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Introduction: Mobility Against the Stream? New Concepts, Methodological Approaches and Regional Perspectives on Return Migration in Europe

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Return Migration and Regional Development in Europe

Part of the book series: New Geographies of Europe ((NGE))

Abstract

In The Road Home, the reader can accompany the fictive character of Lev, an Eastern European migrant heading to the UK to find a job and support his family back home. Having just left his home country, he is already thinking about his return. English novelist Rose Tremain tells a story, typical of the migration patterns within Europe since the mid-2000s. The Eastern enlargement of the EU and the creation of a common European labour market induced significant migration flows from the post-socialist countries of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) to high-income countries, mainly in Western and Northern Europe. Consequently, many regions throughout CEE have been experiencing large-scale emigration of labour, whereas many regions in the ‘old’ Europe have benefited from the arrival of skilled labour. This imbalance in labour migration has raised new concerns about social, economic and territorial cohesion throughout the EU.

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Acknowledgements

The Re-Turn project aimed at pushing the topic of return migration on to the political agenda, providing an account of the extent of return migration and the competences and needs of returning migrants as well as the concrete measures to promote remigration as a source to foster knowledge development in home regions. Re-Turn’s objective was to identify, advance and implement measures to capitalise on returning migrants and thus enhance human capital and return migrants’ entrepreneurial abilities in participating regions. The introduction draws partly on the results of collaborative work with Aline Hämmerling, Stefan Haunstein, Anika Schmidt, Jan Keil (Leibniz Institute for Regional Geography, Leipzig, Germany); Stefanie Smoliner (Centre for Social Innovation, Vienna, Austria); Lajos Boros, Gábor Hegedűs, Gábor Lados (University of Szeged, Hungary). The Re-Turn project was funded by the ERDF in the frame of the CENTRAL EUROPE programme (contract no. 1568CC19BC5FA1D9720AB3BD3220ACA9; see also http://www.re-migrants.eu).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Regional Geography of Europe, Leibniz-Institut für Länderkunde, Leipzig, Germany

    Thilo Lang & Robert Nadler

  2. Institute for European Studies, TU Chemnitz, Chemnitz, Germany

    Birgit Glorius

  3. Department of Economic and Social Geography, University of Szeged, Szeged, and Institute of Geography, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest, Hungary

    Zoltán Kovács

Authors
  1. Thilo Lang
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  2. Birgit Glorius
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  3. Robert Nadler
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  4. Zoltán Kovács
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Leibniz Institute for Regional Geography, Leipzig, Germany

    Robert Nadler

  2. University of Szeged, Szeged, Hungary

    Zoltán Kovács

  3. Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Chemnitz, Germany

    Birgit Glorius

  4. Chemnitz University of Technology, Leipzig, Germany

    Thilo Lang

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© 2016 The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s)

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Lang, T., Glorius, B., Nadler, R., Kovács, Z. (2016). Introduction: Mobility Against the Stream? New Concepts, Methodological Approaches and Regional Perspectives on Return Migration in Europe. In: Nadler, R., Kovács, Z., Glorius, B., Lang, T. (eds) Return Migration and Regional Development in Europe. New Geographies of Europe. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-57509-8_1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-57509-8_1

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-137-57508-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-137-57509-8

  • eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)

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