Geographies of global lifestyle migration: Towards an anticolonial approach

Abstract

This article brings the critiques of anticolonial theorists into conversation with the burgeoning literature on Global North-to-South lifestyle migration – including scholarship employing related terminologies such as residential tourism and amenity migration. Our review synthesizes strengths in this multi-disciplinary literature while also drawing attention to most scholars’ limited engagement with the ways colonial relations of power constitute these flows. We propose an anticolonial approach for conducting global lifestyle migration research and demonstrate both the conceptual and methodological dimensions of such an approach by drawing on research conducted in Talamanca, Costa Rica.

Geographies of migration II: Decolonising migration studies

“…The link between migration and development, for example, is maintained through an assemblage of knowledge, institutions and practices dominated by European definitions and conceptions of appropriate progress (Raghuram, 2020), an epistemic coloniality that links racialised difference to power asymmetries across world regions. Migration pairs with development through international aid and security mantra and in attempts by Western states to manage and control movement of people across borders (Emard and Nelson, 2020). Similarly, the study of migrant integration is entangled with efforts to manage migration-generated population diversity (Schinkel, 2018), obscuring how racialisations are produced through migration regimes and turning attention away from racism and other forms of discrimination.…”

Lifestyle Migration

“…Building on earlier scholarship on internal lifestyle migration in post-industrial contexts and intra-European flows, the geographical focus of the literature has expanded since the mid-2000s to contemplate lifestyle migration from the Global North to the Global South (Emard & Nelson, 2020). Similar tendencies are noted by scholars of both migration flows; not least the socio-demographic and economic characteristics of the migrants-namely white, middle class baby boomers-and similar questions are explored around migration motivations, socio-spatial incorporation, and the negotiation of privilege.…”

“…Oftentimes the destination state also has a role to play in attracting affluent migrants through migration and attractive fiscal policies-see, for example, Benson and O'Reilly's work on Panama and Malaysia (2018) or Ono (2015) on the latter. Within a decolonial frame, understanding these dynamics moves far beyond ideas related to relative privilege to embed north-south lifestyle migration in the longue durée of histories bequeathed from the colonial word order and its continuities inherent in economic globalisation (Emard & Nelson, 2020;Hayes, 2021).…”

Why we need to know more about diversity among the globally mobile: a systematic literature review of non-traditional expatriate research and future research agenda for minority expatriates

“…The research that has examined lifestyle migration or retiree migration (e.g. Benson, 2010; Butler, 2013; Emard and Nelson, 2020) (with some of the latter group still being involved in part-time paid work) could be expanded to include studies of specific groups of NTEs. For example, research could explore LGBTIQA + expatriates and their experiences of lifestyle migration, such as in relation to cultural values of the nation in which they reside and work and implications for adjustment and intercultural effectiveness.…”

“…The research that has examined lifestyle migration or retiree migration (e.g. Benson, 2010;Butler, 2013;Emard and Nelson, 2020) (with some of the latter group still being involved in part-time paid work) could be expanded to include studies of specific groups of NTEs. For example, research could explore.…”