FEDERAL UNIVERSITY OF OYE EKITI EKITI STATE

FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY

COURSES TITLE: CURRENT ISSUES IN PSYCHOLOGY

COURSE CODE: PSY 411

NAME: IWUJI GLORIA TOCHUKWU

MATRIC NO: PSY/2019/1058

QUESTION

WRITE A TERM PAPER ON CONCEPT OF MIGRATION AND EFFECT

OF FAMILY AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT.

LECTURER IN CHARGE:

DR. OLATUNJI
Introduction

Migration is the movement of an individual from one place of residence to another. Within
demography, migration is defined as a movement that results in a long-term or permanent change
in usual place of residence. Many definitions contend that the movement must be of a substantial
distance and result in the individual residing in the destination on a somewhat permanent basis.
Because of data limitations, in operational terms, migration is typically defined as a move that
crosses a specified political boundary, such as a county, or moves into a different labor market
for the purpose of establishing a new place of residence.

Migration within a country is referred to as internal migration, and migration that crosses a
national boundary is called

Migration within a country is referred to as internal migration, and migration that crosses a
national boundary is called immigration or emigration.

Humans as a species have constantly moved, constantly migrated from place to place. But why
do they do it and what does it involve? Is it for work, for leisure or for some other reason? Are
their journeys long or short? Do they move voluntarily or are they forced to move by
circumstances beyond their control? What happens to them when they arrive at their new
destinations and how are they received by those already living there? These are just some of the
questions that we need to ask ourselves when we deal with the issue of migration. Such questions
are important as they can inform us about the many types of migrant experience that people can
have. Examining examples from the past can also help us understand events taking place today.
We can compare and contrast and assess whether there are continuing links between historical
events and what we see happening around us in our contemporary world. Migration is an ancient
process and we can find many echoes with today.

At the international level, no universally accepted definition of "migrant" exists. The term
migrant was usually understood to cover all cases where the decision to migrate was taken freely
by the individual concerned for reasons of "personal convenience" and without the intervention
of an external compelling factor; it therefore applied to people, and family members, moving to
another country or region to better their material or social conditions and improve the prospect
for themselves or their family. The United Nations defines a migrant as an individual who has
resided in a foreign country for more than one year irrespective of the causes, voluntary or
involuntary, and the means, regular or irregular, used to migrate. Under such a definition, those
travelling for shorter periods as tourists and businesspeople would not be considered migrants.
However, common usage includes certain kinds of shorter-term migrants, such as seasonal farm-
workers who travel for short periods to work planting or harvesting farm products.

A person who, "owing to a well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion,
nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinions, is outside the country
of his nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the
protection of that country" (Art. 1(A)(2), Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, Art.
1A(2), 1951 as modified by the 1967 Protocol). In addition to the refugee definition in the 1951
Refugee Convention, Art. 1(2), the 1969 Organization of African Unity (OAU) Convention
defines a refugee as any person compelled to leave his or her country "owing to external
aggression, occupation, foreign domination or events seriously disturbing public order in either
part or the whole of his country or origin or nationality." Similarly, the 1984 Cartagena
Declaration states that refugees also include people who flee their country "because their lives,
security or freedom have been threatened by generalised violence, foreign aggression, internal
conflicts, massive violations of human rights or other circumstances which have seriously
disturbed public order."

Migration theory has been at an impasse for several decades (see Arango 2000; de Haas 2010a;
Massey et al. 1993;

Massey 2019; Skeldon 2012). The field of migration studies has remained a surprisingly under-
theorised field of social inquiry. This is unfortunate, as we can only develop a richer
understanding of migration processes if we do not conceptually separate them from broader
processes of social change of which they are a constituent part. Much thinking on migration
remain implicitly or explicitly based on simplistic push-pull models or neo-classical individual
income (or

"utility') maximising assumptions, despite their manifest inability to explain real-world patterns
and processes of migration.
Although prior migration theories have been rightfully criticised for their unrealistic
assumptions, researchers have generally been better at debunking such theories than at coming
up with viable theoretical alternatives.

To overcome this impasse and to advance our understanding of migration processes as an

Applying Sen's (1999) capabilities framework to migration, this paper defines human mobility as
people's capability (freedom) to choose where to live - including the option to stay - instead of a
more or less automated, passive and

'cause-and-effect response to a set of static push and pull factors. The paper draws on Berlin's
(1969) concepts of positive and negative liberty to theorise the complex and non-linear ways in
which macro-structural change can shape migration aspirations and capabilities, as well as to
define new, theory-derived categories of human mobility and migration.

POSITIVE EFFECT OF MIGRATION ON FAMILY AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

In today's globalized world, people are constantly moving and migrating in large numbers. The
positive effects of these movements are rarely highlighted. This article will therefore shed light
to the positive impact of migration on both origin and destination countries.

Migration is an important phenomenon caused and orchestrated by powerful economic and

According to IOM, migrant is a person who moves away from his or her place of usual
residence, whether within a country or across an international border, temporarily or
permanently, and for a variety of reasons. An IOM 2022 report states that the estimated number
of international migrants is currently around 281 million, which equates to 3.6 percent of the
global population.
More than 90% of the world's migrant population left their home places voluntarily and mostly
for economic reasons ("economic migrants" who decide to leave their country of birth in search
of employment). The remaining 10% are refugees and asvlum seekers who have fled to another
country

International migration undoubtedly poses serious challenges: pressure on public services and
state resources, overcrowding, language barriers and cultural differences, increased level of
pollution, racial tensions and discrimination. However, there is an opposite side of the migration
phenomenon: the positive economic and social impact on host countries.

Immigrants boost output and employment of the host country, create new opportunities for native
workers, provide skills needed for economic growth, generate new ideas, stimulate international
trade, and contribute positively to long-term fiscal balances. Integrating migrants into the labour
market is the key to maximizing their contribution to production and development, limiting their
potential burden on public finances, and reducing their potential impact on crime rates. The
expansion of the labour force, the increase of cultural variety, the filling of skill gaps in the
labour

NEGATIVE IMPACT

• The loss of a person from rural areas, impact on the level of output and development of rural
areas.

• The influx of workers in urban areas increases competition for the job, houses, school facilities
etc.

• Having large population puts too much pressure on natural resources, amenities and services.

• It is difficult for a villager to survive in urban areas because in urban areas there is no natural
environment and pure air. They have to pay for each and everything.

• Migration changes the population of a place, therefore, the distribution of the population is
uneven in India.

• Many migrants are completely illiterate and uneducated, therefore, they are not only unfit for
most jobs, but also lack basic knowledge and life skills.
ACCORDING TO PROF ERHABOR IDEMUDIA SPEECH ON THE LAST
CONFERENCE OF THE ASSOCIATION OF LIFESPAN BEHAVIOURAL
DEVELOPMENTAL PRACTITIONALS HELD ON FUOYE CAMPUS

BREAKING NEWS MAKING HEADLINES IN EU PAPERS

> 25,000 Congolese sought asylum in France between 2000 and 2013

> 500,000 immigrants entered Europe illegally in the year 2015

Spain alone arrested 10,000 illegal immigrants in the year 2015

> 39,000 immigrants deported from EU Countries in year 2000 alone

> 20,000 illegal immigrants in detention

> More than 5,000 illegal immigrants were deported from Spain alone in year 2001

> 400,000 illegal immigrants smuggle into EU each year

> Soanish government spends $20 million on border security measures alone

Migrant workers make important contributions to the labour market in both high- and low-skilled
occupations

Over the past ten years, immigrants represented 47% of the increase in the workforce in the
United States, and 70% in Europe (OECD, 2012). Across OECD countries, only a relatively
small part of these workforce entrants came through managed labour migration (which represents
only a fraction of all movements to the OECD), and more came through other channels,
including family, humanitarian and free-movement migration.

The education status of immigrants varies considerably. Just like the relationship between
younger and older native-born people, young immigrants are generally much more educated than
immigrants nearing retirement. This is also true for immigrants entering the labour force: on
average over a third are tertiary-educated. The same proportion, however, has not completed
their upper-secondary education. Since 2000/01, immigrants have represented 31% of the
increase in the highly educated labour force in Canada, 21% in the United States and 14% in
Europe. Even though most migration is not directly driven by workforce needs, immigrants are
playing a significant role in the most dynamic sectors of the economy. New immigrants
represented 22% of entries into strongly growing occupations in the United States and 15% in
Europe. These include notably health-care occupations and STEM occupations (Science,
Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). At the same time, immigrants represented about a
quarter of entries into the most strongly declining occupations in Europe (24%) and the United
States (28%). In Europe, these occupations include craft and related trades workers as well as
machine operators and assemblers; in the United States, they concern mostly jobs in production,
installation, maintenance and repair. In all these areas, immigrants are filling labour needs by
taking up jobs regarded by domestic workers as unattractive or lacking career prospects.

MIGRANTS CONTRIBUTE MORE IN TAXES AND SOCIAL CONTRIBUTIONS

Recent work on the fiscal impact of migration for all European OECD countries, as well as
Australia, Canada and the United States, has provided new and internationally comparative
evidence (Liebig and Mo, 2013). The study suggests the impact of the cumulative waves of
migration that arrived over the past 50 years in OECD countries is on average close to zero,
rarely exceeding 0.5% of GDP in either positive or negative terms. The impact is highest in
Switzerland and Luxembourg, where immigrants provide an estimated net benefit of about 2% of
GDP to the public purse. Immigrants are thus neither a burden to the public purse nor are they a
panacea for addressing fiscal challenges. In most countries, except in those with a large share of
older migrants, migrants contribute more in taxes and social contributions than they receive in
individual benefits. This means that they contribute to the financing of public infrastructure,
although admittedly to a lesser extent than the native-born. Contrary to widespread public belief,
low-educated immigrants have a better fiscal position – the difference between their
contributions and the benefits they receive – than their native-born peers. And where immigrants
have a less favourable fiscal position, this is not driven by a greater dependence on social
benefits but rather by the fact that they often have lower wages and thus tend to contribute less.

In countries where recent labour migrants make up a large part of the immigrant population,
immigrants have a much more favourable fiscal position than in countries where humanitarian
migrants account for a significant part of the immigrant population. Labour migrants tend to
have a much more favourable impact than other migrant groups, although there is some
convergence over time. On the other hand, the fiscal position of immigrants is generally less
favourable in countries with longstanding immigrant populations and little recent labour
immigration.

Migration contributes to spur innovation and economic growth International migration has both
direct and indirect effects on economic growth. There is little doubt that where migration
expands the workforce, aggregate GDP can be expected to grow. However, the situation is less
clear when it comes to per capita GDP growth.

changing the age pyramid of receiving countries. Migrants tend to be more concentrated in the
younger and economically active age groups compared with natives and therefore contribute to
reduce dependency ratios (Gagnon, 2014). Second, migrants arrive with skills and abilities, and
so supplement the stock of human capital of the host country. More specifically, evidence from
the United States suggests that skilled immigrants contribute to boosting research and
innovation, as well as technological progress (Hunt, 2010). The proportion of highly educated
immigrants in OECD countries is rising sharply. The number of tertiary-educated immigrants in
OECD countries showed an unprecedented increase in the past decade (up by 70%), reaching a
total of almost 30 million in 2010/11. Of these, about 5 million, or 17%, arrived in the past five
years. This trend is mostly driven by Asian migration – more than 2 million tertiary educated
migrants originating from this region arrived in the OECD in the past five years (OECD-
UNDESA, 2013). Few empirical studies have tried, however, to estimate the overall impact of
net migration on economic growth, in part because of a shortage of harmonised comparative data
on international migration by skills levels.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Attitudinal change among youths in Africa needed. Such behaviour change programme should
target real life experiences among migrants in developed nations. That life in these countries are
not bed of roses.
Also, African nations particularly those where migrants are common (West, East and some
Southern countries) should expedite economic and social action reforms in their countries to
minimize the need to migrate.

Finally, the host countries should put in place why programmes to minimise triggering factors
that predispose migrants to psychological problems programmes should also target the local
population developing positive attitude to migrants.

Conclusion

The conclusions of the optimists and pessimists are not necessarily incompatible. Migration has
different impacts in different contexts. For example, evidence on remittances shows that context
matters greatly in both the amount remitted and its use. This may be key to whether migration
reduces disparities, as the very conditions in which remittances could lead to development, were
the reasons migrants left in the first place. Migration should be seen within a larger strategy of
poverty reduction, not as an optimistic “solution” nor as a pessimistic “problem”. Unfortunately
current gaps in knowledge—including in social policy literature—do not help find the right
balance.

The effects of temporary worker schemes on development at origin have been framed mainly in
terms of remittances or brain drain. This leaves the problem of what children and others left
behind do in cases where significant proportions of the population of prime productive age have
migrated, and it raises questions around what sustainable social policy can mean when
production and tax collection occurs elsewhere