Conceptual dimension of migration phenomenon

Definitions

Migration is a universal phenomenon that has taken place since the existence of humanity. Human beings have migrated to other places to live in better conditions by changing the places they live for some reasons. This change of place is not a simple or ordinary phenomenon; It is the event that they carry their own cultural elements to the places they go and whether they can adopt the cultural elements of the place they go.

It is a comprehensive and highly debated topic of recent years, whose research is multifaceted. Migration is a phenomenon that needs to be examined in sociological, cultural and psychological as well as economic and legal dimensions; because with the increase in migration events in recent years, the demographic structure of the world has also changed. This change necessitated more academic study of the phenomenon of migration. Concepts related to migration have started to be given more place. Many researches and articles have been written in academic journals on the terms, causes, types and results of the phenomenon of migration. According to the studies, between 2000 and 2016, there were more than 2,400 in the two peer-reviewed journals, the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies (JEMS) and Ethnic and Racial Studies (ERS-Ethnicity and Race Studies). More articles have been published. According to the results of this research, scientific interest in migration studies has increased in an unprecedented way in the last 16 years.

Terms and definitions related to migration are often confused, incomprehensible, contradictory and even controversial issues. The usage patterns of migration terms have different meanings from country to country and even in different cities within the same country. In the absence of a generally accepted definition, each group or point of view tried to make its own definition. In its most general definition, migration is the movement of population from one place to another.

According to TDK, migration; It is defined as “the act of moving individuals or communities from one country to another, from one settlement to another for economic, social and political reasons, moving”.

According to the International Migration Law Dictionary of Migration Terms, the definition of migration is: To move across an international border or within a state. It is the population movements in which people are displaced regardless of their duration, structure and reason. This includes refugees, internally displaced persons, displaced persons and economic migrants.

In the International Migration Law Dictionary of Migration Terms, migrant: It covers the person and family members who migrate to another country or region in order to improve their financial and social situation and to increase the future expectations of themselves or their families.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), on the other hand, defines a migrant as “an individual who has resided in a foreign country for more than one year, regardless of reasons, whether voluntary or not, migration routes, regular or irregular”.

While there is no unity in the definition of the concept of immigrant, the definitions of immigrant and refugee have also caused confusion. The term refugee, which is the Turkish meaning of the English word 'refugee', and the term immigrant are often confused with each other. The terms immigrant and refugee are used separately in international law. While a migrant is a person who leaves voluntarily and for better living conditions, a refugee is a person who leaves his country for compelling reasons, to find a safe place.

Refugee: “A person who is outside the country of his/her nationality due to a well-founded fear of persecution because of his/her race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group and political views, and who does not wish to benefit from the protection of the relevant country because of such fear” Confusion between the terms refugee and It is also seen in the concepts of asylum seekers.

Asylum, (Old language Asylum): “The concept of asylum, which has no definition in international law, can be defined as a person leaving his country due to various pressures and being subject to the protection of another country”…

Asylum seeker: “A person who seeks security in a country other than his/her own country in order to be protected from persecution or serious harm and awaits the outcome of his/her application for refugee status within the framework of relevant national or international documents. As a result of a negative decision, these persons have to leave the country and may be deported like any foreigner who is in an irregular or illegal situation in the country if they are not allowed to stay in the country on humanitarian or other grounds.

Irregular Immigrant: This is one of the most confused concepts. According to IOM's definition, "a person who lacks legal status in a transit or host country due to illegal entry, violation of entry conditions, or expiration of the visa" is defined. This concept has revealed the concepts of legal and illegal immigration and immigrant. Irregular immigration In the concept of the absence of documents and records, there is an illegal situation. In recent years, many countries have seen irregular migrants as a risky and dangerous element for their borders and have broadened and deepened their border controls, since their numbers could not be fully recorded by the state. In order to control illegal migration and irregular migration to the EU, new technologies and surveillance mechanisms have been established and electronic monitoring systems have been established.

As it can be understood from the definition above, an asylum seeker also seeks asylum in the country from which he fled, like a refugee, but an asylum seeker is a person whose application for asylum has not been concluded, but is under legal investigation in the country of asylum. Asylum seekers are considered as foreigners benefiting from a temporary protection

Types of Migration

Migrations can be classified in various ways. According to their reasons, they appear as forced and voluntary migrations. Voluntary migration is when individuals voluntarily migrate to other places to benefit from better opportunities. It is forced migration for people to migrate from their place of residence to other places due to reasons such as war, disaster, exile, against their will, and refugees and exchange migrations can be given as examples.

While the population movements within the borders of the country are internal migration; Population movements that cross the borders of the country are external migration. Migration from rural areas to cities in Turkey after 1950s; Then there were mass migrations from Turkey to the industrialized countries of Europe. As a result of the migration of qualified, young and productive people from the underdeveloped Eastern regions of our country, together with the accumulated capital, to the industrially developed Western Anatolian regions, our Eastern Anatolian and Southeastern Anatolian Regions lost both their manpower and the assets and capital they took with them and became impoverished. Today, when we look at it in general, all countries experience external migration problems for various reasons. Some of the reasons are as follows: Economic reasons, high unemployment rate, natural disasters, wars, regime changes in countries and changes in borders.

The situation where individuals leave their place of residence and settle in another place is called permanent migration. Seasonal migration, on the other hand, is the situation in which people spend a certain period of a year in another country to work. For example, people migrate to tourist centers in summer to work during the tourist season.

Legal and illegal immigration are types of immigration named according to their methods. legal immigration; human mobility is carried out in accordance with laws and regulations, that is, by legal means. A person who legally immigrates from one country to another has a valid immigration visa and all legal documents. Illegal immigration, on the other hand, can be defined as entering, staying and working in ways that do not comply with the laws and regulations of the sending, transit and immigration countries. As an example, immigrants from Syria and Afghanistan, who come to our country illegally by land and sea every year, can be given as an example.

Reasons for Migration with Theories

The first migration theory is the "Laws of Migration", which was published by the geographer Ravenstein in 1885 and consists of 7 articles.

Migration and Distance: Immigrants generally tend to migrate to short-distance places and migrate to large industrial and commercial centers where job opportunities are plentiful.

Migration and its steps: Developing trade and industrialization in cities attract people from rural areas to urban areas, the population in the rural area of ​​that city decreases, but this decrease increases with immigrants coming from more distant regions. In other words, places that gradually thin out and vacate are filled by immigrants from nearby areas.

The process of diffusion and absorption: According to Ravenstein, people do not migrate just to have migrated. They have a purpose to migrate; this aim is to get a share from the developing economy in the city. This process is the diffusion process. Developing industry in cities also needs workforce, and meeting this need with migration to industrial centers is also a process of absorption.

Migration chains: According to Ravenstein, migration develops in a chain over time, and the settlements that receive migration also give migration. Each wave of migration triggers another, and a wave of migration occurs and the chain continues.

Direct migration: those who migrate long distances prefer large trade and industrial centers.

People living in cities tend to migrate less than those living in rural areas.

Ravenstein's last law is about gender, and according to him, women tend to immigrate more than men. Men tend to migrate abroad and long distance, while women tend towards short distance and domestic migration. Ravenstein's immigration laws laid the groundwork for later immigration studies, immigration theories and models. However, it is thought that there is incomplete and insufficient understanding of today's multi-factor and more complex migration phenomenon.

Stouffer's Theory of Migration: Samuel Stouffer's 1940 "Crossing Opportunities: Theory of Mobility and Distance" (Interverning Opportunities: A Theory Relating Mobility and Distance)”; It is considered as a sociologically based study in which the phenomenon of migration is examined both geographically and economically. Stouffer in this article; emphasized that distance is a very important factor in the phenomenon of migration. According to Stouffer's theory; The number of people migrating a certain distance is directly proportional to the number of opportunities at that distance. At the same time, the number of people migrating and the rate of increase in opportunities in distance traveled are directly proportional to each other.

Arthur Lewis (1954), Sjaastad (1962) and Harris-Todaro (1970) emphasized in their studies that, unlike traditional theories, the phenomenon of migration is of economic origin and that the individual is an immigrant who makes a rational (micro-based) cost-benefit calculation.

In his 1954 article “Economic Development with Unlimited Supplies of Labor”, Arthur Lewis examined the relationship between the unlimited supply of labor and economic development. According to Lewis, people migrate from places with low wages to places where resources are scarce and wages are high.

Larry Sjaastad, in his article titled “The Costs and Returns of Human Migration” published in 1962, says that people are rational and make a decision to migrate by calculating costs. If people's returns are more than the costs to be incurred, the decision to migrate takes place. According to Sjaastad, the cost factors that people consider when making a migration decision are as follows: monetary cost (costs during the migration process such as transportation, meals, accommodation), opportunity costs (income earned during the journey, while looking for a job, and learning a new job) and its spiritual cost (separation from the environment, family and friends).

Everett Lee's article "A Theory of Migration", published in 1966, also explained the push-pull factors of the migration phenomenon. As pull factors; places with high economic development, high income or better income situations, high security level and easy access to the labor market. Pushing factors are; places with economic unemployment, low income, heavy taxes, poverty, discrimination, restrictions on freedom of thought or religion, bad climate and natural conditions. Lee; He listed the process of immigration and the factors that affect immigrants' decision to migrate; a) Location-related factors b) Destination-related factors c) Interfering obstacles d) Individual factors.

Willam Petersen, on the other hand, investigated the main reasons underlying the push-pull factors in his studies. According to Petersen, the historical cycle is very important in the phenomenon of migration because; a feature seen as a push factor for migration in a certain period of time can be seen as a pull factor in a certain period. Fluctuations in the economy of a country affect the upper, middle and lower classes in that country in different ways and cause people to decide to migrate.

Mabongunje became the pioneer of migration systems theory with his article “Systems Approach to A Theory of Rural-Urban Migration” published in 1970. Migration systems theory is a theory developed within the framework of international relations, on economic and political grounds. According to this theory; Two or more countries mutually form a migration system and a chain of relations with the exchange of immigrants. This relationship can be between two close countries, or between countries and regions that are very distant from each other. Before the immigration relationship, there is a relationship based on commercial and financial relations or cultural ties between the two sending and receiving countries. E.g; The basis of the migration movement from Algeria to France is the presence of the French colony in Algeria.

Immanuel Wallerstein's work on migration is also known as "center-periphery theory, world systems analysis, modern world systems theory". In his research and studies on migration, Wallerstein evaluated the factors that cause migration from a different perspective than the previously described theories. According to Wallerstein, the reason for migration mobility is the capitalist system. There are core and peripheral countries that are mutually dependent on each other. Core countries are countries that are economically and socially developed and generally adopted the capitalist system of relations. Peripheral countries are those that are dependent on core countries surrounded by networks and values ​​within the capitalist system. The Core and Peripheral countries are mutually dependent on each other within the framework of the system of capitalist values ​​and economic imperatives. According to this system; Central countries need cheap labor, raw materials and peripheral countries for the marketing of manufactured goods. Peripheral countries, on the other hand, are central countries to complete their capitalist development.

 They are included in this type of relationship system. Thus, a bilateral dependency chain is created between the core and peripheral countries. This dependency chain operation causes both migration from the peripheral countries to the central countries and a continuous migration within the surrounding country itself.

Network Theory: According to the network theory, the immigrant social networks established between the receiving country and the sending country and the continuity of these networks are effective on mutual migrations. Network theory simply consists of the necessary knowledge, experience and guidance between people who have migrated and people who want to migrate. There is no formula and recipe for the formation of migrant networks. Networks form spontaneously in the first stage and develop spontaneously over time. In other words, the social network established with the first migration stage grows stronger with subsequent migrations and continues. The positive effect of migrant networks is that they facilitate the social integration of newly arrived migrants. The negative effect of immigrant networks is that new immigrants avoid contact with the public in the country they migrated to, causing them to withdraw into their own group. Turkish immigrants living in Germany can be given as an example to this situation. Among the Turkish immigrants living in Germany, there are still people who do not speak German and have not left their Turkish neighborhood. It shows that adaptation to the country of immigration cannot be achieved, and this is the negative result of the social networks formed among immigrants. Network theory, unlike other theories, emphasizes the individual by trying to understand migration through immigrants.

Oded Stark and David Bloom, in their joint article "The New Economics of Labor Migration"; They brought a new perspective by emphasizing that the decision to migrate is not only an individual decision, but that the family and other family members are also influential in this decision, and that a joint decision is taken. According to the theory, the purpose of immigration decision is not only to increase income, but also to reduce income risks to a minimum by calculating. Family members look for ways to obtain an income that will minimize fluctuations in income by determining the economic activities in the place where they live and where they intend to migrate. For example; If there is economic disruption and distress in the place where the immigrant comes from, the immigrant can send money to his family and this money can be used for living and even for investment purposes. .

The migration theory developed by Guilomoto and Sandron is known as the "Institutional Theory". According to the theory, there is limited visa incompatibility between the sending country and the country that will receive these immigrants. For-profit and non-profit institutions and organizations have been established to resolve the problems arising from this incompatibility. While for-profit organizations solve these problems by resorting to illegal means (by issuing forged documents, issuing documents for travel and forged marriages); non-profit institutions and organizations inform immigrants about immigration laws and provide services such as social services and legal advice.

As a result; Migration theories examined so far do not have any superiority over the other and these theories are the sources used to understand the international migrations in our age. One of the important events that have taken place in the world in recent years is that immigration is constantly on the agenda in national and international politics. While migration started simple with the beginning of history, the concept of migration has become modern and complex with the creation of the modern world by human beings, and has an important place as a phenomenon that needs to be studied, researched and developed with theories. It is a subject that is tried to be solved by scientists in every period with its definitions, concepts, reasons and results. Lawyers, sociologists, political scientists; They produced, wrote and explained the constantly changing and added definitions and theories in the phenomenon of migration. Especially recently, the status of immigrants from Syria and Afghanistan in Turkey has been discussed a lot. But in general, it was only the simple definition of the word immigrant that most of our people learned. For years, the distinctions that need to be considered in detail, whether those who came from Syria and lived among us are asylum seekers or refugees, legal immigrants or illegal immigrants, have been overshadowed by our hospitality.

(To be continued: International Migration)

Resources:

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