Post-Communist Cross-Border Migration in South-Eastern Albania: Who Leaves? Who Stays Behind?

Abstract

The opening-up of Albania to the outside world in the early 1990s brought about changes that have had a dramatic effect on society. Emigration has been a major consequence of the fall of communism. An estimated 600,000 or so Albanians are believed to have left the country, many of them permanently. Useful as such a piece of information is, it falls short of the data required to understand the motivations and micro-level consequences of cross-border migration, whether temporary or of a more permanent nature. Why do Albanians leave? Who leaves—and who stays behind? Are there any identifiable trends in the propensity to move, type of movement or the reason why people leave? Several studies have addressed issues such as these, but few (if any) have had the privilege of using survey data that are based on a statistically sound sampling frame. This paper, which is based on a survey conducted in the Korçë district in south-eastern Albania in late 2002 with regional planning ends in mind, adopts the perspective of the sending country and sets out to profile the emigrant from this particular part of the country. Covering 1,315 urban and rural households, a major feature of this survey is that it covers both migrant and non-migrant households. The data are analysed with a view to identifying the correlates of migration. As such, it also serves as a starting point for further work on other aspects of emigration.