Hein de Haas | |
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![]() Hein de Haas, 2023 | |
Born | 1969 |
Academic work | |
Discipline | Sociology, geography |
Notable works | How Migration Really Works |
Hein de Haas (born 1969) is a Dutch sociologist and geographer who has lived and worked in the Netherlands, Morocco and the United Kingdom. [1] He is currently Professor of Sociology at the University of Amsterdam (UvA). [2] His research is focusing on the relationship between migration and social transformation and development in origin and destination countries. [3] He is a founding member and co-director of the International Migration Institute (IMI) at Oxford University, and directs IMI nowadays from its current base at UvA. He is also Professor of Migration and Development at the University of Maastricht. With an h-index of more than 60, de Haas is an internationally renowned expert. [4] In his field of migration, he is among the top five most cited scholars internationally. [5]
De Haas is lead author of The Age of Migration: International Population Movements in the Modern World, a leading text book in the field of migration studies. [6] His 2023 book How Migration Really Works: A Factful Guide to the Most Divisive Issue in Politics has been translated in German, Dutch, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Greek and Korean. He maintains a blog on migration-related topics. [7]
Hein de Haas has argued that "much conventional thinking about migration is based on myths rather than facts". [8] He has argued that, contrary to conventional views, economic development in poor countries lead to more instead of less migration. He also argued that - in the face of "systematic demand for labor migration or conflict in origin countries" - "to a certain extent, migration is inevitable". Hein de Haas has argued that there has been an incompatibility between economic liberalization and labour market deregulation on one hand and political calls for less migration on the other. [9]
Hein de Haas studied at the University of Amsterdam, where he obtained an undergraduate degree in anthropology in 1989 and a M.A. degree in environmental geography in 1995, and at the Catholic University of Nijmegen, where he acquired a Ph.D. in social sciences in 2003. From 1998 to 2005, De Haas worked as a postdoctoral researcher and lecturer in Nijmegen and Amsterdam, including a position as visiting scholar at the American University in Cairo. In 2006, De Haas became a founding member and – from 2011 to 2016 – a co-director of the International Migration Institute at Oxford University. Since 2015, De Haas has been a Professor of Sociology at the University of Amsterdam, in addition to a position as Extraordinary Professor of Migration and Development at the University of Maastricht/United Nations University. [10] In terms of editorial duties, he e.g. sits on the editorial board of Migration Studies . [11]
Hein de Haas' research covers a broad range of issues related to migration and development, including the determinants of migration, migration policies, and the linkages between migration and development, transnationalism and rural-urban transformations, with particular emphasis on the Middle East and Africa.
In his research, Hein de Haas repeatedly emphasized the key role of Europe's demand for cheap migrant labour in informal sectors as a main determinant for migration from Africa to Europe and characterized migration as "inevitable". [12] More recently, De Haas has drawn attention to the importance of migration processes' internal dynamics in general and the indirect feedback dynamics affect both countries of origin and destination. [13]
Hein de Haas conceptualizes the effects of migration policies as a set of stated policy objectives and corresponding laws, regulations and measures whose implementation affects the direction, volume, composition and timing of migration. The effectiveness of these policies is mitigated by gaps regarding their implementation and efficacy, with a further discursive gap persisting between the public policy discourse on migration and the policies that are actually set. Within that framework, the effect of restrictive immigration policies is reduced by (i) migrants' diversion to less restrictive countries, (ii) migrants' diversion to less restricted channels of immigration (e.g. family reunion), (iii) "now or never" migration based on expectations on upcoming restrictions, and (iv) decreases in return migration flows due to restrictions on circular migration. [14] In particular, Haas and Mathias Czaika have questioned the effectiveness of immigration policies in e.g. reducing the number of immigrants, arguing that their effects are often dwarfed and overcompensated by non-migration policies, and may have unintended effects; [15] for instance, the restriction of immigration through travel visa policies not only significantly decreases immigration but also return migration of existing immigrants. [16]
De Haas' research has emphasized the positive role that migrants' remittances can play in communities' development, e.g. in southern Morocco, [17] as well as in financing social development. [18] At the same time, De Haas has also criticized bad investment environments and especially restrictions on circular migration for keeping remittances' potential from being fully realized and warned against celebrations of migration as "self-help development 'from below'", as this perspective draws away attention from the structural constraints faced by many developing countries and their governments' responsibility to address them. [19] [20] [21] Instead, De Haas has argued for politics' engagement of diasporas with regard to supporting the development of their countries of origin. [22] Based on the example of Morocco, De Haas has also studied the transition of migration patterns, their adaptation to and circumvention of immigration restrictions, and the scenario for countries to become simultaneously a source and a destination of migration. [23] [24]
With regard to the link between migration and development, De Haas has criticized the popular ideas that the socioeconomic development of low-income countries will decrease migration, arguing instead that - at least in the short and medium term - improvements in income, education and infrastructure tends to increase people's ability and desire to emigrate. [25] De Haas has also been critical of the idea that migration is accelerating, pointing instead - in work with Czaika - to changes in the nature and direction of migration, with most emigration in the early 21st century originating from non-European countries and being directed at a shrinking number of destination countries, thereby reflecting globalization patterns. [26]
In recent research on immigrants' return migration intentions, De Haas and Tineke Fokkema find that these intentions decrease in their sociocultural integration, whereas economic integration and transnational ties have more ambiguous and sometimes positive effects. [27]
Human capital flight is the emigration or immigration of individuals who have received advanced training in their home country. The net benefits of human capital flight for the receiving country are sometimes referred to as a "brain gain" whereas the net costs for the sending country are sometimes referred to as a "brain drain". In occupations with a surplus of graduates, immigration of foreign-trained professionals can aggravate the underemployment of domestic graduates, whereas emigration from an area with a surplus of trained people leads to better opportunities for those remaining. But emigration may cause problems for the home country if the trained people are in short supply there.
Human migration is the movement of people from one place to another, with intentions of settling, permanently or temporarily, at a new location. The movement often occurs over long distances and from one country to another, but internal migration is the dominant form of human migration globally.
Free migration or open immigration is the position that people should be able to migrate to whatever country they choose with few restrictions.
A remittance is a non-commercial transfer of money by a foreign worker, a member of a diaspora community, or a citizen with familial ties abroad, for household income in their home country or homeland.
Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not usual residents or where they do not possess nationality in order to settle as permanent residents. Commuters, tourists, and other short-term stays in a destination country do not fall under the definition of immigration or migration; seasonal labour immigration is sometimes included, however.
African immigrants in Europe are individuals residing in Europe who were born in Africa. This includes both individuals born in North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa.
Opposition to immigration, also known as anti-immigration, is a political position that seeks to restrict immigration. In the modern sense, immigration refers to the entry of people from one state or territory into another state or territory in which they are not citizens. Illegal immigration occurs when people immigrate to a country without having official permission to do so. Opposition to immigration ranges from calls for various immigration reforms, to proposals to completely restrict immigration, to calls for repatriation of existing immigrants.
Codevelopment is a trend of thought and a development strategy in development studies which considers migrants to be a developing factor for their countries of origin.
Circular migration or repeat migration is the temporary and usually repetitive movement of a migrant worker between home and host areas, typically for the purpose of employment. It represents an established pattern of population mobility, whether cross-country or rural-urban. There are several benefits associated with this migration pattern, including gains in financial capital, human capital, and social capital. There are also costs associated with circular migration, such as brain drain, poor working conditions, forced labor, and the inability to transfer acquired skills to home economies. Socially, there are strong connections to gender, health outcomes, development, poverty, and global immigration policy.
An open border is a border that enables free movement of people between jurisdictions with no restrictions on movement and is lacking substantive border control. A border may be an open border due to intentional legislation allowing free movement of people across the border, or a border may be an open border due to a lack of legal controls, a lack of adequate enforcement or adequate supervision of the border. An example of the former is the Schengen Agreement between most members of the European Economic Area. An example of the latter has been the border between Bangladesh and India, which is becoming controlled. The term "open borders" applies only to the flow of people, not the flow of goods and services, and only to borders between political jurisdictions, not to mere boundaries of privately owned property.
During the period of 1965 – 2021, an estimated 440,000 people per year emigrated from Africa; a total number of 17 million migrants within Africa was estimated for 2005. The figure of 0.44 million African emigrants per year pales in comparison to the annual population growth of about 2.6%, indicating that only about 2% of Africa's population growth is compensated for by emigration.
Michael Andrew Clemens is an American economist who studies international migration and global economic development.
Women migrant workers from developing countries engage in paid employment in countries where they are not citizens. While women have traditionally been considered companions to their husbands in the migratory process, most adult migrant women today are employed in their own right. In 2017, of the 168 million migrant workers, over 68 million were women. The increase in proportion of women migrant workers since the early twentieth century is often referred to as the "feminization of migration".
The International Migration Institute (IMI) is an international network that promotes research on international migration. It is based at the University of Amsterdam and is part of the Amsterdam Institute for Social Science Research (AISSR). It was established as a research institute at Oxford University in the United Kingdom where it was affiliated with the Oxford Department of International Development.
Giovanni Peri is an Italian-born American economist who is Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at the University of California, Davis, where he directs the Global Migration Center. He is also a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and the co-editor of the peer-reviewed Journal of the European Economic Association. He is known for his research on the economic impact of immigration to the United States. He has also researched the economic determinants of international migrations and the Economic impact of immigration in several European Countries. He has challenged and broadened the work of George Borjas, which has argued that immigration has negative economic effects on low educated US workers.
Christian Dustmann, FBA, is a German economist who currently serves as Professor of Economics at the Department of Economics of University College London. There, he also works as Director of the Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration (CReAM), which he helped found. Dustmann belongs to the world's foremost labour economists and migration scholars.
Frédéric Docquier is a Belgian economist and Professor of Economics at the Catholic University of Louvain (UCLouvain). He ranks as one of the leading economists in the field of international migration, with a focus on brain drain and skilled migration.
Ruud Koopmans is a Dutch sociologist and professor at the Humboldt University of Berlin. His research focuses on migration, social integration and transnationalization.
Catalina Amuedo-Dorantes is a Spanish economist, a Professor in the Economics and Business Management faculty at the University of California, Merced and a Professor and Department Chair at San Diego State University. Since 2015, she has been the Western Representative for a standing committee called the Committee for the Status of Women in the Economics Profession (CSWEP). Her field of work focuses on the fundamentals of labour economics and international migration, particularly the nature of immigration policies and its impact on migrant's assimilation into the community at a state and local level. Amuedo-Dorantes has published multiple articles in refereed journals including Journal of Public Economics, Journal of Population Economics, International Migration, and Journal of Development Economics.
Almost half of international migrants are women, generally travelling as either migrant workers or refugees. Women migrant workers migrate from developing countries to high-income countries to engage in paid employment, typically in gendered professions such as domestic work. Because their work disproportionately takes place in private homes, they are vulnerable to exploitation and abuse. Wages earned are largely sent home to the originating country to support the cost of living of the family left behind.