Population and Migration: European and Chinese Experiences Compared

The Democratization of Long-Distance Migration: Trajectories and Flows during the “Mobility Transition,” 1850–1910

“…Yet, migration also regularly took place without personal or family connections, guided by other channels of information, such as printed media, professional networks, recruitment agencies, travelers' tales, or even gossip (Lesger 2006;Lesger et al 2002). Crucially, access to such personal and impersonal networks and information is socially selective, which helps to explain why and how different migrant groups adapted their behavior to changing circumstances in different ways and at different speeds (Winter 2009).…”

“…Like other spatial interactions, migration tends to be characterized by a distance-decay effect: other things being equal, the likelihood of migration between any two places declines as their distance increases (Fellman et al 2003: 68-69). Yet, migration's sensitivity to distance and "intervening obstacles" is socially selective, which can be related to differences in the relative costs and benefits of travel (Lee 1966) and differential access to social networks and channels of information (Winter 2009). Ravenstein's (1885: 196-99) so-called "laws of migration" observed as early as the late nineteenth century that women were as mobile as men but tended to move over shorter distances, while men dominated long-distance migration between cities (see also Alexander and Steidl 2012).…”

“…Ravenstein's (1885: 196-99) so-called "laws of migration" observed as early as the late nineteenth century that women were as mobile as men but tended to move over shorter distances, while men dominated long-distance migration between cities (see also Alexander and Steidl 2012). Likewise, Winter (2013) has likened urban immigration in early modern Europe to a social pyramid. Its broad base, genderbalanced or even female-predominant, consisted of short-distance, low-skilled, low-literate, and unspecialized rural migrants, whose continued influx was necessary to oil the brawn-intensive preindustrial urban economy (Clark 1987;De Vries 1984: 199-210;Poussou 1988).…”

Should Cities Control Immigration Policy?

“…National restrictions on labour mobility in Tudor England, which were inspired mainly by concerns for societal stability, were for instance actively circumvented by urban authorities seeking to recruit an adequate labour supply. 8 We can hear echoes of this conflict today in the case of so-called 'sanctuary cities' that try to resist the deportation of unauthorised migrants by, for example, refusing to pass information about them to state authorities. 9 But why should states feel that they have to get involved if cities are happy to continue to host the migrants, who they presumably see as valued members of their community?…”

Bringing labour back in: Reflections on Worthy Efffortsand on the origins of modern economic growth

“…61 Working outside one's kin group for remuneration also, I would assume, made Western labour -and its skills -more mobile. 62 The question to what extent labour and exchange relations are (im)personal and/ (in)formal is interesting and relevant for understanding economic development but also for the kind of social history Lis and Soly want to write. 63 For me at least it is a pity that they did not more explicitly pay attention to it.…”