Historians and geographers have studied migration and have shown that people have moved between countries and continents for thousands of years2. Migration appears to be a significant feature of human behaviour in the past.
Migration continues today and there are many people who move to new countries or new places within their own country. The United Nations has published statistics recently on patterns of migration. (United Nations, 2013) These statistics are now summarised.
More people are living abroad today than at any other time in the past. In 2013, 232 million people, or 3.2 per cent of the world’s population, were international migrants, compared with 175 million in 2000 and 154 million in 1990.
Asians and Latin Americans living outside of their countries are now the biggest groups. In 2013, Asians represented the largest group, accounting for about 19 million migrants living in Europe, some 16 million in Northern America and about 3 million in Oceania. Migrants born in Latin America and the Caribbean represented the second largest group with the majority, 26 million, living in Northern America.
In 2013, South Asians were the largest group of international migrants. Of the 36 million international migrants from South Asia, 13.5 million resided in the oil-producing countries in Western Asia. International migrants originating from Central America, including Mexico, represented another large group of migrants. About 16.3 million, out of 17.4 million Central American migrants lived in the US.
Europe and Asia together host nearly two-thirds of all international migrants worldwide. Europe remains the most popular destination with 72 million international migrants in 2013, compared to 71 million in Asia. Since 1990, Northern America recorded the largest gain in the absolute number of international migrants, adding 25 million, and experienced the fastest growth in migrants by 2.8 per cent per year.
Compared to other destination regions, Asia saw the largest increase of international migrants since 2000, adding some 20 million migrants in 13 years. Mr. Wilmoth said, ‘this growth was mainly fuelled by the increasing demand for foreign labour in the oil-producing countries of Western Asia and in South-Eastern Asian countries with rapidly growing economies, such as Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand.’ (United Nations, 2013)
In 2013, nearly half of all international migrants lived in 10 countries, as shown in the table below.
Table 1 – Top Ten Countries for Migrants
| Country | Number of Migrants Living In The Country |
| US | 45,800,00 |
| Russia | 11,000,000 |
| Germany | 9,800,000 |
| Saudi Arabia | 9,100,000 |
| United Arab Emirates | 7,800,000 |
| United Kingdom | 7,800,000 |
| France | 7,400,000 |
| Canada | 7,300,000 |
| Australia | 6,500,000 |
| Spain | 6,500,000 |
Most international migrants are of working age between 20 to 64 years old; about 75% of the total migrant population. This is significantly higher than for the general population, where the proportion of people in the working age range stands at 5%.
Since most migrants are of working age, young migrants, those under age 20, are fewer than all international migrants. In addition, children born to foreign-born parents are not counted as international migrants in many countries. As a consequence, children are only 15 per cent of the global migrant population, compared to 35 per cent for the total population. However these statistics may be inaccurate.
Older migrants, those above age 65, are about 11 per cent of all migrants in the world. Many older migrants have been living in their countries of destination for decades. In developed countries, the number of older migrants has increased from 11 million in 1990 to 18 million in 2013.
Roughly half of all international migrants are women but there are considerable differences across regions. Whereas 52 per cent of all migrants in the North are women, they account for only 43 per cent in the South. Historic destinations of international migrants, such as Europe and the Americas, generally have higher proportions of women. Male migrants, however, significantly outnumber female migrants in Asia and Africa, where migration is often of shorter duration, and where the living and working conditions favour men over women. For example working in the mining, oil and construction industries.
Refugees are only a small proportion of the global migrant population, numbering 15.7 million or around seven per cent of all international migrants in 2013. Nearly nine of every ten refugees in the world live in developing regions. Asia hosts the largest number of refugees (10.4 million) followed by Africa (2.9 million) and Europe (1.5 million).
These interesting statistics from the United Nations show that migration still happens and is growing. They also suggest that many people migrate for economic reasons – to get a better job and raise their income. Some are refugees.
When people move they often go to live in other countries or cities because that is where they can find work. So this research looked at the experience of people migrating. Background research into the reasons for migration also suggested that there were different types of reasons for moving – push and pull factors. (Loiselle, 2013) This guided the construction of the interview checklist in the research.
However these statistics do not tell us the whole story about why people migrate. They only give some patterns and trends. To find out about the reasons and the experience of migration for people in more detail it is better to get qualitative data and find out what they think. This is therefore the purpose of the research.
Aims
Statistics and headlines in the media might give some background to the issue of migration but they do not really explain the causes of migration fully from the point of view of the people choosing to move. From my own experience and work in school I was interested in the issue of migration and knew that the reasons for migration could be quite complex. The aim of the research was therefore to find out why people migrate from their perspective.
In this research the main research questions were:
· What are the main reasons for migration?
· Why do people move to cities?
Method
There were two main methods of research in this study. Firstly some background research into secondary sources about migration in general and secondly some primary research amongst the local immigrant community using unstructured interviews.
The background research was designed to get information about the patterns and trends in migration to develop understanding of migration in general and to check that my view that migration was increasing was accurate, as suggested by personal experience and witnessed in my own city. The background research was done on the internet mainly because this was practically much easier than using libraries – access at school and from home was much better and there was more information available.
Finding out about the experience of people and the meaning they give to their actions and lives is usually better through methods which get people to ‘talk for themselves’. The research can get information about their reasons first hand and in depth. They can tell their own story in their own words. This helps the researcher to really see things from their perspective – to ‘stand in their shoes’. The method which was used was therefore unstructured interviews.
The interviews were with six people of different ages and genders, and from different families and occupations. This was to try to make the sample representative. The interviews took place in their homes in a relaxed environment because they were all friends of my family. My parents provided suggestions for people to interview and contacted them to get permission before the interviews were organised. This made the research ethical and safe.
The participants were told that the interview was confidential and that the results would be recorded using a tape recorder. All gave permission for this type of recording.
The unstructured interview was guided by the following checklist of topics to cover but left open so that experience, reasons and motivations for migration could be explored fully.
Table 2 – Unstructured Interview Checklist
| Area of Discussion | Possible Topics |
| Previous Way of Life | Job; Housing; Family; Local Community and Neighbourhood; Leisure; Other |
| Reasons for Moving – push factors | Unemployment; Local Natural Disaster; Conflict; Poor Environment; Poverty; Other |
| Reasons for moving – pull factors | Better Job Opportunities; Better Working Conditions; To Be Closer To Family; Cultural Opportunities; Other |
| Other reasons for moving | Probe and Ask |
| Experience of migration - positive | Guided by participant (work; education; housing; family; culture; religion; community relations) |
| Experience of migration in practice - negative | Guided by participant (work; education; housing; family; culture; religion; community relations) |
| Other | Probe and Ask |
The research was also going to find participants from different countries over the internet using an internet community of people from Asia. However permission to contact people this way was not received from the leader of the organisation hosting the community. This was due to concerns about confidentiality and a history of discrimination and prejudice against immigrants that some had experienced. The people felt vulnerable so did not want to take part. Participant observation within my own wider community was also considered but rejected as it was likely to take too much time and the information gathered may have been biased by my own relationships with the group.
The results from the research are described below.
