Migration as a Complex Phenomena of Identity and Social Integration: A Sociological View on Albanian Migration Case (original) (raw)
Related papers
The end of communism regime and the raise of democratization process helped Albanian society to be 'open border' toward all countries in the world, especially toward Western ones during 1990's. This phenoma was quite new for Albanian society. Migration involves a series of events that can be highly traumatizing of identity and problems of inegration. The process involves uprooting, being separated from traditional values, being placed in new social and cultural different situations of hosted countries. So for many migrants, social integration process is not quite easy. Resistance to their participation in society results from language problems and culturally defined behavior that often reinforce stereotypes and prejudices. This situation brought out many challenges in the social identity and integration problems of migrants life in hosted countries.In this paper it is going to be focused on the analyses of Albanian migration during post communist period. Also it will be focused on the recent Albanian migration, emigrants and their integration process in the hosted European societies. Consequently to this, it is going to be focuse on the challenges of their social identity during the integration period. Are the emigrants integrated and harmonizing with the European societies or they are just trying to shape their life according to the social, economical and cultural conditions? Or let say that, are the emigrant assimilating their own identity just to be a social actor in the European societies?
The fall of communism in Albania after 1990's, bring out opportunities of forming relations with different countries of the world. The end of communism and democratization process helps Albanian society to be open toward the different countries, especially to European ones. These connections and influences between the local and the global are quite new in Albanian history. In countries of Eastern Europe, such as Albania, made these countries to form and have economical, political and cultural relationships with other Western countires. These relationships nad new cooporation make possible Albanian society to be familiar and internationalized in the world economy, politics adn other cultural processes. One of phenomena that helped Albanian to be internationalized was migration. The acceptance of migration forms at Western and Eastern societies changed because of the emigrants flowed from Balkan countries, especially from Albania toward European countries. At the beginning and some years after 1990's the migration form was illegally. For this reason, European country applied different policies to migrations for acceptance or to cast out the emigrants. After the foundation of European Union, as all other policies the migration policies change too. In this paper will be analyses the recent forms of Albanian society internationalization in the world. Also will be analyses the recent Albanian migration and emigrant situation in Europe and their integration process in the European societies where they are living. Are the emigrants integrated and harmonizing with the European society or they are just trying to shape their life according to the social, economical and cultural conditions? Or let say that, are the emigrant assimilating their own identity just to be a social actor in the European societies? Will be providing an overview of policies of the European Integration toward migration and emigrants, to discuses and to analyses the process of Albanian society member toward 'Europeanization' and integration to the European Union societies. Also in this paper will be focused on the challenges and opportunities of Albanian internationalization and Albanian migration in the Western countries.
Education as an Important Factor on Migrants Integra-tion: Albanian Migration Case
Migration involves a series of events that can be highly inluence the identity of migrants during the process of integration. This process may involve uprooting, being separated from traditional values, being placed in new social and cultural different situations of hosted countries. So for many migrants, social integration process is not quite easy. Resistance to their participation in society results from language problems and culturally deined behavior that often reinforce stereotypes and prejudices. This situation brought out many challenges in the social identity, integration problems of migrants life in hosted countries but even during the education process or learning of language. This paper will focused on the analyzing of Albanian migration after post-communist society. Also will be debate on the education and language learning as an important element on the integration of migrants.
Migration as a challenge for Albanian Post communist society
Migration is a global phenomenon caused not only by economic factor but many others like social, political, cultural, environmental, health, education etc. It generally takes place from the area of less economic opportunities and retarded social development towards developed and fast developing areas. But in Albania this phenomena was quite different from the other society. By the end of stricter communism regime and the raise of democratization process in Albania, brought out huge challenges for Albanian society. One of these challenges was the movement of people as the cause of internal and international migration phenomena. The 'open border' toward all countries in the world, especially toward Western ones during 1990's was a quite new phenomena for Albanian society, that cause drastic, rapid, inevitable and unplanned changes in the population. This happened as the result of many reasons. Such as the forbidden of moving outside Albania and the curiosity of 'what is around' was one of reasons to migrate. Also, forbidden of movement of people for continuing their life, within Albania were as push factor to form the internal migration. Although economical, political, education and socio-cultural beneficiaries were some of push factors for internal and international migration in Albania. The objectives of this articles are going to be focus on analyze of internal and international Albanian migration during post communist period till nowadays. During analyze of this phenomena is going to take into consideration social changes, social capital and its effect on the Albanian society challenges.
Journal of Balkan and Black Sea Studies, 2022
The emigration phenomenon is one of the most debated topics in today’s world. Europe has been faced with different waves of refugees and emigrants from different countries. One of these countries is Albania. For more than 25 years, the Albanian emigration phenomenon has been part of these debates, which have focused on the integration of Albanian emigrants in host societies. These debates have always been done by representatives of the hosting countries, and rarely by Albanian representatives. However, in recent years, several experts have been focusing on research on the Albanian emigration phenomenon from different perspectives. This article aims to analyse the level of social integration of Albanian emigrants (especially after 1990) in host societies such as Turkey. Based on the statement of this study, Albanian emigrants have a high level of integration in Turkish society. The data for this study was collected quantitatively and analysed using SPSS. The results of Albanian emigrants' social integration appear to be quite balanced, indicating a high level of emigrant integration into Turkish society .
2014
The persisting economic crisis in Europe and the policy makers need to propose quick solutions to the migration problems contributed to emphasize the concepts of circular migration and return in the last few years. The main aim of this paper is to underline the connections between these phenomena and the transformations in the relationships between migrants and their host countries, and -consequently -the changes in the way they contribute to build social processes. The work will focus on the Albanian community in Italy, which can be regarded as an interesting object of studies in consideration of his migration history and of the links between the two countries. Albanian migration changed completely in the last twenty years: from the violent media impact of the first arrivals in 90s to the so called "mimesis" as a privileged form of integration, until the actual role played by the second generation and the wide student community looking for public spaces to express their d...
ISR-Forcshungsbericht Heft 50. Herausgegeben vom Institut für Stadt- und Regionalforschung.ERLAG DER ÖSTERREICHISCHEN AKADEMIE DER WISSENSCHAFTEN WIEN 2019, 2019
With the issue of integration reflecting the persistence of the connection between migrant integration and the nation state, conversely, the notion of transnationalism seems to transcend the earlier static assumptions in integration research, aiming at shedding light on the bonds and practices developed between individual, collective, and govern-mental actors located in two or more countries. In fact, the transnational mobility of immigrants is clearly placed in the framework of the integration discourse, where national integration policies as well as citizenship regimes are considered as systemic opportunity structures that may encourage, discourage, or shape the degrees and types of immigrants’ economic, political and social-cultural involvement in transnational activities. In the context of redefining the concept of integration as a three-way process (country of destination, country of origin and migrant him/herself), the notions of integration and transnationalism have gained a prominent role in understanding the multiple trajectories of migrants. Cross-border movements as well as the emerging multicultural mosaic of the urban environment now seem to be permanent features of European societies. With this problem in mind, this study seeks to identify the patterns of interaction between integration and transnationalism under specific context-bound national and local conditions and see how they shape the dynamics of migration trajectories of Albanian migrants. The aim is to investigate the interaction of processes related to integration and transnationalism and to identify the conditions under which these processes may affect each other. It do so by applying a comparative cross-national and cross-local perspective, focusing on two (receiving) countries that represent different migration and integration regimes, Greece and Austria, particularly focusing on two local metropolitan areas: Athens and Vienna. The analytical approach is based on the argument that these complex processes take place within migration systems that connect countries and regions. We adopt the migration systems approach mainly as an analytical framework for our empirical research in Greece and Austria. It functions as a typological paradigm of an EU-Western Balkans migration system that takes into account the (a) heterogeneity and multiple dynamics of migration trajectories, (b) changes (e.g., economic crisis, stagnation) occurring in a migration system, and (c) the role of migrants’ agency (vis-à-vis structure). By focusing on the diptych integration-transnationalism of Albanians through a comparative cross-national and cross-local lens, the study aspires to bring a new understanding to one of the most representative cases in the EU-Western Balkans migration system.
The collapse of communist regime in Balkan brought significant politically, economically and socio-culturally drastically changes. Albania was one of the countries touched by these changes, which engaged internationally after establishing a democratic political system. Democratization process brought out many transitions in society because it appeared as very complex process that ended with consolidation of an anomic democratic governing system. The effective implementation of the new democratic constitutions and policies required changes in the economic, social and political transformations, including also the migration flows in and out of Albania. Democratization process helped Albanian society to be 'open border' toward all countries in the world, especially toward Western ones, during 1990's. This phenomena was quite new for Albanian society. Also the lack of the established democratization process may be defined as a push factor of migration flows.
The fall of communism in Albania was followed by a massive movement of citizens towards western countries, where they settled for a better life. But after living abroad for many years, many Albanians have decided to return home. Although in many cases return was voluntary, some of the returnees want to migrate again, maybe permanently this time. Others move back and forth, spending only short periods of time abroad, when they are unemployed at home. The main aim of our research is to explore the experiences of Albanian returnees at their home country, their feelings about the decision to return, the difficulties of their reintegration in Albania, and how they perceive themselves in the Albanian society. We call it a 're-integration' because Albania is not the country that they left behind when they first migrated. It has changed the same way as other closed societies have, after they opened their borders. We also explore their first impressions and reactions when they settled in Albania, the way they perceive the Albanians who have never migrated, and whether migrating again is a possibility for the future.
Identity in the Narratives of Albanian Return Migrants from Greece
2012
Immigration is one of the most important social and economic phenomena in post-communist Albania. Following the fall of communism in 1989, hundreds of thousands of Albanians fled their country in search of a better life. Their destination was mainly Greece and Italy, because of their geographical proximity. After having lived in Greece for a considerable time period, a small but increasing number of Albanian migrants decided to return. The number is increasing rapidly during the last year, because of the Greek debt crisis. In this study we try to explore the main factors that motivated their return to Albania (we do not include the last years’ returnees. This is another project of ours for the near future). Such might be family, success or failure in their personal life, in their work, etc. Did the Albanian government provide incentives for their return or was it a decision based on their limited knowledge of Albanian reality? A second aim is to understand the difficulties of their re-socialization. Albania has changed vastly since they left and, therefore, a reintegration to the new conditions is necessary. It is a different cultural setting that favors a double identity, a new Greek identity, and an old Albanian one that needs to change in order to adapt to the new conditions.