From routes to roots:The determinants and consequences of internal return migration

• Main Author: Awi, Eric N.
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2019
• Subjects: Migration, Internal; Return migration; Internal migrants; Development Studies
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_doctoral/1389; https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2407&context=etd_doctoral
• Institution: De La Salle University

While reasons for out-migration are relatively well understood, little is known about why individuals return to their places of origin. This study argues that the determinants and consequences of the return of the internal migrants depend on their relative successes and failures in the destination area. I anchored this study on the migration theories that aptly expound the success and failure of the returnees (i.e. New Economics of Labor Migration (NELM) and neoclassical economics). The theories were employed to develop different discussions about internal return migration. They discussed the success and failure of the migrants in the destination area to help us understand the antecedents and possible consequences of migrants' return. The success and failure of the returnees in most imigration studies are mostly viewed through economic perspectives. However, this study discusses not only from an economic perspective but also from a social standpoint to examine the return migration pattern of the returnees, especially when their social relationships play essential roles in their decisions to return. This study investigates why internal migrants return to their home communities. Subsequently, this study explores the determinants and consequences of internal migrants' return and how social and economic factors contribute to the return of the returnees. Also, this study explores the perceptions of non-migrants towards the return of the internal migrants, and how internal return migration contributes to development. This study shows that personal, familial, and economic factors are what transpired as determinants of the returnees. These factors are also being associated with the consequences of their return. The determinants of the return under personal factors are comprised of: (1) nostalgia and stressors which includes environmental stressors and regionalist discrimination: (2) pursuit of professional growth in the province for returnees believe that their career can be improved in their home region: (3) personal displacement wherein it was the returniees' and their family's choice to return due to their failed migration experiences in the destination area. As for consequences, their return became an advantage for their career (i.e. entrepreneurial activities, investments) and social relationships. In social and economic viewpoints, the narratives of the internal return migrants explicated the success-failure dichotomy. Migrants only appear as striving to gain work experience based on international return migration literature. Thus, this internal return migration study bridges that gap by showing that those internal return migrants can also bring positive socioeconomic contributions to their home community.