Social Networks and Migration

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Links to concepts of social networks and social support have been crucial to advances in migration theory and research. Social ties, and the social networks based on the structure of these ties, affect whether potential migrants leave, where they go, and the likelihood of return. Substantial research has been done on migration and social networks in places of destination. But little is known about ties to and within the origin, most likely because the data requirements are so severe (prospective social network data and then following migrants to destination). The proposed research fills this gap. It uses a unique, prospective, longitudinal data set that has complete social network data at origin measured in 1994 for 51 villages in Nang Rong district, Northeast Thailand, and then follows people over time (to 2000) in origin and destinations. We propose three related analyses. The first examines the effects of social ties to the origin on the likelihood of being a migrant in 2000 among those who were resident in the village in 1994, testing hypotheses about the implications of access to information and other resources, obligations, and relative deprivation. The second focuses on return migration. For those who were present in the village in the 1984 round of data collection but absent in 1994, what are the effects of ties to the origin on the likelihood that the migrant is living back in the village in 2000? Hypotheses about return migration focus on the obligational components of these ties. The third analysis will investigate the effects of social ties year by year between 1994 and 2000 to study migration over short intervals and to test hypotheses about the effects of the economic crisis in July 1997. The third analysis is based on a subset of villages having life history data for both migrants and non-migrants.