Social and public dimensions of international migration: a comparative study of Turkey and Ukraine

Abstract

Our paper analyses the recent problems of international migration in the 21st century, as well as its biases and pitfalls, stemming from the social, public, and economic perspectives. We employ the first-hand data and the empirical findings from the representative survey questionnaire conducted in Turkey and Ukraine within the framework of the EU-funded EUMAGINE project (2010-2013) that focused on how Europe is perceived from outside the EU, and how these perceptions affect migration aspirations and decisions of potential migrants. In total, more than 8.000 respondents took part in the survey conducted in 2011-2012 which provided interesting results for our empirical analysis. We analyze the impact of demographic, structural and socio-cultural determinants on migration expectations and plans, and review the prospects for future studies on noneconomic determinants of external migration. Our results demonstrate the differences and similarities of potential migrants in both Turkey and Ukraine based on the social background, personal characteristics and other relevant factors