Estimating and Visualising Migration Flow Data

Nikola Sander¹, Guy Abel¹, Ramon Bauer¹ & Johannes Schmidt²

¹Wittgenstein Centre | Vienna Institute of Demography

²Null2, Berlin

Migration & Development Conference, June 2014

View the slides at http://nikolasander.github.io/oxford

Global migration has accelerated and diversified!

In the age of globalisation, migration has become:

...more intense

...less spatially focussed

...less unidirectional

Limited empirical testing of these assumptions!

Largely due to a lack of global flow data.

So, what data are available on global migration flows?

Most widely available are data on migrant stocks

Captured in censuses, registers and surveys

Comparing country of birth with country of current residence

Complete and harmonised datasets published by UN (1990-2010) and World Bank (1960-2000)

An accumulative measure of migration over several decades that cannot capture contemporary trends!

Migrant flow data much less widely available

Censuses only capture inflows, registers use varying definitions

Harmonisation exist for European flows (IMEM)

Outside Europe only unharmonised data for selected countries

Estimating flows from stocks

UN bilateral stock data lifetime transitions 1990, 2000, 2010 more than 200 countries

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New global flow estimates 5-year transitions 1990-95 to 2005-10 196 countries

Visualising remittances flows

Guy Abel & Nikola Sander (2014): Quantifying Global International Migration Flows. Science, Vol. 343, pp.1520-22.

Download the flow estimates, 1990-2010.

Interactive data visualisation"The Global Flow of People"

Contact

nikola.sander@oeaw.ac.at

@nikolasander