Author :
Abstract
Keywords
Abstract
This paper offers a conceptual review of migration theories and empirical testing of the neoclassical theory of migration in the context of the EU East-West flows. In addition to outlining weaknesses of the dominant approaches, it synthesizes current suggestions on how to advance migration theorizing. The paper empirically tests the neoclassical paradigm, used widely in the pre-enlargement research, on the actual data of after-accession labor mobility from the EU8 countries to the UK and Ireland. It shows that the neoclassical theory struggles to account for significantly different rates of outmigration from CEE countries which share relatively similar living standards and wage differentials relative to Western Europe. The paper concludes with outlining suggestions for new analytical approach to studying migration processes, which needs to incorporate country-specific institutional and structural variables, give greater emphasis to sending countries and analyze migration as part of broader global processes and socio-economic changes. Such approach speaks directly to recent works concerned with migration theorizing which also call to study migration as related to and part of social change.
