Romanians in Western Europe

Remus Gabriel Anghel is a researcher at the Romanian Institute of Research on National Minorities, and visiting professor at the Political Science Department, Babes-Bolyai University, Cluj, Romania. He received his PhD in sociology at the University of Bielefeld, Germany. The areas of his research include Romanian migration in Italy and Germany, as well as the migration of ethnic minorities. He has published on the topics of migrant transnationalism, irregular migration, migration, development, and social change. He is currently involved in researching the effects of migration among Romanian and Roma migrants in Romania.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroductionConstructing Status in Transnational Migration Nation States, Migrants’ Incorporation, and Social StatusFieldwork Encounters: Migrants and Mobilities in the Heart of EuropePart One: Romanian Germans in Germany Chapter 1: Germans Moving “Home:” From Timisoara to NurembergReadiness to Go. German Migration during State SocialismThe Big Wave: Mass Migration of the Romanian GermansChapter 2: Living in Nuremberg: Accepted but DifferentGetting to Nuremberg Labor Market IncorporationGetting Education …and Better JobsSociality Networks, Claims for Identity, and Prestige LossMarriage to Romanian Women and “Romanianization”Chapter 3: A Weak Transnationality: Memory, Leisure, and Plans to Return Remembering Places: Transnationalism as Memory“Romania Tourists:” Transnationalism as LeisureTransnational PensionersPlans to Move BackPart Two: Romanians in ItalyChapter 4: “We Need to Get Out Of Here”: From Borsa to MilanMigration from Borsa: Causes, Periods, and Mechanisms of MigrationThe Initial Phase: Inventing Migration StrategiesThe Development of Migration: Kinship Networks Freedom of Movement in EuropeChapter 5: Making Milan Their Own: From Precariousness to AdaptationGetting to MilanFinding HousingFinding JobsLegalization Freedom to Travel and Its Effects in MilanChapter 6: Back Home: Prestige, Gain, Remittances, and Social ChangeRemittances for Sustaining HouseholdsTransnational Strategies of Investment Migrant Transnationalism, Social Change and Prestige Gain Transnational Migration and Social TransformationConclusionsReferencesIndexAbout the Author

By using statistical evidence, oral histories, and migration theories, Anghel (Romanian Institute of Research on National Minorities) offers a valuable study of ethnic Germans migrating from Romania to Germany and of Romanian migrants to Italy. The author analyzes the obstacles and opportunities the chosen host nations provided after the collapse of eastern European regimes and the European Union's expansion. Depicting ethnic Germans migrating from Romania to Nuremberg as the saga of people returning to their ancestral homeland allowed for granting of juridical rights and legal employment. The Italian government's laissez-faire attitude toward migration, however, caused more difficulties for Romanians migrating to Milan; these were later ameliorated by legalization processes that developed only after the flood of migrants made their presence too obvious to ignore. In addition to an assessment of migration's impact in countries of origin and destination is an interesting analysis of notions of transnationality in contemporary Europe. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Undergraduates and above.