Global Connections and Emerging Inequalities in Europe

This book explores connections between poverty and migration in the context of the expansion of neoliberalism in Europe, examining these global concerns from a local perspective.

The book explores connections between poverty and migration in the context of the expansion of neoliberalism in Europe, examining these global concerns from a local perspective. The last decade has witnessed a massive, perhaps unprecedented, movement of people across Europe. Some of the dislocated are victims of war, but even greater numbers are casualties of the economic reforms which were implemented after the collapse of socialism in eastern Europe, and some 10-15 years earlier in western Europe. As this volume shows, people do not move in only one direction, from economically weaker to stronger regions; rather, movement takes place both into and out of recently created 'backwaters'. Such movements reflect the dynamic and shifting form of an ever-changing Europe, where people are responding to new opportunities for mobility, and to local inequalities resulting from political changes and economic reforms. As people seek new opportunities, movement itself becomes part of the process of generating new inequalities between regions and nations.  Symbolically and objectively the map of Europe is being redrawn. The chapters in this collection give vivid examples of not only the process of re-mapping, but also of people’s strong sense of local 'place' and their participation in global movements.

Acknowledgements; 1. Emerging Inequalities in Europe: Poverty and Transnational Migration – Deema Kaneff and Frances Pine; 2. Capital, Family or Community in Postsocialist Rural Romania: Inequalities and Equalities – Míriam Torrens; 3. International Labour Migration, Remittances and Economic Development in Moldova – Dennis Goerlich and Matthias Luecke; 4. From Street Busking in Switzerland to Meat Factories in the UK: A Comparative Study of Two Roma Migration Networks from Slovakia – Jan Grill; 5. Transnational Migration of Bulgarian Roma – Ilona Tomova; 6. The End of Politics in Romania’s Jiu Valley: Global Normalisation and the Reproduction of Inequality – David A. Kideckel; 7. Assistance Migrants in Russia: Upsetting the Hierarchies of Transitional Development – Melissa L. Caldwell; 8. Contemporary Contexts of European Migration: Concluding Thoughts – Deema Kaneff and Frances Pine; List of Contributors; Index