literature review of migration

• Search Menu
• Advance articles
• Editor's Choice
• Author Guidelines
• Submission Site
• Open Access
• Why Publish?
• About Migration Studies
• Editorial Board
• Call for Papers
• Advertising and Corporate Services
• Journals Career Network
• Self-Archiving Policy
• Dispatch Dates
• Journals on Oxford Academic
• Books on Oxford Academic

Article Contents

1. introduction, 2. studies of migration studies, 3. methodology, 4. metadata on migration studies, 5. topic clusters in migration studies, 6. trends in topic networks in migration studies, 7. conclusions, acknowledgements.

• < Previous

Mapping migration studies: An empirical analysis of the coming of age of a research field

• Article contents
• Figures & tables
• Supplementary Data

Asya Pisarevskaya, Nathan Levy, Peter Scholten, Joost Jansen, Mapping migration studies: An empirical analysis of the coming of age of a research field, Migration Studies , Volume 8, Issue 3, September 2020, Pages 455–481, https://doi.org/10.1093/migration/mnz031

• Permissions Icon Permissions

Migration studies have developed rapidly as a research field over the past decades. This article provides an empirical analysis not only on the development in volume and the internationalization of the field, but also on the development in terms of topical focus within migration studies over the past three decades. To capture volume, internationalisation, and topic focus, our analysis involves a computer-based topic modelling of the landscape of migration studies. Rather than a linear growth path towards an increasingly diversified and fragmented field, as suggested in the literature, this reveals a more complex path of coming of age of migration studies. Although there seems to be even an accelerated growth for migration studies in terms of volume, its internationalisation proceeds only slowly. Furthermore, our analysis shows that rather than a growth of diversification of topics within migration topic, we see a shift between various topics within the field. Finally, our study shows that there is no consistent trend to more fragmentation in the field; in contrast, it reveals a recent recovery of connectedness between the topics in the field, suggesting an institutionalisation or even theoretical and conceptual coming of age of migration studies.

Migration studies have developed rapidly as a research field in recent decades. It encompasses studies on all types of international and internal migration, migrants, and migration-related diversity ( King, 2002 ; Scholten, 2018 ). Many scholars have observed the increase in the volume of research on migration ( Massey et al., 1998 ; Bommes and Morawska, 2005 ; Scholten et al., 2015 ). Additionally, the field has become increasingly varied in terms of links to broader disciplines ( King, 2012 ; Brettell and Hollifield, 2014 ) and in terms of different methods used ( Vargas-Silva, 2012 ; Zapata-Barrero and Yalaz, 2018 ). It is now a field that has in many senses ‘come of age’: it has internationalised with scholars involved from many countries; it has institutionalised through a growing number of journals; an increasing number of institutes dedicated to migration studies; and more and more students are pursuing migration-related courses. These trends are also visible in the growing presence of international research networks in the field of migration.

Besides looking at the development of migration in studies in terms of size, interdisciplinarity, internationalisation, and institutionalisation, we focus in this article on the development in topical focus of migration studies. We address the question how has the field of migration studies developed in terms of its topical focuses? What topics have been discussed within migration studies? How has the topical composition of the field changed, both in terms of diversity (versus unity) and connectedness (versus fragmentation)? Here, the focus is not on influential publications, authors, or institutes, but rather on what topics scholars have written about in migration studies. The degree of diversity among and connectedness between these topics, especially in the context of quantitative growth, will provide an empirical indication of whether a ‘field’ of migration studies exists, or to what extent it is fragmented.

Consideration of the development of migration studies invokes several theoretical questions. Various scholars have argued that the growth of migration studies has kept pace not only with the growing prominence of migration itself but also with the growing attention of nation–states in particular towards controlling migration. The coproduction of knowledge between research and policy, some argue ( Scholten, 2011 ), has given migration research an inclination towards paradigmatic closure, especially around specific national perspectives on migration. Wimmer and Glick Schiller (2002 ) speak in this regard of ‘methodological nationalism’, and others refer to the prominence of national models that would be reproduced by scholars and policymakers ( Bommes and Morawska, 2005 ; Favell, 2003 ). More generally, this has led, some might argue, to an overconcentration of the field on a narrow number of topics, such as integration and migration control, and a consequent call to ‘de-migranticise’ migration research ( Dahinden, 2016 ; see also Schinkel, 2018 ).

However, recent studies suggest that the growth of migration studies involves a ‘coming of age’ in terms of growing diversity of research within the field. This diversification of migration studies has occurred along the lines of internationalisation ( Scholten et al., 2015 ), disciplinary variation ( Yans-McLaughlin, 1990 ; King, 2012 ; Brettell and Hollifield, 2014 ) and methodological variation ( Vargas-Silva, 2012 ; Zapata-Barrero and Yalaz, 2018 ). The International Organization for Migration ( IOM, 2017 : 95) even concludes that ‘the volume, diversity, and growth of both white and grey literature preclude a [manual] systematic review’ of migration research produced in 2015 and 2016 alone .

Nonetheless, in this article, we attempt to empirically trace the development of migration studies over the past three decades, and seek to find evidence for the claim that the ‘coming of age’ of migration studies indeed involves a broadening of the variety of topics within the field. We pursue an inductive approach to mapping the academic landscape of >30 years of migration studies. This includes a content analysis based on a topic modelling algorithm, applied to publications from migration journals and book series. We trace the changes over time of how the topics are distributed within the corpus and the extent to which they refer to one another. We conclude by giving a first interpretation of the patterns we found in the coming of age of migration studies, which is to set an agenda for further studies of and reflection on the development of this research field. While migration research is certainly not limited to journals and book series that focus specifically on migration, our methods enable us to gain a representative snapshot of what the field looks like, using content from sources that migration researchers regard as relevant.

Migration has always been studied from a variety of disciplines ( Cohen, 1996 ; Brettell and Hollifield, 2014 ), such as economics, sociology, history, and demography ( van Dalen, 2018 ), using a variety of methods ( Vargas-Silva, 2012 ; Zapata-Barrero and Yalaz, 2018 ), and in a number of countries ( Carling, 2015 ), though dominated by Northern Hemisphere scholarship (see, e.g. Piguet et al., 2018 ), especially from North America and Europe ( Bommes and Morawska, 2005 ). Taking stock of various studies on the development of migration studies, we can define several expectations that we will put to an empirical test.

Ravenstein’s (1885) 11 Laws of Migration is widely regarded as the beginning of scholarly thinking on this topic (see Zolberg, 1989 ; Greenwood and Hunt, 2003 ; Castles and Miller, 2014 ; Nestorowicz and Anacka, 2018 ). Thomas and Znaniecki’s (1918) five-volume study of Polish migrants in Europe and America laid is also noted as an early example of migration research. However, according to Greenwood and Hunt (2003 ), migration research ‘took off’ in the 1930s when Thomas (1938) indexed 191 studies of migration across the USA, UK, and Germany. Most ‘early’ migration research was quantitative (see, e.g. Thornthwaite, 1934 ; Thomas, 1938 ). In addition, from the beginning, migration research developed with two empirical traditions: research on internal migration and research on international migration ( King and Skeldon, 2010 ; Nestorowicz and Anacka, 2018 : 2).

In subsequent decades, studies of migration studies describe a burgeoning field. Pedraza-Bailey (1990) refers to a ‘veritable boom’ of knowledge production by the 1980s. A prominent part of these debates focussed around the concept of assimilation ( Gordon, 1964 ) in the 1950s and 1960s (see also Morawska, 1990 ). By the 1970s, in light of the civil rights movements, researchers were increasingly focussed on race and ethnic relations. However, migration research in this period lacked an interdisciplinary ‘synthesis’ and was likely not well-connected ( Kritz et al., 1981 : 10; Pryor, 1981 ; King, 2012 : 9–11). Through the 1980s, European migration scholarship was ‘catching up’ ( Bommes and Morawska, 2005 : 14) with the larger field across the Atlantic. Substantively, research became increasingly mindful of migrant experiences and critical of (national) borders and policies ( Pedraza-Bailey, 1990 : 49). King (2012) also observes this ‘cultural turn’ towards more qualitative anthropological migration research by the beginning of the 1990s, reflective of trends in social sciences more widely ( King, 2012 : 24). In the 1990s, Massey et al. (1993, 1998 ) and Massey (1994) reflected on the state of the academic landscape. Their literature review (1998) notes over 300 articles on immigration in the USA, and over 150 European publications. Despite growth, they note that the field did not develop as coherently in Europe at it had done in North America (1998: 122).

We therefore expect to see a significant growth of the field during the 1980s and 1990s, and more fragmentation, with a prominence of topics related to culture and borders.

At the turn of the millennium, Portes (1997) lists what were, in his view, the five key themes in (international) migration research: 1 transnational communities; 2 the new second generation; 3 households and gender; 4 states and state systems; and 5 cross-national comparisons. This came a year after Cohen’s review of Theories of Migration (1996), which classifies nine key thematic ‘dyads’ in migration studies, such as internal versus international migration; individual versus contextual reasons to migrate; temporary versus permanent migration; and push versus pull factors (see full list in Cohen, 1996 : 12–15). However, despite increasing knowledge production, Portes argues that the problem in these years was the opposite of what Kritz et al. (1981) observe above; scholars had access to and generated increasing amounts of data, but failed to achieve ‘conceptual breakthrough’ ( Portes, 1997 : 801), again suggesting fragmentation in the field.

Thus, in late 1990s and early 2000s scholarship we expect to find a prominence of topics related to these five themes, and a limited number of “new” topics.

In the 21st century, studies of migration studies indicate that there has been a re-orientation away from ‘states and state systems’. This is exemplified by Wimmer and Glick Schiller’s (2002) widely cited commentary on ‘methodological nationalism’, and the alleged naturalisation of nation-state societies in migration research (see Thranhardt and Bommes, 2010 ), leading to an apparent pre-occupation with the integration paradigm since the 1980s according to Favell (2003) and others ( Dahinden, 2016 ; Schinkel, 2018 ). This debate is picked up in Bommes and Morawska’s (2005) edited volume, and Lavenex (2005) . Describing this shift, Geddes (2005) , in the same volume, observes a trend of ‘Europeanised’ knowledge production, stimulated by the research framework programmes of the EU. Meanwhile, on this topic, others highlight a ‘local turn’ in migration and diversity research ( Caponio and Borkert, 2010 ; Zapata-Barrero et al., 2017) .

In this light, we expect to observe a growth in references to European (and other supra-national) level and local-level topics in the 21t century compared to before 2000.

As well as the ‘cultural turn’ mentioned above, King (2012 : 24–25) observes a re-inscription of migration within wider social phenomena—in terms of changes to the constitutive elements of host (and sending) societies—as a key development in recent migration scholarship. Furthermore, transnationalism, in his view, continues to dominate scholarship, though this dominance is disproportionate, he argues, to empirical reality. According to Scholten (2018) , migration research has indeed become more complex as the century has progressed. While the field has continued to grow and institutionalise thanks to networks like International Migration, Integration and Social Cohesion in Europe (IMISCOE) and Network of Migration Research on Africa (NOMRA), this has been in a context of apparently increasing ‘fragmentation’ observed by several scholars for many years (see Massey et al., 1998 : 17; Penninx et al., 2008 : 8; Martiniello, 2013 ; Scholten et al., 2015 : 331–335).

On this basis, we expect a complex picture to emerge for recent scholarship, with thematic references to multiple social phenomena, and a high level of diversity within the topic composition of the field. We furthermore expect increased fragmentation within migration studies in recent years.

The key expectation of this article is, therefore, that the recent topical composition of migration studies displays greater diversity than in previous decades as the field has grown. Following that logic, we hypothesise that with diversification (increasingly varied topical focuses), fragmentation (decreasing connections between topics) has also occurred.

The empirical analysis of the development in volume and topic composition of migration studies is based on the quantitative methods of bibliometrics and topic modelling. Although bibliometric analysis has not been widely used in the field of migration (for some exceptions, see Carling, 2015 ; Nestorowicz and Anacka, 2018 ; Piguet et al., 2018 ; Sweileh et al., 2018 ; van Dalen, 2018 ), this type of research is increasingly popular ( Fortunato et al., 2018 ). A bibliometric analysis can help map what Kajikawa et al. (2007) call an ‘academic landscape’. Our analysis pursues a similar objective for the field of migration studies. However, rather than using citations and authors to guide our analysis, we extract a model of latent topics from the contents of abstracts . In other words, we are focussed on the landscape of content rather than influence.

3.1 Topic modelling

Topic modelling involves a computer-based strategy for identifying topics or topic clusters that figure centrally in a specific textual landscape (e.g. Jiang et al., 2016 ). This is a class of unsupervised machine learning techniques ( Evans and Aceves, 2016 : 22), which are used to inductively explore and discover patterns and regularities within a corpus of texts. Among the most widely used topic models is Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA). LDA is a type of Bayesian probabilistic model that builds on the assumption that each document in a corpus discusses multiple topics in differing proportions. Therefore, Document A might primarily be about Topic 1 (60 per cent), but it also refers to terms associated with Topic 2 (30 per cent), and, to a lesser extent, Topic 3 (10 per cent). A topic, then, is defined as a probability distribution over a fixed vocabulary, that is, the totality of words present in the corpus. The advantage of the unsupervised LDA approach that we take is that it does not limit the topic model to our preconceptions of which topics are studied by migration researchers and therefore should be found in the literature. Instead, it allows for an inductive sketching of the field, and consequently an element of surprise ( Halford and Savage, 2017 : 1141–1142). To determine the optimal number of topics, we used the package ldatuning to calculate the statistically optimal number of topics, a number which we then qualitatively validated.

The chosen LDA model produced two main outcomes. First, it yielded a matrix with per-document topic proportions, which allow us to generate an idea of the topics discussed in the abstracts. Secondly, the model returned a matrix with per-topic word probabilities. Essentially, the topics are a collection of words ordered by their probability of (co-)occurrence. Each topic contains all the words from all the abstracts, but some words have a much higher likelihood to belong to the identified topic. The 20–30 most probable words for each topic can be helpful in understanding the content of the topic. The third step we undertook was to look at those most probable words by a group of experts familiar with the field and label them. We did this systematically and individually by first looking at the top 5 words, then the top 30, trying to find an umbrella label that would summarize the topic. The initial labels suggested by each of us were then compared and negotiated in a group discussion. To verify the labels even more, in case of a doubt, we read several selected abstracts marked by the algorithm as exhibiting a topic, and through this were able to further refine the names of the topics.

It is important to remember that this list of topics should not be considered a theoretically driven attempt to categorize the field. It is purely inductive because the algorithm is unable to understand theories, conceptual frames, and approaches; it makes a judgement only on the basis of words. So if words are often mentioned together, the computer regards their probability of belonging to one topic as high.

3.2 Dataset of publications

For the topic modelling, we created a dataset that is representative of publications relevant to migration studies. First, we identified the most relevant sources of literature. Here we chose not only to follow rankings in citation indices, but also to ask migration scholars, in an expert survey, to identify what they considered to be relevant sources. This survey was distributed among a group of senior scholars associated with the IMISCOE Network; 25 scholars anonymously completed the survey. A set of journals and book series was identified from existing indices (such as Google Scholar, Web of Science, and Scopus) which were then validated and added to by respondents. Included in our eventual dataset were all journals and book series that were mentioned at least by two experts in the survey. The dataset includes 40 journals and 4 book series (see Supplementary Data A). Non-English journals were omitted from data collection because the algorithm can only analyse one language. Despite their influence on the field, we also did not consider broader disciplinary journals (for instance, sociological journals or economic journals) for the dataset. Such journals, we acknowledge, have published some of the most important research in the history of migration studies, but even with their omission, it is still possible to achieve our goal of obtaining a representative snapshot of what migration researchers have studied, rather than who or which papers have been most influential. In addition, both because of the language restriction of the algorithm and because of the Global North’s dominance in the field that is mentioned above ( Bommes and Morawska, 2005 ; Piguet et al., 2018 ), there is likely to be an under-representation of scholarship from the Global South in our dataset.

Secondly, we gathered metadata on publications from the selected journals and book series using the Scopus and Web of Science electronic catalogues, and manually collecting from those sources available on neither Scopus nor Web of Science. The metadata included authors, years, titles, and abstracts. We collected all available data up to the end of 2017. In total, 94 per cent of our metadata originated from Scopus, ∼1 per cent from Web of Science, and 5 per cent was gathered manually. One limitation of our dataset lies in the fact that the electronic catalogue of Scopus, unfortunately, does not list all articles and abstracts ever published by all the journals (their policy is to collect articles and abstracts ‘where available’ ( Elsevier, 2017 )). There was no technical possibility of assessing Scopus or WoS’ proportional coverage of all articles actually published. The only way to improve the dataset in this regard would be to manually collect and count abstracts from journal websites. This is also why many relevant books were not included in our dataset; they are not indexed in such repositories.

In the earliest years of available data, only a few journals were publishing (with limited coverage of this on Scopus) specifically on migration. However, Fig. 1 below demonstrates that the numbers constantly grew between 1959 and 2018. As Fig. 1 shows, in the first 30 years (1959–88), the number of migration journals increased by 15, while in the following three decades (1989–2018), this growth intensified as the number of journals tripled to 45 in the survey (see Supplementary Data A for abbreviations).

Number of journals focussed on migration and migration-related diversity (1959–2018) Source: Own calculations.

Within all 40 journals in the dataset, we were able to access and extract for our analysis 29,844 articles, of which 22,140 contained abstracts. Furthermore, we collected 901 available abstracts of chapters in the 4 book series: 2 series were downloaded from the Scopus index (Immigration and Asylum Law in Europe; Handbook of the Economics of International Migration), and the abstracts of the other 2 series, selected from our expert survey (the IMISCOE Research Series Migration Diasporas and Citizenship), were collected manually. Given the necessity of manually collecting the metadata for 896 abstracts of the chapters in these series, it was both practical and logical to set these two series as the cut-off point. Ultimately, we get a better picture of the academic landscape as a whole with some expert-approved book series than with none .

Despite the limitations of access, we can still have an approximate idea on how the volume of publications changed overtime. The chart ( Fig. 2 ) below shows that both the number of published articles and the number of abstracts of these articles follow the same trend—a rapid growth after the turn of the century. In 2017, there were three times more articles published per year than in 2000.

Publications and abstracts in the dataset (1959–2018).

The cumulative graph ( Fig. 3 ) below shows the total numbers of publications and the available abstracts. For the creation of our inductively driven topic model, we used all available abstracts in the entire timeframe. However, to evaluate the dynamics of topics over time, we decided to limit the timeframe of our chronological analyses to 1986–2017, because as of 1986, there were more than 10 active journals and more articles had abstracts. This analysis therefore covers the topical evolution of migration studies in the past three decades.

Cumulative total of publications and abstracts (1959–2017).

Migration studies has only internationalised very slowly in support of what others have previously argued ( Bommes and Morawska, 2005 ; Piguet et al., 2018 ). Figure 4 gives a snapshot of the geographic dispersion of the articles (including those without abstracts) that we collected from Scopus. Where available, we extracted the country of authors’ university affiliations. The colour shades represent the per capita publication volume. English-language migration scholarship has been dominated by researchers based, unsurprisingly, in Anglophone and Northern European countries.

Migration research output per capita (based on available affiliation data within dataset).

The topic modelling (following the LDA model) led us, as discussed in methods, to the definition of 60 as the optimal number of topics for mapping migration studies. Each topic is a string of words that, according to the LDA algorithm, belong together. We reviewed the top 30 words for each word string and assigned labels that encapsulated their meaning. Two of the 60 word strings were too generic and did not describe anything related to migration studies; therefore, we excluded them. Subsequently, the remaining 58 topics were organised into a number of clusters. In the Table 1 below, you can see all the topic labels, the topic clusters they are grouped into and the first 5 (out of 30) most probable words defining those topics.

Topics in migration studies

After presenting all the observed topics in the corpus of our publication data, we examined which topics and topic clusters are most frequent in general (between 1964 and 2017), and how their prominence has been changing over the years. On the basis of the matrix of per-item topic proportions generated by LDA analysis, we calculated the shares of each topic in the whole corpus. On the level of individual topics, around 25 per cent of all abstract texts is about the top 10 most prominent topics, which you can see in Fig. 5 below. Among those, #56 identity narratives (migration-related diversity), #39 migration theory, and #29 migration flows are the three most frequently detected topics.

Top 10 topics in the whole corpus of abstracts.

On the level of topic clusters, Fig. 6 (left) shows that migration-related diversity (26 per cent) and migration processes (19 per cent) clearly comprise the two largest clusters in terms of volume, also because they have the largest number topics belonging to them. However, due to our methodology of labelling these topics and grouping them into clusters, it is complicated to make comparisons between topic clusters in terms of relative size, because some clusters simply contain more topics. Calculating average proportions of topics within each cluster allows us to control for the number of topics per cluster, and with this measure, we can better compare the relative prominence of clusters. Figure 6 (right) shows that migration research and statistics have the highest average of topic proportions, followed by the cluster of migration processes and immigrant incorporation.

Topic proportions per cluster.

An analysis on the level of topic clusters in the project’s time frame (1986–2017) reveals several significant trends. First, when discussing shifts in topics over time, we can see that different topics have received more focus in different time frames. Figure 7 shows the ‘age’ of topics, calculated as average years weighted by proportions of publications within a topic per year. The average year of the articles on the same topic is a proxy for the age of the topic. This gives us an understanding of which topics were studied more often compared with others in the past and which topics are emerging. Thus, an average year can be understood as the ‘high-point’ of a topic’s relative prominence in the field. For instance, the oldest topics in our dataset are #22 ‘Migrant demographics’, followed by #45 ‘Governance of migration’ and #46 ‘Migration statistics and survey research’. The newest topics include #14 ‘Mobilities’ and #48 ‘Intra-EU mobility’.

Average topic age, weighted by proportions of publications (publications of 1986–2017). Note: Numbers near dots indicate the numeric id of topics (see Table 1 for the names).

When looking at the weighted ‘age’ of the clusters, it becomes clear that the focus on migration research and statistics is the ‘oldest’, which echoes what Greenwood and Hunt (2003 ) observe. This resonates with the idea that migration studies has roots in more demographic studies of migration and diversity (cf. Thornthwaite, 1934 ; Thomas, 1938 ), which somewhat contrasts with what van Dalen (2018) has found. Geographies of migration (studies related to specific migration flows, origins, and destinations) were also more prominent in the 1990s than now, and immigrant incorporation peaked at the turn of the century. However, gender and family, diversity, and health are more recent themes, as was mentioned above (see Fig. 8 ). This somewhat indicates a possible post-methodological nationalism, post-integration paradigm era in migration research going hand-in-hand with research that, as King (2012) argues, situates migration within wider social and political domains (cf. Scholten, 2018 ).

Diversity of topics and topic clusters (1985–2017).

Then, we analysed the diversification of publications over the various clusters. Based on the literature review, we expected the diversification to have increased over the years, signalling a move beyond paradigmatic closure. Figure 9 (below) shows that we can hardly speak of a significant increase of diversity in migration studies publications. Over the years, only a marginal increase in the diversity of topics is observed. The Gini-Simpson index of diversity in 1985 was around 0.95 and increased to 0.98 from 1997 onwards. Similarly, there is little difference between the sizes of topic clusters over the years. Both ways of calculating the Gini-Simpson index of diversity by clusters resulted in a rather stable picture showing some fluctuations between 0.82 and 0.86. This indicates that there has never been a clear hegemony of any cluster at any time. In other words, over the past three decades, the diversity of topics and topic clusters was quite stable: there have always been a great variety of topics discussed in the literature of migration studies, with no topic or cluster holding a clear monopoly.

Average age of topic clusters, weighted by proportions (publications of 1986–2017).

Subsequently, we focussed on trends in topic networks. As our goal is to describe the general development of migration studies as a field, we decided to analyse topic networks in three equal periods of 10 years (Period 1 (1988–97); Period 2 (1998–2007); Period 3 (2008–17)). On the basis of the LDA-generated matrix with per-abstract topic proportions (The LDA algorithm determines the proportions of all topics observed within each abstract. Therefore, each abstract can contain several topics with a substantial prominence), we calculated the topic-by-topic Spearman correlation coefficients in each of the time frames. From the received distribution of the correlation coefficients, we chose to focus on the top 25 per cent strongest correlations period. In order to highlight difference in strength of connections, we assigned different weights to the correlations between the topics. Coefficient values above the 75th percentile (0.438) but ≤0.5 were weighted 1; correlations above 0.5 but ≤0.6 were weighted 2; and correlations >0.6 were weighted 3. We visualised these topic networks using the software Gephi.

To compare networks of topics in each period, we used three common statistics of network analysis: 1 average degree of connections; 2 average weighted degree of connections; and 3 network density. The average degree of connections shows how many connections to other topics each topic in the network has on average. This measure can vary from 0 to N − 1, where N is the total number of topics in the network. Some correlations of topics are stronger and were assigned the Weight 2 or 3. These are included in the statistics of average weighted degree of connections, which shows us the variations in strength of existing connections between the topics. Network density is a proportion of existing links over the number of all potentially possible links between the topics. This measure varies from 0 = entirely disconnected topics to 1 = extremely dense network, where every topic is connected to every topic.

Table 2 shows that all network measures vary across the three periods. In Period 1, each topic had on average 21 links with other topics, while in Period 2, that number was much lower (11.5 links). In Period 3, the average degree of connections grew again, but not to the level of Period 1. The same trend is observed in the strength of these links—in Period 1, the correlations between the topics were stronger than in Period 3, while they were the weakest in Period 2. The density of the topic networks was highest in Period 1 (0.4), then in Period 2, the topic network became sparser before densifying again in Period 3 (but not to the extent of Period 1’s density).

Topic network statistics

These fluctuations on network statistics indicate that in the years 1988–97, topics within the analysed field of migration studies were mentioned in the same articles and book chapters more often, while at the turn of the 21st century, these topic co-occurrences became less frequent; publications therefore became more specialised and topics were more isolated from each other. In the past 10 years, migration studies once again became more connected, the dialogues between the topics emerged more frequently. These are important observations about topical development in the field of migration studies. The reasons behind these changes require further, possibly more qualitative explanation.

To get a more in-depth view of the content of these topic networks, we made an overview of the changes in the topic clusters across the three periods. As we can see in Fig. 10 , some changes emerge in terms of the prominence of various clusters. The two largest clusters (also by the number of topics within them) are migration-related diversity and migration processes. The cluster of migration-related diversity increased in its share of each period’s publications by around 20 per cent. This reflects our above remarks on the literature surrounding the integration debate, and the ‘cultural turn’ King mentions (2012). And the topic cluster migration processes also increased moderately its share.

Prominence and change in topic clusters 1988–2017.

Compared with the first period, the topic cluster of gender and family studies grew the fastest, with the largest growth observed in the turn of the century (relative to its original size). This suggests a growing awareness of gender and family-related aspects of migration although as a percentage of the total corpus it remains one the smallest clusters. Therefore, Massey et al.’s (1998) argument that households and gender represented a quantitatively significant pillar of migration research could be considered an overestimation. The cluster of health studies in migration research also grew significantly in the Period 2 although in Period 3, the percentage of publications in this cluster diminished. This suggests a rising awareness of health in relation to migration and diversity (see Sweileh et al., 2018 ) although this too remains one of the smallest clusters.

The cluster on Immigrant incorporation lost prominence the most over the past 30 years. This seems to resonate with the argument that ‘integrationism’ or the ‘integration paradigm’ was rather in the late 1990s (see Favell, 2003 ; Dahinden, 2016 ) and is losing its prominence. A somewhat slower but steady loss was also observed in the cluster of Geographies of migration and Migration research and statistics. This also suggests not only a decreasing emphasis on demographics within migration studies, but also a decreasing reflexivity in the development of the field and the focus on theory-building.

We will now go into more detail and show the most connected topics and top 10 most prominent topics in each period. Figures 11–13 show the network maps of topics in each period. The size of circles reflects the number and strength of links per each topic: the bigger the size, the more connected this topic is to the others; the biggest circles indicate the most connected topics. While the prominence of a topic is measured by the number of publications on that topic, it is important to note that the connectedness the topic has nothing necessarily to do with the amount of publications on that topic; in theory, a topic could appear in many articles without any reference to other topics (which would mean that it is prominent but isolated).

Topic network in 1988–97. Note: Numbers indicate topics' numerical ids, see Table 1 for topics' names.

Topic network in 1998–2007. Note: Numbers indicate topics' numerical ids, see Table 1 for topics' names.

Topic network in 2008–2017. Note: Numbers indicate topics' numerical ids, see Table 1 for topics' names.

Thus, in the section below, we describe the most connected and most prominent topics in migration research per period. The degree of connectedness is a useful indicator of the extent to which we can speak of a ‘field’ of migration research. If topics are well-connected, especially in a context of increased knowledge production and changes in prominence among topics, then this would suggest that a shared conceptual and theoretical language exists.

6.1 Period 1: 1988–97

The five central topics with the highest degree of connectedness (the weighted degree of connectedness of these topics was above 60) were ‘black studies’, ‘mobilities’, ‘ICT, media and migration’, ‘migration in/from Israel and Palestine’, and ‘intra-EU mobility’. These topics are related to geopolitical regions, ethnicity, and race. The high degree of connectedness of these topics shows that ‘they often occurred together with other topics in the analysed abstracts from this period’. This is expected because research on migration and diversity inevitably discusses its subject within a certain geographical, political, or ethnic scope. Geographies usually appear in abstracts as countries of migrants’ origin or destination. The prominence of ‘black studies’ reflects the dominance of American research on diversity, which was most pronounced in this period ( Fig. 11 ).

The high degree of connectedness of the topics on ICT and ‘media’ is indicative of wider societal trends in the 1990s. As with any new phenomenon, it clearly attracted the attention of researchers who wanted to understand its relationship with migration issues.

Among the top 10 topics with the most publications in this period (see Supplementary Data B) were those describing the characteristics of migration flows (first) and migration populations (third). It goes in line with the trends of the most connected topics described above. Interest in questions of migrants’ socio-economic position (fourth) in the receiving societies and discussion on ‘labour migration’ (ninth) were also prevalent. Jointly, these topics confirm that in the earlier years, migration was ‘studied often from the perspectives of economics and demographics’ ( van Dalen, 2018 ).

Topics, such as ‘education and language training’ (second), community development’ (sixth), and ‘intercultural communication’ (eighth), point at scholarly interest in the issues of social cohesion and socio-cultural integration of migrants. This lends strong support to Favell’s ‘integration paradigm’ argument about this period and suggests that the coproduction of knowledge between research and policy was indeed very strong ( Scholten, 2011 ). This is further supported by the prominence of the topic ‘governance of migration’ (seventh), reflecting the evolution of migration and integration policymaking in the late 1980s and beginning of the 1990s, exemplified by the development of the Schengen area and the EU more widely; governance of refugee flows from the Balkan region (also somewhat represented in the topic ‘southern-European migration’, which was the 10th most prominent); and governance of post-Soviet migration. Interestingly, this is the only period in which ‘migration histories’ is among the top 10 topics, despite the later establishment of a journal dedicated to the very discipline of history. Together these topics account for 42 per cent of all migration studies publications in that period of time.

6.2 Period 2: 1998–2007

In the second period, as the general degree of connectedness in the topic networks decreased, the following five topics maintained a large number of connections in comparison to others, as their average weighted degree of connections ranged between 36 and 57 ties. The five topics were ‘migration in/from Israel and Palestine’, ‘black studies’, ‘Asian migration’, ‘religious diversity’, and ‘migration, sexuality, and health’ ( Fig. 12 ).

Here we can observe the same geographical focus of the most connected topics, as well as the new trends in the migration research. ‘Asian migration’ became one of the most connected topics, meaning that migration from/to and within that region provoked more interest of migration scholars than in the previous decade. This development appears to be in relation to high-skill migration, in one sense, because of its strong connections with the topics ‘Asian expat migration’ and ‘ICT, media, and migration’; and, in another sense, in relation to the growing Muslim population in Europe thanks to its strong connection to ‘religious diversity’. The high connectedness of the topic ‘migration sexuality and health’ can be explained by the dramatic rise of the volume of publications within the clusters ‘gender and family’ studies and ‘health’ in this time-frame as shown in the charts on page 13, and already argued by Portes (1997) .

In this period, ‘identity narratives’ became the most prominent topic (see Supplementary Data B), which suggests increased scholarly attention on the subjective experiences of migrants. Meanwhile ‘migrant flows’ and ‘migrant demographics’ decreased in prominence from the top 3 to the sixth and eighth position, respectively. The issues of education and socio-economic position remained prominent. The emergence of topics ‘migration and diversity in (higher) education’ (fifth) and ‘cultural diversity’ (seventh) in the top 10 of this period seem to reflect a shift from integrationism to studies of diversity. The simultaneous rise of ‘migration theory’ (to fourth) possibly illustrates the debates on methodological nationalism which emerged in the early 2000s. The combination of theoretical maturity and the intensified growth in the number of migration journals at the turn of the century suggests that the field was becoming institutionalised.

Overall, the changes in the top 10 most prominent topics seem to show a shifting attention from ‘who’ and ‘what’ questions to ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions. Moreover, the top 10 topics now account only for 26 per cent of all migration studies (a 15 per cent decrease compared with the period before). This means that there were many more topics which were nearly as prominent as those in the top 10. Such change again supports our claim that in this period, there were more intensive ‘sub-field’ developments in migration studies than in the previous period.

6.3 Period 3: 2008–17

In the last decade, the most connected topics have continued to be: ‘migration in/from Israel and Palestine’, ‘Asian migration’, and ‘black studies’. The hypothetical reasons for their central position in the network of topics are the same as in the previous period. The new most-connected topics—‘Conflicts, violence, and migration’, together with the topic ‘Religious diversity’—might indicate to a certain extent the widespread interest in the ‘refugee crisis’ of recent years ( Fig. 13 ).

The publications on the top 10 most prominent topics constituted a third of all migration literature of this period analysed in our study. A closer look at them reveals the following trends (see Supplementary Data B for details). ‘Mobilities’ is the topic of the highest prominence in this period. Together with ‘diasporas and transnationalism’ (fourth), this reflects the rise of critical thinking on methodological nationalism ( Wimmer and Glick Schiller, 2002 ) and the continued prominence of transnationalism in the post-‘mobility turn’ era ( Urry (2007) , cited in King, 2012 ).

The interest in subjective experiences of migration and diversity has continued, as ‘identity narratives’ continues to be prominent, with the second highest proportion of publications, and as ‘Discrimination and socio-psychological issues’ have become the eighth most prominent topic. This also echoes an increasing interest in the intersection of (mental) health and migration (cf. Sweileh et al., 2018 ).

The prominence of the topics ‘human rights law and protection’ (10th) and ‘governance of migration and diversity’ (9th), together with ‘conflicts, violence, and migration’ being one of the most connected topics, could be seen as a reflection of the academic interest in forced migration and asylum. Finally, in this period, the topics ‘race and racism’ (fifth) and ‘black studies’ (seventh) made it into the top 10. Since ‘black studies’ is also one of the most connected topics, such developments may reflect the growing attention to structural and inter-personal racism not only in the USA, perhaps reflecting the #blacklivesmatter movement, as well as in Europe, where the idea of ‘white Europeanness’ has featured in much public discourse.

6.4 Some hypotheses for further research

Why does the connectedness of topics change across three periods? In an attempt to explain these changes, we took a closer look at the geographical distribution of publications in each period. One of the trends that may at least partially explain the loss of connectedness between the topics in Period 2 could be related to the growing internationalisation of English language academic literature linked to a sharp increase in migration-focussed publications during the 1990s.

Internationalisation can be observed in two ways. First, the geographies of English language journal publications have become more diverse over the years. In the period 1988–97, the authors’ institutional affiliations spanned 57 countries. This increased to 72 in 1998–2007, and then to 100 in 2007–18 (we counted only those countries which contained at least 2 publications in our dataset). Alongside this, even though developed Anglophone countries (the USA, Canada, Australia, the UK, Ireland, and New Zealand) account for the majority of publications of our overall dataset, the share of publications originating from non-Anglophone countries has increased over time. In 1988–97, the number of publications from non-Anglophone European (EU+EEA) countries was around 13 per cent. By 2008–17, this had significantly increased to 28 per cent. Additionally, in the rest of the world, we observe a slight proportional increase from 9.5 per cent in the first period to 10.6 per cent in the last decade. Developed Anglophone countries witness a 16 per cent decrease in their share of all articles on migration. The trends of internationalisation illustrated above, combined with the loss of connectedness at the turn of the 21st century, seem to indicate that English became the lingua-franca for academic research on migration in a rather organic manner.

It is possible that a new inflow of ideas came from the increased number of countries publishing on migration whose native language is not English. This rise in ‘competition’ might also have catalysed innovation in the schools that had longer established centres for migration studies. Evidence for this lies in the rise in prominence of the topic ‘migration theory’ during this period. It is also possible that the expansion of the European Union and its research framework programmes, as well as the Erasmus Programmes and Erasmus Mundus, have perhaps brought novel, comparative, perspectives in the field. All this together might have created fruitful soil for developing unique themes and approaches, since such approaches in theory lead to more success and, crucially, more funds for research institutions.

This, however, cannot fully explain why in Period 3 the field became more connected again, other than that the framework programmes—in particular framework programme 8, Horizon 2020—encourage the building of scientific bridges, so to speak. Our hypothesis is thus that after the burst of publications and ideas in Period 2, scholars began trying to connect these new themes and topics to each other through emergent international networks and projects. Perhaps even the creation and work of the IMISCOE (2004-) and NOMRA (1998-) networks contributed to this process of institutionalisation. This, however, requires much further thought and exploration, but for now, we know that the relationship between the growth, the diversification, and the connectedness in this emergent research field is less straightforward than we might previously have suggested. This begs for further investigation perhaps within a sociology of science framework.

This article offers an inductive mapping of the topical focus of migration studies over a period of more than 30 years of development of the research field. Based on the literature, we expected to observe increasing diversity of topics within the field and increasing fragmentation between the topics, also in relation to the rapid growth in volume and internationalisation of publications in migration studies. However, rather than growth and increased diversity leading to increased fragmentation, our analysis reveals a complex picture of a rapidly growing field where the diversity of topics has remained relatively stable. Also, even as the field has internationalised, it has retained its overall connectedness, albeit with a slight and temporary fragmentation at the turn of the century. In this sense, we can argue that migration studies have indeed come of age as a distinct research field.

In terms of the volume of the field of migration studies, our study reveals an exponential growth trajectory, especially since the mid-1990s. This involves both the number of outlets and the number of publications therein. There also seems to be a consistent path to internationalisation of the field, with scholars from an increasing number of countries publishing on migration, and a somewhat shrinking share of publications from Anglo-American countries. However, our analysis shows that this has not provoked an increased diversity of topics in the field. Instead, the data showed that there have been several important shifts in terms of which topics have been most prominent in migration studies. The field has moved from focusing on issues of demographics, statistics, and governance, to an increasing focus on mobilities, migration-related diversity, gender, and health. Also, interest in specific geographies of migration seems to have decreased.

These shifts partially resonated with the expectations derived from the literature. In the 1980s and 1990s, we observed the expected widespread interest in culture, seen in publications dealing primarily with ‘education and language training’, ‘community development’, and ‘intercultural communication’. This continued to be the case at the turn of the century, where ‘identity narratives’ and ‘cultural diversity’ became prominent. The expected focus on borders in the periods ( Pedraza-Bailey, 1990 ) was represented by the high proportion of research on the ‘governance of migration’, ‘migration flows’, and in the highly connected topic ‘intra-EU mobility’. Following Portes (1997) , we expected ‘transnational communities’, ‘states and state systems’, and the ‘new second generation’ to be key themes for the ‘new century’. Transnationalism shifts attention away from geographies of migration and nation–states, and indeed, our study shows that ‘geographies of migration’ gave way to ‘mobilities’, the most prominent topic in the last decade. This trend is supported by the focus on ‘diasporas and transnationalism’ and ‘identity narratives’ since the 2000s, including literature on migrants’ and their descendants’ dual identities. These developments indicate a paradigmatic shift in migration studies, possibly caused by criticism of methodological nationalism. Moreover, our data show that themes of families and gender have been discussed more in the 21st century, which is in line with Portes’ predictions.

The transition from geographies to mobilities and from the governance of migration to the governance of migration-related diversity, race and racism, discrimination, and social–psychological issues indicates a shifting attention in migration studies from questions of ‘who’ and ‘what’ towards ‘how’ and ‘why’. In other words, a more nuanced understanding of the complexity of migration processes and consequences emerges, with greater consideration of both the global and the individual levels of analysis.

However, this complexification has not led to thematic fragmentation in the long run. We did not find a linear trend towards more fragmentation, meaning that migration studies have continued to be a field. After an initial period of high connectedness of research mainly coming from America and the UK, there was a period with significantly fewer connections within migration studies (1998–2007), followed by a recovery of connectedness since then, while internationalisation has continued. What does this tell us?

We may hypothesise that the young age of the field and the tendency towards methodological nationalism may have contributed to more connectedness in the early days of migration studies. The accelerated growth and internationalisation of the field since the late 1990s may have come with an initial phase of slight fragmentation. The increased share of publications from outside the USA may have caused this, as according to Massey et al. (1998) , European migration research was then more conceptually dispersed than across the Atlantic. The recent recovery of connectedness could then be hypothesised as an indicator of the field’s institutionalisation, especially at the European level, and growing conceptual and theoretical development. As ‘wisdom comes with age’, this may be an indication of the ‘coming of age’ of migration studies as a field with a shared conceptual and theoretical foundation.

The authors would like to thank the three anonymous reviewers for their constructive feedback, as well as dr. J.F. Alvarado for his advice in the early stages of work on this article.

This research is associated with the CrossMigration project, funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the grant agreement Ares(2017) 5627812-770121.

Conflict of interest statement . None declared.

Bommes M. , Morawska E. ( 2005 ) International Migration Research: Constructions, Omissions and the Promises of Interdisciplinarity . Aldershot : Ashgate .

Google Scholar

Google Preview

Brettell C. B. , Hollifield J. F. ( 2014 ) Migration Theory: Talking across Disciplines . London : Routledge .

Caponio T. , Borkert M. ( 2010 ) The Local Dimension of Migration Policymaking . Amsterdam : Amsterdam University Press .

Carling J. ( 2015 ) Who Is Who in Migration Studies: 107 Names Worth Knowing < https://jorgencarling.org/2015/06/01/who-is-who-in-migration-studies-108-names-worth-knowing/#_Toc420761452 > accessed 1 Jun 2015.

Castles S. , Miller M. J. ( 2014 ) The Age of Migration: International Population Movements in the Modern World , 5th edn. Basingstoke : Palgrave Macmillan .

Cohen R. ( 1996 ) Theories of Migration . Cheltenham : Edward Elgar .

Dahinden J. ( 2016 ) ‘A Plea for the “De-migranticization” of Research on Migration and Integration,’ Ethnic and Racial Studies , 39 / 13 : 2207 – 25 .

Elsevier ( 2017 ) Scopus: Content Coverage Guide . < https://www.elsevier.com/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/69451/0597-Scopus-Content-Coverage-Guide-US-LETTER-v4-HI-singles-no-ticks.pdf > accessed 18 Dec 2018.

Evans J. A. , Aceves P. ( 2016 ) ‘Machine Translation: Mining Text for Social Theory,’ Annual Review of Sociology’ , 42 / 1 : 21 – 50 .

Favell A. ( 2003 ) ‘Integration Nations: The Nation-State and Research on Immigrants in Western Europe’, in Brochmann G. , ed. The Multicultural Challenge , pp. 13 – 42 . Bingley : Emerald .

Fortunato S. , et al.  ( 2018 ) ‘Science of Science’ , Science , 359 / 6379 : 1 – 7 .

Geddes A. ( 2005 ) ‘Migration Research and European Integration: The Construction and Institutionalization of Problems of Europe’, in Bommes M. , Morawska E. (eds). International Migration Research: Constructions, Omissions and the Promises of Interdisciplinarity , pp. 265 – 280 . Aldershot : Ashgate .

Gordon M. ( 1964 ) Assimilation in American Life . New York : Oxford University Press .

Greenwood M. J. , Hunt G. L. ( 2003 ) ‘The Early History of Migration Research,’ International Regional Sciences Review , 26 / 1 : 3 – 37 .

Halford S. , Savage M. ( 2017 ) ‘Speaking Sociologically with Big Data: Symphonic Social Science and the Future for Big Data Research,’ Sociology , 51 / 6 : 1132 – 48 .

IOM ( 2017 ) ‘Migration Research and Analysis: Growth, Reach and Recent Contributions’, in IOM, World Migration Report 2018 , pp. 95 – 121 . Geneva : International Organization for Migration .

Jiang H. , Qiang M. , Lin P. ( 2016 ) ‘A Topic Modeling Based Bibliometric Exploratoin of Hydropower Research,’ Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews , 57 : 226 – 37 .

Kajikawa Y. , et al.  ( 2007 ) ‘Creating an Academic Landscape of Sustainability Science: An Analysis of the Citation Network,’ Sustainability Science , 2 / 2 : 221 – 31 .

King R. , Skeldon R. ( 2010 ) ‘Mind the Gap: Integrating Approaches to Internal and International Migration,’ Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies , 36 / 10 : 1619 – 46 .

King R. , Skeldon R. ( 2002 ) ‘Towards a New Map of European Migration,’ International Journal of Population Geography , 8 / 2 : 89 – 106 .

King R. , Skeldon R. ( 2012 ) Theories and Typologies of Migration: An Overview and a Primer . Malmö : Malmö Institute for Studies of Migration, Diversity and Welfare (MIM ).

Kritz M. M. , Keely C. B. , Tomasi S. M. ( 1981 ) Global Trends in Migration: Theory and Research on International Population Movements . New York : The Centre for Migration Studies .

Lavenex S. ( 2005 ) ‘National Frames in Migration Research: The Tacit Political Agenda’, in Bommes M. , Morawska E. (eds) International Migration Research: Constructions, Omissions and the Promises of Interdisciplinarity , pp. 243 – 263 . Aldershot : Ashgate .

Martiniello M. ( 2013 ) ‘Comparisons in Migration Studies,’ Comparative Migration Studies , 1 / 1 : 7 – 22 .

Massey D. S. , et al.  ( 1993 ) ‘Theories of International Migration: A Review and Appraisal,’ Population and Development Review , 19 / 3 : 431 – 66 .

Massey D. S. ( 1994 ) ‘An Evaluation of International Migration Theory: The North American Case,’ Population and Development Review , 20 / 4 : 699 – 751 .

Massey D. S. , et al.  ( 1998 ) Worlds in Motion: Understanding International Migration at the End of the Millennium . Oxford : Clarendon .

Morawska E. ( 1990 ) ‘The Sociology and Historiography of Immigration’, In Yans-McLaughlin V. , (ed.) Immigration Reconsidered: History, Sociology, and Politics . Oxford : Oxford University Press .

Nestorowicz J. , Anacka M. ( 2018 ) ‘Mind the Gap? Quantifying Interlinkages between Two Traditions in Migration Literature,’ International Migration Review , 53/1 : 1 – 25 .

Pedraza-Bailey S. ( 1990 ) ‘Immigration Research: A Conceptual Map,’ Social Science History , 14 / 1 : 43 – 67 .

Penninx R. , Spencer D. , van Hear N. ( 2008 ) Migration and Integration in Europe: The State of Research . Oxford : ESRC Centre on Migration, Policy and Society .

Piguet E. , Kaenzig R. , Guélat J. ( 2018 ) ‘The Uneven Geography of Research on “Environmental Migration”,’ Population and Environment , 39 / 4 : 357 – 83 .

Portes A. ( 1997 ) ‘Immigration Theory for a New Century: Some Problems and Opportunities,’ International Migration Review , 31 / 4 : 799 – 825 .

Pryor R. J. ( 1981 ) ‘Integrating International and Internal Migration Theories’, in Kritz M. M. , Keely C. B. , Tomasi S. M. (eds) Global Trends in Migration: Theory and Research on International Population Movements , pp. 110 – 129 . New York : The Center for Migration Studies .

Ravenstein G. E. ( 1885 ) ‘The Laws of Migration,’ Journal of the Royal Statistical Society , 48 : 167 – 235 .

Schinkel W. ( 2018 ) ‘Against “Immigrant Integration”: For an End to Neocolonial Knowledge Production,’ Comparative Migration Studies , 6 / 31 : 1 – 17 .

Scholten P. ( 2011 ) Framing Immigrant Integration: Dutch Research-Policy Dialogues in Comparative Perspective . Amsterdam : Amsterdam University Press .

Scholten P. ( 2018 ) Mainstreaming versus Alienation: Conceptualizing the Role of Complexity in Migration and Diversity Policymaking . Rotterdam : Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam .

Scholten P. , et al.  ( 2015 ) Integrating Immigrants in Europe: Research-Policy Dialogues . Dordrecht : Springer .

Sweileh W. M. , et al.  ( 2018 ) ‘Bibliometric Analysis of Global Migration Health Research in Peer-Reviewed Literature (2000–2016)’ , BMC Public Health , 18 / 777 : 1 – 18 .

Thomas D. S. ( 1938 ) Research Memorandum on Migration Differentials . New York : Social Science Research Council .

Thornthwaite C. W. ( 1934 ) Internal Migration in the United States . Philadelphia, PA : University of Pennsylvania Press .

Thränhardt D. , Bommes M. ( 2010 ) National Paradigms of Migration Research . Göttingen : V&R Unipress .

Urry J. ( 2007 ) Mobilities . Cambridge : Polity .

van Dalen H. ( 2018 ) ‘Is Migration Still Demography’s Stepchild?’ , Demos: Bulletin over Bevolking en Samenleving , 34 / 5 : 8 .

Vargas-Silva C. ( 2012 ) Handbook of Research Methods in Migration . Cheltenham : Edward Elgar .

Wimmer A. , Glick Schiller N. ( 2002 ) ‘Methodological Nationalism and beyond: Nation-State Building, Migration and the Social Sciences,’ Global Networks , 2 / 4 : 301 – 34 .

Yans-McLaughlin V. ( 1990 ) Immigration Reconsidered: History, Sociology, and Politics . Oxford : Oxford University Press .

Zapata-Barrero R. , Yalaz E. ( 2018 ) Qualitative Research in European Migration Studies . Dordrecht : Springer .

Zapata-Barrero R. , Caponio T. , Scholten P. ( 2017 ) ‘Theorizing the “Local Turn” in a Multi-Level Governance Framework of Analysis: A Case Study in Immigrant Policies,’ International Review of Administrative Sciences , 83 / 2 : 241 – 6 .

Zolberg A. R. ( 1989 ) ‘The Next Waves: Migration Theory for a Changing World,’ International Migration Review , 23 / 3 : 403 – 30 .

Supplementary data

Email alerts, citing articles via.

• Recommend to your Library

Affiliations

• Online ISSN 2049-5846
• Copyright © 2024 Oxford University Press
• About Oxford Academic
• Publish journals with us
• University press partners
• What we publish
• New features  
• Open access
• Institutional account management
• Rights and permissions
• Get help with access
• Accessibility
• Advertising
• Media enquiries
• Oxford University Press
• Oxford Languages
• University of Oxford

Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide

• Copyright © 2024 Oxford University Press
• Cookie settings
• Cookie policy
• Privacy policy
• Legal notice

This Feature Is Available To Subscribers Only

Sign In or Create an Account

This PDF is available to Subscribers Only

For full access to this pdf, sign in to an existing account, or purchase an annual subscription.

Advertisement

A systematic review of climate migration research: gaps in existing literature

• Review Paper
• Open access
• Published: 16 April 2022
• Volume 2 , article number  47 , ( 2022 )

Cite this article

You have full access to this open access article

• Rajan Chandra Ghosh   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-9027-6649 1 , 2 &
• Caroline Orchiston   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-3171-2006 1  

9895 Accesses

9 Citations

12 Altmetric

Explore all metrics

Climatic disasters are displacing millions of people every year across the world. Growing academic attention in recent decades has addressed different dimensions of the nexus between climatic events and human migration. Based on a systematic review approach, this study investigates how climate-induced migration studies are framed in the published literature and identifies key gaps in existing studies. 161 journal articles were systematically selected and reviewed (published between 1990 and 2019). Result shows diverse academic discourses on policies, climate vulnerabilities, adaptation, resilience, conflict, security, and environmental issues across a range of disciplines. It identifies Asia as the most studied area followed by Oceania, illustrating that the greatest focus of research to date has been tropical and subtropical climatic regions. Moreover, this study identifies the impact of climate-induced migration on livelihoods, socio-economic conditions, culture, security, and health of climate-induced migrants. Specifically, this review demonstrates that very little is known about the livelihood outcomes of climate migrants in their international destination and their impacts on host communities. The study offers a research agenda to guide academic endeavors toward addressing current gaps in knowledge, including a pressing need for global and national policies to address climate migration as a significant global challenge.

Similar content being viewed by others

Climate-Conflict-Migration Nexus: An Assessment of Research Trends Based on a Bibliometric Analysis

Scales and sensitivities in climate vulnerability, displacement, and health

Lori M. Hunter, Stephanie Koning, … Jamon Van Den Hoek

Climate change-induced migration: a bibliometric review

Juan Milán-García, José Luis Caparrós-Martínez, … Jaime de Pablo Valenciano

Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.

Introduction

Population displacement can be driven by climatic hazards such as floods, droughts (hydrologic), and storms (atmospheric), and geophysical hazards such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and tsunami (Smith and Smith 2013 ). The interactions between natural hazard events, and social, political, and human factors, frequently act to intensify the negative effects of climatic and geophysical hazards, leading to political and social unrest, increased social vulnerability, and human suffering. As a consequence of these adverse effects, people migrate from their native land, causing stress, uncertainty, and loss of lives and properties. However, such migration can also have positive impacts on migrants’ lives. For example, migrants may be able to diversify their livelihood and have greater access to education or healthcare.

In 2020, 30.7 million people from 149 countries and territories were displaced due to different natural disasters. Among them, climatic disasters were solely responsible for displacing 30 million people within their own country, with the highest recorded displacement occurring in 2010 when 38.3 million people were displaced (IDMC 2021a ; IOM 2021 ). It is difficult to estimate the actual number of people that moved due to the impacts of climate change (Mcleman 2019 ), because peoples’ migration decisions are triggered by a range of contextual factors (de Haas 2021 ). Nevertheless, the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) states that approximately 283.4 million people were displaced internally between the years 2008 and 2020 because of climatic disasters across the globe (Table 1 ). This number represents almost 89% of the total disaster-induced displacement that occurred during this timeframe (IDMC 2021a ).

People who move from their homes due to climate-driven hazards are described in a range of ways, including climate migrants, environmental migrants, climate refugees, environmental refugees, and so on (Perkiss and Moerman 2018 ). The process of migration related to climate-driven hazards is variously described as environmental migration, environmental displacement, climate-induced migration or climigration (Bronen 2008 ).

In this research, we focus on climate-induced migration more specifically induced by slow-onset climatic disasters (sea-level rise, drought, salinity etc.), rapid onset extreme climatic events (storms, floods etc.), or both (precipitation, erosion etc.). This study investigates how climate change-induced migration studies are framed in the existing literature and identifies key gaps in the published literature.

There is a significant ongoing debate about the links between climate change and human migration in the academic literature. Some researchers strongly believe that climate change directly causes people to move, whereas the others argue that climate change is just one of the contextual factors in peoples’ migration decisions (Laczko and Aghazarm 2009 ). Although there are scholarly opinions that call into question climate change as a primary cause of migration (Black 2001 ; Black et al. 2011 ; McLeman 2014 ), there is also evidence that climate change causes severe environmental effects and exacerbates the vulnerabilities of people that force them to leave their place of living (Bronen and Chapin 2013 ; Laczko and Aghazarm 2009 ; McLeman 2014 ).

Moreover, the relationship between the adverse effects of climate change and different types of human mobility (migration, displacement, or planned relocation) has become increasingly recognized in recent years (Kälin and Cantor 2017 ). It is assumed in general that the number of climate displaced people is likely to increase in future (Mcleman 2019 ; Wilkinson et al. 2016 ), and climate change could permanently displace an estimated 150 million to nearly 1 billion people as a critical driver by 2050 (Held 2016 ; Perkiss and Moerman 2018 ). As the number of climate migrants increases rapidly in some areas of the world (IDMC 2017 ), it is now confirmed as a significant global challenge (Apap 2019 ) and recognized as a considerable threat to human populations (Ionesco et al. 2017 ).

Climate migration has multifaceted impacts on peoples’ livelihoods. Being displaced from their home, people migrate within their own country, described as internal migration, or across borders to other countries known as international migration. Internal movements of climate migrants occur mostly to nearby major cities or large urban centers (Poncelet et al. 2010 ). Climate migrants who try to move internationally are significantly challenged by two different security problems. Firstly, they cannot live in their own homeland because of worsening climatic impacts and are forced to leave their ancestral land. Secondly, they cannot move to other countries quickly to find a safer place because, according to international law, climate migrants are not refugees and they are not supported by the UN Refugee Convention or any international formal protection policies (Apap 2019 ; Mcleman 2019 ). In this situation, they live with significant livelihood uncertainty. The United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (SFDRR) recognize them as a key group that is highly exposed and vulnerable because of their circumstances (Ionesco et al. 2017 ). Hence, policy development to address complex climate migration issues has become an emerging priority around the globe (Apap 2019 ).

In order to address this global challenge, there has been growing academic and policy attention focused on regional (Kampala Convention-2009 by African Union), national (Nansen Initiative—2012 by Norway and Switzerland), and international (Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration- 2018 by United Nations) levels of climate-induced migration in recent years. Myers’s ( 2002 ) seminal article signposted environmentally driven migration as one of the most significant challenges of the twenty-first century, and later, similar assumptions were made by Christian Aid (Baird et al. 2007 ), IOM (Brown 2008 ), and Care International (Warner et al. 2009 ). Such predictions led to a proliferation of the academic discourse on migration, focused on national and international security, policy frameworks, and human rights (Boncour and Burson 2009 ). Other studies have focused on vulnerability assessment, risk reduction, adaptation, resettlement, relocation, sustainability, and resilience, considering pre-, during and post-disaster circumstances of climate migration (Bronen 2011 ; Bronen and Chapin 2013 ; IDMC 2019 ; IOM 2021 ; King et al. 2014 ).

This research contributes to the discourse by identifying the gaps in the published literature regarding climate migration. A systematic literature review was undertaken to shed light on the current extent of academic literature, including gaps in knowledge to develop a climate migration research agenda. Two notable review papers provided a solid foundation for this endeavor. First, Piguet et al. ( 2018 ) developed a comprehensive review of publications on environment-induced migration from a global perspective based on a bibliographic database—CliMig. Their detailed mapping of environmentally induced migration research focused on five categories of climatic hazards (droughts, floods, hurricanes, sea-level rise, and rainfall); however, it did not include salinity and erosion which are also climate-driven and has direct effects on internal and international migration (Chen and Mueller 2018 ; Mallick and Sultana 2017 ; Rahman and Gain 2020 ).

The second key review paper was by Obokata et al. ( 2014 ), which provided an evidence-based explanation of the environmental factors leading to migration, and the non-environmental factors that influence the migration behaviors of people. Their scope of analysis was limited to international migration and excluded other types of migration, such as internal climate-induced migration.

Although migration, or more specifically environmental migration, was occurring over many decades of the twentieth century, the IPCC First Assessment report was released in 1990, which presented the first indications of the risks of climate change-induced human movement (IPCC 1990 ). This milestone report then stimulated the academic discourse, and consequently, a rapid increase in climate migration publication resulted. For this reason, the current study undertook a systematic review of literature across three decades beginning in 1990 and ending in 2019. This study aims to understand how the published literature has framed the climate-induced migration discourse. This paper identifies the key gaps in existing scholarship in this field and proposes a research agenda for future consideration on current and emerging climate migration issues.

In the following section, we outline the systematic review method and identify how journal articles were searched, selected, reviewed, and analyzed. In the next section, we present the results of this study. Results are organized into four subsections that illustrate the reviewed literature in the following ways—spatial and temporal trends, disciplinary foci, triggering forces of migration, and other key issues. Finally, we conclude by identifying research gaps, addressing the limitations of this study, and presenting a research agenda.

Methodology

We have adopted a systematic review methodology for this study because it provides an …overall picture of the evidence in a topic area which is needed to direct future research efforts (Petticrew and Robert 2006 ). Systematic reviews reduce the bias of a traditional narrative review, although it is challenging to eliminate researcher bias while interpreting and synthesizing results (Doyle et al. 2019 ). It also limits systematic bias by identifying, evaluating, and synthesizing all relevant studies to answer specific questions or sets of questions, and produces a scientific summary of the evidence in any research area (Petticrew and Robert 2006 ). Moreover, systematic reviews effectively address the research question and identify knowledge gaps and future research priorities (Mallett et al. 2012 ). We have adopted this approach following the methodology developed by Berrang-Ford et al. ( 2011 ) which was tested in the field of environmental and climate change studies, with measurable outcomes. We have conducted the review following these four steps—article search, selection, review, and analysis (Fig.  1 ).

Systematic review flowchart

Article search

We conducted a comprehensive literature search to identify the published academic literature on climate-induced migration to develop a clear understanding of this field of study. We identified sixteen commonly used keywords to search for articles that are predominantly used in the literature. ProQuest central database was selected and used in consultation with a skilled subject librarian to search for the relevant articles for this study. We conducted this literature search in July 2019 using the key thesaurus terms, presented in Table 2 . All keywords were then searched individually in the publication’s title and abstract. We only considered English language peer-reviewed articles for this study, published between the years 1990 and 2019 (up to June).

Article selection

The main purpose of this process was to ensure the selection of appropriate literatures for further analysis. We approached the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta Analyses (PRISMA), a systematic evaluation tool, which was also used by Huq et al. ( 2021 ). In stage one of the selection process, 277 articles were counted based on our search criteria. In stage two, we excluded 25 duplicates, and 252 articles remained for further assessment. In the third and final stage of the detailed assessment of each paper, we identified a further 91 publications that were not relevant to our study but appeared in our searched list because search terms were briefly mentioned in their title and/or abstract without being described in further detail. As these articles did not fit with the aim and content of this research, we excluded those 91 and selected a final 161 articles for this study.

Article review

All the selected articles were then considered for detailed review in order to achieve the purpose of the study. A questionnaire (Online Attachment—A) was developed partially following Berrang-Ford et al. ( 2011 ); Obokata et al. ( 2014 ) and Piguet et al. ( 2018 ) to investigate how climate migration studies are framed in the published literature. Then each article was reviewed in detail in response to the individual parameters of the questionnaire such as general information ( article title, authors name, publication year, journal, discipline, content ), methodological approach ( qualitative, quantitative, mixed ), focused study areas ( country, climatic zones ), source of migrants ( rural, urban ), migration types ( internal, international ), impacts of climate migration ( social, economic, political, health, cultural, environmental, security ), causes of migration ( climatic: flood, sea-level rise, drought etc ., other: socio-economic, political, cultural ), target communities ( displaced community, receiving community ), and livelihoods ( housing, income, employment, etc . ) of climate migrants described in the publications.

Article analysis

All the data were recorded in Microsoft Office Excel spreadsheets. Relevant data for each parameter were filtered, analyzed, and summarized using the necessary Excel tools. Referencing was compiled through Mendeley Desktop.

Spatial and temporal trend

General information.

In this section, the publication date of the reviewed articles was used in order to identify the development of the academic discourse in climate migration studies over the last three decades (1990–2019). Results show the increasing focus of academic attention on this area of research over that timeframe. The study found only four publications between the years 1990 and 1999. During 2000–2009, an additional 16 articles were published, which was followed by an almost 90 percent (141 publications) increase in reviewed articles over the period of 2010–2019 (Table 3 ).

Reviewed study areas

In 84 reviewed articles, the study reported research focused on a particular location, and in some cases, they considered two or more areas for their research. Therefore, multiple counting for each study has been considered, which represents all the continents except Antarctica. The analysis shows that Asia (38%) is the continent with the greatest number of climate migration studies, followed by Oceania (20%), North America (17%), and Africa (14%). In contrast, Europe and South America have received less attention, with 7% and 5%, respectively. Table 4 presents the distribution of study areas by continent focused on the reviewed papers.

Climatic zones of the reviewed studies

This study identified the climatic zones of the study areas in order to find out which zones are most commonly studied among the reviewed studies. We adopted the climatic zones of the world from Peel et al. ( 2007 ), which is the updated version of Koppen’s climate classification, and categorizes the world climate into five major zones, i.e., (i) tropical, (ii) arid, (iii) temperate, (iv) cold, and (v) polar. This review shows that 86 publications mentioned their study areas, equating to 54% of the total reviewed papers. Among them, 81% referred to a specific region as their study area. The study areas were then classified into the above-mentioned climatic zones with one reference offered randomly for each country as an example of the range of research that has been conducted.

This study reveals that 49% of this group (among 81%) focused on tropical climatic areas such as Bangladesh (Islam et al. 2014 ), Cambodia (Jacobson et al. 2019 ), Kiribati (Bedford et al. 2016 ), Papua New Guinea (Connell and Lutkehaus 2017 ), Philippines (Tanyag 2018 ), Tuvalu (Locke 2009 ), and Vanuatu (Perumal 2018 ) among others, and 16% focused on arid climatic zones such as African Sahel (McLeman and Hunter 2010 ), Israel (Weinthal et al. 2015 ), Peru (Scheffran 2008 ), and Senegal (Nawrotzki et al. 2016a , b ). In addition to these, 13% of authors focused on temperate regions, i.e., Mexico (Nawrotzki et al. 2016a , b ), Nepal (Chapagain and Gentle 2015 ), Taiwan (Kang 2013 ), UK (Abel et al. 2013 ), and the USA (Rice et al. 2015 ) for their study and 3% focused on cold climatic areas, i.e., Alaska: USA (Marino and Lazrus 2015 ), Canada (Omeziri and Gore 2014 ), and northern parts of China (Ye et al. 2012 ). No studies were found based on polar regions (Fig.  2 ). Some studies did not specify a region or country of study but instead focused on broader regions such as Africa (White 2012 ), Asia–Pacific (Mayer 2013 ), Europe (Werz and Hoffman 2016 ), Latin America (Wiegel 2017 ), and Pacific (Hingley 2017 ).

Climatic zones of the reviewed study areas-adopted from Peel (2007)

Migration types and sources of climate migrants

Migration types here refer to whether migration was internal (within a country or region) or international (across borders), and sources of climate migrants refer to people from rural or urban source regions. Most authors (73%) mentioned nothing regarding migration types, but a quarter (27%) explicitly discussed internal or international migration. Among them, 11% described climate migration within countries and 10% investigated cross-border migration. Some authors (6%) were concerned with both internal and international climate migration. Source regions for climate migrants were not often considered, with only 19 publications mentioning the origin of migrants. Among these, 11 articles stated that migration occurred from rural areas, and two publications discussed migration from urban areas. Also, six articles described climate migration from both rural and urban areas.

Disciplinary foci

Research discipline.

This study reveals that climate migration studies are becoming more focal issues in different research disciplines that include more than 40 subject areas. Hence, we developed a typology for the reviewed articles based on the relevant research themes. The typology consists of six research disciplines, each of which includes different subjects, as follows.

Social sciences: Social sciences, Sociology, Political Science, International Relations, Comprehensive Works, Population Studies, Anthropology, Social Services and Welfare, History, Philosophy, Ethnic Interests, Civil Rights, Women's Studies

Geography and environment: Meteorology, Environmental Studies, Energy, Conservation, Earth Sciences, Geography, Agriculture, Geology, Biology, Archaeology, Pollution

Business studies and development: Management, Business and Economics, International Commerce, International Development and Assistance, Economics, Insurance, Investments, Accounting

Law, policy, and planning: Law, Military, Civil Defense, Criminology and Security, Environmental policy

Health and medical science: Public Health, Psychology, Medical Sciences, Physical Fitness, and Hygiene

Other: Literature, Library and Information Sciences, Physics, Technology

Among the reviewed publications, some articles were discussed from the perspective of one particular discipline, while others came from two or more disciplines. Therefore, multiple counting for each discipline was considered during the analysis. The study reveals that Social Science covers the highest percentage of publications (41%), followed by Geography and Environment (30%), Business Studies and development (10%), Law, policy and planning (9%), and Health and medical science (7%). Only 2% of publications are not covered by any of these disciplines.

Primary research themes

The authors discussed a diverse range of themes in the reviewed articles. Key themes have been classified into eight categories based on their topics and focusing subjects. Some of the publications focused on multiple themes, which were counted separately under each theme. Most of the authors (27%) focused on Politics and policy issues, and almost a fifth (18%) of total articles focused on the themes of population, health, and development issues. Human rights, conflicts, and security issues were discussed in 16% of papers, and climate, vulnerability, adaptation, and resilience topics were the focus of 12% of publications. In 11% of publications, the authors focused on identity and cultural issues, and socio-economic topics comprised a further 9% of the total. Environmental issues were discussed by 4% of reviewed articles and 3% of publications did not fit into any of the above categories and are described as Other.

Methodological approaches

This review identified that researchers applied both qualitative and quantitative methods in climate migration research. A total of 82% of the reviewed articles used qualitative methodologies, and 9% quantitative. In addition to these, 9% of articles used mixed methods in climate migration research. Of those who used qualitative studies, most were review-based (86%), comprising systematic review, empirical evidence-based review, critical synthesis review, critical discourse review, and policy review. Only 14% of qualitative studies used interview methods (7%), case studies (6%), and focus group discussion (1%). Data sources reported in the reviewed literature for the quantitative research included secondary data (73%), historical data (13%), remote sensing data (7%), and survey data (7%).

Triggering forces of migration

Climatic causes of migration.

The reviewed publications outlined a range of different causes of climate migration. This study reveals nineteen climate-related causes of migration. We merged these causes into eight categories, defined as (i) climate change (climate change, global warming, temperature, environmental change, climate-induced natural disaster, meteorological events, extreme weather, heatwave), (ii) flood, (iii) sea-level rise (sea-level rise, melting glacier), (iv) drought (drought, desertification), (v) storm (storm, cyclone, hurricane, typhoon), (vi) salinity (salinity, tidal surge), (vii) precipitation-induced landslide, and (viii) erosion (coastal erosion, river erosion). “Climate change” is defined as a separate category because some publications named climate change as an overarching driver of migration, rather than specifying any particular hazard. In 70 publications, authors mentioned particular climatic events that were solely responsible for human migration, and 53 of these articles predominantly identified climate change as the main driver of migration, followed by sea-level rise (6), drought (4), flood (3), storm (2), and precipitation-induced landslide (2). In the remaining articles, scholars identified two or more climatic events that were collectively responsible for human displacement. Based on these articles, multiple counting for each climatic event was considered and the results show that climate change was the most commonly cited cause in 126 articles, along with other climatic causes. The authors also identified sea-level rise, drought, flood, and storms as the significant drivers of peoples’ migration along with other climatic drivers, which were mentioned in 51, 46, 44, and 43 articles, respectively. Precipitation-induced landslide and erosion were recognized in 17 and 12 articles, respectively, as the causes of human displacement, whereas eight articles identified salinity as the main reason.

Influencing causes of migration

Although this review was focused on identifying the climatic causes of human displacement, some other causes emerged during the analysis that also influence migration. In 68 publications, economic, social, environmental, political, cultural, and psychological causes were stated as drivers of migration, in addition to the climatic causes. Among these, economic causes (32%) have been identified as the most common driver, followed by social (25%) and environmental (22%) causes. Some articles described political causes (16%), and the remainder mentioned cultural (3%) and psychological (1%) drivers of migration.

Other key issues

• Impacts of climate migration

One of the key findings of this review concerns the impacts of climate migration. In 48 publications, authors described a range of different impacts caused by climate migration, such as social, economic, political, health, cultural, environmental, and security. All the impacts were identified based on the location of climate migrants which are classified into the following three categories: (i) impacts on the place of origin, (ii) impacts on the place of destination, and (iii) impacts on both origin and destination. The review demonstrates that the impacts of climate migration were more frequently identified for the place of origin rather than for the destination. In the place of origin, authors discussed the economic, social, and cultural impacts, compared to political, security, health, and environmental impacts. In contrast, in the destination, scholars were more focused on security and cultural impacts. Overall, security, cultural and economic impacts were the most frequently discussed themes by the authors of reviewed literature in comparison with other impacts (Table 5 ).

Discussed communities

More than half of the reviewed articles ( N  = 81) described climate migrants and/or their receiving communities. In most of the discussions, authors talked about both displaced and host communities together (57%). In more than two-fifths of articles, they considered only displaced communities (42%). In contrast, none of the authors of the reviewed literature discussed host communities in detail in their publications, except Dorent ( 2011 ). Only a few authors briefly mentioned host communities during the discussion of climate migration impacts.

Livelihoods of climate migrants

This review demonstrates that the overall livelihood of climate migrants has not been a key focus in any of the reviewed literature. However, a few separate parameters of livelihoods, including housing, income and employment, health, access to resources, and education were mentioned in 23 articles. The analysis shows that the livelihoods of migrants in their place of origin (71%) were more likely to be considered compared to their destination (11%). In some articles (18%), authors addressed the livelihoods of climate migrants considering both their place of origin and destination. In total, all the articles which considered livelihoods had a specific focus on internal migration, and none mentioned the livelihoods of climate migrants in terms of international migration.

Discussion and research gaps

Climate change-induced migration is neither new (Nagra 2017 ), nor a future hypothetical phenomenon—it is a current reality (Coughlin 2018 ). This review provides a comprehensive analysis of how this field of study is framed in the existing literature. The academic discourse on human migration due to climate change is suggestive of a long-standing causal connection, which is hard to dissociate (Milán-García et al. 2021 ; Parrish et al. 2020 ; Piguet et al. 2011 ).

The review of spatial and temporal trends of climate-induced migration studies illustrates the growth in the field since the release of 1st IPCC report in 1990. In addition, this review has explored some basic questions that are useful to guide future research in this field of study, for instance, which study areas have received greater or lesser focus? Where are these study areas located in relation to global climatic zones? How are people migrating, i.e., internally, or internationally? What are the spatial sources of climate-induced migrants, i.e., rural, or urban environments?

This review also demonstrates that the expansion of climate migration research increased rapidly after 2000, although the studies in this field began before 2000 (Table 3 ). It denotes that the global academia and policymakers have emphasized their focus on this topic in recent decades (Milán-García et al. 2021 ; Piguet et al. 2011 ). Moreover, this review identifies the Asia–Pacific region as the global ‘hotspot’ of climate migration research (Table 4 ). This reflects the IDMC ( 2019 ) report that states more than 80% of the total displacement between 2008 and 2018 occurred within this region. Moreover, a significant proportion of global environmental displacement will continue to occur in the Asia–Pacific region (Mayer, 2013 ). Therefore, this region could be considered as a critical ‘living laboratory’ for future climate migration research.

Climate migration is mostly occurring internally (IDMC 2021a ; Laczko and Aghazarm 2009 ), and in recent years, it has been widely acknowledged in the policy areas (Fussell et al. 2014 ; The World Bank 2018 ). Nevertheless, this study reveals that only a quarter of the reviewed studies for example, Chapagain and Gentle ( 2015 ), Islam et al. ( 2014 ), and Prasain ( 2018 ) have considered the migration types (internal or international) and sources (rural or urban) of climate migrants in their research. Thus, this review identifies the gap and need for contributions to the academic discourse that investigate migration types, the origin of migrants, and their patterns of migration.

The review of the disciplinary foci of climate-induced migration literature reveals that a broader range of disciplines are now focusing on this research topic, which suggests that greater interdisciplinarity is developing in the discourse. IDMC ( 2021b ) data presented in Table 1 show that climate-induced disasters are displacing millions of people every year, but surprisingly none of the reviewed publications appeared under the subject category of disaster management in the database. This reflects the emergent nature of the academic discourse on climate migration and disaster management, which includes recent studies by Ye et al. ( 2012 ), Tanyag ( 2018 ), and Hamza et al. ( 2017 ). In addition, politics and policy issues regarding climate migration were discussed by scholars; however, no country-specific policies were found during the review that considered both the origin and host communities of climate migrants.

Campbell ( 2014 ) argues that there is insufficient empirical evidence within climate migration research. However, this review reveals that research in this area has been undertaken using a range of methodologies, from qualitative (review, case study, interview, focus group discussion etc.) to quantitative (based on survey data, secondary data, historical data, and remote sensing data), which has produced a strong foundation of work to guide future pathways for interdisciplinary climate migration research. A significant proportion of the research to date has been review-based. Also, there is a lack of empirical studies in this research field that consider the application of geographic information system and remote sensing.

It is clear from reviewing the triggering forces of climate-induced migration literature that climatic events are dominantly responsible for climate migration, which is supported by Rahman and Gain ( 2020 ), Connell and Lutkehaus ( 2017 ), Gemenne ( 2015 ), and Kniveton et al. ( 2012 ). Despite this, there are some other influencing push and/or pull factors such as socio-economic, political, cultural, etc., which are likely to compound (or be compounded by) climate impacts, to trigger the migration process (Black et al. 2011 ; de Haas 2011 , 2021 ; Fussell et al. 2014 ). While there remains ample anecdotal evidence of the relationship between climate change impacts and migration, the specific reasons for people to decide to migrate are interwoven with indirect pressures, such as livelihood disruption, poverty, war, or disaster (Werz and Hoffman 2016 ). Moreover, why people choose to stay at their places is also essential in the context of creeping environmental and climate-induced migration (Mallick and Schanze 2020 ).

One of the other key issues reviewed in this study is that the literature to date fails to build an understanding of the impacts of climate migration on both the origin (source regions) and destination of the climate migrants. There are very few studies such as Comstock and Cook ( 2018 ), Maurel and Tuccio ( 2016 ), Pryce and Chen ( 2011 ), Rahaman et al. ( 2018 ), Rice et al. ( 2015 ), and Schwan and Yu ( 2017 ) that investigate different aspects of socio-economic impacts (housing, health, social, economic, etc.) of climate migration in the destination region, and this presents a clear gap in knowledge that requires further study. Also, no current research has been identified during the review that focused on the environmental impacts of climate migration.

In addition, this review identifies that there was less attention paid to the impacts of climate migration on host communities compared to displaced populations in their new locations. Given that migration will continue to increase globally, there is likely to be a growing need to understand the range of potential impacts on host communities. Although some countries and regions are developing policies to manage internal migration, there are no formal protection policies for cross-border climate migration (Nishimura 2015 ; OHCHR 2018 ; Olsson 2015 ; Zaman 2021 ). Therefore, policy arrangements for managing the needs of climate displaced people in their new communities need to be developed to account for issues related to impacts, livelihoods, community cohesion, and cultural diversity and values. Future research should address the significant gap in understanding the livelihoods of climate migrants in their cross border or international destination. More specifically, in developed countries where the employment sector is more formalized, there is less room for informal economic practices that are common in developing contexts. More formal employment arrangements make it challenging for migrants to establish new livelihoods, alongside other challenges such as language barriers, and other financial, social, cultural and well-being issues.

Limitations and future research scope

Limitations of this study.

There are some limitations to this systematic review; firstly, this review used ProQuest as the sole database for the analysis, and future work could extend the scope to include other major databases. Secondly, this study only considered English language literature, and there are likely to be significant publications in other languages relating to climate migration that were not included in this analysis. Thirdly, looking at pre-1990 or post-2019 literature could add more exciting findings to the search list, which would provide more informative literature. Finally, the outputs of this review are limited to the nature of the search terms, and thus, if other words or texts such as climate-induced relocation or mobility were used, it might extend the range of the review.

Toward a research agenda for climate migration

This review has highlighted several exciting future research opportunities that will build on the strong foundation of work over the past decades in the field of climate migration studies. These include the following research themes; (i) a richer understanding of the full range of impacts (such as social, economic, environmental, and cultural) of climate migration on host communities; (ii) in-depth analysis of the livelihoods of climate-induced migrants in their new destination; (iii) evidence-based research on internal and international climate migration with their sources; (iv) long-term migration policy development at national, regional, or international levels considering both climate migrants and host communities; (v) scope and application of geographic information systems and remote sensing in this area of research, and (vi) developing sustainable livelihood frameworks for climate migrants. The authors believe that academic contributions to these research themes will drive climate migration challenges toward long-term solutions, particularly in those countries that are going to be hosting increasing numbers of climate migrants in future.

This study aimed to understand the past three decades of academic endeavor on climate migration and to identify the gaps in the existing literature in order to inform a research agenda for future research. Climate change, climate-induced migration, and climate migrants are now considered significant global challenges. Climate migrants are identified as a vulnerable group, and a consideration of issues for this group is essential in addressing the goals of the SDGs and SFDRRR. There is a growing body of knowledge that reflects the global relevance of climate migration as a major current and future challenge (Boncour and Burson 2009 ). Addressing the issues and challenges of this form of migration will improve the survival and certain resettlement rights of climate migrants (Miller 2017 ). Therefore, this review contributes a research agenda for future climate migration studies. This study has revealed a critical need to establish a universally agreed definition of ‘climate-induced migrants’ and ‘climate-induced migration,’ which remains unclear to date. Lack of clarity only acts to reduce the visibility of issues related to climate-induced migration. In addition, there is a crucial need to improve the evidence base for climate-induced migration by improving current global datasets, to inform local, regional, and global policy development. Policies need to be future-looking in preparation for a rapid and significant increase in climate-related migration across the globe, within and across national borders. For instance, it is important for receiving countries to anticipate an upsurge in migration by developing appropriate policies to support new migrants, particularly regarding visa and immigration arrangements. Addressing current gaps in knowledge will lead to improved pathways to manage this global migration challenge, which is now a critical need if we are to achieve a sustainable future in a climate-challenged world.

Data availability

Data are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Abel G, Bijak J, Findlay A, Mccollum D, Winiowski A (2013) Forecasting environmental migration to the United Kingdom: an exploration using Bayesian models. Popul Environ 35(2):183–203. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11111-013-0186-8

Article   Google Scholar  

Apap J (2019) The concept of ‘climate refugee’: towards a possible definition. https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2018/621893/EPRS_BRI(2018)621893_EN.pdf . Accessed 26 Aug 2021

Baird R, Migiro K, Nutt D, Kwatra A, Wilson S, Melby J, Pendleton A, Rodgers M, Davison J (2007) Human tide: the real migration crisis. https://www.christianaid.org.uk/sites/default/files/2017-08/human-tide-the-real-migration-crisis-may-2007.pdf . Accessed 11 Sep 2021

Bedford R, Bedford C, Corcoran J, Didham R (2016) Population change and migration in Kiribati and Tuvalu, 2015–2050: Hypothetical scenarios in a context of climate change. N Z Popul Rev 42:103–134

Google Scholar  

Berrang-Ford L, Ford J, Paterson J (2011) Are we adapting to climate change? Glob Environ Change 21(1):25–33. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2010.09.012

Black R (2001) Environmental refugees: myth or reality? In: UNHCR: New Issues in Refugee Research (No. 34). https://www.unhcr.org/research/working/3ae6a0d00/environmental-refugees-myth-reality-richard-black.html . Accessed 04 Sep 2021

Black R, Adger WN, Arnell NW, Dercon S, Geddes A, Thomas D (2011) The effect of environmental change on human migration. Glob Environ Change 21(SUPPL. 1):S3–S11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2011.10.001

Boncour P, Burson B (2009) Climate change and migration in the South Pacific region: policy perspectives. Policy Q 5(4):13–20. https://doi.org/10.26686/pq.v5i4.4312

Bronen R (2008) Alaskan communities’ rights and resilience. Forced Migr Rev 31:30–32

Bronen R (2011) Climate-induced community relocations: creating an adaptive governance framework based in human rights doctrine. N Y Univ Rev Law Soc Change 35(2):357–407

Bronen R, Chapin FS (2013) Adaptive governance and institutional strategies for climate-induced community relocations in Alaska. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 110(23):9320–9325. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1210508110

Brown O (2008) Migration and climate change. In: IOM Migration Research Series (No. 31). https://publications.iom.int/books/mrs-no-31-migration-and-climate-change . Accessed 11 Sep 2021

Campbell JR (2014) Climate-change migration in the Pacific. Contemp Pac 26(1):1–28. https://doi.org/10.1353/cp.2014.0023

Chapagain B, Gentle P (2015) Withdrawing from agrarian livelihoods: environmental migration in Nepal. J Mt Sci 12(1):1–13. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-014-3017-1

Chen J, Mueller V (2018) Coastal climate change, soil salinity and human migration in Bangladesh. Nat Clim Change 8(11):981–985. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-018-0313-8

Comstock AR, Cook RA (2018) Climate change and migration along a Mississippian periphery: a fort ancient example. Am Antiq 83(1):91–108. https://doi.org/10.1017/aaq.2017.50

Connell J, Lutkehaus N (2017) Environmental refugees? A tale of two resettlement projects in coastal Papua New Guinea. Aust Geogr 48(1):79–95. https://doi.org/10.1080/00049182.2016.1267603

Coughlin J (2018) The Figure of the “Climate Refugee” in Inger Elisabeth Hansen’s Å resirkulere lengselen: avrenning foregår (2015). Scand Can Stud 25:68–90

de Haas H (2011) The determinants of international migration: conceptualising policy, origin and destination effects. IMI Working Pap Ser 32(2011):35

de Haas H (2021) A theory of migration: the aspirations-capabilities framework. Comp Migr Stud 9(1):1–35. https://doi.org/10.1186/S40878-020-00210-4

Dorent N (2011) Transitory cities: emergency architecture and the challenge of climate change. Development 54(3):345–351. https://doi.org/10.1057/dev.2011.60

Doyle EEH, Johnston DM, Smith R, Paton D (2019) Communicating model uncertainty for natural hazards: a qualitative systematic thematic review. Int J Disaster Risk Reduct 33:449–476. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2018.10.023

Fussell E, Hunter LM, Gray CL (2014) Measuring the environmental dimensions of human migration: the demographer’s toolkit. Glob Environ Change 28(1):182–191. https://doi.org/10.1016/J.GLOENVCHA.2014.07.001

Gemenne F (2015) One good reason to speak of “climate refugees.” Forced Migr Rev 49:70–71

Hamza M, Koch I, Plewa M (2017) Disaster-induced displacement in the Caribbean and the Pacific. Forced Migr Rev 56:62–64

Held D (2016) Climate change, migration and the cosmopolitan dilemma. Global Pol 7(2):237–246. https://doi.org/10.1111/1758-5899.12309

Hingley R (2017) “Climate refugees”: an oceanic perspective. Asia Pac Policy Stud 4(1):158–165. https://doi.org/10.1002/app5.163

Huq ME, Sarker MNI, Prasad R, Hossain MA, Rahman MM, Al-Dughairi AA (2021) Resilience for disaster management: opportunities and challenges. In: Alam GMM, Erdiaw-Kwasie MO, Nagy GJ, Filho WL (eds) Climate vulnerability and resilience in the global south : human adaptations for sustainable futures, 1st edn. Springer, Cham, pp 425–442. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-77259-8_22

Chapter   Google Scholar  

IDMC (2017) Global Disaster Displacement Risk: A Baseline for Future Work. https://www.internal-displacement.org/publications/global-disaster-displacement-risk-a-baseline-for-future-work . Accessed 09 Sep 2021

IDMC (2019) Disaster displacement: a global review 2008–2018. https://environmentalmigration.iom.int/disaster-displacement-global-review-2008-2018 . Accessed 08 Sep 2021

IDMC (2021a) GRID 2021a: Internal displacement in a changing climate. Global Report on Internal Displacement, Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre. https://www.internal-displacement.org/global-report/grid2021/ . Accessed 14 June 2021

IDMC (2021b) IDMC Query Tool—Disaster. Global Internal Displacement Database. https://www.internal-displacement.org/database/displacement-data . Accessed 09 Dec 2021

IOM (2021) Environmental Migration: Recent Trends. Migration Data Portal, International Organization for Migration. https://migrationdataportal.org/themes/environmental_migration_and_statistics . Accessed 31 Aug 2021

Ionesco D, Mokhnacheva D, Gemenne F (2017) The atlas of environmental migration, 1st edn. Routledge, London. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315777313

Book   Google Scholar  

IPCC (1990) IPCC First Assessment Report Overview. https://www.ipcc.ch/assessment-report/ar1/ . Accessed 10 Sep 2021

Islam MM, Sallu S, Hubacek K, Paavola J (2014) Migrating to tackle climate variability and change? Insights from coastal fishing communities in Bangladesh. Clim Change 124:733–746. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-014-1135-y

Jacobson C, Crevello S, Chea C, Jarihani B (2019) When is migration a maladaptive response to climate change? Reg Environ Change 19(1):101–112. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-018-1387-6

Kälin W, Cantor D (2017) The RCM Guide: a novel protection tool for cross-border disaster-induced displacement in the Americas. Forced Migr Rev 56:58–61

Kang MJ (2013) From original homeland to “permanent housing” and back: the post-disaster exodus and reconstruction of south Taiwan’s indigenous communities. Soc Sci Dir 2(4):85–105. https://doi.org/10.7563/SSD_02_04_08

King D, Bird D, Haynes K, Boon H, Cottrell A, Millar J, Okada T, Box P, Keogh D, Thomas M (2014) Voluntary relocation as an adaptation strategy to extreme weather events. Int J Disaster Risk Reduct 8:83–90. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2014.02.006

Kniveton DR, Smith CD, Black R (2012) Emerging migration flows in a changing climate in dryland Africa. Nat Clim Change. https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1447

Laczko F, Aghazarm C (2009) Introduction and overview: enhancing the knowledge base. In: Laczko F, Aghazarm C (eds) Migration, environment and climate change: assessing the evidence. International Organization for Migration, Le Grand-Saconnex, pp 7–40

Locke JT (2009) Climate change-induced migration in the Pacific Region: sudden crisis and long-term developments. Geogr J 175(3):171–180. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-4959.2009.00317.x

Mallett R, Hagen-Zanker J, Slater R, Duvendack M (2012) The benefits and challenges of using systematic reviews in international development research. J Dev Eff 4(3):445–455. https://doi.org/10.1080/19439342.2012.711342

Mallick B, Schanze J (2020) Trapped or voluntary? Non-migration despite climate risks. Sustainability 12(11):1–6. https://doi.org/10.3390/su12114718

Mallick B, Sultana Z (2017) Livelihood after relocation-evidences of Guchchagram project in Bangladesh. Soc Sci 6(3):1–19. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci6030076

Marino E, Lazrus H (2015) Migration or forced displacement? The complex choices of climate change and disaster migrants in Shishmaref, Alaska and Nanumea, Tuvalu. Hum Organ 74(4):341–350. https://doi.org/10.17730/0018-7259-74.4.341

Maurel M, Tuccio M (2016) Climate instability, urbanisation and international migration. J Dev Stud 52(5):735–752. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220388.2015.1121240

Mayer B (2013) Environmental migration in the Asia-Pacific region: could we hang out sometime? Asian J Int Law 3(1):101–135. https://doi.org/10.1017/S204425131200029X

Mcleman R (2019) International migration and climate adaptation in an era of hardening borders. Nat Clim Change 9(12):911–918. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-019-0634-2

McLeman RA (2014) Climate and human migration: past experiences, future challenges. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139136938

McLeman RA, Hunter LM (2010) Migration in the context of vulnerability and adaptation to climate change: insights from analogues. Wiley Interdiscip Rev Clim Change 1(3):450–461. https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.51

Milán-García J, Caparrós-Martínez JL, Rueda-López N, de Pablo Valenciano J (2021) Climate change-induced migration: a bibliometric review. Glob Health 17(1):1–10. https://doi.org/10.1186/S12992-021-00722-3

Miller DS (2017) Climate refugees and the human cost of global climate change. Environ Justice 10(4):89–92. https://doi.org/10.1089/env.2017.29027.dm

Myers N (2002) Environmental refugees: a growing phenomenon of the 21st century. Philos Trans R Soc B Biol Sci 357(1420):609–613. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2001.0953

Nagra S (2017) The Oslo principles and climate change displacement: missed opportunity or misplaced expectations? Carbon Clim Law Rev CCLR 11(2):120–135. https://doi.org/10.21552/cclr/2017/2/8

Nawrotzki RJ, Runfola DM, Hunter LM, Riosmena F (2016a) Domestic and International Climate Migration from Rural Mexico. Hum Ecol 44(6):687–699. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10745-016-9859-0

Nawrotzki RJ, Schlak AM, Kugler TA (2016b) Climate, migration, and the local food security context: introducing Terra Populus. Popul Environ 38(2):164–184. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11111-016-0260-0

Nishimura L (2015) ‘Climate change migrants’: impediments to a protection framework and the need to incorporate migration into climate change adaptation strategies. Int J Refug Law 27(1):107–134. https://doi.org/10.1093/ijrl/eev002

Obokata R, Veronis L, McLeman R (2014) Empirical research on international environmental migration: a systematic review. Popul Environ 36(1):111–135. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11111-014-0210-7

OHCHR (2018) The slow onset effects of climate change and human rights protection for cross-border migrants. https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Migration/OHCHR_slow_onset_of_Climate_Change_EN.pdf . Accessed 10 Dec 2021

Olsson L (2015) Environmental migrants in international law: An assessment of protection gaps and solutions. Environmental Migration Portal: Climate Change, Displacement. https://environmentalmigration.iom.int/environmental-migrants-international-law-assessment-protection-gaps-and-solutions . Accessed 10 Dec 2021

Omeziri E, Gore C (2014) Temporary measures: Canadian refugee policy and environmental migration. Refuge 29(2):43–53. https://doi.org/10.25071/1920-7336.38166

Parrish R, Colbourn T, Lauriola P, Leonardi G, Hajat S, Zeka A (2020) A critical analysis of the drivers of human migration patterns in the presence of climate change: a new conceptual model. Int J Environ Res Public Health 17(17):1–20. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17176036

Peel MC, Finlayson BL, Mcmahon TA (2007) Updated world map of the Köppen-Geiger climate classification. Hydrol Earth Syst Sci 11(5):1633–1644. https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-11-1633-2007

Perkiss S, Moerman L (2018) A dispute in the making. Account Audit Account J 31(1):166–192. https://doi.org/10.1108/AAAJ-06-2016-2582

Perumal N (2018) The place where I live is where I belong: community perspectives on climate change and climate-related migration in the Pacific island nation of Vanuatu. Island Stud J 13(1):45–64. https://doi.org/10.24043/isj.50

Petticrew M, Robert H (2006) Systematic reviews in the social sciences: a practical guide. Blackwell Publishing, Hoboken. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470754887

Piguet E, Pécoud A, de Guchteneire P (2011) Migration and climate change: an overview. Refug Surv Q 30(3):1–23. https://doi.org/10.1093/rsq/hdr006

Piguet E, Kaenzig R, Guélat J (2018) The uneven geography of research on “environmental migration.” Popul Environ 39(4):357–383. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11111-018-0296-4

Poncelet A, Gemenne F, Martiniello M, Bousetta H (2010) A country made for disasters: environmental vulnerability and forced migration in Bangladesh. In: Afifi T, Jäger J (eds) Environment, forced migration and social vulnerability. Springer, Berlin, pp 211–222. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-12416-7

Prasain S (2018) Climate change adaptation measure on agricultural communities of Dhye in Upper Mustang, Nepal. Clim Change 148:279–291. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-018-2187-1

Pryce G, Chen Y (2011) Flood risk and the consequences for housing of a changing climate: an international perspective. Risk Manage 13(4):228–246. https://doi.org/10.1057/rm.2011.13

Rahaman MA, Rahman MM, Bahauddin KM, Khan S, Hassan S (2018) Health disorder of climate migrants in Khulna City: an urban slum perspective. Int Migr. https://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12460

Rahman MS, Gain A (2020) Adaptation to river bank erosion induced displacement in Koyra Upazila of Bangladesh. Prog Disaster Sci 5:1000552. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pdisas.2019.100055

Rice JL, Burke BJ, Heynen N (2015) Knowing climate change, embodying climate praxis: experiential knowledge in Southern Appalachi. Ann Assoc Am Geogr 105(2):253–262. https://doi.org/10.1080/00045608.2014.985628

Scheffran J (2008) Climate change and security. Bull Atom Sci 64(2):19–25. https://doi.org/10.2968/064002007

Schwan S, Yu X (2017) Social protection as a strategy to address climate-induced migration. Int J Clim Change Strateg Manage 10(1):43–64. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJCCSM-01-2017-0019

Smith K, Smith K (2013) Environmental hazards: assessing risk and reducing disaster, 6th edn. Routledge, London. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203805305

Tanyag M (2018) Resilience, female altruism, and bodily autonomy: disaster-induced displacement in Post-Haiyan Philippines. Signs J Women Cult Soc 43(3):563–585. https://doi.org/10.1086/695318

The World Bank (2018) Groundswell: preparing for internal climate migration. https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/infographic/2018/03/19/groundswell---preparing-for-internal-climate-migration . Accessed 29 June 2021

Warner K, Ehrhart C, de Sherbinin A, Adamo S, Chai-Onn T (2009) In search of shelter: mapping the effects of climate change on human migration and displacement. https://www.care.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/CC-2009-CARE_In_Search_of_Shelter.pdf . Accessed 11 Sept 2021

Weinthal E, Zawahri N, Sowers J (2015) Securitizing water, climate, and migration in Israel, Jordan, and Syria. Int Environ Agreem Polit Law Econ 15(3):293–307. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10784-015-9279-4

Werz M, Hoffman M (2016) Europe’s twenty-first century challenge: climate change, migration and security. Eur View 15(1):145–154. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12290-016-0385-7

White G (2012) Climate change and migration: security and borders in a warming world. Oxford University Press, Oxford. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199794829.001.0001

Wiegel H (2017) Refugees of rising seas. Science 357(6346):41. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aan5667

Wilkinson E, Kirbyshire A, Mayhew L, Batra P, Milan A (2016) Climate-induced migration and displacement: closing the policy gap. https://www.odi.org/sites/odi.org.uk/files/resource-documents/10996.pdf . Accessed 12 March 2021

Ye Y, Fang X, Khan MAU (2012) Migration and reclamation in Northeast China in response to climatic disasters in North China over the past 300 years. Reg Environ Change 12(1):193–206. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-011-0245-6

Zaman ST (2021) Legal protection for the cross-border climate-induced population movement in south asia: exploring a durable solution. J Environ Law Litig 36:187–235

Download references

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Dr Douglas Hill, Dr Ashraful Alam and Dr Bishawjit Mallick for their feedback on the initial draft of this article.

This research has been supported by a University of Otago Doctoral Scholarship. Open Access funding is enabled and organized by CAUL and its Member Institutions.

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Centre for Sustainability, School of Geography, University of Otago, Dunedin, 9016, New Zealand

Rajan Chandra Ghosh & Caroline Orchiston

Department of Emergency Management, Faculty of Environmental Science and Disaster Management, Patuakhali Science and Technology University, Patuakhali, 8602, Bangladesh

Rajan Chandra Ghosh

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Contributions

Both authors have contributed to the study conception and design. RCG performed the literature search, collected and analyzed the data, and prepared the first draft of the manuscript. CO critically reviewed the manuscript. Both authors have read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rajan Chandra Ghosh .

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest.

The authors have no financial or non-financial interests to disclose.

Supplementary Information

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

Supplementary file1 (DOCX 14 kb)

Rights and permissions.

Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ .

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Ghosh, R.C., Orchiston, C. A systematic review of climate migration research: gaps in existing literature. SN Soc Sci 2 , 47 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s43545-022-00341-8

Download citation

Received : 23 September 2021

Accepted : 28 March 2022

Published : 16 April 2022

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s43545-022-00341-8

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Climate-induced migration
• Climate-induced migrants
• Livelihoods
• Systematic review
• Find a journal
• Publish with us
• Track your research

• Tools and Resources
• Customer Services
• African Literatures
• Asian Literatures
• British and Irish Literatures
• Latin American and Caribbean Literatures
• North American Literatures
• Oceanic Literatures
• Slavic and Eastern European Literatures
• West Asian Literatures, including Middle East
• Western European Literatures
• Ancient Literatures (before 500)
• Middle Ages and Renaissance (500-1600)
• Enlightenment and Early Modern (1600-1800)
• 19th Century (1800-1900)
• 20th and 21st Century (1900-present)
• Children’s Literature
• Cultural Studies
• Film, TV, and Media
• Literary Theory
• Non-Fiction and Life Writing
• Print Culture and Digital Humanities
• Theater and Drama
• Share This Facebook LinkedIn Twitter

Article contents

Literary representations of migration.

• Marisel Moreno Marisel Moreno Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, University of Notre Dame
• https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190201098.013.371
• Published online: 23 May 2019

Migration has always been at the core of Latina/o literature. In fact, it would be difficult to find any work in this corpus that does not address migration to some extent. This is because, save some exceptions, the experience of migration is the unifying condition from which Latina/o identities have emerged. All Latinas/os trace their family origins to Latin America and/or the Hispanic Caribbean. That said, not all of them experience migration first-hand or in the same manner; there are many factors that determine why, how, when, and where migration takes place. Yet, despite all of these factors, it is safe to say that a crucial reason behind the mass movements of people from Latin America and the Hispanic Caribbean to the United States has been direct or indirect US involvement in the countries of origin. This is evident, for instance, in the cases of Puerto Rico (invasion of 1898) and Central America (civil wars in the 1980s), where US intervention led to migration to the United States in the second half of the 20th century. Other factors that tend to affect the experience of migration include nationality, class, race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, religion, language, citizenship status, age, ability, and the historical juncture at which migration takes place.

The heterogeneous ways in which migration is represented in Latina/o literature reflect the wide range of factors that influence and shape the experience of migration. Latina/o narrative, poetry, theatre, essay, and other forms of literary expressions capture the diversity of the migration experience. Some of the constant themes that emerge in these works include nostalgia, transculturation, discrimination, racism, uprootedness, hybridity, and survival. In addressing these issues, Latina/o literature brings visibility to the complexities surrounding migration and Latina/o identity, while undermining the one-dimensional and negative stereotypes that tend to dehumanize Latinas/os in US dominant society. Most importantly, it allows the public to see that while migration is complex and in constant flux, those who experience it are human beings in search for survival.

• Latina/o literature
• Latin America
• Hispanic Caribbean
• transculturation
• marginality
• displacement
• undocumented migration
• forced migration

Migration has always been a central theme in Latina/o literature because movement and displacement are at the core of the US Latina/o experience. The label “Latina/o” itself hints at the idea of movement because it is used to refer to people of Latin American or Hispanic Caribbean descent in the United States. 1 For some Latinas/os, the experience of migration is personal; it is something that they have lived through and recall. For others, it is more of a distant or inherited memory, sometimes passed down from generation to generation. Yet even in cases where there is significant temporal and physical distance from the country of origin, the Latina/o experience in the United States tends to be informed and shaped by the legacy of movement, albeit to different degrees. Migration in Latina/o literature refers not only to the actual process of moving but also to the emotional, psychological, and socioeconomic impact that that process has on individuals, families, and communities. Because of the different contexts in which migration tends to occur, as well as the multiplicity of variables that inform it—race, ethnicity, class, gender, sexual orientation, age, religion, education, political affiliation, citizenship status, culture, mode of transportation, nationality, generation, and ability—it is important to recognize its fluidity. There is not only one typical Latina/o migration experience, but rather there are multiple ones, and Latina/o literature offers a window into that diversity.

Broadly speaking, the representation of migration in Latina/o narrative, poetry, drama, essay, and other literary forms usually encompasses themes such as displacement (for political and economic reasons), nostalgia, uprootedness, transculturation, cultural hybridity, biculturalism, bilingualism, survival, the American Dream, adaptation, exclusion, discrimination, prejudice, and marginality. Yet the development of these themes varies significantly among writers and works. The extent to which migration is depicted as a positive or negative experience reflects how deeply personal it is. Migration does not occur in a vacuum; it is informed, influenced, and determined by economic, political, and social forces, structures, and circumstances that usually are beyond an individual’s control. As a result, literary texts often reveal the tensions that emerge between the personal and the systemic forces at play. A cursory review of Latina/o literature suffices to illustrate the plurality of experiences surrounding the theme of migration. Precisely because of the immeasurable breadth of the topic, this article does not seek to offer an exhaustive examination, but rather aims to provide a general overview of the representation of migration in Latina/o literary production. Likewise, it is not possible to mention or cover every Latina/o author, poet, or literary work that deals with this theme. The works discussed here have been selected because they illustrate some of the predominant tendencies regarding the representation of migration in this area. The reader should be aware, however, that they constitute a limited sample of the vast and rich literary production that addresses this theme.

Migration from Latin America and the Hispanic Caribbean to the United States has been taking place for centuries. Shifting geopolitical borders, in addition to and informed by US economic, neocolonial, and neo-imperialist interests, are some of the reasons behind the mass displacements from these regions. Continuous US interventions, occupations, and invasions throughout the region for economic, political, or military reasons—informed by the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine—have resulted in significant migration from Latin America and the Caribbean to the United States. 2

Although there has been a Latin American and Hispanic Caribbean presence in the United States since the 19th century , the first significant wave of Mexican migration took place as a result of the Mexican Revolution ( 1910–1920 ). Additional waves from other countries followed, and they significantly accelerated at about the middle of the 20th century , in part as a result of technological advances. Some of the reasons for this displacement include political exile, civil wars, dictatorial and authoritarian regimes, cartel and gang violence, ethno-racial prejudice and violence, the search for economic opportunities, family reunification, and persecution due to gender and sexual orientation. Some of these reasons are more urgent than others, but in the end they all have one thing in common: survival. When reflecting on the topic of migration, place of origin is of crucial importance given the specific political and socioeconomic circumstances that characterize each country’s migration history, as well as US policy toward them. This is evident, for instance, in the distinctions that emerge between the representations of migration in the works of US Puerto Ricans (who are US citizens and colonial subjects), Cuban Americans (who fled an authoritarian regime and extreme poverty), and Salvadoran Americans (who escaped the violence of civil war and drug cartels).

Although clear distinctions emerge between histories of migration by country of origin, differences can be found within countries, as well. It is possible for distinct waves of immigrants from the same country to have completely divergent experiences. This is evident in the contrast that emerges between the welcoming reception experienced by upper- and middle-class Cubans who fled after the triumph of the Cuban Revolution in 1959 and the rejection felt by their compatriots, the underprivileged dark-skinned balseros (rafters) who escaped in makeshift vessels in the 1990s and who, unlike their predecessors, were not immediately allowed into the United States. 3 Another crucial factor in the way migration is represented in literature is generation. With some exceptions, the closer an author is to the actual experience of migration, the more pronounced are the themes of nostalgia, longing, anger, or sense of uprootedness. For Latinas/os who belong to the one-and-a-half and second generations, the themes of biculturalism, bilingualism, hybridity, and integration into US society tend to be at the forefront. Regardless of the generation, however, the success or (most often) the failure to attain the American Dream seems to loom large in Latina/o writing.

Mode of transportation is another variable that is tied to the conditions that inform migration and that also determines how this experience is perceived and conveyed in literature. Until the mid- 20th century most migrants arrived in the United States by train or ship, and later on commercial flights. Yet it is important to remember that the mode of transportation is determined by a range of factors that includes an individual’s status, capital, location, and US immigration policy toward the country of origin at that specific historical juncture. Since the late 20th century undocumented Mexican, Central American, and South American migrants have risked their lives walking and riding on top of trains in order to cross the Mexico-US border. Cuban migration through Mexico has increased since the early 21st century . Likewise, for decades unauthorized Dominicans and Cubans have attempted to cross the ocean using yolas and balsas (makeshift rafts) to reach Puerto Rico and the Florida Keys, many perishing in the process.

The way migration is understood has also shifted in recent times. Traditionally thought of as a permanent unidirectional displacement, migration has been transformed by technological advances and globalization, which allow short-term and circular migration to take place. The length of stay in the United States is often determined by push-pull factors including political and socioeconomic conditions in the United States and the country of origin. Since the late 20th century , return migration (to the home country) and circular (back-and-forth) migration have become common, and they contribute to the constant reinforcement and revitalization of transnational ties between populations in the countries of origin and their diasporas. Transmigration, in turn, has led to the interrogation and challenging of cultural, racial, and gender norms in the countries of origin. As migrants move between their home and host countries, their worldviews and perceptions—which travel with them—have led to the dismantling of static notions of identity. One example is the understanding of race: in the United States this is defined by the black-white paradigm, but it is much more nuanced in Latin America and the Hispanic Caribbean. Many Latinos/as have embraced their African roots as a result of their experiences living or growing up in the diaspora. This attitude marks a shift in mentality regarding prevailing identity discourses in the countries of origin, given that blackness and the African heritage have tended to be minimized or denied across Latin America and the Hispanic Caribbean.

As must be evident by now, migration is a highly complex phenomenon that is experienced, understood, and conveyed in different ways by different people. Because the majority of Latina/o literature has been produced since the mid- 20th century , this article focuses on works published from the 1960s to the present. It is divided by country or region of origin in order to offer the reader a more cohesive overview of migration in Latina/o literature.

Mexican American Literature

A discussion of the Mexican presence in the United States must take into account the shifting geopolitical borders between the two nations. There has been a significant Mexican presence in the United States since 1848 , when the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed to put an end to the Mexican-American War. As a result of the treaty and the definition of a new Mexico-US border, the United States absorbed expansive territories that once belonged to Mexico and the populations that had lived on those lands for generations. 4 The first significant wave of Mexican migration to the United States took place as a result of the Mexican Revolution, when thousands tried to escape the violence of war. Mexican and Mexican American workers became the backbone of the US economy during this period, but as a result of the Great Depression in 1929 , thousands were forcibly deported to Mexico. Throughout the 20th century , the push-pull factors that have influenced Mexican migration have mirrored the interdependency that has long existed between the Mexican and US economies. The Bracero Program, for instance, brought thousands of Mexicans to the United States as temporary workers from 1940s to the 1960s, a time when the country desperately needed an expendable workforce. 5 Although the vast majority of Mexicans in the United States have migrated to the country legally, many have done so without documents. Because the US economy and large corporations rely on a cheap labor force, Mexicans trying to escape extreme poverty and violence have been lured to the United States to work, even under conditions of exploitation. Gloria Anzaldúa’s foundational text Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza ( 1987 ) is indispensable reading for anyone seeking to better understand the Mexico-US border, its borderlands, and migration through the lens of intersectionality.

Although Mexican American literary production is quite vast, migration has remained a major theme. Migration is at the heart of . . . y no se lo tragó la tierra ( 1971 ) by Tomás Rivera, also known as the “father of Chicano literature.” Within the narrative frame the reader does not observe the characters crossing the Mexico-US border, but nonetheless as migrant farmworkers they are in a constant state of displacement. Uprootedness and dislocation characterize the lives of the people in this tight-knit community as they travel the migrant circuit between Texas and Minnesota searching for work during the harvest season. The impact of this difficult lifestyle on the unnamed boy protagonist—who provides a sense of unity to a story told from multiple perspectives and in multiple voices—is evident as we observe him struggling at school. In this bildungsroman we not only see the protagonist dealing with the challenges of adolescence but also see how his life as a migrant farmworker leads to an early loss of innocence. Prejudice, racism, exploitation, and extreme poverty are the defining conditions of life in this community. From the death of his aunt and uncle to the heatstroke that almost kills his own father and little brother, abuse at the hands of a corrupt couple who takes advantage of his family, and his expulsion from school after being a victim of bullying, the protagonist faces countless hardships. Yet he does not conform to the role of victim, a position that the adults in the community seem resigned to accepting. On the contrary, he challenges authority by questioning the system that keeps the group oppressed and by questioning God for not protecting his people. Through a series of gestures, the boy makes clear that he is ready to fight for his dignity, thus heralding the rebellious youth spirit that coalesced during the Chicano movement in the 1960s and 1970s.

Like Rivera’s text, the production of playwright Luis Valdez’s theater company El Teatro Campesino was deeply influenced by the struggle of César Chávez’s and Dolores Huerta’s United Farm Workers (UFW), which began in the mid-1960s. Many of his earlier short plays defended the plight of the farmworkers and promoted their activism in the UFW by addressing relevant topics and using untrained farmworker actors who performed in the fields. In contrast, his masterpiece play Zoot Suit ( 1979 ) shifted attention to the Zoot Suit riots of 1943 in Los Angeles and gained him widespread recognition when the film version was released in 1981 .

Like Rivera’s protagonist, the main character in Helena María Viramontes’s Under the Feet of Jesus ( 1995 ), Estrella, faces the obstacles that come with being the oldest daughter in a family of migrant farmworkers. Viramontes’s text is also a coming-of-age novel that traces Estrella’s development in the midst of unimaginable hardship. Abandoned by the father, the family members are forced to move from an urban to a rural area, where they must survive by working the land. As migrant farmworkers they endure brutal working conditions, violence, hunger, thirst, heatstroke, lack of adequate housing, and pesticide poisoning. As is the case with the unnamed boy in Rivera’s text, living under such conditions shapes Estrella’s character and inspires her to rise above her situation. Yet Estrella’s agency and anger lead her to express herself physically and unequivocally against those whom she perceives as her oppressors. She shares with the boy a rebellious spirit, but hers is also molded by the intersectionality of her experiences as a woman and an ethnoracial minority. Informed by Third World feminism, Under the Feet of Jesus sheds light on the double oppression that Latinas usually confront. 6 Estrella’s strength and determination represent a beacon of hope for those who, like her, have been oppressed for too long. Rivera’s and Viramontes’s works seek to humanize and to bring visibility to a sector of the Latina/o population that has remained in the shadows despite the crucial role that it plays as the backbone of the US economy.

Luis J. Rodríguez’s poem “Running to America” ( Poems Across the Pavement , 1989 ) addresses the predicament of the undocumented migrant. The poem opens with the following description: “They are night shadows/violating borders” (1–2). 7 The darkness associated with the night mirrors the secretiveness of their movements. Whereas in these verses the poetic voice seems to be recycling the rhetoric of criminalization associated with the undocumented migrant, the rest of the poem challenges that perception. Those who are running to America include women and children; they are “[a] hungry people” who “have no country” (51–52). 8 In their dire situation, “[t]hey must run to America” (41). Yet, once there,

Their skin, color of earth, is a brand for all the great ranchers, for the killing floors on Soto street, and as slaughter for the garment row. Still they come. (42–50) 9

As the poetic voice points out, the migrants’ dark skin not only marks them as “Others” in US society but also facilitates their ill treatment. Whether in the service industry, slaughterhouses, garment factories, or the fields, these migrants have survived abuse and exploitation. They have also given birth to a new generation that is stronger because of their sacrifice: “Their babies are born/with a lion/in their hearts” (73–75). With these verses, the poem humanizes those who have been criminalized and objectified by society and announces a new dawn of hope.

Reyna Grande’s memoir, The Distance Between Us ( 2013 ), offers an important perspective that is often lacking in discussions about migration: that of the children who remain behind. In this work Grande recounts her experiences as a child left behind by her parents, who migrated to the United States in search of opportunities. Left under the care of her abusive grandmother, Grande and her siblings endure severe poverty and emotional mistreatment. Thinking that her life would be much better once her father brings them to the United States with him, she soon realizes that her alcoholic father is abusive and not capable of taking care of his children. Grande’s memoir is an invaluable addition to the Mexican American literary corpus because it provides a window into the experiences of thousands of children who are left behind by their undocumented parents in the country of origin and who later cross the border (also without documents) in order to reunite with them. Given the polarizing debate taking place in the United States about undocumented migration, Grande’s text puts a face to the statistics and sheds light on the suffering, abandonment, violence, poverty, and desperation that children of undocumented migrants are forced to endure. For anyone looking to arrive at a deeper understanding of the circumstances that lead to unauthorized migration—especially in the case of unaccompanied children crossing the border—this memoir offers a compelling perspective.

US Puerto Rican Literature

Puerto Rico’s colonial status as an unincorporated territory of the United States has had a profound impact on its migration history and has also marked a significant contrast to the histories, patterns, and conditions faced by other Latinas/os. Ceded by Spain to the United States after losing the Spanish-American War in 1898 , Puerto Rico has remained under US control for more than a century. Although US citizenship was imposed on Puerto Ricans by the Jones-Shafroth Act in 1917 , this is considered to be a second-class citizenship given that Puerto Ricans on the island do not have the same benefits and rights as do citizens on the mainland. That said, whereas stateside Puerto Ricans have more privileges than their counterparts on the island—such as being able to vote in presidential elections—they still tend to feel like second-class citizens because they are often perceived as foreigners. 10 In other words, Puerto Ricans’ US citizenship has not led to this group’s incorporation into the US national imaginary. The paradoxical and conflictual condition of Puerto Ricans in the diaspora has been a central concern in their literary and cultural production. Many works question, challenge, and subvert the myth of Puerto Rican privilege by demonstrating how despite having US citizenship—which does confer them a degree of mobility across geopolitical borders that most foreign-born Latinas/os lack—US Puerto Ricans tend to experience conditions similar to those faced by other Latinas/os. These include racism, discrimination, poverty, unemployment, exploitation, and lack of adequate housing, schooling, and healthcare.

A significant Puerto Rican presence in the mainland—specifically in New York—can be traced back to the end of the 19th century , when Puerto Rican and Cuban exiles joined forces to fight for these islands’ independence from Spain. Cigar factory workers also established communities, known as colonias , and became politically and civically engaged in their societies. 11 The works of Jesús Colón, Bernardo Vega, Julia de Burgos, and Arturo Schomburg, among others, offer insight into this early chapter of the Puerto Rican migration experience. In the mid- 20th century , in part as a result of Operation Bootstrap, an initiative by Luis Muñoz Marín’s government to industrialize and modernize the island, migration augmented significantly. Attracted by the promise of employment and opportunities, about 650,000 Puerto Ricans went to the mainland between 1946 and 1964 in a wave known as the Great Migration. 12 It was not surpassed until after 2010 , with the Puerto Rican exodus that resulted from the economic crisis, and the devastation caused by the impact of Hurricane María ( September 20, 2017 ). 13 Most Puerto Ricans—usually low-skilled, uneducated, and from rural areas—who arrived during the Great Migration, faced difficult challenges in adapting to their new lives in the United States.

From the massive displacement of Puerto Ricans a new literature inspired by the experience of migration or adaptation to US society was born. Nuyorican literature, which emerged in the 1960s and 1970s, was profoundly informed by the civil rights and black power movements. The label “Nuyorican,” originally used as an insult to refer to Puerto Ricans outside the island—and which hinted at underlying racial, class, and linguistic prejudices—was reclaimed by Nuyorican poets and authors to distinguish themselves from insular Puerto Ricans and Anglo Americans. Piri Thomas’s autobiographical novel Down These Mean Streets ( 1967 ), which follows the tradition of the bildungsroman, is considered a foundational work not only of Nuyorican literature but of Latina/o letters more broadly. The novel attracted national attention and instantly became a bestseller, in part because of its representation of the struggles, challenges, and prejudices faced by a young Afro–Puerto Rican in an urban setting. Thomas, born in New York in 1928 to a Puerto Rican mother and a Cuban father, offers a second-generation perspective that has been invaluable to the understanding of the repercussions of migration across generations from a literary standpoint.

In about the same period, Nuyorican poets Miguel Algarín and Miguel Piñero published their landmark collection Nuyorican Poetry: An Anthology of Puerto Rican Words and Feelings ( 1975 ), which opened the floodgates for many more publications by Puerto Ricans in the diaspora. 14 Pedro Pietri’s foundational poem “Puerto Rican Obituary” ( 1973 ) strongly denounces the conditions of oppression and exploitation that Puerto Rican colonial migrants have faced in the United States. The poem, which became a hymn of sorts among members of the Nuyorican community, seeks to dismantle the myth of the American Dream that leads this group not only to remain passive in the face of systemic violence (“They worked/ten days a week/and were only paid for five”), but to sacrifice their cultural identity (“Dead Puerto Ricans/Who never knew they were Puerto Ricans”) in order to attain the dream of upward mobility promoted by the media. 15 Although the poem decries the injustices that Puerto Ricans face in the United States, it also holds them responsible in a gesture that seeks to awaken their conscience in order to promote social change. Tato Laviera’s poetry collection La carreta Made a U-turn ( 1979 ) also addresses the theme of migration. This is evident from the title, an ironic play on René Marqués’s La carreta ( 1953 ), a landmark drama about the migration of a peasant Puerto Rican family that moves from the mountains to San Juan, and later to New York City, in search of survival during the Great Migration. His collection AmeRícan ( 1985 ) also explores migration as well as transculturation. In the poem “nuyorican,” the speaker reflects upon his return to the island after years of absence. In his apostrophe to Puerto Rico, he denounces the prejudice (linguistic, class, racial) that he has endured as a result of the differences that he, as a “Nuyorican,” or transcultural “other,” embodies. He declares:

yo soy tu hijo, de una migración, pecado forzado, me mandaste a nacer nativo en otras tierras (8–11) 16

In these verses migration is depicted not as a choice but rather as an experience that was imposed or forced on underprivileged and disenfranchised Puerto Ricans. Although Operation Bootstrap aimed to modernize the island, it was also supposed to curtail “overpopulation” by promoting migration to the mainland. Ironically, despite the government’s push to promote migration, it was looked down on and sometimes even articulated as a form of treason, the “pecado forzado” (“forced sin”) that Laviera alludes to in this poem. 17

Judith Ortíz Cofer’s Silent Dancing: A Partial Remembrance of a Puerto Rican Childhood ( 1990 ) is one of the first works of US Puerto Rican literature to address el vaivén , or the back-and-forth pattern of circular migration that has characterized the lives of many Puerto Ricans. 18 In this hybrid text, one that combines memoir, short story, and poetry, the protagonist struggles to navigate the opposing cultural worlds of her homeland and the United States. As a “Navy brat,” she and her family are forced to migrate to the United States to accompany her father, but they also spend half of the year at her grandmother’s house in the mountains of Puerto Rico. Although the narrator-protagonist is aware of her privilege in relation to other Puerto Ricans that she knows—in terms of both her class and her light skin color—that privilege is not enough to offset the prejudice and discrimination that she faces growing up in New Jersey. In one of the most oft-cited passages of the text, she states,

As a Navy brat, shuttling between New Jersey and the pueblo, I was constantly made to feel like an oddball by my peers, who made fun of my two-way accent: a Spanish accent when I spoke English; and, when I spoke Spanish, I was told that I sounded like a “Gringa.” Being the outsiders had already turned my brother and me into cultural chameleons. 19

Here, the protagonist articulates her sense of otherness—based on her cultural hybridity and own process of transculturation—as she navigates the distinct cultural terrains of Puerto Rico and the United States. Not feeling that she fully belongs in either one, her sense of identity emerges from the condition of in-betweenness. 20

Esmeralda Santiago’s memoir, When I Was Puerto Rican ( 1993 ), helps shed light on the phenomenon of Puerto Rican migration to the mainland during the mid- 20th century . Unlike the depiction of migration as a vaivén observed in Ortíz Cofer’s Silent Dancing —a result of her privileged economic status—Santiago’s text portrays it as a one-way displacement. Her family’s position as poor jíbaros , or peasants, leads them on a path that was all too common among the rural population: migrating from the interior to San Juan and eventually to New York. As a result of her parents’ unstable relationship and the father’s constant abandonment, Negi’s mother moves the family to Santurce and later to New York. The fact that most of the action takes place in Puerto Rico—ten in thirteen chapters are set on the island—is significant because it emphasizes the extreme conditions that lead the family to migrate. The trauma that the protagonist faces as she is about to board the plane is palpable when she describes herself as “unwilling to face the metal bird that would whisk us to our new life.” 21 Negi understands the gravity of the situation and seems aware of the repercussions that the move could have for her identity. In a frequently cited passage, she states: “For me, the person I was becoming when we left was erased, and another one was created. The Puerto Rican jíbara who longed for the green quiet of a tropical afternoon was to become a hybrid who would never forgive the uprooting.” 22 With these words, the adult Negi reflects on the painful process of transculturation on which she was about to embark, which destabilized her sense of cultural identity as a Puerto Rican. Cultural hybridity emerges as a result of navigating two linguistic codes and distinct sociocultural mores as a Puerto Rican teenager recently arrived in the United States. The last three chapters of the book address her process of adaptation to her new urban environment. 23 The sequels Almost a Woman ( 1998 ) and The Turkish Lover ( 2004 ) provide greater insight into the process of transculturation that begins at the end of When I Was Puerto Rican .

Whereas most US Puerto Rican literature dealing with the theme of migration has focused on the experience of adaptation to urban environments—especially on the East Coast—few works have delved into the experiences of Puerto Ricans who settled in rural areas. This lack is in part a result of the fact that most Puerto Ricans settled in cities. But not all did; few people realize that thousands of Puerto Ricans were recruited to work as seasonal farmworkers between 1948 and 1990 all across the United States. 24 This is why Fred Arroyo’s literary production represents such an invaluable contribution. In his semiautobiographical collection Western Avenue and Other Fictions ( 2012 ), Arroyo offers a narrative that simultaneously continues and breaks away from the established East Coast–based and urban-centered body of US Puerto Rican letters. Like other works, Western Avenue denounces the poverty, abjection, racism, gender violence, substance abuse, and criminalization that have characterized the lives of many Puerto Ricans in the diaspora. The difference, however, is that these characters are depicted in a rural midwestern setting, whether working at the Green Giant cannery in Niles, Michigan, or digging potatoes and picking vegetables in southwestern Michigan. Because they are always migrating and in search of work, these Puerto Ricans’ lives seem closer to those of Mexican braceros and migrant farmworkers than to those of their compatriots on the East Coast. In fact, if something is clear after reading the text, it is that Puerto Rican farmworkers, despite having US citizenship, have been treated like foreigners and exploited in the fields. By depicting the rural experience of Puerto Rican farmworkers in the Midwest, Arroyo’s work challenges, enriches, and diversifies the dominant narrative about Puerto Rican migration to the United States. 25

And finally, Quiara Alegría Hudes’ Elliot Trilogy—consisting of the plays Elliot: A Soldier’s Fugue ( 2007 ), Water by the Spoonful ( 2011 ), and The Happiest Song Plays Last ( 2014 )—also represents a unique contribution to the literary and cultural production of the Puerto Rican diaspora. The plays follow the life of Elliot, a Puerto Rican Iraq War veteran who grew up in North Philadelphia, as he confronts the impact of PTSD and addiction. Elliot: A Soldier’s Fugue examines the effects of war across three generations of Puerto Rican soldiers. By its representation of Elliot’s grandfather’s participation in the Korean War, his father’s involvement in the Vietnam War, and his own service in Iraq, the play unveils the connections between Puerto Ricans’ colonial condition and the legacy of war. Water by the Spoonful , which won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2012 , is a darker play that delves into the complexities of adapting to civilian life as a war veteran. The play addresses addiction, mother-son relationships, online group therapy, depression, suicide, and survival. The last of the installments, The Happiest Song Plays Last , follows Elliot as he returns to the Middle East (Jordan) to film a movie and his Philadelphia-based cousin Yaz, a music professor and activist in her community. With Yaz and Elliot’s reunification in the end, the play emphasizes the strong links that unite this Puerto Rican family, while it also offers an insightful reflection on the meaning, fluidity, and complexity of the concept of family.

Dominican American Literature

Although Dominicans have been present in the United States since the 19th century —and, some would argue, before that period—not until the 1960s did the confluence of political and economic forces lead to massive migration from the Dominican Republic to the United States. 26 The first significant wave occurred as a result of the assassination of the dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo in 1961 and the political upheaval that ensued, namely, the overthrow of the democratically elected President Juan Bosch by neo-Trujilloist factions. When pro-Bosch revolutionaries sought to restore him to power in 1965 , the US military invaded the Dominican Republic for the second time in the 20th century , crushing the rebellion. In the end, the US intervention facilitated the rise to power of Joaquín Balaguer, Trujillo’s right-hand man and the regime’s ideologue, who in turn launched a violent persecution campaign against his enemies. Seeking refuge from political oppression, thousands of Dominicans migrated to the East Coast and to Puerto Rico. A second wave followed in the 1980s and 1990s as a result of the economic crisis, which led many Dominicans to seek survival and better opportunities outside their country. Although the majority of those who migrated did so legally, a significant number arrived in the United States and Puerto Rico without documents. 27 Ironically, the issue of citizenship has resurfaced since the passing of TC 168-13, also known as La Sentencia, a highly controversial law that has rendered stateless thousands of Haitian Dominicans. The Dominican Republic’s complex history and neocolonial relation to the United States have propelled migration, and its transnational character has been captured in the literature of its diaspora.

The literary production of Dominicans in the United States extends as far back as the nineteenth century , but most works produced until the 1990s were written in Spanish and therefore only reached a limited audience. 28 The more recent Spanish-language publications of US Dominican poets Marianela Medrano and Sussy Santana and authors Aurora Arias, Rita Indiana Hernández, and Rey Andújar, continue to enrich Dominican letters in the United States. 29 A watershed moment for this corpus occurred with the publication of Julia Alvarez’s widely acclaimed novel How the García Girls Lost Their Accents ( 1991 ). The work depicts the life of the García family as it moves between the Dominican Republic and the United States for political reasons. It is the father’s participation in anti-Trujillo insurgent activities that forces them to flee their country in order to survive. Told from different perspectives and following a nonlineal development, it privileges the stories of the four García daughters as they each struggle to navigate the cultural expectations placed on them by their traditional parents (Old World) and by US society at large (New World). Trying to adapt to their new home, Carla, Sandra, Yolanda, and Sofia are forced to negotiate their processes of transculturation. Class also plays a key role given that the family also has to adapt to the loss of their privileged status as a result of their migration to the United States. The novel traces the search for identity that marks the lives of the members of the García family. As the daughters mature, they begin to understand what they have gained and what they have lost in the process of migration. They gain a significant degree of freedom, but they also lose—to varying degrees—their accents, homeland, and Dominican cultural identity. Focusing on issues of race, ethnicity, class, gender, transculturation, and transmigration, the novel is the first work of Dominican American literature to examine the complexity of Dominican migration from a feminist perspective while reaching a mainstream US audience.

Angie Cruz’s Let It Rain Coffee ( 2005 ) likewise centers on the experience of migration while it challenges some of the myths associated with it, such as the myth of the Dominican Dream. 30 The novel follows the lives of two main characters, Don Chan and Esperanza. Don Chan, who was brought from China to the Caribbean as part of the “coolie” trade, acquires a strong sense of Dominican identity that in political terms positions him against the Trujillo dictatorship. 31 He embodies patriotism to such a degree that migration to the United States—or the heartbreak caused by his forced move after the death of his wife—literally sends him to the grave. Esperanza, Don Chan’s daughter-in-law, represents the opposite posture. Not only does she descend from a family of Trujillo supporters, but she does not display any emotional attachment to the Dominican Republic. On the contrary, from rural Los Llanos, where she lives with her husband Santo (Don Chan’s son), she dreams of escaping to the United States and making a better life for herself. But unlike the majority of Dominicans, whose main destination has been New York, Esperanza’s obsession with the television show Dallas leads her to dream about settling there. Despite the unconventional choice of destination, her trajectory mirrors that of thousands of Dominicans who embark on the dangerous journey from the Dominican Republic to Puerto Rico in a yola , a precarious vessel. Esperanza arrives pregnant and undocumented in Puerto Rico, which becomes a stepping stone in her journey to the continental United States. Although she eventually ends up living and raising her two children in New York, her desire to achieve a luxurious lifestyle—like the one she was exposed to on television—remains a constant in her life that has a negative impact on all of her close relationships. A noteworthy aspect of the novel is the portrayal of return migration, an important theme that until the publication of this book had not garnered much literary attention. Esperanza’s return to the Dominican Republic, as well as her reception by her family, sheds light on the dynamics that often play out between the diaspora and the homeland. As a migrant, Esperanza is expected to succeed in the United States and to share her wealth with her family. Her return is tainted by the greed displayed by her family members and the pressure that they place on her for not having achieved a high level of financial success after leaving the country. Let It Rain Coffee questions the fictions that sustain the myth of the Dominican Dream by depicting the challenges and pressures associated with migration to the United States. 32

Migration to and from the Dominican Republic has also been a major concern in the works of Junot Díaz, possibly the most celebrated Dominican American author to date. Because Díaz’s popularity also extends to the realm of academic scholarship and his works have garnered significant critical attention, this discussion is limited in order to focus on works by less well-studied literary figures. In his short story collections Drown ( 1996 ) and This Is How You Lose Her ( 2012 ), as well as in his Pulitzer Prize–winning novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao ( 2007 ), his main characters often have to negotiate their Dominican pasts and their American presents, which often bring to the fore issues of race and gender. His ever-present character (and alter ego), Yunior, is only a child when he first appears in Drown . Growing up black and underprivileged in the Dominican Republic, he and the rest of the family must endure the father’s subsequent move to the United States in search for a better life (in the story “Aguantando”). The father’s physical and emotional abandonment (he starts a new family in the United States) is shown to have a great impact on the family, though he later manages to bring them to New Jersey. The story “Fiesta, 1980” offers a multilayered reflection on the topics of migration, adaptation, masculinity, race, and ethnicity. In it, Yunior’s father is depicted as an authoritative and violent figure who controls his wife and children through fear and terror—symbolically representing the legacy of Trujillo’s dictatorship. The story’s overlapping of the family gathering (fiesta) and the father’s visits to his mistress coalesce in the depiction of Yunior’s sickness (revulsion) when he rides in his father’s new Volkswagen, which in turn is a symbol of the status he has achieved as an immigrant. Yunior, who knows very well the price that his family has had to pay for the luxury of having migrated to the United States, appears to be subconsciously rebelling against everything that his father represents. As Yunior’s life journey continues and he becomes a young adult, he must negotiate the challenges that he faces as an Afro-Dominican American man.

The emerging Afro-Dominican performance poet Elizabeth Acevedo has been carving a space within Dominican-American, Latina/o, and American letters more broadly, as illustrated by the fact that her first novel, The Poet X , won the 2018 National Book Award for young people’s literature. Born and raised in New York, Acevedo produces works that are informed by her Afro-Dominican identity and her family’s immigration story. Her poetry collection Beastgirl and Other Origin Myths ( 2016 ) addresses a number of thematic concerns such as migration, racism, sexism, classism, prejudice, writing, poverty, and living in the inner city, as well as Dominican myths, history, and identity. Her poem “Mami Came to This Country as a Nanny” explores the link between the poetic voice and her mother by addressing the intersection of gender, race, ethnicity, and class. The title’s reference to the mother’s immigration story is illustrative of the conditions under which thousands of Dominican and other Latina women have arrived in the United States to be employed as maids and nannies. In the poem, the poetic voice reflects on her upbringing and coming-into-womanhood, symbolized by the skill—passed down from mother to daughter—of washing her underwear by hand. Mastering this domestic chore becomes a matter of pride: “no menstrual cycle ever made me more woman/in mami’s eyes than this learning how to wash my own ass” (11–12). 33 The mother’s work and sacrifice seem to pay off as the speaker attends college. But for the daughter, disconnecting from the past, from her roots, is impossible. As she states,

this memory tightens my fist that first week of freshman year when katie kerr’s mother, who has a throat made for real pearls, points her unsoftened mouth at me, you better take care of Katie, she’s always had help . (14–17) 34

The poem underscores how race, ethnicity, class, and gender intersect in the eyes of Katie Kerr’s mother, who from her privileged position reads the body of the poetic voice as help instead of her daughter’s fellow student. Her comment reveals the prejudice, classism, and racism that Afro-Latina women face in US society. Dehumanization and invisibility also emerge as conditions that oppress Latinas and women of color. The poem suggests that while the poetic voice can enjoy opportunities denied to her mother, the prejudice and discrimination that she has inherited as an immigrant and woman of color will continue to be challenges for the rest of her life.

Cuban American Literature

As with Puerto Ricans and Dominicans, there have been Cubans in the United States since the 19th century , but it was not until the mid-to-late 20th century that mass migration from Cuba began in earnest. Given their distinct reasons, historical contexts, demographic profiles, and reception by US society, sociologists and anthropologists have often divided Cuban migration into various waves. According to Grenier and Pérez, these are the early exiles, the Airlift, the Mariel Exodus, and the rafter crisis. 35 The early exiles ( 1959–1962 ) constituted the first wave to leave the island as a result of the triumph of the Cuban Revolution. Most people in this group settled in Miami, were part of the Cuban elite, were mostly light-skinned, and received substantial help from the US government upon arrival because of their refugee status. The Airlift ( 1965–1973 ), or the “freedom flights,” at first brought mostly women and the elderly, but later on the group included small entrepreneurs and white-collar employees. The Mariel Exodus of 1980 followed the overtaking of the Peruvian Embassy in Havana by more than 10,000 Cuban nationals seeking to escape the country. When Fidel Castro announced that anyone who wanted to leave could do so from the Port of Mariel, more than 125,000 left. This group included dark-skinned Cubans who belonged to the lower socioeconomic strata of the population, but it also included intellectuals, artists, and professionals. 36 The arrival of this particular group caused a shift in US public opinion about US migration policy toward Cuba. Compared to earlier waves, this group faced significant prejudice and racism from mainstream society and the Miami Cuban community. The balsero (rafter) crisis reached its peak in 1994 during the Special Period, the label given in Cuba to the decade of the 1990s, which was characterized by extreme poverty and government repression in the aftermath of the fall of the Soviet Union. 37 Desperate to leave, thousands of Cubans escaped in makeshift vessels; some made it to US soil, others where intercepted and sent to Guantánamo, and an unknown number perished on the journey. As a result of this wave, US policy toward Cuban migrants was forever altered.

Given these migration waves, Cuban literature in the United States is highly diverse. Because early exile literature such as Lino Novás Calvo’s Maneras de contar ( 1970 ) was typically written in Spanish, it had limited circulation. One exception is the play El Súper ( 1970 ) by Iván Acosta, about a Cuban exile family in New York trying to cope with displacement. The play was turned into a film directed by León Ichaso and Orlando Jiménez Leal in 1979 . Without a doubt, Cristina García is recognized as one of the most important Cuban American authors. Her debut novel Dreaming in Cuban ( 1992 ) garnered national attention and became one of the works associated with the Latina literary boom of the 1990s. Dreaming in Cuban tells the story of three generations of a family that has been physically and emotionally divided as a result of the Cuban Revolution. The two opposing political views are reflected in the characters of Celia, the matriarch of the family, and Lourdes, her daughter. As an ardent follower of Fidel Castro, Celia remains in Cuba with her daughter Felicia and her grandchildren and does whatever she can to defend the Revolution. Lourdes, in contrast, goes into exile and settles in New York City, where she lives with her husband and daughter Pilar. As a staunch anti-communist, Lourdes thrives in her new homeland. She spends her life trying to achieve the American Dream, first as a guard and later as the proud owner of Yankee Doodle Bakery. Her teenage daughter Pilar finds herself at a crossroads in her search for her identity as the daughter of Cuban parents in the United States. Despite the distance that separates them, Pilar and her grandmother Celia develop a deep bond that leads Pilar and Lourdes to return to Cuba for a visit. Through the characters’ relationships, the novel offers a polyphonic exploration of the effects of Cuban history on the family by privileging female voices.

The theme of Cuban migration is also central in Ana Menéndez’s short story collection In Cuba I Was a German Shepherd ( 2001 ). The title story centers on the life of Máximo, a Cuban exile who left as a result of the revolution. An older widower, Máximo struggles to survive in the midst of his losses. The story takes place in Miami, and more specifically Domino Park, where he often joins friends to play dominoes. Intermingled with poignant commentary regarding the demographic changes faced by Little Havana in recent decades (from Cuban to pan-Latino enclave) and its exoticization at the hands of the tourism industry is the story of a man who is trying to make sense of who he has become after years of exile. Present-day Miami is contrasted to the Miami of the past, as well as to the Cuba of yesterday (la Cuba de ayer), that is, Cuba before Castro. We learn that Máximo had been a professor at the university who left abruptly (“he said good-bye to no one”) two years after the triumph of the Revolution. In Miami, he first drove a taxi and then convinced his wife to open a small restaurant in Calle Ocho, the heart of Little Havana, where “a generation of former professors served black beans and rice to the nostalgic.” 38 The loss of social capital and status as a result of exile is highlighted as one of the most impactful repercussions of migration. After losing his wife, Máximo spends his days reminiscing about the Cuba that he left behind. One way to channel the feelings of loss and nostalgia is by telling jokes, which he tends to do while playing dominoes. In these moments, through his performance and his friends’ reactions, Máximo is forced to confront the anguish that lies underneath. In “In Cuba I was a German Shepherd,” Menéndez offers a critical yet compassionate portrayal of a Cuban generation also known as the “Golden Exile.” More important, the story challenges the perception that the members of this particular wave made an effortless transition into US society given all of the support they received from the US government. As the story shows, uprooting and exile are always painful.

The theme of Cuban exile is rendered even more complex in Speaking Wiri Wiri , a poetry collection by Dan Vera ( 2013 ). Vera’s experience as a Cuban American born and raised in southern Texas, thus growing up outside a Cuban enclave and, more specifically, along the Mexico-US border, has informed his writing in unique ways. In contrast to the vast majority of literary works by Cuban Americans—which often deal with exile while privileging the geographical location of Miami—Vera’s poems shift the location to the Texas border. His poem “Lago de Mil Ojos,” for instance, describes the drive that the poetic voice used to take with his father between Laredo and Freer. Stopped by agents at a checkpoint, the father would hand “proof of identification” while the child (the poetic voice) translated:

How old was I when I recognized the interrogation or understood the importance of my answers? To be born here and never belong. To fear the suspicion of authorities Who might question the presence of a Cuban in the middle of this desert, who didn’t speak the language, who depended on a boy to tell his story. (9–16) 39

Linguistic barriers and the experience of child translators is commonplace in Latina/o immigrant literature, but what makes this poem stand out is the sense of dislocation that it highlights by focusing on an experience more commonly associated with migrants of Mexican and Central American descent along the Mexico-US border. Suspicion, racial profiling, and criminalization of these migrants are widespread in a region where surveillance has increased over the years. In contrast, until relatively recently, Cubans have enjoyed an unparalleled degree of protection and support from the US government. The poem challenges the privilege associated with Cuban exiles by showing how the highly politicized border region becomes a great equalizer: any migrant who does not speak English will always be regarded with suspicion. By shedding light on the unique circumstances of growing up Cuban along the Texas border, Vera’s poetry not only adds to the richness of Cuban American cultural production, but it bridges the distance between Latina/o groups that are considered to be symbolically and culturally distant from one another.

US Central American Literature

Central American migration to the United States dates back to the 19th and early 20th centuries . However, mass migration grew substantially during the last decades of the 20th century as a result of the civil wars that plagued the region. Violence, persecution, terror, extreme poverty, and genocide led thousands of people to flee their homelands. Most of the migrants hailed from the countries consumed by the chaos of civil war—Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua—though others in the region were also affected. That said, the experience of migration as a survival mechanism differed among the citizens of each country based on US migration policy toward them. For instance, Salvadorans and Guatemalans were routinely denied refugee status, and therefore did not enjoy the government support that comes with that designation, because they were migrating from US-backed regimes. 40 Nicaraguans, on the other hand, obtained significant support as they fled the Sandinista government, which the United States was fighting. In the 21st century , the surge in Central American migration to the United States has originated from the Northern Triangle—El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras—mostly as a result of extreme poverty, organized crime, narco-trafficking, gang violence, and corruption. For those who study the region, the roots of the present violence can be clearly traced back to the civil wars that plagued the region decades earlier. In order to understand the literature produced by US Central Americans, it is not only important to be cognizant of the specific histories of each country, but also to recognize the additional level of trauma that many in the diaspora share as a result of that violent past.

Héctor Tobar’s The Tattooed Soldier ( 1998 ) is one of the first novels written in English by a Guatemalan American to address the impact of the Guatemalan civil war in the diaspora. The text tells the story of Antonio and Guillermo, enemies whose paths cross during the Los Angeles riots of 1992 . Through the use of flashbacks, the reader learns the history behind Antonio’s and Guillermo’s migration to the United States and how they represent opposing sides during the war. The narrative does not shy away from depicting graphic details of the ethnic cleansing campaigns that killed more than 200,000 people, most of whom were Mayans. By developing Antonio and Guillermo’s conflict on US soil, the novel not only emphasizes that migration does not erase the trauma of war, but perhaps more important, serves to highlight the central role that the United States played in the war through the training and financial support of the government, that is, the side doing most of the killing. Some of the themes that the novel challenges and questions are warfare, violence, impunity, the perception of the United States as a champion of justice and freedom, the fine line between victim and victimizer, and poverty.

Sylvia Sellers-García’s novel When the Ground Turns in Its Sleep ( 2007 ) also examines the impact of the Guatemalan civil war, in this case through the story of Nítido Amán. Born of Guatemalan parents, Nítido is raised in the United States but returns to Guatemala to learn more about his family’s past. Through a series of turns of events, such as the fact that he is mistaken for a priest, he begins to unearth some of the reasons for the silences surrounding a nearby town affected by the trauma of war. Sellers-García’s and Tobar’s novels have enriched the Latina/o literary corpus by examining a chapter of Latina/o history that has not received enough attention to date.

William Archila’s poetry collection The Art of Exile ( 2009 ) also represents an important addition to Latina/o literature that illuminates the struggle of US Central Americans as victims of vicious civil wars. Born in El Salvador, Archila fled the country in 1980 with his mother and siblings at the age of twelve. The poems in the collection delve into the past (civil war), the moment of migration, and the return to the homeland. 41 The poem “Immigration Blues, 1980 ” reflects on the condition of the speaker, who positions himself by claiming, “I’m a war away from home” (8). 42 As he states,

I think of torn bodies, cramped, unburied in a ditch, covered in weeds or dust. They become items for the evening news, documents from another small-foot country, another Lebanon, a mile from God. (20–25) 43

The speaker’s description of himself hints at the different layers of his feeling of being a “foreigner.” From his physical appearance (“black hair”), he moves inward to address the linguistic barriers (“raw accent”) that mark him as an “Other” in US society. But beyond this, hiding under the surface, is the trauma of war. Despite living in another country, the memory of the tortured and the dead continues to haunt him. Not only that, but despite having witnessed unspeakable violence, he is forced to confront the fact that the suffering of his people is minimized—relegated to “items for the evening news”—by the very country (United States) that financially backed the civil war that forced him to flee. As this poem illustrates, Central American migration to the United States occurred under conditions of extreme violence during the civil wars. Unfortunately, violence continues to be the driving force behind migration today, so trauma remains a central concern in the literary production of this group.

Javier Zamora’s incursion into the Latina/o literary landscape represents a welcome and necessary addition to this corpus. His first poetry collection, Unaccompanied ( 2017 ), offers a much-needed reflection on Central American migration from the perspective of an unaccompanied immigrant child. He was born in El Salvador and migrated at the age of nine in order to reunite with his parents in the United States. The poems in the collection deal with the memory of the process of migration. This process is marked by the unexpected, evident in the poem “Second Attempt Crossing,” when he was protected by an MS-13 gang member:

     So I wouldn’t touch their legs that kicked you, you pushed me under your chest,      and I’ve never thanked you Beautiful Chino (14–17).

El Salvador and its civil war loom large in these poems, especially in “El Salvador”:

               Tonight, how I wish you made it easier to love you, Salvador. Make it easier      to never have to risk our lives (16–18).

Fear, terror, trauma, hope, and nostalgia all combine in raw verses that unveil the suffering behind what has been lost:

Abuelita, I can’t go back and return. There’s no path to papers. I’ve got nothing left but dreams [. . .] (“To Abuelita Neli,” 6–7) Other contributions to this growing corpus include Guatemalan American Maya Chincilla’s poetry collection. 44

Southern Cone

Although migration from South America to the United States has an extended history that dates back to the 19th century , this diverse subgroup among Latinas/os has received limited attention in comparison to others. This is explained in part by the fact that these are smaller, more dispersed, and more recently established immigrant communities. In addition, the literary and cultural production of US South Americans has been slower to emerge. Given the diversity in terms of race, ethnicity, politics, and country of origin—not to mention each country’s unique relationship with the United States—it is difficult to generalize. Owing to the widely shared experiences of living under dictatorial regimes, state- and nonstate-sponsored terrorism, guerrilla warfare, and civil war, South American literary production in the United States tends to address these themes. The literature of Peruvian-American author Daniel Alarcón is a case in point. His works War by Candlelight ( 2005 ), Lost City Radio ( 2007 ), At Night We Walk in Circles ( 2013 ), and the graphic novel Ciudad de payasos ( 2010 ) are works that, to different degrees, address internal (rural to urban) and external migration (from Peru to the United States) as a result of political instability and poverty. Alarcón’s talent and tendency to focus on the Peruvian sociopolitical and cultural landscape has earned him a level of recognition and prestige in his country of origin that is rarely reached by Latina/o writers. Other South American Latina/o authors include Marie Arana (Peruvian), Marjorie Agosín (Chilean), Ariel Dorfman (Chilean), Ernesto Quiñonez (Ecuadoran–Puerto Rican), and Sergio de la Pava (Colombian).

Discussion of the Literature

Given that the theme of migration is such a central concern in Latina/o literature, most of the criticism that has developed over the decades addresses this topic. Because Mexican and Puerto Rican letters in the United States saw significant growth during the 1960s and 1970s, the literary criticism produced during those decades focused on these specific groups. As Cubans, Dominicans, and Central Americans began to settle in the United States their literary production slowly came into existence. Until relatively recently, the critical literature about Latina/o literary production followed a pattern determined by nationality. But in recent years, the tendency to publish scholarship based on a particular group has given way to more inclusive critical works that seek to connect—from a pan-Latina/o perspective—the production of distinct subgroups.

Relevant scholarship concerning Chicano/a and Mexican American literature includes Limón’s Mexican Ballads, Chicano Poems: History and Influence in Mexican-American Social Poetry ( 1992 ), Calderón and Saldívar’s Criticism in the Borderlands: Studies in Chicano Literature, Culture, and Ideology ( 1991 ), Aldama’s Brown on Brown: Chicana/o Representations of Gender, Sexuality, and Ethnicity ( 2005 ), Guidotti-Hernández’s Unspeakable Violence: Remapping U.S. and Mexican Imaginaries ( 2011 ), and Román’s Race and Upward Mobility: Seeking, Gatekeeping, and Other Class Strategies in Postwar America ( 2017 ). The emergence of Third World feminism in the 1970s and 1980s also entailed critical works by Chicana feminists such as Gloria Anzaldúa and Cherríe Moraga. The need to consider the intersections of race, gender, ethnicity, and sexuality is evinced in the foundational anthology This Bridge Called My Back ( 1981 ) by Anzaldúa and Moraga, Anzaldúa’s Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza ( 1987 ), Saldívar-Hull’s Feminism on the Border: Chicana Gender Politics and Literature ( 2000 ), Brady’s Extinct Lands, Temporal Geographies: Chicana Literature and the Urgency of Space ( 2002 ), and Rincón’s Bodies at War: Genealogies of Militarism in Chicana Literature and Culture ( 2017 ). More recently, Arias’s Taking Their Word: Literature and the Signs of Central America ( 2007 ), Rodríguez’s Dividing the Isthmus : Central American Transnational Histories, Cultures, and Literatures ( 2009 ), Padilla’s Changing Women, Changing Nation: Female Agency, Nationhood, and Identity in Trans-Salvadoran Narratives ( 2012 ), and Vigil’s War Echoes: Gender and Militarization in U.S. Latina/o Cultural Production ( 2014 ) are important additions to the growing criticism regarding US Central American literary production.

Latina/o Caribbean literature has a robust critical scholarship. Early interventions focused on US Puerto Rican letters, but as the Cuban and Dominican populations came of age in the diaspora, so did their literatures and the critical scholarship about them. Barradas’s Partes de un todo: Ensayos y notas sobre literatura puertorriqueña en los Estados Unidos ( 1999 ) and Flores’s Divided Borders: Essays on Puerto Rican Identity ( 1992 ) and From Bomba to Hip Hop: Puerto Rican Culture and Latino Identity ( 2000 ) are considered foundational works of US Puerto Rican cultural criticism. Other works dealing with Puerto Rican migration in literature are Sánchez González’s Boricua Literature: A Literary History of the Puerto Rican Diaspora ( 2001 ), Negrón-Muntaner’s Boricua Pop: Puerto Ricans and the Latinization of American Culture ( 2004 ), Moreno’s Family Matters: Puerto Rican Women Authors on the Island and the Mainland ( 2012 ), and Noel’s In Visible Movement: Nuyorican Poetry From the Sixties to Slam ( 2014 ). Relevant scholarship concerning Dominican American literature includes Suárez’s The Tears of Hispaniola: Haitian and Dominican Diaspora Memory ( 2006 ), Méndez’s Narratives of Migration and Displacement in Dominican Literature ( 2012 ), and García-Peña’s The Borders of Dominicanidad: Race, Nation, and Archives of Contradiction ( 2016 ). In the field of Cuban American literary studies, the following critical works are central: Pérez Firmat’s Life on the Hyphen: The Cuban-American Way ( 1994 ), Álvarez-Borland’s Cuban American Literature of Exile: From Person to Persona ( 1998 ), and López’s Unbecoming Blackness: The Diaspora Cultures of Afro-Cuban America ( 2012 ).

Along with the increase in critical studies about the literary production of specific Latina/o groups, recent decades have been marked by what could be called a pan-Latina/o turn. One of the early contributions to this growing body of scholarship was Aparicio and Chávez-Silverman’s Tropicalizations: Transcultural Representations of “Latinidad” ( 1997 ). Works that followed include Martínez–San Miguel’s Caribe Two Ways: Cultura de la migración en el Caribe insular hispánico ( 2003 ), Dalleo and Machado Sáez’s The Latino/a Canon and the Emergence of Post-Sixties Literature ( 2007 ), Caminero-Santangelo’s On Latinidad: U.S. Latino Literature and the Construction of Ethnicity ( 2007 ), Falconi and Mazzotti’s The Other Latinos: Central and South Americans in the United States ( 2008 ), Pérez Rosario’s Hispanic Caribbean Literature of Migration ( 2010 ), Socolovsky’s Troubling Nationhood in U.S. Latina Literature ( 2013 ), and Irizarry’s Chicana/o and Latina/o Fiction: The New Memory of Latinidad ( 2016 ). Flores’s The Diaspora Strikes Back: Caribeño Tales of Learning and Turning ( 2008 ) offers a pan-Latina/o approach to the topic of return migration in the Caribbean, a theme that has become more relevant over the years but which remains understudied.

The study of Latina/o literature from the viewpoint of race and ethnicity represents a relatively recent direction in this scholarship and provides crucial avenues of intellectual inquiry for future investigation. Flores and Jiménez-Román’s The Afro-Latin@ Reader: History and Culture in the United States ( 2010 ) and Rivera-Rideau et al.’s Afro-Latin@s in Movement ( 2016 ) are two important contributions in the field of Afro-Latina/o studies. Saldaña-Portillo’s Indian Given: Racial Geographies Across Mexico and the United States ( 2016 ) blends Mexican American and indigenous studies. Queer and LGBTQ Latina/o literary production has also expanded significantly in recent decades, and so has the criticism about it. Important critical works include J. M. Rodríguez’s Queer Latinidad: Identity Practices, Discursive Spaces ( 2003 ), La Fountain–Stokes’s Queer Ricans: Cultures and Sexualities in the Diaspora ( 2009 ), and Ortíz’s Cultural Erotics in Cuban America ( 2007 ). Other key identity issues are at the center of Minich’s Accessible Citizenships: Disability, Nation, and the Cultural Politics of Greater Mexico ( 2013 ), in which she explores the intersection between disability and Latina/o literary studies. Just as the corpus of Latina/o literature continues to grow and diversify, so does the critical scholarship concerning it. Latina/o literature is an ever-expanding field that will continue to enrich the US literary corpus for decades to come.

Links to Digital Materials

• Border and la frontera in the US-Mexico Borderlands .
• Central American–American feminisms .
• Contemporary Latina/o literature in the Midwest .
• Currents in Dominican American literature .
• Decoloniality and identity in Central American Latina/o literature .
• Dominican ethnic identities, national borders, and literature .
• La Bloga, the world’s longest-established Chicana/o, Latina/o literary blog .
• Latino Book Review .
• LatinoStories.com .
• Latinx Talk, research, commentary, and creativity that fosters critical dialogue .
• Letras Latinas Blog, a blog produced by Letras Latinas, the literary initiative of the Institute for Latino Studies at the University of Notre Dame .
• Librotraficante, a website created by Tony Díaz in response to the ban on Mexican American Studies in Arizona (HB 2281) .
• The Latino fiction of Piri Thomas .
• Nuestra palabra .
• Nuyorican and diasporican literature and culture .
• Pat Mora, author, presenter, and literacy advocate .
• Puerto Rican nationhood, ethnicity, and literature .
• 50 Playwrights Project, a digital space for Latina/o theater .

Further Reading

• Álvarez-Borland, Isabel . Cuban American Literature of Exile: From Person to Persona . Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1998.
• Anzaldúa, Gloria . Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza . San Francisco: Aunt Lute Books, 1987.
• Aparicio, Frances , and Susana Chávez-Silverman , eds. Tropicalizations: Transcultural Representations of Latinidad . Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1997.
• Bost, Suzanne , and Frances Aparicio , eds. The Routledge Companion to Latino/a Literature . London: Routledge, 2015.
• Caminero-Santangelo, Marta . On Latinidad: U.S. Latino Literature and the Construction of Ethnicity . Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 2007.
• Dalleo, Raphael , and Elena Machado Sáez . The Latino/a Canon and the Emergence of Post-Sixties Literature . New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007.
• Flores, Juan . From Bomba to Hip Hop: Puerto Rican Culture and Latino Identity . New York: Columbia University Press, 2000.
• García-Peña, Lorgia . The Borders of Dominicanidad: Race, Nation, and Archives of Contradiction . Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2016.
• González, Juan . Harvest of Empire: A History of Latinos in America . New York: Penguin, 2011.
• Jiménez-Román, Miriam , and Juan Flores . The Afro-Latin@ Reader: History and Culture in the United States . Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010.
• Latina Feminist Group . Telling to Live: Latina Feminist Testimonios. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2001.
• Martínez–San Miguel, Yolanda . Caribe Two Ways: Cultura de la migración en el Caribe insular hispánico . San Juan: Ediciones Callejón, 2003.
• Méndez, Danny . Narratives of Migration and Displacement in Dominican Literature . New York: Routledge, 2012.
• Moreno, Marisel . Family Matters: Puerto Rican Women Authors on the Island and the Mainland . Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2012.
• Noel, Urayoán . In Visible Movement: Nuyorican Poetry From the Sixties to Slam . Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2014.
• Ortíz, Ricardo . Cultural Erotics in Cuban America . Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2007.
• Pérez Rosario, Vanessa , ed. Hispanic Caribbean Literature of Migration: Narratives of Displacement . New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.
• Rodríguez, Ana Patricia . Dividing the Isthmus: Central American Transnational Histories, Cultures, and Literatures . Austin: University of Texas Press, 2009.
• Saldívar, José David . Trans-Americanity: Subaltern Modernities, Global Coloniality , and the Cultures of Greater Mexico . Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2012.
• Saldívar-Hull, Sonia . Feminism on the Border: Chicana Gender Politics and Literature . Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002.
• Torres-Padilla, José , and Carmen Haydée Rivera , eds. Writing off the Hyphen: New Perspectives on the Literature of the Puerto Rican Diaspora . Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2008.

1. See Suzanne Oboler’s Ethnic Labels, Latino Lives: Identity and the Politics of (Re)Presentation in the United States (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995).

2. See Juan González, Harvest of Empire: A History of Latinos in America (New York: Penguin, 2011) .

3. For a more detailed analysis of patterns of Cuban migration to the United States, see Guillermo Grenier and Lisandro Pérez, The Legacy of Exile: Cubans in the United States (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2003), and Jorge Duany, Blurred Borders: Transnational Migration Between the Hispanic Caribbean and the United States (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2011).

4. González, Harvest of Empire , 99.

5. González, Harvest of Empire , 103. See also Mireya Loza, Defiant Braceros: How Migrant Workers Fought for Racial, Sexual, and Political Freedom (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2016).

6. For a definition of Third World Feminism, see Paul Allatson, Key Terms in Latino/a Cultural and Literary Studies (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2007).

7. Luis J. Rodríguez, Poems Across the Pavement , 1. (Chicago: Tia Chucha, 1989)

8. Rodríguez, Poems Across the Pavement , 2.

9. Rodríguez, Poems Across the Pavement , 2.

10. See Jorge Duany, The Puerto Rican Nation on the Move: Identities on the Island and in the United States (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2002).

11. See Virginia Sánchez Korrol, From Colonia to Community: The History of Puerto Ricans in New York City (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994).

12. Jorge Duany, Blurred Borders: Transnational Migration Between the Hispanic Caribbean and the United States (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2011), 51.

13. See Arelis Hernández, “ Exodus from Puerto Rico Grows as Island Struggles to Rebound from Hurricane Maria ,” Washington Post , March 6, 2018.

14. For a detailed analysis of Nuyorican poetry, see Urayoán Noel, In Visible Movement: Nuyorican Poetry From the Sixties to Slam (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2014) .

15. Pedro Pietri, Puerto Rican Obituary/Obituario Puertorriqueño (San Juan: Isla Negra, 2000).

16. “I’m your son / of a migration, / forced sin, / you sent me to be born in other lands” (my translation). Tato Laviera, AmeRícan (Houston: Arte Público Press, 1985), 53.

17. Laviera, AmeRícan , 53.

18. See Duany, Puerto Rican Nation on the Move , 52–53.

19. Judith Ortíz Cofer, Silent Dancing: A Partial Remembrance of a Puerto Rican Childhood (Houston: Arte Público Press, 1990), 17.

20. See Marisel Moreno, Family Matters: Puerto Rican Women Authors on the Island and the Mainland (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2012) .

21. Esmeralda Santiago, When I Was Puerto Rican (New York: Vintage Books, 1994), 209.

22. Santiago, When I Was Puerto Rican , 209.

23. See Moreno, Family Matters .

24. See Duany, The Puerto Rican Nation on the Move , 88.

25. See Marisel Moreno, “The Untold Midwestern Puerto Rican Story: Fred Arroyo’s Western Avenue and Other Fictions ,” Studies in American Fiction 42, no. 2 (Fall 2015): 269–289.

26. See Ernesto Sagás and Sintia Molina, eds., Dominican Migration: Transnational Perspectives (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2004); Duany, Blurred Borders , 55–60.

27. For a detailed study of unauthorized migration from the Dominican Republic, see Frank Graziano, Undocumented Dominican Migration (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2013).

28. Hispanophone Dominicans in the United States include the poet Marianela Medrano (“El ombligo negro de un bongó” in Regando Esencias/The Secret of Waiting , New York, Ediciones Alcance, 1998), the performance poet Sussy Santana ( Pelo bueno y otros poemas , United States, Atento a mi Publishing, 2009), Rey Andújar ( Candela , Santo Domingo, Santillana, 2008), and Daisy Cocco de Filippis, who has written extensively on Dominican literature in the United States. See Silvio Torres-Saillant, “La literatura dominicana en los Estados Unidos y la periferia del márgen,” Cuadernos de poética 21 (1993): 7–26.

29. See Marisel Moreno, “‘Burlando la raza:’ La poesía de escritoras afrodominicanas en la diaspora,” Camino Real: Estudios de las Hispanidades Norteamericanas 3, no. 4 (2011): 169–192.

30. See Patricia Pessar, A Visa for a Dream: Dominicans in the United States (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1995).

31. See Andrew Wilson, The Chinese in the Caribbean (Princeton, NJ: Markus Wiener, 2004).

32. See Marisel Moreno, “Dominican Dreams: Diasporic Identity in Angie Cruz’s Let It Rain Coffee ,” Sargasso no. 2 (2008–2009): 101–116.

33. Elizabeth Acevedo, Beastgirl and Other Origin Myths (Portland, OR: Yesyes Books, 2016), 13.

34. Acevedo, Beastgirl and Other Origin Myths , 13.

35. Guillermo Grenier and Lisandro Pérez, The Legacy of Exile: Cubans in the United States (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2003).

36. Grenier and Pérez, Legacy of Exile , 24.

37. See Duany, Blurred Borders , 46–47.

38. Ana Menéndez, In Cuba I Was a German Shepherd (New York: Dove Press, 2001), 7.

39. Dan Vera, Speaking Wiri Wiri (Pasadena: Red Hen Press, 2013), 29.

40. See González, Harvest of Empire , 129.

41. For a study of Archila’s poetry see Marisel Moreno, “ The ‘Art of Witness’ in US Central American Cultural Production: An Analysis of William Archila’s The Art of Exile and Alma Leiva’s Celdas ,” Latino Studies 15, no. 3 (Fall 2017): 287–308.

42. William Archila, The Art of Exile (Tempe, AZ: Bilingual Press, 2009), 25.

43. Archila, The Art of Exile , 25–26.

44. Guatemalan American Maya Chincilla’s, The Cha Cha Files: A Chapina Poética (San Francisco, Kórima Press, 2014); Salvadoran American Leticia Hernández-Linares’s Mucha Muchacha, Too Much Girl: Poems (San Fernando, CA, Tia Chucha Press, 2015); and The Wandering Song: Central American Writing in the United States , edited by Tobar et al. (San Fernando, Tia Chucha Press, 2017).

Related Articles

• Maya Youth Literatures in the Diaspora
• The Indigenous Presence and Central American-American Writers in the United States
• Decoloniality and Identity in Central American Latina and Latino Literature
• The Presence of Coloniality in Central American-American Fictions
• Border and in the US–Mexico Borderlands
• Hispanic Caribbean Sexiles
• US Central Americans in Art and Visual Culture

Printed from Oxford Research Encyclopedias, Literature. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a single article for personal use (for details see Privacy Policy and Legal Notice).

date: 26 March 2024

• Cookie Policy
• Privacy Policy
• Legal Notice
• Accessibility
• [66.249.64.20|81.177.182.154]
• 81.177.182.154

Character limit 500 /500

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

• Publications
• Account settings

Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .

• Advanced Search
• Journal List
• HHS Author Manuscripts

Immigration, Work, and Health: A Literature Review of Immigration Between Mexico and the United States

Understanding the influence someone’s job or career has on their health goes beyond the physical, emotional and social hazards, risks and conditions that they face at work. One’s job or career also exerts a significant influence over other aspects of life that contribute or detract from their health and that of their family. Work is the major incentive for Latin American migration to the United States. Latino immigrants experience increasingly poorer outcomes for physical health and chronic diseases the longer they remain in the U.S. The strong link between work and immigration suggests that, for many Latin Americans, immigration can be understood as a career path which puts them, and their family members, in situations that can change their physical, emotional, and social health as a condition of their employment. Given the large number of Latin Americans who emigrate for work, it is essential that the unique physical, mental and social impacts of emigration are accounted for when working with clients impacted by emigration at the individual, family and community level as well as those social workers practicing at the system level. This paper is a literature review that explores the impact that emigrating for work has on the health of those that emigrate and their family members that stay behind.

The World Health Organization (WHO) defines health as, “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity” ( World Health Organization, 2014 ). The WHO recognizes there are many contextual factors that influence health, collectively known as social determinants of health . The WHO defines social determinants of health as the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work and age. These circumstances are shaped on all levels, local, national and global, by the distribution of power, money and resources ( World Health Organization, 2014 ). Latinos are the fastest growing ethnic population in the United States (U.S.) ( Ortman & Guarneri, 2009 ). In particular, Latino immigrants experience increasingly poorer outcomes for physical health and chronic diseases the longer they remain in the U.S. ( Acevedo-Garcia, Bates, Osypuk, & McArdle, 2010 ; Rogers, 2010 ). This paper is a literature review that explores the impact that emigrating for work has on the health of those that emigrate and their family members that stay behind.

Work is the major incentive for Latin American migration to the United States and has a tremendous impact on immigrant health ( Cleaveland, 2012 ; Donald E. Eggerth, DeLaney, Flynn, & Jacobson, 2012 ; Ryo, 2013 ). Work is a central component in people’s lives that directly and indirectly impacts the physical, psychological and social well-being of both the worker and their family ( World Health Organization, 2014 ). Understanding the influence someone’s job or career has on their health goes beyond the physical, emotional and social hazards, risks and conditions that they face at work ( Commission on Social Determinants of Health, 2008 ). One’s job or career also exerts a significant influence over other aspects of life that contribute or detract from their health and that of their family ( Commission on Social Determinants of Health, 2008 ). Work often determines the type of health care you have, the kind of neighborhood you can afford to live in, how much money you have to meet the needs of your family, and the time you have to spend with your family ( Braveman, Egerter, & Williams, 2011 ). Different careers offer different opportunities and challenges to health and therefore exert stronger influence over the physical, emotional and social elements of health. For example, long-haul truckers often make more money than local drivers and therefore may be better able to provide for the physical needs of their family, but their career requires that they spend significant amounts of time away from home which can be challenging to social aspects of health like family life and friendships. Social workers help individuals, families, and groups restore or enhance their capacity for social functioning ( Barker, 2003 ). Therefore, the relationship between a career or job and the worker’s ability to attain optimal health for themselves and their family is understood as an important consideration for social work.

Work is the principal driver of current international immigration ( International Labor Organization, 2009 ). Over half of the 214 million international immigrants are labor migrants actively participating in the workforce; their families account for an additional 40% of the global immigrant population ( International Labor Organization, 2009 ). Immigration from Latin America to the United States experienced tremendous growth over the past 20 years and there are currently about 19 million Latino immigrants living in the United States today ( Motel & Patten, 2012 ). Mexican immigrants figure prominently in these numbers. In 2008, 12.7 million Mexican immigrants were living in the U.S. They accounted for 32% of the foreign-born population, up from just 8% (760,000) in 1970 ( Pew Hispanic Center, 2009 ). Although most immigrants from Latin America are authorized to be in the United States, increasing numbers of recent Latino immigrants do not have legal status. For example, Passel and Cohn (2009) estimated that roughly 80% of Mexican immigrants coming to the United States in the last decade were undocumented. Increased emigration has led to significant demographic changes for Mexico as well. In 1970, only 1.7% of Mexican citizens lived in the U.S.; however, in 2008, 11% of the total Mexican population, and an even larger portion of the working-age population, lived in the U.S. ( Pew Hispanic Center, 2009 ).

For many Mexicans, immigration can be understood as a career path which puts them in situations that can change their physical, emotional, and social health. The strong link between work and immigration ( International Labor Organization, 2009 ) suggests that the health impacts of this change in lifestyle are, at some level, work-related even though they are often not the result of conditions at their place of employment ( Davies, Basten, & Frattini, 2010 ; Ingleby, 2012 ) . The life course perspective is helpful in understanding how the decision to migrate for work can impact health and well-being over time ( Leong, Eggerth, & Flynn, 2014 ). While emigrating for work has the general goal of improving one’s economic opportunities, Jones (1996) cautions against considering the benefits of a given career without also considering the negatives related to that profession. For example, becoming a physician provides one with high income and opportunities to assist needy individuals. However, it also involves long work hours, tremendous job demands, and a high divorce rate due to the failure to balance work and family. Similarly, migration, under the best circumstances, entails challenges for the individual and their family; such as long periods of separation ( Grzywacz et al., 2006 ). Unauthorized migration has many additional risks ranging from exploitation by human smugglers to the stress of finding and keeping employment without documents ( Flynn, 2010 ).

Social workers help people increase their capacities for problem solving and coping, and they help them obtain needed resources, facilitate interactions between individuals and between people and their environments, make organizations responsible to people, and influence social policies ( Barker, 2003 ). Given the large number of Mexicans who emigrate for work, it is essential that the unique physical, mental and social impacts of emigration are accounted for when working with clients at the individual, family and community level as well as those social workers practicing at the system level.

Immigration and Health

The first section explores how immigration impacts the physical, emotional, and social health of the individual and his or her family. Specifically it looks at Mexican immigrants coming to the United States. The second section will then address the impact of immigration on the health of family members who stayed behind in Mexico. The final section addresses immigration and the health of immigrants returning to Mexico.

Impact on health of those that immigrate to the United States

Physical health.

The search for employment is central to Mexican migration to the U.S. ( International Labor Organization, 2009 ). The jobs they typically work have an elevated risk of injury or illness ( Hudson, 2007 ; Orrenius & Zavodny, 2009 ). Latino immigrant workers are fatally injured at a rate of 5.9 per 100,000 population, compared with 4.0 per 100,000 population for all workers in the U.S. ( Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2008 ). Mexican immigrants figure prominently in these disparities. From 2003 to 2006, two-thirds of work-related deaths among Latinos were among immigrants, and 70% of those immigrants were Mexican. Lack of access to health care ( Ku & Matani, 2001 ; Lashuay & Harrison, 2006 ), language barriers ( Lashuay & Harrison, 2006 ; National Research Council, 2003 ), discrimination ( Okechukwu, Souza, Davis, & de Castro, 2014 ), fear of retaliation ( Smith-Nonini, 2003 ), temporary work arrangements ( Landsbergis, Grzywacz, & LaMontagne, 2014 ), lack of knowledge about workplace safety procedures and regulatory protections ( Pransky et al., 2002 ), and for some, lack of authorization to work ( Flynn, 2010 ; Walter, Bourgois, Margarita Loinaz, & Schillinger, 2002 ) are some of the factors that can make it difficult for immigrant workers to address their occupational safety and health (OSH) concerns ( Lashuay & Harrison, 2006 ).

According to data from the U. S. Census Bureau ( Passel & Cohn, 2009 ), most undocumented migrants work in farming jobs (25%), followed by those employed in groundskeeping and building maintenance (19%), construction (17%), food preparation and serving (12%), and production (10%). Multiple studies across the U.S. have shown that immigrant farmworkers are vulnerable populations that experience high rates of injury and disease ( Arcury, Rodriguez, Kearney, Arcury, & Quandt, 2014 ; Brock, Northcraft-Baxter, Escoffery, & Greene, 2012 ; Kelly, Glick, Kulbok, Clayton, & Rovnyak, 2012 ; McCurdy & Kwan, 2012 ; Shipp, Cooper, del Junco, Cooper, & Whitworth, 2013 ). The major occupational hazards experienced by these workers are pesticide and heavy metals exposures, sun exposure, musculoskeletal injuries, and poor field sanitation ( Quandt et al., 2010 ; Sakala, 1987 ). Data on injury or illness rates among day laborers (construction, yard work, and maintenance) are sparse, but findings consistently indicate increased rates of occupational injuries. These workers also deal with problems related to the safety, security, hygiene, and privacy of migrant farmworker housing ( Arcury et al., 2012 ). Latino immigrant workers in construction and roofing face higher risks of injury and death ( Albers, Hudock, & Lowe, 2013 ; Arcury et al., 2014 ; Dong, Choi, Borchardt, Wang, & Largay, 2013 ; O'Connor, Loomis, Runyan, Abboud dal Santo, & Schulman, 2005 ). Immigrant workers in poultry processing plants in the U.S. face higher risks of exposure to parasites, musculoskeletal injuries and skin diseases ( Grzywacz et al., 2012 ; Pichardo-Geisinger et al., 2014 ; Pichardo-Geisinger et al., 2013 ; Quandt et al., 2014 ), and cleaning workers are exposed to hazardous chemicals ( Pechter, Azaroff, Lopez, & Goldstein-Gelb, 2009 ),

In addition to physical danger at work, the career choice to immigrate often entails work-induced lifestyle factors which impact physical health. Schedule demands, wage uncertainly, marginal benefits, overall stress, poor diet, and minimal free-time are some examples of factors which can negatively impact the physical health of immigrant workers and their families ( Commission on Social Determinants of Health, 2008 ). Specifically, increased time in the United States results in an increased prevalence of chronic conditions and the adoption of poor health behaviors as immigrants assimilate to life in the United States ( Singh & Siahpush, 2002 ). For example, recent Latino immigrants had better self-reported overall health, fewer daily activity limitations and fewer days spent in bed due to illness than U.S.-born individuals ( Cho, Frisbie, Hummer, & Rogers, 2004 ). They also had a lower prevalence of negative health conditions ( Antecol & Bedard, 2006 ). However these advantages diminish or disappear the longer immigrants spend in the United States.

Studies have also shown acculturation and time in the United States is positively associated with increased body mass index ( Antecol & Bedard, 2006 ; Cho, et al., 2004 ) and adoption of less healthy diets due to work schedules and intensity that allow limited time or energy for food preparation at home ( Arenas-Monreal, Ruiz-Rodriguez, Bonilla-Fernandez, Valdez Santiago, & Hernandez-Tezoquipa, 2013 ). Likewise increased rates of smoking ( Abraido-Lanza, Chao, & Florez, 2005 ; Bethel & Schenker, 2005 ), alcohol use ( Abraido-Lanza, et al., 2005 ), sedentary lifestyle and hypertension ( Chakraborty et al., 2003 ), diabetes ( Lopez & Golden, 2014 ; Schneiderman et al., 2014 ), poor sleep ( Seicean, Neuhauser, Strohl, & Redline, 2011 ), and disabilities ( Escobar Latapi, Lowell, & Martin, 2013 ) have all been shown to increase the longer immigrants remain in the United States. The lifestyle changes associated with low-wage, often temporary employment in the United States are often cited as factors central to the deteriorating health of immigrant workers and their families. Escobar Latapi et al. (2013) concluded that improving migrant health is largely dependent on upgrading working conditions and education.

Mental Health

Working conditions and the ancillary effects of employment can have both positive and negative impacts on a worker’s mental health. Blustein (2006) identified three core functions that work has the potential to fulfill: (a) work as a means for survival and power, (b) work as a means of social connection, and (c) work as a means of self-determination. To the degree that work can fulfill these needs, it likely has a positive impact on the mental health of the worker. However, the workplace is often one of the social spaces where people from different social, ethnic and racial backgrounds interact. Therefore it can be the site where larger social dynamics such as discrimination, xenophobia, racism and bullying play out ( Okechukwu, et al., 2014 ). Latino immigrants are one group for whom this is especially true; they are often socially isolated within the larger community, with very limited employment opportunities and living with severe social constraints ( Okechukwu, et al., 2014 ). This is even more significant for vulnerable groups of immigrants such as undocumented immigrants ( Flynn, 2010 ) or immigrant women ( Donald E. Eggerth, et al., 2012 ) who often face additional stressors at work. These dynamics can take a significant psychological toll on workers, as suggested by studies of discrimination and psychological and emotional distress at work ( Krieger et al., 2006 ).

For immigrant workers, stress does not stop with workplace discrimination. Indeed, choosing to immigrate for work implies a total change in lifestyle that brings with it a series of social and economic stressors that reach well beyond one’s place of employment and into all facets of life ( Sandhu & Asrabadi, 1994 ). The challenges associated with the process of adapting to a new social environment are referred to as acculturative stress ( Sandhu & Asrabadi, 1994 ). While Latino immigrants to the United States experience better mental health than the U.S. population upon arrival to the United States, as with physical health, these advantages tend to dissipate the longer they live in the United States ( Vega, Sribney, Aguilar-Gaxiola, & Kolody, 2004 ). Several studies have found higher rates of psychiatric challenges in immigrant groups when compared to the general population of their host country ( Hutchinson & Haasen, 2004 ; Silveira & Ebrahim, 1998 ; Vega, et al., 2004 ). Time in the United States was associated with increased experiences of racial discrimination by Latino immigrants which negatively impacted both their mental and physical health ( Gee, Ryan, Laflamme, & Holt, 2006 ). It also appears that immigrants may have worse mental health outcomes when compared with the population in their home countries. For example, Hovey and King (1997) found higher levels of suicide among Mexican immigrants to the United States as compared to Mexico.

Although journeying to a foreign land inspires hope for a better future, much acculturative stress surrounds the process ( Suarez-Orozco & Suarez-Orozco, 2001 ). A longitudinal study assessing the impact of acculturative stress in immigrant adolescents found that as levels of acculturative stress increase, internalizing mental health symptoms increase as well ( Sirin, Ryce, Gupta, & Rogers-Sirin, 2013 ) . These internalized mental health symptoms include anxiety, depression, and somatic symptoms ( Sirin, et al., 2013 ; Wei et al., 2007 ). Acculturative stress is closely associated with challenges to social health and is discussed in the next section.

Social Health

Labor migration plays a very large role in the social aspects of health. Employment is a key motivation for immigration and is central to the choice of a destination once the decision to emigrate has been made ( International Labor Organization, 2009 ; Kochhar, Suro, & Tafoya, 2005 ). The destination sets the parameters for the social health of the immigrant. For example: is the destination a large metropolitan area or a small town?; does it have an established Latino community or is it a new settlement area with little to no bilingual infrastructure?; are the politics of the established population adversarial, friendly or ambivalent to new immigrants? Once employed the job will dictate the individual’s daily schedule, the amount of free time they have, and their ability to work overtime or get a second job. As mentioned earlier, for immigrants, the workplace is one of the primary sites of interaction with members of the established community.

Isolation and a lack of social support is a significant challenge to social health for many immigrants. Immigrating for work often involves separation from one’s social network – family and friends – for extended periods of time ( Grzywacz, et al., 2006 ). This can be especially true when the cost of travel is prohibitive or the lack of immigration documents prevents routine passage between countries ( D.E. Eggerth & Flynn, 2013 ). Moreover, developing social supports and accessing local resources among the established community can be very difficult.

Perhaps the most obvious barrier to integration with the established community is language. Not being able to receive assistance due to language barriers is frustrating ( D.E. Eggerth & Flynn, 2013 ). Given their significant work and family obligations, immigrant workers often do not have the time or energy to dedicate to learning a new language. Likewise, many have limited formal education in their native language which increases the difficulty of learning a foreign language ( Donald E. Eggerth, et al., 2012 ). In addition, the legal, socio-cultural and political condition of the host country can further complicate integration of immigrant workers into the community. For example immigrants are often prohibited from receiving means-tested benefits, gaining citizenship, or accessing resources such as health care ( Castaneda, 2009 ). The most extreme example of social exclusion is the categorization of some immigrants as “illegal” ( De Genova, 2002 ), as the constant fear of deportation contributes to both acute and low-grade levels of stress ( Berk & Schur, 2001 ). Separation from family and friends together with language problems and social exclusionary policies in the host countries can all contribute to feelings of isolation for immigrant workers.

Alternately, even when entire families are able to immigrate together, there are significant stressors related to acculturation both as individuals and as a family group ( Rogler, 1994 ). Often immigration confuses traditional family roles and power dynamics. For example children often acculturate and learn the language of the host country faster than their parents. This often places them in the role of interpreting social norms for their parents or translating at meetings with school officials, medical providers, etc. Similarly, immigration can challenge traditional gender roles in the family. Immigrant women often work outside of the home in host countries whereas they typically would remain housewives in their home countries. Menjivar (1999) reported that Central American immigrant women found that the self-esteem they gained from working outside the home was often accompanied by demeaning or violent behavior from their husbands in an attempt to retain the traditional gender roles in the family.

Latino families are a part of social networks that exercise resource sharing such as transportation and financial support ( Ayón & Naddy, 2013 ). Latino families rely on each family member for emotional, financial, and moral support; placing emphasis on the role of the father ( Haxton & Harknett, 2009 ). However, in comparison to the African-American family, Hispanics are more likely to receive support from both parents ( Haxton & Harknett, 2009 ). Thus, when one Latino spouse emigrates for work, it is presumed that heightened family conflict will occur ( Donald E. Eggerth, et al., 2012 ), impacting those that stayed behind. The next section describes how labor migration impacts the health of family members who stayed behind.

Impact on Health of Family Members that Stay Behind

While immigration has been understood as a social determinant of health for the immigrant ( Davies, et al., 2010 ; Ingleby, 2012 ), its role as a social determinant of health of family members left behind is by and large overlooked. According to Kanaiaupuni and Donato (1999) in its initial stages, migration is disruptive to communities and families; however, in the long term it is beneficial to household survival and eventually becomes part of local institutions and community life. In some cases, it helps families thrive. Families of immigrants in the U.S. have more economic resources that allow them better access to goods and services; these families are also larger, their members are younger, and have more years of education than families with no migrant relatives ( Salgado de Snyder et al., 2010 ). For example, in 2013, an estimated $22 billion were sent by migrants to Mexico ( Cohn, Gonzalez-Barrera, & Cuddington, 2013 ). The central question is to what degree the international labor migration determines the physical, mental and social health of those family members who are left behind.

Salgado de Snyder et al. (2010) conducted a survey among 702 families with and without migrant relatives in rural communities of three central states in Mexico. Compared to families without a migrant relative, women in migrant sending households reported having more sexually transmitted diseases and more chronic diseases such as hypertension and diabetes. They also reported having more infectious diseases such as tuberculosis and pneumonia. While the differences for each individual condition were not statistically significant, a consistent pattern of worse health outcomes in immigrant households emerged across all conditions that were studied.

Using data from the Mexican Migration Project, which surveyed Mexican communities during the winters of 1987-1988 through 1992-1993, Kanaiaupuni and Donato (1999) found that in communities going through the initial period of intense migration, infant survival worsened considerably. However, infant mortality was reduced in half in communities with 20 years or more of migration. High annual remittances from migrant workers back to their families of at least $10,000 improved infant survival with the odds of death reduced by 27%, after controlling for other factors.

Using data from the 1997 National Survey of Demographic Dynamics (Encuesta Nacional de Dinámica Demográfica, ENADID), Hildebrandt and McKenzie (2005) found higher birth weights and lower infant mortality rates among children born in Mexico in a migrant-sending household. Conversely, they found that children in migrant households were less likely to be breastfed, vaccinated, or visit a doctor in their first year of life.

Baker et al. (2010) analyzed data from the Mexican Family Life Survey and found that children living in a migrant-sending household appear to have gained more weight (higher body mass index and risk for overweight) than those that did not have migrant relatives, even after controlling for past weight status. They also found that the levels and patterns of obesity in migrant-sending households more closely resemble those among resident Mexican-Americans than those of other Mexicans remaining in Mexico.

A nutrition transition has been occurring over the past two decades as a result of economic development and globalization, leading to increases in obesity. In less developed countries, obesity has tended to be relatively rare, but as economic development ensues (accompanied by rising incomes, urbanization, and increasing availability of inexpensive, high-caloric foods), obesity has increased. It has been suggested that migration networks may constitute one of the factors affecting nutrition transition in Mexico, a world-wide process that involves shifts in food consumption and physical activity patterns ( Baker et al., 2010 ).

Elderly dependents that stay behind may have health effects associated with a child’s migration. In a survey of rural communities in central Mexico, Salgado de Snyder et al. (2010) found that elderly residents of non-migrant sending households reported a lower number of “bone” diseases (osteoporosis, arthritis, rheumatism, uric acid), chronic diseases (diabetes, hypertension, heart disease), infectious diseases (pulmonary diseases, tuberculosis, urinary infection, intestinal infection, prostate infection), and eyesight conditions (blindness and visual impairment), compared to those in migrant sending households, although none of the differences were statistically significant. However, while differences for specific conditions were not statistically significant, a consistent pattern of poorer health for individuals from migrant households emerged.

Using data from the 2001 Mexican Health and Aging Study (MHAS), a nationally representative survey of Mexicans born before 1950, Antman (2010) found that elderly parents of migrants have a greater probability of being in poor physical health. This effect is independent of children’s remittances, but the contributing factors could not be identified.

The mental effects of migration on women remaining in their countries of origin revolve around the issues of attachment, separation and loss. A study conducted in Mexico and reported by UNICEF ( D’Emilio et al., 2007 ) found that 70% of women interviewed stated that they had suffered periods of depression and 30% considered some of their health problems as related to the stress of having absent partners or family members.

It has been reported that 17 percent of Mexican children are expected to experience the migration of a father by the age of 14 ( Nobles, 2007 ). Because female migration is becoming more common in Mexico, it is likely that the proportion of children experiencing household migration is actually even larger. Not much information is available on the mental health effects of children left behind by migrating parents from Mexico to the United States. Studies in Nicaragua and Mexico have found that children resented the absence of fathers; and mothers have reported increased parenting problems with their children ( D’Emilio, et al., 2007 ). Furthermore, problems associated with drug and alcohol abuse were reported to be greater among adolescents of migrant fathers, and reduced attention to school and home tasks were also cited as result of parental migration ( D’Emilio, et al., 2007 ).

Using longitudinal data from the Mexican Family Life Survey (MxFLS), Arenas and Yahirun (2011) found that parents whose children migrated to the US between 2002 and 2005 had higher levels of anxiety, sadness, loneliness and a wish to die compared to parents of children who did not migrate. In comparison, parents of children who migrated within Mexico only had outcomes related to sadness compared to parents whose children never left. Antman (2010) found a significant association between being separated from a child now living in the U.S. and poor mental health outcomes for elderly parents still living in Mexico.

Mexican migration produces periods of spousal and parent-child separation that are often considerable in both frequency and duration ( Kanaiaupuni, 2000 ). Separation contributes to a series of emotional, physical and health consequences among family members left behind. Those who remain in the communities of origin are mostly women, youth and children, who are left to face the new reality that migration imposes on their lives. These women maintain a strong relationship of dependency with their partners, not only because of their duty as wives, but also due to the economic control exercised by men, as it has been reported that they are not able to freely decide where the money their husbands’ send will be spent ( Garcia Oramas, Ruiz Pimentel, & Ruiz Vallejo, 2011 ).

Studying families of migrants in rural communities in the state of Veracruz, Mexico, Garcia Oramas et al. (2011) found that numerous migrants leave their spouses under the guardianship of their relatives, usually their parents or in-laws. This is intended to protect their families, but especially to maintain social control over their partners. Caballero et al. (2008) studied partners of migrants in two central Mexico communities, and found similar familiar dynamics. Moreover, they report that these women have little control over the type and timing of the use of contraceptive methods: the decision to stop or continue is almost always taken at the request of the male, with the expectation that the woman will become pregnant during the months that her partner is visiting.

Caballero et al. (2008) also found that when a woman is alone, she has less capacity to respond to health problems: in a moment of crisis, she has no one to discuss her doubts or concerns or seek advice, as typically her husband would fill that role. She also faces difficulties such as childcare, access to healthcare and transportation. Thus, women of migrating men self-medicate and delay seeking professional healthcare. Alternately, having a spouse who emigrates can improve access to health care in certain circumstances. For example, in the case of sexual health, these women often have greater freedom of choice to attend health services and continue (or not) contraception ( Caballero, et al., 2008 ). It has also been reported that families of migrants use private health services more often than families without a migrant relative ( Salgado de Snyder, et al., 2010 ).

Impact on Health of Those that Return to Mexico

Mexican immigration to the United States over the past four decades has represented the largest migration from any one country in the history of the United States. However, the past five years have seen a marked decrease in the number of Mexicans emigrating to the United States as well as a doubling of the number of Mexican immigrants returning to Mexico, e.g. 1,390,000 returning migrants between 2005-2010 which is up from just 670,000 between 1995 – 2000),( Passel & Cohn, 2009 ). Indeed, in the 2010 Mexican Census almost a million people reported having worked in the United States, up from just 230,000 five years earlier ( Escobar Latapi, et al., 2013 ). While future flows will fluctuate in response to changing economic and political conditions in Mexico and the United States, the 12 million Mexican immigrants living in the United States - many of whom came during the 1990’s as undocumented immigrants – have the potential to significantly impact the flow of returning migrants as they age out of the labor pool ( Passel & Cohn, 2009 ). Migrants return home for a variety of both positive (retirement after financial success, family reunification etc.) and negative (unemployment, illness, deportation, etc.) reasons.

The growing tide of returning migrants might present challenges related to social and economic reintegration for returning immigrants – especially those of working age. Alternately, those who are returning as a result of an injury or illness as well as those returning in their retirement might present challenges to the health care systems both in terms of service provision and cost. Gaining a better understanding of the physical, mental and social health issues that surround return migration is an important first step in developing policies and initiatives that will help address the needs of returning migrants today as well as anticipated needs in the future.

According to a binational report ( Escobar Latapi, et al., 2013 ), retrospective studies of older adults who returned to Mexico either at a young or old age show that compared to immigrants that remain in the United States, the health of return migrants is poor in indicators such as self-rated health, height, hypertension, smoking and higher mortality rates. Mexican immigrants also have higher old-age disability rates than individuals born in the United States, perhaps due to the cumulative effects of repetitive manual work.

González-Block and Sierra-de la Vega (2011) conducted a cross-sectional study of Mexican migrants who returned specifically to Mexico from the U.S. for hospital care. They found that hospitals in high and very high migration areas, as well as those along the U.S.-Mexico border were being used by sick returning migrants, who were not able have their hospital needs met in the United States. The treated conditions most commonly reported by the hospitals were: trauma (56%), diabetes complications (38%), elective surgery (36%), HIV-AIDS (20%), chronic renal failure (18%), cancer (18%), other chronic diseases (14%), respiratory diseases (13%), animal bites and dehydration (7%), and psychiatric disorders (4%).

The reason for return is likely an important factor in the mental health of returning migrants. It is not difficult to imagine that returning to Mexico as the result of deportation, unemployment, or medical care would entail a very different mindset than returning to retire in your home village after many productive working years in the United States. While both may face challenges reinserting themselves into Mexican society, those returning after some misfortune would likely be at greater risk for mental/emotional health problems. Therefore, an analysis of the 2008 National Addiction Survey (Encuesta Nacional de Adicciones) showed that, in general, U.S. migrants returned to Mexico showed a three-fold increase in the risk of planned suicide attempts ( Borges, Orozco, & Medina Mora, 2012 ).

Similar to mental health, the conditions under which the individual returns to Mexico are likely have a significant impact on their social health. For those who are returning with financial resources it is easy to imagine that the reinsertion would be easier.

On the other hand, for those who return not having met their financial goals, the return likely brings up feelings of frustration as well as stress related to economic needs. As mentioned above, work can both positively and negatively impact mental health. In the case of youth or working age returning migrants, probably one of the most important steps in the reinsertion process will be getting on the road to a job either through gainful employment or continuing their education. Moctezuma (2013) highlights the difficulties school aged returning immigrants have in matriculating into schools in Mexico due to a lack of certified documents (e.g. birth certificates, report cards, school records) as well as academic problems such as language barriers and non-aligned curriculum. He advocates for a process that takes into account the reality of the returning migrant and facilitates the documentation they need to continue their studies.

Another central component to social health and reinsertion of returning immigrants is family. As stated previously many parents often leave loved ones behind when they emigrate for work. While this strategy may have proved successful in providing materially for their loved ones it likely required them to spend many years apart, often during their children’s formative years. It is not hard to imagine how reunification after many years apart may be difficult and even awkward. Moctezuma (2013) also points out that recently there has been a significant rise in the number of families with children returning to Mexico. Social health can be compromised if some of the family members were not in agreement with returning to Mexico. Likewise, if the children have never lived in Mexico or don’t speak Spanish well, the transition to a different standard of living or limitations on social interactions due to language and cultural barriers can further threaten social health.

Eleven percent of the Mexican population lives in the United States and roughly 20% of all children in Mexico have, at one time or another, had a father working in the United States. If we add to these numbers the increased number of women emigrating to the United States as well as the increased flow of immigrants returning to Mexico after having worked in the United States, it is not hard to see that a large number of Mexican families are directly affected by migration in and out of country. Developing a better understanding of migration patterns and their impact, both positive and negative, on the health of migrants and on family members who stay behind is essential in understanding the individual and societal costs of immigration. This in turn will inform improvements in public health policies and interventions that may serve to improve the physical, mental, and social health of the Mexican population. Finally, this knowledge can provide a social context for therapeutic individual interventions and approaches to social work that attempt to understand and address the health challenges many Mexican children and adults face as a result of immigration.

Disclaimer:

The findings and conclusions in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

• Abraido-Lanza AF, Chao MT, Florez KR. Do healthy behaviors decline with greater acculturation? Implications for the Latino mortality paradox. Social Science & Medicine. 2005; 61 (6):1243–1255. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Acevedo-Garcia D, Bates LM, Osypuk TL, McArdle N. The effect of immigrant generation and duration on self-rated health among US adults 2003-2007. [Soc Sci Med] Social Science & Medicine. 2010; 71 (6):1161–1172. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Albers JT, Hudock SD, Lowe BD. Residential building stakeholders' attitudes and beliefs regarding nail gun injury risks and prevention. New Solutions. 2013; 23 (4):577–605. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Antecol H, Bedard K. Unhealthy assimilation: why do immigrants converge to American health status levels? Demography. 2006; 43 (2):337–360. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Antman FM. How does adult child migration affect the health of elderly parents left behind? Evidence from Mexico. American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings. 2010; 100 (2) [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Arcury TA, Rodriguez G, Kearney GD, Arcury JT, Quandt SA. Safety and injury characteristics of youth farmworkers in north Carolina: a pilot study. J Agromedicine. 2014; 19 (4):354–363. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Arcury TA, Summers P, Carrillo L, Grzywacz JG, Quandt SA, Mills TH., 3rd Occupational safety beliefs among Latino residential roofing workers. Am J Ind Med. 2014; 57 (6):718–725. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Arcury TA, Weir MM, Summers P, Chen H, Bailey M, Wiggins MF, et al. Safety, security, hygiene and privacy in migrant farmworker housing. New Solutions. 2012; 22 (2):153–173. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Arenas-Monreal L, Ruiz-Rodriguez M, Bonilla-Fernandez P, Valdez Santiago R, Hernandez-Tezoquipa I. Cambios alimenticios en mujeres morelenses migrantes a Estados Unidos. Salud Pública de México. 2013; 55 (1):35–42. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Arenas E, Yahirun J. Left behind: the effects of offspring’s migration on parental mental health in Mexico. California Center for Population Research, University of California; 2011. [ Google Scholar ]
• Ayón C, Naddy MBG. Latino immigrant families’ social support networks: strengths and limitations during a time of stringent immigration legislation and economic insecurity. Journal of Community Psychology. 2013; 41 (3):359–377. [ Google Scholar ]
• Baker E, Altman CE, Van Hook J. International migration and child obesity in Mexican sending communities. Penn State Population Research Institute; 2010. [ Google Scholar ]
• Barker RL. The social work dictionary. 5th ed NASW Press; Baltimore: 2003. [ Google Scholar ]
• Berk ML, Schur CL. The effect of fear on access to care among undocumented Latino immigrants. Journal of Immigrant Health. 2001; 3 (3):151–156. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Bethel JW, Schenker MB. Acculturation and smoking patterns among Hispanics: a review. Am J Prev Med. 2005; 29 (2):143–148. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Blustein DL. The psychology of working: A new perspective for career development, counseling, and public policy. Lawrence Erlbaum; Mahwah, NJ: 2006. [ Google Scholar ]
• Borges G, Orozco R, Medina Mora ME. Indice de riesgo para el intento suicida en Mexico. Salud Pública de México. 2012; 54 (6):595–606. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Braveman P, Egerter S, Williams DR. The social determinants of health: coming of age. Annu Rev Public Health. 2011; 32 :381–398. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Brock M, Northcraft-Baxter L, Escoffery C, Greene BL. Musculoskeletal health in South Georgia farmworkers: a mixed methods study. Work. 2012; 43 (2):223–236. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Caballero M, Leyva-Flores R, Ochoa-Marin SC, Zarco A, Guerrero C. Las mujeres que se quedan: migracion e implicacion en los procesos de busqueda de atencion de servicios de salud. Salud Pública de México. 2008; 50 (3):241–250. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Castaneda H. Illegality as risk factor: a survey of unauthorized migrant patients in a Berlin clinic. [Soc Sci Med] Social Science & Medicine. 2009; 68 (8):1552–1560. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Work-related injury deaths among hispanics--United States, 1992-2006. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep. 2008; 57 (22):597–600. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Chakraborty BM, Mueller WH, Reeves R, Poston WS, 2nd, Holscher DM, Quill B, et al. Migration history, health behaviors, and cardiovascular disease risk factors in overweight Mexican-American women. Ethn Dis. 2003; 13 (1):94–108. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Cho Y, Frisbie WP, Hummer RA, Rogers RG. Nativity, Duration of Residence, and the Health of Hispanic Adults in the United States1. International Migration Review. 2004; 38 (1):184–211. [ Google Scholar ]
• Cleaveland C. ‘In this country, you suffer a lot’: Undocumented Mexican immigrant experiences. Qualitative Social Work. 2012; 11 (6):566–586. [ Google Scholar ]
• Cohn DV, Gonzalez-Barrera A, Cuddington D. Remittances to Latin America Recover-but Not to Mexico. Pew Research Center; Washington, D.C: 2013. [ Google Scholar ]
• Commission on Social Determinants of Health . Closing the gap in a generation: health equity through action on the social determinants of health. Final Report. World Health Organization; Geneva: 2008. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• D’Emilio AL, Cordero B, Bainvel B, Skoog C, Comini D, Gough J, et al. The impact of international migration: children left behind in selected countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. United Nations Children's Fund; New York: 2007. [ Google Scholar ]
• Davies AA, Basten A, Frattini C. Migration: A social determinant of migrants’ health. Eurohealth. 2010; 16 (1):10–12. [ Google Scholar ]
• De Genova NP. Migrant “illegality” and deportability in everyday life. Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 2002; 31 :419–447. [ Google Scholar ]
• Dong XS, Choi SD, Borchardt JG, Wang X, Largay JA. Fatal falls from roofs among U.S. construction workers. J Safety Res. 2013; 44 :17–24. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Eggerth DE, DeLaney SC, Flynn MA, Jacobson CJ. Work Experiences of Latina Immigrants: A Qualitative Study. Journal of Career Development. 2012; 39 (1):13–30. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Eggerth DE, Flynn MA. Immigration and Stress. In: Genkova P, Ringeisen T, Leong FT, editors. Handbuch Stress und Kultur: interkulturelle und kulturvergleichende Perspektiven (Handbook of Stress and Culture: Intercultural and Cross-cultural Perspectives) Springer VS; Wiesbaden, Germany: 2013. pp. 343–359. [ Google Scholar ]
• Escobar Latapi A, Lowell L, Martin S. Binational dialogue on Mexican migrants in the US and in Mexico. Final report. Georgetown University’s Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM) and Center for Research in Social Anthropology (CIESAS); 2013. [ Google Scholar ]
• Flynn MA. Undocumented status and the occupational lifeworlds of Latino immigrants in a time of political backlash: the workers’ perspective. University of Cincinnati; Cincinnati: 2010. [ Google Scholar ]
• Garcia Oramas MJ, Ruiz Pimentel S, Ruiz Vallejo S. Las que se quedan: género, migración y control social. Les Cahiers ALHIM - Amérique Latine Histoire et Mémoire. 2011; 21 [ Google Scholar ]
• Gee GC, Ryan A, Laflamme DJ, Holt J. Self-reported discrimination and mental health status among African descendants, Mexican Americans, and other Latinos in the New Hampshire REACH 2010 Initiative: the added dimension of immigration. Am J Public Health. 2006; 96 (10):1821–1828. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Gonzalez-Block MA, de la Sierra-de la Vega LA. Hospital utilization by Mexican migrants returning to Mexico due to health needs. BMC Public Health. 2011; 11 :241. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Grzywacz JG, Arcury TA, Mora D, Anderson AM, Chen H, Rosenbaum DA, et al. Work organization and musculoskeletal health: clinical findings from immigrant Latino poultry processing and other manual workers. J Occup Environ Med. 2012; 54 (8):995–1001. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Grzywacz JG, Quandt SA, Early J, Tapia J, Graham CN, Arcury TA. Leaving family for work: ambivalence and mental health among Mexican migrant farmworker men. J Immigr Minor Health. 2006; 8 (1):85–97. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Haxton CL, Harknett K. Racial and Gender Differences in Kin Support: A Mixed-Methods Study of African American and Hispanic Couples. Journal of Family Issues. 2009; 30 (8):1019–1040. [ Google Scholar ]
• Hildebrandt N, McKenzie DJ. The effects of migration on child health in Mexico. 2005.
• Hovey JD, King CA. Suicidality among acculturating Mexican Americans: current knowledge and directions for research. Suicide Life Threat Behav. 1997; 27 (1):92–103. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Hudson K. The new labor market segmentation: labor market dualism in the new economy. Social Science Research. 2007; 36 :286–312. [ Google Scholar ]
• Hutchinson G, Haasen C. Migration and schizophrenia: the challenges for European psychiatry and implications for the future. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol. 2004; 39 (5):350–357. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Ingleby D. Ethnicity, Migration and the 'Social Determinants of Health' Agenda. Psychosocial Intervention. 2012; 21 (3):331–341. [ Google Scholar ]
• International Labor Organization International labour migration and employment in the Arab region: Origins, consequences and the way forward; Paper presented at the Thematic Paper. Arab Employment Forum; 2009. Retrieved from. [ Google Scholar ]
• Jones LK. A Harsh and Challenging World of Work: Implications for Counselors. Journal of Counseling & Development. 1996; 74 (5):453–459. [ Google Scholar ]
• Kanaiaupuni SM. Sustaining Families and Communities: Nonmigrant Women and Mexico-U.S. Migration Processes. Center for Demography and Ecology, University of Wisconsin-Madison; 2000. [ Google Scholar ]
• Kanaiaupuni SM, Donato KM. Migradollars and mortality: The effects of migration on infant survival in Mexico. Demography. 1999; 36 (3):339–353. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Kelly N, Glick D, Kulbok P, Clayton L, Rovnyak V. Health status of migrant farmworkers in the Shenandoah Valley. J Community Health Nurs. 2012; 29 (4):214–224. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Kochhar R, Suro R, Tafoya S. The new Latino south: The context and consequences of rapid population growth. The Pew Charitable Trusts; Washington, DC: 2005. [ Google Scholar ]
• Krieger N, Waterman PD, Hartman C, Bates LM, Stoddard AM, Quinn MM, et al. Social hazards on the job: workplace abuse, sexual harassment, and racial discrimination--a study of Black, Latino, and White low-income women and men workers in the United States. Int J Health Serv. 2006; 36 (1):51–85. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Ku L, Matani S. Left out: immigrants' access to health care and insurance. Health Aff (Millwood) 2001; 20 (1):247–256. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Landsbergis PA, Grzywacz JG, LaMontagne AD. Work organization, job insecurity, and occupational health disparities. Am J Ind Med. 2014; 57 (5):495–515. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Lashuay N, Harrison R. Barriers to occupational health services for low-wage workers in California. California Department of Industrial Relations; Oakland: 2006. [ Google Scholar ]
• Leong FTL, Eggerth DE, Flynn MA. A life course perspective on immigrant occupational health and well-being. In: Sinclair R, Leka S, editors. Contemporary Occupational Health Psychology. Vol. 3. Wiley-Blackwell; New York: 2014. [ Google Scholar ]
• Lopez L, Golden SH. A new era in understanding diabetes disparities among U.S. Latinos--all are not equal. Diabetes Care. 2014; 37 (8):2081–2083. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• McCurdy SA, Kwan JA. Agricultural injury risk among rural California public high school students: prospective results. Am J Ind Med. 2012; 55 (7):631–642. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Menjivar C. The Intersection of Work and Gender: Central American Immigrant Women and Employment in California. American Behavioral Scientist. 1999; 42 (4):601–627. [ Google Scholar ]
• Moctezuma ML. Alteridades sociales y familiares de la migración internacional de retorno a Mexico. Estudios del Desarrollo de la Universidad Autónoma de Zacatecas; 2013. [ Google Scholar ]
• Motel S, Patten E. Hispanic Origin Profiles, 2010. Pew Research Hispanic Trends Project. [Retrieved October 13, 2014]. 2012. from.
• National Research Council . Safety is seguridad: a workshop summary. National Academies Press; Washington, DC: 2003. [ Google Scholar ]
• Nobles J. Parental migration and child health in Mexico; Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Population Association of America.2007. [ Google Scholar ]
• O'Connor T, Loomis D, Runyan C, Abboud dal Santo J, Schulman M. Adequacy of health and safety training among young Latino construction workers. J Occup Environ Med. 2005; 47 (3):272–277. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Okechukwu CA, Souza K, Davis KD, de Castro AB. Discrimination, harassment, abuse, and bullying in the workplace: contribution of workplace injustice to occupational health disparities. Am J Ind Med. 2014; 57 (5):573–586. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Orrenius PM, Zavodny M. Do immigrants work in riskier jobs? Demography. 2009; 46 (3):535–551. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Ortman JM, Guarneri CE. United States population projections: 2000 to 2050. U.S. Census Bureau; Washington, DC: 2009. [ Google Scholar ]
• Passel JS, Cohn D. A portrait of unauthorized immigrants in the United States. Pew Hispanic Center; Washington, DC: 2009. [ Google Scholar ]
• Pechter E, Azaroff LS, Lopez I, Goldstein-Gelb M. Reducing hazardous cleaning product use: a collaborative effort. Public Health Rep. 2009; 124 (Suppl 1):45–52. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Pew Hispanic Center Mexican Immigrants in the United States, 2008. Fact Sheet. [Retrieved October 13, 2014]. 2009.
• Pichardo-Geisinger R, Mora DC, Newman JC, Arcury TA, Feldman SR, Quandt SA. Comorbidity of tinea pedis and onychomycosis and evaluation of risk factors in Latino immigrant poultry processing and other manual laborers. South Med J. 2014; 107 (6):374–379. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Pichardo-Geisinger R, Munoz-Ali D, Arcury TA, Blocker JN, Grzywacz JG, Mora DC, et al. Dermatologist-diagnosed skin diseases among immigrant Latino poultry processors and other manual workers in North Carolina, USA. Int J Dermatol. 2013; 52 (11):1342–1348. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Pransky G, Moshenberg D, Benjamin K, Portillo S, Thackrey JL, Hill-Fotouhi C. Occupational risks and injuries in non-agricultural immigrant Latino workers. Am J Ind Med. 2002; 42 (2):117–123. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Quandt SA, Jones BT, Talton JW, Whalley LE, Galvan L, Vallejos QM, et al. Heavy metals exposures among Mexican farmworkers in eastern North Carolina. Environ Res. 2010; 110 (1):83–88. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Quandt SA, Newman JC, Pichardo-Geisinger R, Mora DC, Chen H, Feldman SR, et al. Self-reported skin symptoms and skin-related quality of life among Latino immigrant poultry processing and other manual workers. Am J Ind Med. 2014; 57 (5):605–614. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Rogers AT. Exploring health beliefs and care-seeking behaviors of older USA-dwelling Mexicans and Mexican-Americans. Ethn Health. 2010; 15 (6):581–599. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Rogler LH. International migrations. A framework for directing research. Am Psychol. 1994; 49 (8):701–708. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Ryo E. Deciding to Cross: Norms and Economics of Unauthorized Migration. American Sociological Review. 2013; 78 (4):574–603. [ Google Scholar ]
• Sakala C. Migrant and seasonal farmworkers in the United States: a review of health hazards, status, and policy. Int Migr Rev. 1987; 21 (3):659–687. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Salgado de Snyder N, Gonzalez-Vazquez T, Infante-Xibille C, Marquez-Serrano M, Pelcastre-Villafuerte B, Servan-Mori EE. Servicios de salud en la Mixteca: utilizacion y condicion de afiliacion en hogares de migrantes y no-migrantes a EU. Salud Pública de México. 2010; 52 (5):424–431. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Sandhu DS, Asrabadi BR. Development of an Acculturative Stress Scale for International Students: preliminary findings. Psychol Rep. 1994; 75 (1 Pt 2):435–448. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Schneiderman N, Llabre M, Cowie CC, Barnhart J, Carnethon M, Gallo LC, et al. Prevalence of diabetes among Hispanics/Latinos from diverse backgrounds: the Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos (HCHS/SOL) Diabetes Care. 2014; 37 (8):2233–2239. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Seicean S, Neuhauser D, Strohl K, Redline S. An exploration of differences in sleep characteristics between Mexico-born US immigrants and other Americans to address the Hispanic Paradox. Sleep. 2011; 34 (8):1021–1031. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Shipp EM, Cooper SP, del Junco DJ, Cooper CJ, Whitworth RE. Acute occupational injury among adolescent farmworkers from South Texas. Inj Prev. 2013; 19 (4):264–270. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Silveira ER, Ebrahim S. Social determinants of psychiatric morbidity and well-being in immigrant elders and whites in east London. Int J Geriatr Psychiatry. 1998; 13 (11):801–812. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Singh GK, Siahpush M. Ethnic-immigrant differentials in health behaviors, morbidity, and cause-specific mortality in the United States: an analysis of two national data bases. Hum Biol. 2002; 74 (1):83–109. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Sirin SR, Ryce P, Gupta T, Rogers-Sirin L. The role of acculturative stress on mental health symptoms for immigrant adolescents: a longitudinal investigation. Dev Psychol. 2013; 49 (4):736–748. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Smith-Nonini S. Back to “The Jungle:” Processing migrants in North Carolina meatpacking plants. Anthropology of Work Review. 2003; 24 (3-4):14–20. [ Google Scholar ]
• Suarez-Orozco C, Suarez-Orozco MM. Children of immigration. Harvard University Press; Cambridge: 2001. [ Google Scholar ]
• Vega WA, Sribney WM, Aguilar-Gaxiola S, Kolody B. 12-month prevalence of DSM-III-R psychiatric disorders among Mexican Americans: nativity, social assimilation, and age determinants. J Nerv Ment Dis. 2004; 192 (8):532–541. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Walter N, Bourgois P, Margarita Loinaz H, Schillinger D. Social context of work injury among undocumented day laborers in San Francisco. J Gen Intern Med. 2002; 17 (3):221–229. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
• Wei M, Heppner PP, Mallen MJ, Ku T-Y, Liao KY-H, Wu T-F. Acculturative stress, perfectionism, years in the United States, and depression among Chinese international students. Journal of Counseling Psychology. 2007; 54 (4):385–394. [ Google Scholar ]
• World Health Organization [Retrieved October 13, 2014]; Social Determinants of Health. 2014 from http://www.who.int/social_determinants/en/

Theory and evidence on the impact of refugees on host communities

Paolo verme.

Imagine a scenario where a country is suddenly faced with a massive influx of refugees from a neighboring country. The host country accommodates some of these refugees in camps built on sparsely populated land, while others are settled on the periphery of urban areas, a common scenario for refugees. According to economic theory, what should we expect to happen in this situation? Additionally, does the existing evidence support the theoretical expectations? In this blog, we will explore these questions by looking at the economic and distributional effects of a refugee crisis.

From an economic perspective, we should expect the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and household incomes of the host country to grow because of a refugee inflow.  In the short-term, inhabited areas that are suddenly populated with refugees, such as refugee camps, experience GDP growth because the refugees receive aid and consume goods and services in a place that previously had no income or consumption. In already-populated areas, like urban areas, GDP will also grow as income and consumption grow with the arrival of the new population. This is simply a statistical outcome resulting from the fact that there are more people (refugees and aid workers) and more money (international aid and government spending) in a particular geographical area. 

In the medium-term, we should also see local household incomes grow. With the population increase and the aid and government spending, local consumption will rise, leading to a boost in local production and sales of goods and services. The presence of refugees in the labor market could potentially reduce labor costs for employers, particularly if they work informally. As a result, local landlords, entrepreneurs, producers, and suppliers of goods and services are likely to experience a surge in income, which can lead to an expansion of their businesses and an overall growth in household income. In economic terms, these are referred to as “expansionary effects” of the economy.   

We should also expect these positive effects to be accompanied by negative externalities and distributional effects that will negatively affect the most vulnerable groups among the hosts. In the short-term, areas that suddenly become home to refugees may experience resource strain and environmental degradation, which can derail local development. In urban areas, the influx of refugees may lead to water and electricity shortages, causing higher costs for both the refugees and the host community, overcrowding of services such as health and education, increased traffic and pollution, and competition for jobs and housing. These factors can result in unemployment, a surge in inflation, create tension, and increase social and economic disparities. 

In the medium-term, the negative distributional effects may become evident. While some locals may experience economic gains, others may be displaced or lose their jobs due to increased competition.   These negative impacts are likely to affect the most vulnerable members of the community, including women, youth, low-skilled and informal workers, and those living in degraded and marginal areas. 

Does the emerging evidence from the economic literature support these theoretical expectations? 

Recent research examining the economic impact of refugees on host communities, largely aligns with theoretical expectations. A comprehensive review and meta-analysis of the existing literature on the impact of refugees on host communities, which I co-authored with Kirsten Schuettler, reveals that the overall effect on household well-being in host communities is predominantly positive with very few studies finding a negative effect on household well-being.   

The review also finds that most studies report no visible effects of forced displacement on either employment or wages of hosts.  However, the studies that identify a significant and negative effect show that employment and wages are more likely to decline for certain groups, particularly females, youth, unskilled workers, informal workers, and lower-educated individuals. The most vulnerable workers are those who are most negatively affected by a refugee crisis. 

In summary, both economic theory and empirical evidence suggest that a refugee crisis can have both positive and negative impacts on host communities.  While certain groups, such as landlords, entrepreneurs, and suppliers of goods and services may experience income growth, vulnerable workers like women, youth, low-skilled and informal workers may face negative effects on their employment and wages.

Ultimately, humanitarian and development organizations must prioritize protecting and assisting vulnerable groups and supporting host governments in managing a sustainable path of economic development. Based on the review paper, the most significant impacts on host communities happen in the short-term and are mostly confined to areas that receive refugees. Therefore, it is crucial for the international community to take prompt and localized actions and focus on the most vulnerable to prevent short-term humanitarian crises from turning into long-term developmental challenges.  

• Fragility Conflict and Violence

Lead Economist, Manager of the Research program on Forced Displacement and Head of Research and Impact Evaluations in the Fragility, Conflict and Violence group of the World Bank.

Join the Conversation

• Share on mail
• comments added