1 Introduction

Increasingly visible migrant communities that coexist within transnational spaces (Vertovec, 2009) are part of a contemporary world marked by a changing political approach to immigration, in which integration is the key word. The vagueness of the term (Schinkel, 2017) is compensated by the potential benefits derived from its usage. Given its multidimensionality (Harder et al., 2018; Voicu & Vlase, 2014), integration allows observing a liquid migration. The term was developed in relation to intra-European migration (Engbersen, 2018), to stress the encapsulation of such spatial movement into a more complex set of social changes, and to stress the flexibility of migration itself. Such fluidity implies a series of temporary states in the personal life, that is appropriate for the case of high-skilled intra-European migrants.

When moving from an EU country to another, EU citizens form a sort of internal migration flow (Jong, & de, and Helga de Valk., 2020). Although citizenship is not challenged due to their EU nationality, and their rights are virtually the same irrespective of the country of residence within European Union, EU migrants still face difficulties. Civil servants may mistreat them, and they also may encounter ignorance and discrimination. One should add the difficulties to understand the culture of the host country and to properly use a structure of opportunities that they do not know in intimate details and often they cannot understand.

Highly skilled migrants might show a different story (Leinonen, 2012), in particular when they migrate to less developed European countries from wealthier ones (Andrejuk, 2017). In such instances, they can convert prestige associated with their own expertise and with their country of origin to foster integration and to receive much higher gratifications and social status as compared to what most could have hoped for in the country of birth.

In this paper, we move the typical story of integration of immigrants to a different context and ask how integration occurs when a high-skilled intra-European migrant moves to a rich region located in a relatively poor country. We consider intra-European highly-skilled migrants to Bucharest, the capital city of Romania, a country with real GDP per capita of 8700 Euro in 2018, largest only to Bulgaria (6500) and almost three times lower than the EU average of 27,640, according to Eurostat.Footnote 1 Based on such conditions, one should expect integration in a select bubble of foreign citizens, and low interaction with local society. However, Bucharest is special in the sense that it is wealthier than almost any Southern and Eastern European NUTS2 regions and is hectic as cultural and social life. We argue that such context changes the type of interaction with local society and leads to blending of the high-skilled migrants rather in the upper strata of the local society than in an expat bubble.

We consider a definition of integration that takes into account the economic, social and cultural domains, particularized through four areas of life: employment, accessing health services, participation in local social life, and learning Romanian language.

For empirical documentation, we use 11 in-depth interviews carried out in July 2017–May 2018 with EU mobile citizens in Bucharest. A fast-integration process is observed. European citizenship becomes a de facto given, that on long term, we expect to lead to a category of new Romanian residents that become influent in local communities and society as part of the critical upper strata of the society.

In the following, we briefly discuss the concepts that we employ. Then we depict the context of the research, that is the Romanian society as a migration country, and we derive our hypotheses. Then we describe the methods and data employed in this paper. Findings are structured around the four themes of integration and show a genuine integration into the higher stratum of the society. A final conclusive section includes a discussion on policy and research implications.

2 Mobile EU Citizens and Integration

Mobile EU citizens that move from Western to Eastern European countries are often among the privileged migrants (Kunz, 2016). Being highly skilled, they might be labelled as expatriates, expats, professional migrants, etc., terms that typically share as common features the image of someone that migrates temporally but lives abroad for long, and is typically employed by a transnational corporation as a professional (Bauböck, 2007; Fechtter, 2007; King, 2002; Meier, 2014; von Koppenfels Amanda, 2014). In this sense, that is also our definition, they are seen as “migrants of privilege” (Croucher, 2009, 2018), sometimes expressing lifestyle migrations (Benson & O’Reill, 2009; Hayes, 2014) or deriving gratifications from diving into cosmopolitanism (van Bochove & Engbersen, 2015), sometimes pursuing migration pathways as means to develop a career (Favell, 2008; Leinonen, 2012; Piekut, 2012), for family reasons (Becker & Teney, 2020), and in search for welfare arrangements dependent on life cycle (Jong, & de, and Helga de Valk., 2020). In general, EU highly-skilled migrants are invisible from ethnic-racial point of view, being similar to the local population (Leinonen, 2012), and are subject to transnational professional inclusion (Iredale, 2001), and play an important role as transmitters of cultural norms and social values (Beaverstock, 2002), even though they typically live in their own bubbles with little interaction with the local society (Favell, 2008; Fechtter, 2007). This poses a challenge in assessing integration.

On the one hand, the complexity of the process of integration is shaped by the individual’s cultural, economic and social background, as well as their willingness to integrate at destination. On the other hand, the host country’s institutional web can facilitate or inhibit integration through public policies targeting immigrants and by enhancing personnel’ capacity to interact with immigrants. Based on these aspects, integration processes are usually understood and characterised as multidimensional processes both in academic approaches (Harder et al., 2018; Snel et al., 2006; Voicu & Vlase, 2014; Wrigley, 2012) and in public views (Sobolewska et al., 2017). Both agency and structure of opportunities play their roles in the process (Lutz, 2017).

Individuals richer in human and material capital are well equipped for human agency (Inglehart & Welzel, 2005). Consequently, through their privileged positions, highly-skilled migrants can manipulate both the environment, that they can even ignore and engage solely with their bubble, and to manifest agency by their own in shaping their lives as they wish. This applies quite well in countries where they enter directly into a dominant class.

Integration of high-skilled is considered by existing policy (Kennedy, 2019; Kolbe, 2021; Kolbe & Kayran, 2019; Triadafilopoulos & Smith, 2013). On one hand, there is a natural preoccupation for the well-being of the immigrants themselves, as human beings. On the other hands, societies are interested in having residents that are integrated and contribute to their life, both social, cultural, and economic.

The process of integration may occur in various areas of life. Given the limited space of this chapter, we opt for a narrow selection of such areas, option which is common to other works as well (Snel et al., 2006; Voicu & Vlase, 2014). We consider mastering the language, as pathway to ability for in-depth experiencing and understanding local society. We also investigate employment and entrepreneurship, therefore integration on the labour market and relation to economy. We analyse aspects linked to accessing health services as part of using the welfare state as ordinary citizens. Last but not least, we consider social participation and developing relations with citizens in the host society, in order to tap for informal engagement with the local society.

Our choice of dimensions reflects the categorization by Snel et al. (2006). Learning the language is a first step towards endorsing local norms, which are otherwise addressed as side-topic in all four domains. Integration on the labour market taps for structural integration along with education. We do not discuss education, since it was set up as selection criteria for our target population, and children education comprises complications due to temporality in the migration decisions. The second facet of integration according to Snel et al. (2006) referred to social and cultural integration. On one hand, this implied relations to natives, on the other the endorsement of norms and values of the host society. Relations to natives are reflected in our choices of dimensions through the social participation, that taps for informal relations, and through accessing the health services, which stands for a more formal relationship to the society, and as indicator for understanding local institutions as sets of formal norms and informal practices.

3 Immigration to Romania and Previous Evidence on Integration

Romania is a major country of emigration, with over 3,five million of its citizens officially resident in other EU countries (EUROSTAT, 2020). In this context, the stock of immigrants in Romania is expected to fill in some of the labour gaps resulted from this massive emigration even if these flows are far from being equivalent (Anghel & Coșciug, 2018). To understand the incoming flows, firstly we outline the stock of foreign citizens in Romania and its structure by paying attention to immigrants who are EU citizens. Secondly, we portray the participation of these two categories of foreign citizens on the Romanian labour market.

As compared to a population of roughly 20 million, the total of foreign citizens was around 137 thousand registered in Romania at the end of the year 2019 are like a drop of water into the sea, despite the increase in recent years [in 2018, the stock of foreign citizens was around 120 thousand; while in 2017 it was near the value of 117 thousand - (Coșciug et al., 2019)]. Most of them hold a non-EU citizenship (61,2%), while 38,8% are foreigners with EU citizenship. Italy, Germany and France are the main sources of incoming intra-European migration flows (Table 10.1).

Table 10.1 Number of foreign citizens in Romania in 2019
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Table 10.2 offers insights on the occupations performed by intra-European immigrants in Romania and also pays attention to specificity of the country’s Bucharest capital region. In 2019, there were over 76 thousand work contracts registered for foreign citizens at national level and about half of these are concentrated in the Capital Area (otherwise, about 12% of Romania’s total population is located in this region). About 25% of the EU foreign citizens who work in Romania are registered in the top job category (Managers and other top executives’ positions), while the correspondent percent within the non-EU foreign citizens is less than 5%. The first three ISCO job categories group 57% of the EU foreign workers in Romania (within the capital region it grows to 79%), while among the non-EU workers the corresponding figure is 17% (rising to 27% for the capital region). In brief, the EU workers are concentrated at the top of the job hierarchy, while the non-EU population is rather over-represented within the last three categories of occupations (MGs 7 to 9 cumulate 70% of the non-EU workers countrywide and 52% in the capital Region). Such occupational discrepancies frame individuals and their families’ life in Romania.

Table 10.2 Immigrants’ work contracts registered in 2019
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While labour market integration is a standard dimension of immigrant’s integration into the destination context, the share of managerial and professional occupations of EU-migrants as compared to others is not only impressive, but also provide a hint on the integration within society. Immigrants entrepreneurship depend on their access to economic resources, social capital at destination and mobilization of ethnic capital (Cederberg & Villares-Varela, 2019; Waldinger & Ward, 1990), as well as the transfers of skills, abilities or knowledge gained in other national contexts (Williams, 2007). Individuals’ work trajectories are influenced by their level of education (Marvel et al., 2016) and their capacity to navigate within the destination context (Harder et al., 2018). Linguistic capital (Dustmann, 1999) and previous experiences of running business (Ucbasaran et al., 2008) also matter.

The difference between the capital region and the rest of the country is easy to be explained by the migration magnet that the first became in recent decades. The number of inhabitants make Bucharest the tenth largest European city. Excluding non-EU cities, Bucharest is the sixth, after London, Berlin, Madrid, Rome, and at basically the same size as Paris (roughly 2.1 million) when not including the metropolitan area. In terms of richness, the GDP/capita in the Bucharest/Ilfov NUTS2 area was in 2018 larger than in any region South of it, including the ones in Italy, Spain, or Southern France. According to Eurostat,Footnote 2 there are only a few regions in the Northern and Western Europe to overpass existing yearly produced wealth in Bucharest and surrounding areas, while in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), only Budapest and Warsaw experience similar levels, while Bratislava and Prague are even richer.

Eurostat data for 2018 reports very high inequality for Romania: the GINI coefficient was 35.1, surpassed only by Latvia, Lithuania and Bulgaria (39.6 – the highest in the EU), and much higher than the EU average of 30.4. All Western societies were more equal, while figures for other countries in the CEE were substantially lower: Hungary (28.7), Poland (27.8), Czechia (24.0), Slovakia (20.9).Footnote 3

3.1 Expectations: An Atypical Integration

Bucharest is a large and wealthy city well served by good international transport links, with a vivid night and cultural life, where high inequality directs most of the wealth to the privileged class, making the place attractive for those in search for high living standards, high incomes, or eager to experience life-style migration.

Within this set up, EU mobile citizens in Bucharest meet the needs under the particular drivers of their migrations. But they also face a local elite in full ascension, in particularly boosted by the discussed inequality. In the perspective on migration as liquid, it becomes critical to see integration as part of wider social changes that occur within the immediate context.

With the depicted interplay of differences in status between the society of origin and the host country, and in adjustments of personal status, as well as considering the inequalities to be found in Romania, we expect that integration of highly-skilled EU mobile citizens does not occur in a bubble of foreigners, but rather in a mix of foreign citizens and tiny social class of wealthy Romanians. Citizenship plays a secondary but important role, since the migration flow that we consider is located between international and internal migration in particular due to EU citizenship.

In the following, we inspect the four domains of integration with the aim to depict the situation of our subjects and their coping with Romanian society. We keep in mind the question whether they act as “regular” members of society, as members of a self-selected bubble of foreigners, or as part of a tiny mixed layer of wealthier people at the top of a poorer European society.

4 Data and Methods

To inspect the type of integration of the EU mobile citizens to Bucharest, a set of interviews with 11 such high-skilled Europeans is employed. The interviews were carried out in 2017–2018, by a team led by the first author of this chapter. Recruitment of interviewees was done using direct contact, after identifying them over social networks or through personal recommendations. Three criteria were employed for selection: (1) at least one year of living in Romania, in order to be sure that they had the opportunity to emerge into interaction with the local society; (2) having a family, in order to increase the probability of interacting with social services, including health, education, social insurance etc.; (3) being highly-educated non-Romanian EU citizens.

Out of the 11 interviewees, one had neither partner, nor kids at the time of interview, but we have considered that the interaction with the local society was assessed as deep enough on the basis of his previous experiences (he had a partner for a while living into the country, and also presented various examples during interview of interacting with service providers, including health care, public administration etc.).

The sample reflects the distribution by occupations observed at national level. Intra-EU movers in Romania are professionals in the corporate sector, or entrepreneurs. Most arrived initially for professional reasons, while two come as part of a life-style migration flow. We examine integration of high skilled, mobile EU citizens in four dimensions: linguistic, economic, access to health care, and social integration (seen through volunteering, interest in politics, and connecting with locals). The four themes were part of the interview guide, and were addressed by all the interviewees. The entire set up of the discussion was free with respect to structure, but it started in all cases with the story of coming to Romania. When the mentioned topics were not addressed spontaneously, specific questions were asked on current employment and history of employment, informal relations with Romanian society, interaction with local service providers, family life, knowledge of Romanian language, future intentions. The questions were not standardised, but the themes in the interviews were (Table 10.3).

Table 10.3 List of interviewees
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Nevertheless, the support provided by eleven interviews can be questioned from the point of view of number of interviewees. However, various accounts from late career researchers in the field lead to a canonical view that the optimal number of interviewees in qualitative research is provided by the proverbial “it depends” and it is actually determined by the old saying that one keeps interviewing until information is saturated (Baker & Edwards, 2012). Numbers may become problematic in this respect, and one might need experimental design to test which is the optimum. In such an experiment, Guest et al. (2006) analysed 60 in-depth interviews and concluded that saturation was reached for sure after 12, and “basic elements for metathemes were present as early as six interviews.” (p. 59). Hennink et al. (2017) worked with 25 interviews to determine that 9 were enough for reaching saturation with a shorter code structure, and 16–24 for more refined approaches. Hagaman and Wutich (2017) identified that one needs 4–6 interviews to correctly identify for the first time the three most common themes, and then, the sample size increases to 8, 9 and 12 for identifying again the first, second, and third most important themes. Therefore, our 11 interviews sample, also considering the noted saturation of information, can be considered as relevant for the aims of this study.

5 Results

We present the findings starting with linguistic integration given that this is the first and most obvious sign in any interaction, since language is key to communication. Then we discuss economic integration, which is the typical mean to access material resources in any society. Then we approach interaction with health care systems, which is also related to tangible needs. Lastly, we consider social integration, which is related to higher-level needs as compared to the others.

5.1 Linguistic Integration: Romanian Proficiency

Seven interviews were carried out in English, the language in which we have approached the interviewees. Two interviewees were approached directly in French, their native language, while three switched to Romanian language from the very beginning, as expression of their own preference. Out of the seven interviewees that preferred discussing in English, three have or had Romanian spouses. Another one, CZ1, which is the only one to be reticent to learning or try learning the language, has a Slovak wife that speaks Romanian. Her reasons to learn the local language relates to using it both in business, and for interacting with the school of their children.

Beyond the mere information about the language preferred in communication with the interviewer, all interviewees mentioned the use of English in work-related communication, but also some knowledge of the local language. The reference for English in work-related situation is justified by one of the interviewees through its higher precision as compared to Romanian and the interviewee’s native language – Portuguese.

I understand [Romanian]. I think it’s like Portuguese or English for me in terms of listening, but because I never practice […] I cannot speak. It’s missing me the vocabulary, the training and ... All the environments I live in, everybody speaks in English, it’s a business environment so you need to be sharp, clear and Romanian language is not clear. I used to say to my employees “Come on guys, you are speaking between you in Romanian, and you don’t understand each other. I say to you in English and is clearer […] It is a good way in fact to contact business in English because it’s much clearer than Romanian. It is a Latin language, like the Portuguese, the same thing. […] Latin languages have a lot of ... things that for business are not so good. English is the perfect language for these things. So, I understand really good, people can tell me whatever they say and because I understand well but I keep speaking in English because I know it better, on my day to day this is the language I use. (PT1).

Except for the three interviews carried out in Romanian, IT1 was also fluent in the language of the host country. All others reported limited knowledge that enabled them to understand enough Romanian for managing in daily interaction, but not for more.

Most of those working at the time of interviews or in the past in the local corporate sector reported taking Romanian classes as part of their first interactions with the local society.

Only three of the interviewees (CZ1, FR3, and DE1) mentioned no or very little knowledge of local language. Out of them, DE1 was taking Romanian classes from time to time, but the very busy schedule was impeding him to perseverate. CZ1 was against learning the local language, basing on the above-mention family division in language skills.

Overall, the impression is that Romanian language was not rejected, but actually used as a tool. Contrary to expectations, access and use to Romanian was not find preponderantly among those natives in Roman languages, and is moderated by having a spouse that is native in Romanian or speaks Romanian as foreign language. Therefore, the focus remains on the apparent non-rejection of the local language, which also ease the interaction with locals. This is contrary to the studies carried out in Poland (Andrejuk, 2017; Piekut, 2012) that located high-skilled immigrants in enclaves of foreigners with no or little interaction with natives.

5.2 Economic Integration: Employment and Entrepreneurship

In correspondence with the EU legal framework, Romania’s legislation distinguishes between intra-EU migrants and immigrants who are third-country nationals (extra-EU), as well as refugees and asylum seekers. Our study included people who took advantage of the legal status of intra-EU migrants and this offered them access to the labour market (Voicu et al., 2020). At the same time, their high level of education and training makes them suitable employees for large multinational corporations with subsidiaries in Romania or contributed to their entrepreneurial projects. The two categories of immigrants, highly-skilled employees and entrepreneurs, allow us to illustrate various aspects of their work life.

Firstly, the work in a multinational corporation frames individuals’ work in a cosmopolitan social milieu in which most of the people are willing to comply to economic, cultural and social values which have a transnational/globalized nature (e.g., sustainable use of resources, accepting diversity in terms of sexual orientation, promoting gender equality). It provides knowledge about the Romanian society, but this is mostly limited to the urban and highly-educated young people who qualifies to work in these companies.

Secondly, depending on the market in which the company operates, broader access to the Romanian society can be derived from contacts with production workers or company’s clientele. There are interviewees who point out that within corporations they make efforts to solve local issues through mechanisms based on a deeper understanding of the social problems. However, some of the practices encountered within host country challenge individuals’ migrants economic and work values.

We had a project in Ferentari [a poor neighbourhood in Bucharest], dedicated to energy theft, to address the problem, but without punishing those who do it. At some point those who steal have high costs, it’s a social explanation. You, as a corporation, have to be an actor in the company, which proves that you understand how the company works. (…) Romania was always very conservative; it did not have a disruptive element to change. (IT1).

All our interviewees but one had experiences of living and working in other countries before Romania. For half of them, previous migrations included non-EU countries, but all have at least one experience in another EU country apart for the country of birth.

Their decisions to move in Romania were influenced by work motivations linked to the development of their professional career or to other opportunities from this area. Due to this fact, they have certain expectations from the host country, and they evaluate their work experiences in Romania in contrast to their former (or potential) experiences from other countries.

The organization is much smaller. Very dynamic. The market is kind of growing but not as developed and not as mature (…) You need to have a significantly higher level of flexibility because you are facing things that you wouldn’t expect. Wouldn’t happen in other places. So, I think that is also something that you see in the country where this type of organization there is a lot of growth here which is very good. There’s a lot of flexibility here when it comes to processes being established and kind of how you run the company. (DE1).

[In Romania] (…) I’m going as an expat for a management position and not really going... to... and Romania... has a lot of opportunities and that is a lot of growth. In Portugal is quite stable... so for a young manager, Romania is much more increasing ...intergrowth... giving opportunities and you come with a new vision and this is appreciated in here. In Portugal you wait for the elders to retire so that you can grow. (…).

Otherwise, Romania is full of opportunities because there are a lot of things to do. (PT1)

I came to open the XXX Hotel, that’s... that’s what I came for... I’ve been abroad in my career once before, I’ve been to Kiev, Ukraine (…) I was back in London and I was looking for another job. (...) At that time, it was one of the main hotels, if not the main hotel in Romania, in Bucharest. So, it was certainly a step up and it was certainly I looked upon it as a challenge and something good for my... for my career. (...) Generally it’s an expatriate you pay very well. (UK1).

Those who hold managing positions undertake active roles in changing mentalities within their social circle and companies. Some put emphasis on Romanians lack of self-confidence or on their feelings of inferiority when compared to foreigners. At the same time, some interviewees criticize certain aspects of the Romanian society and emphasize differences between foreigners and Romanians.

Interviewee: I think you are still a bit like this… and you still have a sentiment of ...

Interviewer: inferiority?

Interviewee: ... inferiority. There is no reason anymore, maybe there was in the past, I don’t know I’m not sure, but as today there is no reason for this feeling in Romania anymore and I am spending my time to say it to my friends and my team there is no reason. Is not because we are foreigner that we are better by default and there is nothing to be ashamed for. (…) you always have this feeling that people have this this sentiment of inferiority. (FR3).

Working as an entrepreneur offers a broader image on the host society due to the various interactions with business partners, employees, clients, public institutions, etc. Romania was perceived at the time of migration as an attractive market for developing a business and several participants in our study were motivated to move in Romania by business reasons. They used economic resources and human capital transferred from abroad, but the experience is embedded in the social and institutional milieu of the host society.

Basically, this challenge gave me the possibility to learn out how to be an entrepreneur somehow, because I remain alone, let say, in the business, trying to do something (...) it was a great opportunity to learn, to develop. At a certain moment I had this invitation from a friend that I met here to start a new business, a platform for health business, and I said OK, fine, I like the ideas, let’s do it (…). I like Romania because the location of Romania is perfect. I adapt really good to the country. (PT1).

I have a business and I still have a business in Czech Republic and I tried to expand (…) It’s time for expansion, where the market is bigger (…) So, Bucharest was like I wouldn’t say perfect but it was good (…) that’s why we choose Romania due to being the biggest capital.... Eastern … Southern Europe... (CZ1).

In some cases, the road to entrepreneurship is paved with obstacles that need to be overcome. However, among our interviewee, for some entrepreneurship was the main option from the very beginning of settling in Bucharest, while others followed this path on the way. Among the main challenges for entrepreneurship can be noted language barriers in relation to public authorities and difficulties derived from social interactions and business partnerships. Respondents included in this study managed to overcome these aspects either by constant readjustments of their practices (including or excluding Romanians in their businesses).

(…) language barrier is there, and there I learned if I need something from authorities, I need to have a Romanian beside me. (CZ1)

I met some people here and I started a business that lasted a year and a half. Then, I didn’t want to have an associate anymore, I thought it was better alone because that’s how I see the situation much more clearly and then I kind of changed the approach in terms of trust [in business partners at the destination]. (PL1).

[in Bucharest] people are nice, people here are very entrepreneurial and this is a thing I like very much and when I speak about opportunities there are always opportunities (...). Business life promote that people are very open but it’s quite unstable. This is a characteristic of a country that is still growing, so it’s lacking the maturity of .. you start a project and you know it takes time to succeed, [in Bucharest] people are still looking for the fast product... This is general, the Romanian culture is still lot based on short-cuts, this is something that I conflict more with the culture. (...)

This is the biggest challenge for me let’s say, it is ... to conciliate my vision that is always medium-long term with the vision that the most people have which is very, very short, this is the thing that has been hard for me to conciliate all the time. (PT1)

Within our sample, an interesting case is the one of FR2. He doesn’t believe in the state, and for him it was hard at first, and everything seemed to be going very slowly. He had a negative experience when he opened his first company, he was perceived as a stranger because he moved to a country where people wanted to leave. He also worked for others, as employee, but preferred to be on his own. At the moment of interviewing, he had no employees, he only worked with an accountant. FR2 had at that time no days off, but he has learned not to stress. The program was flexible and decided by FR2 himself, which gave a feeling of control and tranquillity, as well as option for personal fulfilment. This is consistent with the search for finding a tailored life-style, as depicted in existing literature on privileged migration.

Summing up, for most interviews we observed an initial migration as part of the typical pursuing international career patterns of professional employment. For several, such patterns prolonged into changing jobs and switching to entrepreneurship in Romania, as a base country, not as a stop on the route. From this point of view, the interviewed EU mobile citizens missed no integration, and were an actual part of Romanian society. Again, integration was occurring at the top of society.

5.3 Navigational Integration: Access to Healthcare

In Romania, the majority of the population uses the public health system, even if the access to the voluntary health insurance extended during the last decades and is nowadays available for broader categories of people (e.g. some companies’ benefits packages include private medical assurances) - (Vladescu et al., 2016, 66). However, the actual access to private health insurance and private health care is limited to a minority including mainly corporate employees from transnational companies active in banking, IT, and telecommunications, and defines an unequal healthcare landscape (Stan & Toma, 2019). Most of the interviewed immigrants have access to the upper layer of this uneven health care system. They use the private system of healthcare through self-paid or company-paid assurance packages, and consequently act in the manner their type of employment was supposed to predict for a Romanian employee with similar social positions.

In general, EU mobile citizens’ experiences with the private health system were rather positive. They emphasize the medical staff proficiency, adequate medical equipment and the lack of linguistic barriers in accessing these services. Even more, some lack personal experience with the public healthcare sector, but have indirect knowledge upon it through interaction with Romanian co-workers and friends.

I have never been here in a public hospital. I just heard the stories (...) The doctors are good, very competent for the few things I had to do. They really handed perfectly my wife at [name of private clinic], really nice, the equipment is always good. The look is different than what you will see in... the public system. (AT1).

[There is] a big gap between public and private. It is amazing. (…) It’s not a question of education it’s a question of infrastructure who’s not following and give them the room and give them the appetite to stay because they are less paid in public hospital and they leave. (FR3).

Their preference for private health system indicates low levels of confidence in the host country’ public systems and the fear to access the mainstream public system. At discursive level, this is motivated by the poor medical infrastructure of the public system and a diffuse state of anxiety about using the public medical system. Among our interviewees, there were several who had to use to public health system (e.g., hospitals or emergency rooms) and they had mixed experiences which either altered in a positive way their views, or reinforced the negative attitudes towards the public health system. For example, a Spanish woman emphasized that she was very scarred about using the emergency room when her son had an accident at the playground. In her case, this was a first direct contact with the public system, but she gained confidence for using such services since then.

I needed sewing and I was in front of a private clinic and they sent us the public hospital for children and I was a scared that I heard a lot about [the public] health [system] (...)

I was so scared ... I didn’t know if, I take a plane and go to Spain .... just like that, just as fast ... and when I came in and saw it, it wasn’t what I heard. It was very good for us (...).

It was urgent and when I entered, I don’t even know what it was like inside, it was still new, still new devices, still very good and then the ones I received were very fast [medical help] ... (ES1).

Within the sample, there were no mentions of linguistic barriers in accessing the public health system and the interviewees were able to solve their medical issues using English, French or basic Romanian. In general, they did not feel discriminated against because there are foreigners, but one immigrant mentioned a privileged treatment compared to the local population when they accessed public health system.

I feel it was nice first but made me uncomfortable, because we were foreigner and look wealthy, they made us pass in front of lot of poor people and gypsies that they were waiting and that made me feel very uncomfortable as a person. I really had the feeling that they treated us….it was very nice in a way for sure for you but in the meantime shouldn’t happen this, you are in a hospital. So that is with public hospitals. (FR3).

To this general picture about the public health system, some immigrants also added aspects linked to the informal payments made by patients to the medical staff. These are presented as a standard component of the public health system. It can constitute a new incentive for preferring the private health system because for reducing anxiety linked to such informal payments which require some tacit knowledge (How to approach the staff? How much to give as informal payment? Is it legal? Is it dangerous?)

So, when you come from outside, your natural instinct is to paying each month quite a lot of money, so when you go to see the doctor, I mean...you go to see the doctor, it checks you, it tells you what’s wrong, makes you a prescription, and you go and buy it. That’s it. You understand me? You pay each month for that.... I understand people, I’m sure in the hospital they don’t earn a lot of money, I understand that...it’s...it’s something you get used to it, you see this. You go to the hospital, normally you give the doctor some money, or you want to do an operation, you pay for the operation, even if you pay your money each month, it doesn’t matter, you pay for the operation. So, it’s strange, it’s strange. (…).

I think you get used to the system. I find it strange. OK, we’re mainly private so we don’t pay, but I find it strange to go to pay to the doctor, but you get used to it, I suppose. (UK1).

Immigrants’ integration to the host country embeds smooth access to medical services (Ager & Strang, 2008). In Romania, the use of the private health services is a functional mechanism which contribute to their general adaptation at the host country structure of opportunities, but this is highly dependent on immigrants’ economic status, or it can be part of the package of benefits offered by the employer (which is also part of the status, given its embeddedness in the occupational choice). The qualitative approach allows us to see that this type of immigrants is fully aware about the host country health system, and they are able to accomplish their goals by combining private and public services if the case. It also allowed us to observe that they access the same type of services as their Romanian peers and base their judgements on information provided by the same network of peers.

Such navigational integration is similar to what richer/better educated Romanians living in Bucharest are doing: rely on private health care services and to navigate public health care if they have to. Simultaneously, this is contrary to the typical European model, even for expats, and (still) contrary to the habit of most Romanians that rely mainly on public health care system, and use private providers as last resort.

5.4 Social Integration: Volunteering, Interest in Politics, Informal Relations with Locals

The third type of integration is social. As a proxy, we look at experiences with volunteering, interest in politics, and connecting to locals as mechanisms for interacting with parts of the Romanian society. For our highly-skilled interviewees, such social interactions would be a valuable mean to interact and integrate in a wider society than the narrower in-group. Volunteering and participation in associations can be conceived as belonging to a community, and actively involving in solving its intimate problems.

One of the interviewees, a French woman in her 40 s, is intensively part of such activities. She reports engagement with an NGO and helping as volunteer in one of the poorest neighbourhoods in Bucharest. She offers time, knowledge and passion in fighting severe deprivation and poverty.

I know a bit Ferentari because I work with an NGO, I’m helping some people there. I know a bit the poor, really poor side of Bucharest because there is a friend of mine working with NGO helping kids and also helps the mother to learn a new job to be able to sustain their family and I go there, sometimes, when I have time to help. (FR3).

However, the example of FR3 is unique within our sample. Apart from this case, only IT1 exhibit examples of involvement in associations and volunteering. For all others, such forms of social participation were not an option. Reasons remain less obvious but are unlikely to be related to the structure of opportunity or to personal characteristics. The structure of opportunity is indeed not very developed in Romania, a country with lower levels of participation, but the society, and in particular larger cities, were increasingly witnessing a blooming voluntary sector, in which the typical volunteer has the same profile as our highly-educated EU mobile citizens (Voicu et al., 2020). Therefore, lack of reported participation in volunteering and associative life is a potential indication for lower social integration.

This could be retrieved in low interest in local politics, which is also part of blending within the large society and not only in the immediate community of peers. Out of the eleven interviews, only AT1 reports sparse political interest in Romanian politics, while IT1 is quite active in this respect. However, interest in politics is low with respect to politics in the countries of origin as well. AT1 manifests a moderate interest in Austrian politics, CZ1 and IT1 know quite well the situation in their country of origin, PT1 has a low interest, while all the others reject, even with nihilism (in case of FR2) anything that relates to politics.

Interviewee: Have some feeds from Portuguese media so that I kind of know what is going on there, not that it really interests me but it permits some Portuguese news, If I am going the embassy and they say “A you know what app and write and blablabla and I don’t know anything not likely so I keep this feed which I screen every day to you in country but just to add to what to talk when I meet them. They are not so many but ...

Interviewer: You mean here in Bucharest.

Interviewee: In Bucharest yeah … I’m not really into politics story anything or like that so…I was discussing this morning with a friend, she was telling “Ah, you know about Bucharest highly new govern that was unified and about a guy.

(…) So …because… I wasn’t assigned for these means and I really don’t believe politicians can be friends so…for me it’s completely indifferent things like that. (…)

Beyond these more formal ways to interact with Romania, there are the connections with locals. In this respect, only one interviewee (DE1) does not report at least a type of regular interaction with local people, for leisure, family relations, dining out, sports, etc. Romanian spouses play their roles, but the main agents for relationship are still the co-workers and the schoolmates of children. This leads again to a sort of integration in the same social strata, and little interaction outside it.

I have my wife that is Romanian first of all, I have a lot of Romanian friends (...) I made a group of football. There came all nationalities, we start to play, sometimes we are 6–7 players, sometimes we are up to 10, sometimes we are 20, there was a period when we were like 20 and they were Romanians, they were foreigners, they were from everywhere. (PT1).

Here?? I do not have many [friends’, haha... We have met a lady, and we see each other, she and her husband are Romanians, their children are a little older than ours. Otherwise, we do not ... We stay together, teh four of us, we do not exit or meet people. [Our daughter] plays with a girl in kindergarten, and we were invited twice at Romanian kids’ parties, and we have been also once in [an amusement park]. (ES1).

[Our kids] have very good friends from school. Their best friends are Romanian (PL1).

We have both Romanian and non-Romanian friends, probably more Romanian, because I don’t work for foreigners generally, but with Romanians (UK1)

6 Conclusion

In this chapter, we have depicted the situation of intra-EU skilled migrants to Bucharest from the point of view of their integration in the local society. The findings place them in a selected non-migrant bubble that reunites local elites and foreigners. In fact, some of the interviewees explicitly stated that they are not part of a migrant bubble. With the potential limitation related to the low number of interviews, we have noticed the preferential access to private health care service, employment in managerial and top-level professional positions or as entrepreneurs, a limited formal social participation, compensated with informal contacts to Romanian society, and quite a high level of mastering and accepting local language, despite the preference for the nowadays lingua franca – English. EU citizenship was the background factor that boosted stability along with personal skills in easing the integration within the local community. Both contributed to the liquidity of the migration process through which the EU high-skilled migrants underwent.

Liquid migration implies unpredictability, temporality – sometimes expressed through circularity of movement, loser family ties – that stress the importance of social integration, a focus on employment, complemented with a migratory habitus that goes beyond the typical constraints given by material and social connections, and may stress lifestyle (Engbersen, 2018). We found all these characteristics reflected in the situation of our interviewees. They are in a fluid situation with respect to the desired length of staying, with the prospective settlement, with their family relations outside Romania, etc.

The integration is not done into the broader Romanian society, but in a thin selected stratum that reunites professionals. In many ways, the situation reminds of the segmented assimilation theory. However, the type of integration that we observe is somehow reversed: the EU mobile citizens are far from getting a stable position within the lower class, but they actually become part of the upper-middle or upper-class with the Romanian society. Their interactions with this class are quite powerful, and the exchanges are likely to be frequent and meaningful.

We explain the difference to the studies carried out elsewhere throughout the peculiar situation of the Bucharest-Ilfov region: a rich enclave in a poorer country. In the paper we did not report on the rather negative image that Romania had in the eyes of EU migrant citizens prior to coming to the country, and on the rather positive views at the time of interviews, but they are part of the definitory experiences that they have.

As compared to their potential situation in the home country, their high social status in Romania is a sign of relatively higher social mobility. This creates the context for the type of integration that we have described. It also comes with a general feeling of superiority as compared to the local society. It is worthy to mention that such representation is also common among the Romanian members of the stratum in which EU mobile citizens integrate, which often express feelings of disappointment with the wider Romanian society.

Nevertheless, with migration being liquid, the presence of EU migrants in the Romanian society can be temporary, and their integration simply fluid. Further research could consider stability of their presence within the society, and to which extent they manage to engage in exchanges that lead to contagion of values and lending norms and habits from the societies of origin to the host society, as well as borrowing and transmitting home such norms, values, and habits taken from the Romanian context.

The findings may also be important for policy makers. We go far beyond the typical debate on European integration policy that traditionally focused on third-country nationals that migrated into West-European countries (Engbersen, 2018). By considering the intra-European movement we consider a process that is actual, increases in size, and brings under the focus different needs and a debate that goes beyond citizenship. In fact, citizenship is the prerequisite that tend to divert attention from potential needs for intervention with respect to integration. The intra-EU high skilled migrants that we have studied are sui generis citizens with lower request for support. The local regulators should consider such integrated communities as part of their object for policy making: Expressing citizenship might be partially blocked by partial linguistic integration, while access to provision of social service is avoiding the public sector. When hazards occur, such actual citizens may face difficulties to cope with stressors, both in Romania and in their countries of birth. Tailored policies are needed to be prepared if the number of EU mobile citizens to Bucharest or in the wider Romania increases.

From a different perspective, representatives of other EU countries could consider such mobile citizens as potential factors to boost their interests among the upper-middle class of the Romanian society, that is within the influential stratum of the society. Citizenship becomes in this respect an asset that can be used for both the migrants, their communities of birth, and the societies in which they reside.

In this chapter we treated the EU high-skilled mobile citizens to Bucharest as a homogeneous group. The scope of the paper did not allow discussing gender-related differences, the role of age, West-East origin etc. Further research should explore such distinction, with the aim to increase knowledge related to this newer form of intra-European migration. Comparison to non-EU similar migrants can help understanding the role of citizenship in the process.

Data Sources

  1. 1.

    EUROSTAT

  2. 2.

    General Inspectorate for Immigration in Romania

  3. 3.

    Work Inspection, Ministry of Labour and Social Protection (Romania)