Major migrations follow prior colonial, military, or trade links between countries

Evidence

Migration systems theory suggests that migratory movements generally arise from the existence of prior links between sending and receiving countries based on colonization, political influence, trade, investment, or cultural ties. Thus migration from Mexico to the USA originated in the south-westward expansion of the USA in the nineteenth century, and the deliberate recruitment of Mexican workers by US employers in the twentieth (Fortes and Rumbaut, 1990). Similarly, both Korean and the Vietnamese migrations to America were the long-term consequence of US military involvement. The migrations from India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh to Britain were linked to the British colonial presence on the Indian subcontinent. The Algerian migration to France (and not to Germany) was due to the French colonial presence in Algeria, while the Turkish presence in Germany was the result of direct labor recruitment by Germany in the 1960s and early 1970s. — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 3837

Categorization

• XREF: This directly complements The Reluctant Fundamentalist and Naqvi’s migrant narratives — prior links between sending and receiving countries shape who ends up where. — connects to: The new immigration was actually a gradual deepening reach into remoter European lands — John Higham, Strangers in the Land: Patterns of…, 386
• SEED: Could angle an essay on how migrant destination choices map almost perfectly onto a map of imperial history, using the specific examples here.