ABSTRACT
Throughout human history, migration has taken place as an expression of
the desire to seek new opportunities and a better life. But migration is a
Janus-faced phenomenon and its dark side is played out in the form of
involuntary or forced migration, associated historically with the beginning
of slavery in the late seventeenth century and migrant indentured labour
from colonies since the mid-nineteenth century. International labour
migration is, thus, clearly linked to the gradual expansion of a global capi-
talist economy, which was initially mainly driven by European nation-states (Castles and Miller 1993). In other words, the direction which many (but
not all) migration flows take – that is, from developing to developed
economies – is at the very root a response to the geographically uneven
effects of capitalist development.
