ABSTRACT
Migration research, in its theoretical and empirical forms, has so far largely concentrated on the analysis and explanation of primary mobility processes. However, considerable counter-flows always existed, starting with the historic transatlantic emigration waves, which were believed to be temporary in at least one quarter of the cases (Bade 2002: 141f). A great portion of labour migration from Southern European countries to Northwest Europe was temporary as well. Böhning (1979) estimates that more than 1.5 million of these guest workers returned home during the 1970s, with return rates varying for each sending country concerned. Contrary to transatlantic emigration, the guest worker migration from the 1960s and 1970s was originally conceived as a temporary movement, and even though actual mobility behaviour did not always follow this political agenda, there was a rising interest in the probability of return migration and reintegration in the country of origin. Hence, a growing body of empirical studies on return migration of guest workers has developed since the 1970s (for reviews see Entzinger 1978 and King 1979). Many of those studies followed neoclassical approaches, measuring the return probability of labour migrants from Southern European countries. A further focus of the European migration research agenda was the nexus of return migration and development, mainly in the context of return to less developed countries, the evaluation of return and resettlement programmes and the question of ‘brain return’.
