Presentation from the Final Conference of the EURA-NET project in Brussels, 2nd December 2016.

1. EU-ASIAN MOBILITY AT THE TIME OF
MIGRATION AND REFUGEES COMPACTS
ADDRESSING THE TRANSFORMATIVE
CHARACTERISTICS OF TEMPORARY MIGRATION
Experiences from destination countries
Finland, Germany, the Netherlands
Dr. Kerstin Schmidt
Bielefeld University, Germany
kerstin.schmidt1@uni-bielefeld.de

2. Outline
• General trends in migration and related policies
• Understandings of temporary migration and
temporariness in migration policies
• Politico-legal aspects of temporary migration
• Socio-economic aspects of temporary migration
• Socio-cultural aspects of temporary migration
• Conclusion

3. Temporary migration from Asia to Europe
• political will to attract high-skilled migrants, such as
academics, managers and IT experts, many of the IT
experts are from Asia (India and China).
• companies actively promote businesses in Asia,
especially in China and India, increasing inter-company
transfers (Finland).
• internationalisation of higher education considered
desirable.

4. Temporary migration from Asia to Europe
• Increasingly important phenomenon, concrete numbers
difficult to define.
• In the Netherlands, 60 per cent of temporary labour
migrants are from Asian countries.
• In Finland, 40 per cent of international students are from
Asian countries.
• 1.3 million people, mainly from Syria, Afghanistan and
Iraq, applied for asylum in European countries in the
year 2015 (about 450,000 in Germany).

5. Migration trends and related policies
• “Humanitarian crisis”
• Need for sustainable integration (housing,
education, labour market integration, language
courses - Germany).
• Who engages in these measures and in which
ways?
• Discourses of humanitarian aspects and rights vs.
discourses about ‘human capital’ and ‘utility’ in
certain labour market segments.

6. Temporary migration
• Lack of a coherent understanding of temporary migration
in public discourses and in national legislation.
• Temporariness in relation to migration often not explicitly
considered in immigration laws, or not clearly defined.
• Migration policies implicitly geared towards
temporariness (frequent renewal of residence permits)
• Potential reasons:
• Public opinion: migrants will not stay
• Potential to offer residency to those who qualify (wages, skills)

7. Temporary migration
• In public opinion, the length of stay of migrants is
determined by legal frameworks or by the labour market
in the form of working contracts.
• Migrants base their decisions about staying or leaving on
career prospects but also on personal experiences,
including perceptions of social acceptance.
• In general, stays in European destination countries are
often only one step in the course of international careers.

8. Politico-legal aspects of temporary migration
• Issues regarding the implementation of laws and high
levels of bureaucracy.
• Institutions not sufficiently adapted to the inflow of
temporary migrants: lack of adequately trained personnel
resulting in procedures that are perceived as arbitrary by
migrants.
• Low rates of participation of temporary migrants in
politics or activism.

9. Socio-economic aspects of temporary migration
• Selective admission and integration policies geared towards
economic benefit.
• Fears of cost for society but also optimism regarding
positive outcomes in the long term (humanitarian migrants).
• Employed migrants often satisfied, higher salaries, working
conditions.
• Difficulties with access to the labour market.
• Danger of migrants‘ exploitation.

10. Socio-economic aspects of temporary migration
• Ambiguity with regard to the importance of financial
remittances:
• often families are not economically dependent on remittances,
• migrants cannot afford to remit,
• some temporary migrants also receive reverse remittances.

11. Socio-cultural aspects of temporary migration
• Different understandings of integration:
• policy-makers expect governments to provide
integration measures and migrants to make use of
them;
• migrants often refer to integration in everyday life
situations and with respect to the interaction with
locals, feelings of exclusion, which might result in
shorter stays.

12. Socio-cultural aspects of temporary migration
• Integration of temporary migrants not a policy
concern.
• High-skilled migrants exemption from integration
courses (NL) – difficulties in everyday life.
• Language skills are important.

13. Socio-cultural aspects of temporary migration
• Anti-immigrant sentiments and violence,
xenophobia and racism.
• Increase of right-wing populist parties.
• Danger for social cohesion within and between
European countries.

14. Conclusion
• Temporary migration not a clearly defined concept.
• Temporariness desired by destination societies (flexible
workers, selective procedures for admission and
potential long-term residence)
• Life in limbo not desirable for most people.
• Integration hampered by lack of language and cultural
knowledge, not considered important by governments
and migrants.

15. Conclusion
• Selectivity of admission of migrants, followed by the
selectivity of those who are offered residency (needs of
national economies).
• Transition into the labour market of international students
after graduation.
• Importance of family migration and the integration of
spouses into the labour market and of children into the
educational system.

16. Conclusion
• Perceptions of not being welcome (confusing
bureaucratic procedures, frequent renewal of residence
permits).
• Non-acceptance in society.
• Danger of polarisation of societies.
• Some migrants might leave.
• Others might face obstacles in their career and personal
development.

17. Thank you!
Dr. Kerstin Schmidt
Bielefeld University, Germany
kerstin.schmidt1@uni-bielefeld.de