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A Debate Over Return Migration: The Case of Turkish Guest Workers in Germany

  • Ahmet İçduygu
  • Deniz SertEmail author
Chapter
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Part of the Immigrants and Minorities, Politics and Policy book series (IMPP)

Abstract

This chapter aims to provide an overview of the return migration of Turkish guest workers and their family members. While doing so, it also elaborates on the theoretical and conceptual discussions of the notion of return migration, and it discusses the empirical question of how return migration has evolved over time in the case of the guest-worker scheme between Turkey and Germany. There are several reasons that make it worthwhile to elaborate the case of Turkish guest workers in Europe in general (and in Germany in particular) in the context of the whole notion of return migration. First, it is a migratory system that has evolved from temporary migration to permanent settlement over the last five decades. Second, while this transformation has taken place, some migrants have returned home, but others have stayed abroad. Third, as this covers a period since the early 1960s, different generations are involved, including first-generation labor migrants as well as their Europe-born children, and even grandchildren. Finally, as this migration from Turkey includes various types of movements such as labor migration, family reunion, asylum seeking, and clandestine flows, return migration to Turkey also consequently consists of various types of returnees.

Keywords

Host Country Home Country Asylum Seeker Labor Migration Return Migration 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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Copyright information

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.Koç UniversityIstanbulTurkey
  2. 2.Özyeğin UniversityIstanbulTurkey

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