New Italian migrants in the UK and Germany: Drivers for migration, preparatory steps and insertion in the labour market

Within the framework of Growth, Equal Opportunities, Migration and Markets (GEMM) project funded by the EU’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, this report is the first of the two detailed accounts on Italians’ intra-EU migration. The purpose of the present report is to contribute to the emerging literature on Italians’ mobility to other EU destinations, by shedding light on their motivations for leaving; what their preparation consists in; and, the means they use to find their first employment in the country of origin. Exploring these questions, our understandings on this topic will further developed with the second report concentrating on the arrival and settlements of these new emigrants in the destination country. The report is divided into three sections. The first section examines the motivations of new Italian migrants for leaving Italy. Following recent research on the topic (see for instance Recchi, Barone and Assirelli, 2016; Bartolini, Gropas and Triandafyllidou, 2017), the exploration of motivations is based on a dichotomous categorization between economic and non-economic drivers for migration, even though this distinction is not always clear. In our analysis, highly-, medium- and low-skilled workers rationales for migration are not studied separately, since same types of motivation are found transversally across professional categories. Hence, our argumentation brings together different professional categories with similar motives, without aiming to put drivers’ importance in any hierarchical relation. The second part of the report is structured in the same way. Rather than analysing the empirical material on the basis of professional level and sector, we considered more appropriate to put together all professional groups in order to analyse which the criteria for the selection of the country of destination are; what the preparatory steps are; how research subjects overcome structural barriers. In the third section of this report, we analyse the ways through which new Italian emigrants get their first job when they leave their home country. Contrary to the first two parts, subdivision into levels of skills seemed very relevant in order to investigate different ways of getting a job. Further differences between economic sectors are only outlined here, since they are explored in detail in the second report for the Italian case study. Before we move to the analysis, we give some information on the data collection, whereas the report closes with some conclusions and interesting topics for further discussion.