International Migration: economy, climate, conflict

Course goals

The aim of the course is to explain and examine the processes underlying contemporary international migration from a theory-guided and comparative approach. Having completed the course, students should be familiar with the key questions and theories related to the research field of international migration, be able to critically evaluate theories, research strategies and findings on international migration, and they should be able to generate new research questions and derive testable predictions at macro, micro, and meso levels of explanation.

These goals will be tested by means of four assignments in which students will (1) describe (changing) migration patterns to 2 countries, (2) apply theoretical insights to these patterns, (3) apply theoretical explanations on immigration control to a case study in a debate, and (4) use main theoretical insights on migration in a small scale qualitative study. Furthermore, students will give a presentation on a specific topic in which they have to present and evaluate critically an existing empirical study, present additional information on this topic and stimulate group discussion.

Relation between tests and learning goals

Tests include four assignments, a presentation, and a class participation. Assignment 1 (migration patterns in two countries) tests the ability to find official data on migration, present these data in clear tables, and draw conclusions about similarities and differences between the patterns in the chosen countries. This assignment also tests the ability to explain migration patterns using the theories covered in the course. In particular, this assignment is related to the learning goal of formulating relevant hypotheses and deriving them from theory. Assignment 2 (migration control) tests the ability to research, identify and critically analyse immigration control policy from a country of choice and to defend this policy standpoint in a class debate. This assignment requires students to develop an informed perspective on current immigration policy debates in Europe. Assignment 3 is a research paper that students write based on three qualitative interviews. In doing so, they apply the gathered knowledge to a new problem within the field of international migration. This is related to the goal of generating new research questions. Students also learn to conduct semi-structured interviews and interpret the findings in light of the theories covered in the course.

The presentation equips the students with the skill to extract the main take home message from an academic article, communicate it clearly to others, and generate a lively discussion on the topic. Finally, students get graded for class participation, which includes formulating discussion questions and participating in class discussions. Discussion questions help reach the goal of obtaining an overview of the main concepts, theories and findings in the field of migration while critically engaging with the literature.

Content

The course deals with the main trends, theories and findings of international migration. Examples of questions that will be discussed in the course are: What is international migration? Which types and trends of migration are present in Western countries? What causes migration, and which factors cause its continuation or change? Which factors affect the various immigration control policies? What are the determinants of attitudes towards immigration policies? What are the main reasons of return migration? Throughout the course, theoretical approaches and empirical studies from different disciplinary traditions are discussed (sociology, economics, demography, psychology), explaining migration at micro-, meso-, and macro-levels of analysis. The emphasis of the course is on theory-driven, comparative research examples, strategies, and findings. In addition, current controversies in the field of migration studies will be discussed.