the radical right-wing party (Minkenberg 2015).…”