April 08, 2013 | News | Interview

Forecasting Migration

In this interview, migration researcher Frans Willekens explains when forecasts about migration movements can be done and for what kind of forecasts data from statistical offices are unsuitable. Frans Willekens headed the Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute (NIDI) for many years. Since April 2013 he is heading a research group at the MPIDR.

For many years, migration has been your main research – will you continue to work on that topic at the MPIDR?
Yes, I will continue to work on migration - especially on international migration toward Europe. We want to get a better understanding of the underlying causes of migration. Several questions arise from this. To name some of them: What factors affect the decision to emigrate? What factors hinder and what factors facilitate emigration? How important are family members? What role do friends play who are already living abroad?

Are there known factors that influence migration?
Sure, there are several well-studied factors. People with a good formal education are more likely to emigrate than people without formal education. Economic factors are important as well: People need money to migrate. Those who receive financial support from their family thus are more likely to move country. Often this means that the family pools money to send one member of the family to Europe or America. Another example: If a person knows someone who has already emigrated, chances are higher that he or she will emigrate as well . And possibly migrate to the same country. We call this the “feed-back” effect.

Recently, newspapers have often reported about Eastern Europeans who are moving in great numbers to the major German cities. Is it possible to predict how many are still to come?
When a migration flow such as this one has already started, you can make predictions on the basis of trends revealed by data from statistical offices. But these data only allow for short-term forecasts  – a year, for example. The situation may change and, as a result, the level, direction and composition of migration may change as well.

In this particular case, it is probably more helpful to have a look at past experiences. We know from history that enlargement of the European Union temporarily always resulted in migration each time a new country joined the EU. But the dreaded huge out-migration flows have not materialized. People generally return to their country when the economic situation there has improved. The key driver of migration is the geographical distribution of opportunities to improve your life and that of your children.

The data from statistical offices are not suitable for long-term migration forecasts

Why is it not possible to  do long-term forecasts?
The reason is that these data document the outcome of migration flows – not the reasons behind them. Predictions on the basis of past behaviour are reliable when the system is stable, i.e. when conditions do not change and people respond to these conditions in the same way as people in the past. But conditions change, for instance when regulatory measures are taken to prevent migration flows, or events occur, like political changes in the country or natural disasters.

Therefore, for the current research project we r focus on the root causes of migration. We want to find out why some people desire to migrate , how these desires evolve over time and in the life course and how they add up to migration flows and migration corridors. .The aim is to make generalizations, thus we will develop models that link current and future migration flows to decisions individuals and families make in search for a better life and in response to barriers and opportunities resulting from institutional factors. This method is called  'agent-based modeling and simulation'. You could also say: We want to develop models that describe how people think and act.

Frans Willekens was professor of Population Studies at the University of Groningen and director of the Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute (NIDI) in The Hague. In early 2011 he returned to his hometown in Flanders, Belgium. In April 2013, he moved to Rostock to  build up  a research group focusing  on migration.