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The Effects of Migration: The Children Left Behind

Document number
2150
Date
2009
Title
The Effects of Migration: The Children Left Behind
Author/publisher
Soros Foundation
Availability
View/save PDF version of this document
Document type(s)
Research/Study/Analysis,
Keywords
Irregular Migration, Feminization of migration, Economic migration, Labour migration, Free movement, Undocumented migrants; Undocumented labour; Migrant rights; Migration management; Comprehensive approach to migration; Migration policy; Restrictive migration measures,
Summary
Any discussion about the consequences of a social phenomenon ‘x' on a group, community, or another social phenomenon ‘y' must involve the answer to the question ‘what would have happened to y in the absence of x?'. In other words, it must isolate the effect of x on y from the effects of other factors that were also affecting y. In social research, scientific experimentation - as a method used to determine the relation of causality between two or more variables while keeping the other factors under control - becomes in most cases almost impossible to use, because there often exists a set of variables which cannot be kept under control and whose influence cannot be ignored. On the level of common sense, certain phenomena often receive simple explanations, which easily attribute causality between two events. In the case of migration, which is a complex multi-faceted phenomenon, produced in time and space, generalizing statements of the type "children whose parents work abroad do poorly in school" or "a 12 year old committed suicide because his mother left to work in Italy" only work as tabloid headlines, because their validity remains controversial. To be correct from the point of view of common sense, as well as from a practical point of view one must discuss the risks facing the children because their parents are working abroad.
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