ABSTRACT
This chapter investigates the causes and consequences of migration today. It reviews the theoretical explanations for why people migrate, along with the individual, national, and structural factors that compel such movement across borders. The chapter explores the economic and political effects of international migration on sending and receiving countries. It argues that the postwar economic and political development of many European countries can only be understood with reference to the migratory flows that occurred in these decades, including the political and economic motivations that facilitated them. Many European countries also lost both their main industrial sectors and a significant proportion of manpower to the war. The economic recession that began in 1973 led most European countries to formally or informally end their respective guest worker programs and attempt to restrict immigration. Mass ethnic minority population transfers also occurred in other European countries, especially in the East.
