Comparative analysis of bilateral memoranda on anti-human trafficking cooperation between Thailand and three neighboring countries : what do the origin and the destination states agree upon?

In order to prevent, suppress and punish human trafficking, bilateral agreements between origin of victim countries and destination countries are crucial, because their cooperation involves cross-border activities such as repatriation of victims, extradition of criminals and information-sharing. This article analyzes three bilateral legal instruments between The Government of The Kingdom of Thailand and her three neighboring countries, namely The Royal Government of Cambodia, The Government of Lao People's Democratic Republic and The Government of The Union of Myanmar. The analysis will examine the legal status of the victim, the victim as witness in criminal proceedings, the victim protection programs, the recovery and restitution of damages, the process of repatriating the victim, and the prosecution of the criminal.

The healthy immigrant effect: Patterns and evidence from four countries

The existence of a healthy immigrant effect—where immigrants are on average healthier than the native born—is a widely cited phenomenon across a multitude of literatures including epidemiology and the social sciences. There are many competing explanations. The goals of this paper are twofold: first, to provide further evidence on the presence of the healthy immigrant effect across source and destination country using a set of consistently defined measures of health; and second, to evaluate the role of selectivity as a potential explanation for the existence of the phenomenon. Utilizing data from four major immigrant recipient countries, USA, Canada, UK, and Australia allows us to compare the health of migrants from each with the respective native born who choose not to migrate. This represents a much more appropriate counterfactual than the native born of the immigrant recipient country and yields new insights into the importance of observable selection effects. The analysis finds strong support for the healthy immigrant effect across all four destination countries and that selectivity plays an important role in the observed better health of migrants vis a vis those who stay behind in their country of origin.

Malaria imported from Ghana by returning gold miners, China, 2013

During May-August 2013, a malaria outbreak comprising 874 persons in Shanglin County, China, was detected among 4,052 persons returning from overseas. Ghana was the predominant destination country, and 92.3% of malarial infections occurred in gold miners. Preventive measures should be enhanced for persons in high-risk occupations traveling to malaria-endemic countries.

Les trajectoires socioprofessionnelles des nouveaux arrivants, travailleurs qualifiés au Québec : qu'est-ce qu'une «intégration réussie»?

Les études qui portent sur l’intégration professionnelle des travailleurs immigrants s’intéressent majoritairement aux résultats des acteurs sur le marché du travail ou à leur parcours d’intégration en mettant l’accent sur les barrières à l’intégration, plus rarement sur les stratégies des acteurs. Peu d’études s’intéressent aux trajectoires des travailleurs qualifiés qui ont réussi leur intégration socioprofessionnelle depuis une perspective centrée sur leur expérience subjective. Notre étude se situe résolument dans une approche micro-individuelle, donc, centrée sur les acteurs, ici, de nouveaux immigrants, travailleurs qualifiés, en processus d’intégration. Elle porte sur le déroulement de leur processus d’intégration, depuis leur décision d’immigrer jusqu’à la situation actuelle, après 5 à 10 ans passés au Québec. Notre perspective, axée sur l’expérience individuelle de l’immigrant, visait en même temps à relier les facteurs micro, macro et meso sociaux interagissant continuellement pour produire des trajectoires d’intégration uniques. Cette recherche qualitative, inspirée par le courant de la sociologie clinique, analyse les trajectoires socioprofessionnelles de sujets qui occupaient au moment de l’entrevue des emplois qualifiés, situés minimalement au niveau de leur diplôme. Elle portait sur la situation pré-migratoire : les motifs de départ, le choix de la destination; puis le parcours d’intégration socioprofessionnelle au Québec et finalement la situation actuelle du point de vue des objectifs et de la satisfaction personnelle des sujets. Il nous importait de mettre en lumière l’expérience personnelle d’intégration vue depuis la perspective subjective des acteurs. Ce faisant, nous avons étudié l’agentivité des travailleurs qualifiés qui se sont posés en tant qu’acteurs actifs et réflexifs face aux déterminant sociaux et limitations qui pesaient sur eux. Une deuxième question de recherche reliée à celle des trajectoires portait sur le regard subjectif des sujets sur l’intégration. Nous avons voulu savoir ce que c’est pour chacun que l’« intégration réussie » (au Québec) et l’intégration professionnelle « réussie ». De cette façon, il devient possible de révéler la diversité des positions et des perceptions individuelles des sujets quant à la question de l’intégration sans présumer du ou des résultats possibles de leur cheminement. Nos résultats révèlent la diversité des attentes individuelles face à l’immigration et à l’intégration dans le pays de destination et donc, ils nous invitent à tenir compte de la particularité de chaque sujet. L’immigration et l’intégration s’inscrivent pour les sujets dans une démarche individuelle plus large, celle de la réalisation de leurs projets de vie. Ces projets se situent à plusieurs niveaux et leur réalisation agit comme un guide des démarches individuelles qui visent à atteindre une vie qui s’avère satisfaisante, réussie, pleine ou complète, selon les acteurs. Il nous a été possible de rendre visibles les efforts que les acteurs ont déployés et déploient pour accomplir leurs projets et poursuivre leur chemin vers la réalisation de soi. Notre recherche a démontré qu’il est nécessaire de tenir compte tant de la subjectivité et des différences entre les acteurs au moment d’analyser leurs parcours que des résultats de leur intégration afin de concevoir des programmes qui intègrent davantage la complexité des processus en marche. Au final, il s’agit de contribuer plus efficacement à ce que les diverses expériences d’immigration et d’intégration soient « réussies ».

Un análisis de la relación comercial entre Colombia y Estados Unidos en el marco de los acuerdos comerciales

Estados Unidos es el principal socio comercial de Colombia: es el país de destino del 36% de las exportaciones colombianas y el país de origen del 25% de las importaciones colombianas (DANE, 2011). La relación entre ambos profundizó sus lazos con el programa arancelario ATPA, luego ATPDEA, en virtud del cual al 80% de la oferta exportable de Colombia se le ofrecía ya sea con libre acceso al mercado estadounidense, o entrada con pago de arancel reducido. Posteriormente, la entrada en vigencia del TLC generó las bases para una relación comercial más profunda aún, que también incluyera beneficios para Estados Unidos y prolongara y profundizara los beneficios que Colombia ya recibía. Este trabajo se enfoca en analizar paso a paso el comportamiento del comercio entre ambos países a través de los años y, por supuesto, el comportamiento actual del comercio, teniendo siempre en cuenta el contexto económico mundial, así como el contexto económico bilateral.

Arranjos urbanos e subjetivos contemporâneos na invenção de territórios turísticos

We seek consistency empirical and analytical rigor to the concept of touristification in the course of the contemporary arrangements of subjectivity and urbanity stations through a landscape of social (dis)encounters between residents and foreigners living in the capital of Rio Grande do Norte, Natal. In the last three decades the city has become a major destination country for national and international tourism, making tourism an important monitor of choreography in search of synchrony between cities and subjectivities, orchestrated by the cyclical crises and the relentless battle for systemic capitalistic expansion and survival. We proceed with an ethnographic and cartographic inspiration in Ponta Negra, where the waterfront redevelopment in 2000 conducted by the government, influenced the implementation of various establishments, services and practices related to the construction of Natal s major industry hub of tourism and entertainment. We proposed an arch-genealogy of touristification inspared on Michel Foucault analytical perspective, increased by authors in confluence or in different theoretical and methodological approaches, among which stand out Karl Marx, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri. The reflections that initially turned to the advancement of the sphere of consumerism as the issue capable of articulating the developmental trajectory of the capitalist system and the practice of tourism, promoting some effects (un)desirable in the conflictual dynamics of the condition of the district of Ponta Negra, territory each again (re) produces the designs to meet the consumption by affluent portion of the population and foreign, encountering social exclusion and inclusion differentiated a growing trend. We go forward with an analysis of the "liberation of desire" phenomenal features of the process of producing subjective, providing a breakdown of the recent world s financial crisis initially, but proved social and political crisis also, through a plot derived from the operation of real estate speculation, which Natal is mainly caught through touristification, showing the outlines of a generalized crisis in establishing a new order buoyed by the emergence of a context "biopolitical" since it is a major route that uses the capital to survive and expand, while guiding the process of "strategic beautification" held in Ponta Negra, problematized by us. We conclude by assessing the appropriateness of proposing on further analysis to explore the establishment of a "new social ontology in terms of interference touristification ongoing and the constitution of a "new order" local/global, away from that characterize a system's capitalist overcoming, try to give emphasis in the current stage of the radicalization of a capitalistic utopia

Foreign Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean 2000

Includes bibliography

Foreign Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean 1998

Includes bibliography

The impact of climate change on the tourism sector in the Caribbean

The main aim of this study is to estimate the economic impact of climate change on nine countries in the Caribbean basin: Aruba, Barbados, Dominican Republic, Guyana, Jamaica, Montserrat, Netherlands Antilles, Saint Lucia and Trinidad and Tobago. A typical tourism demand function, with tourist arrivals as the dependent variable, is used in the analysis. To establish the baseline, the period under analysis is 1989-2007 and the independent variables are destination country GDP per capita and consumer price index, source country GDP, oil prices to proxy transportation costs between source and destination countries. At this preliminary stage the climate variables are used separately to augment the tourism demand function to establish a relationship, if any, among the variables. Various econometric models (single OLS models for each country, pooled regression, GMM estimation and random effects panel models) were considered in an attempt to find the best way to model the data. The best fit for the data (1989-2007) is the random effects panel data model augmented by both climate variables, i.e. temperature and precipitation. Projections of all variables in the model for the 2008-2100 period were done using forecasting techniques. Projections for the climate variables were undertaken by INSMET. The cost of climate change to the tourism sector was estimated under three scenarios: A2, B2 and BAU (the mid-point of the A2 and B2 scenarios). The estimated costs to tourism for the Caribbean subregion under the three scenarios are all very high and ranges from US$43.9 billion under the B2 scenario to US$46.3 billion under the BAU scenario.

La migración de retirados europeos al mercado de viviendas español: una evidencia sobre sus efectos

La migración internacional de retirados no es un fenómeno nuevo entre los países de la Unión Europea. Hay un buen número de sociólogos que han descrito el proceso y sus implicaciones en las formas de vida, especialmente en los casos de migración de los hogares de jóvenes retirados desde los países del norte de Europa hacia los soleados del sur. Muchos de estos movimientos afectan al mercado de viviendas desde el mismo momento de la llegada al país de destino y, en muchos casos, los flujos de población generados por esta migración contribuyen al cambio en las tendencias de edificación en los casos en que los destinos tienen bajos niveles de renta. Estos flujos tienen también implicaciones futuras como la necesidad de aumentar los servicios de atención a la tercera edad o en salud lo que, hoy por hoy, implican un elevado gasto público para el sistema español. Este artículo se interesa por las implicaciones en el corto plazo, así como en indagar en el fenómeno en sí. A través de la explotación de parte de los resultados de un proyecto de investigación denominado REVIcVAL (Retirados y vivienda en la Comunidad Valenciana), el artículo muestra algunas características de este flujo migratorio así como la racionalidad a la hora de tomar la decisión de comprar una vivienda. El ejercicio empírico utiliza información primaria recogida a través de un cuestionario recopilando información de retirados ingleses y alemanes en la costa de Alicante durante los años 2005 y 2006, con una base municipal, y estima la racionalidad en la toma de decisión de compra de viviendas.

Transnational parenting and the well-being of Angolan migrant parents in Europe

Studies on the transnational family highlight the emotional difficulties of migrant parents separated from their children through international migration. This article consists of a large-scale quantitative investigation into the insights of transnational family literature by examining the well-being of transnational parents compared with that of parents who live with their children in the destination country. Furthermore, through a survey of Angolan migrant parents in both the Netherlands and Portugal, we compare the contexts of two receiving country. Our study shows transnational parents are worse off than their non-transnational counterparts in terms of four measures of well-being – health, life satisfaction, happiness, and emotional well-being. Although studies on migrant well-being tend to focus exclusively on the characteristics of the receiving countries, our findings suggest that, to understand migrant parents' well-being, a transnational perspective should also consider the existence of children in the migrant sending country. Finally, comparing the same population in two countries revealed that the receiving country effects the way in which transnational parenting is associated with migrant well-being.

A aprendizagem da língua portuguesa pela comunidade chinesa a residir em Portugal: um estudo sobre diferentes gerações

Considerando o aumento do número de imigrantes oriundos da República Popular da China que procuram Portugal como país de destino, propõe-se um estudo sobre a forma como este grupo de imigrantes, em particular, aprende a língua portuguesa como língua de acolhimento. A análise será de natureza histórica, uma vez que irá descrever a história da imigração Chinesa para Portugal, em articulação com a procura e o interesse crescente na República Popular da China de cursos de PLE e do estudo da cultura portuguesa. A esta visão de um ponto de vista histórico irá contrapor-se o estudo da situação atual da forma como os imigrantes chineses fazem a aprendizagem da língua de acolhimento, em Portugal, através de análise de entrevistas realizadas a imigrantes a residir na área de Lisboa. Um outro aspeto importante que irá ser considerado no meu estudo é a questão da diferença geracional. A minha pesquisa procurará averiguar se a pertença a diferentes gerações, contrastando adultos/idosos e jovens, determina motivações, práticas e resultados diferenciados na aprendizagem da língua portuguesa como língua de acolhimento. Será importante considerar-se neste estudo os diferentes contextos em que é feita a aprendizagem da língua de acolhimento: o formal, o não formal e o informal. Além disso, iremos também abordar a questão da integração linguística e cultural dos imigrantes, em Portugal. A metodologia de pesquisa adotada é a da recolha de dados por entrevista.

The Kremlin plays the immigration card. OSW Commentary No. 112, 2013-08-19

Russia is currently the world’s second most popular destination country for international migrants (second only to the United States). In recent years, Russia’s relatively high economic growth has attracted foreign workers from poorer neighbouring republics in Central Asia, as well as from Ukraine and Belarus. In the absence of a consistent immigration policy, the largescale influx of immigrants has become a major issue affecting social relations in Russia. The majority of Russians oppose the arrival of both foreign workers and internal migrants from Russia’s North Caucasus republics, claiming that their presence in Russia contributes to the escalation of ethnic and religious tensions, fuels organised crime and corruption, and increases competition on the labour market. As many as 70% of Russians are in favour of restricting the number of immigrants allowed into the country, calling on the government for a more stringent policy on immigration. Since the end of July the authorities have responded to these calls by carrying out a series of raids on markets and construction sites across Moscow, where most immigrants tend to find employment. The raids have led to arrests and deportations. However, these measures should not be seen as a serious attempt to deal with the problem of economic migrants in the capital, mainly because of the highly selective and staged nature of the crackdown. This, coupled with the timing of the initiative, might indicate that the raids are a part of an ongoing election campaign, particularly in the run-up to the Moscow mayoral elections scheduled for 8 September. By adopting anti-immigration rhetoric, the Kremlin is seeking both to garner support among Russian voters, who tend to be easily swayed by nationalist sentiments, and to steal the anti-immigration card from the opposition and its leader Alexei Navalny. The opposition has been calling for a clearer policy on this issue and has blamed the government for the current lack of control over migrant numbers, accusing the authorities of benefiting from the widespread corruption linked to immigration. In a broader context, the actions taken by the government are a response to the declining legitimacy of the current ruling elite. By attempting to address the immigration issue, the Kremlin is trying to restore its image as a government attentive to social problems and capable of solving them effectively.

Weaving Futures. Family Transnationalism in the migration from Dominican Republic and Brazil to Spain

This article explores forms of migrant families’ reorganization within a (new) global economic crisis and the hardening of migration control in Europe; based on the cases of Dominican and Brazilian migration to Spain.Our goal is not to characterize the wholeness of strategies from these collectives, instead visualize its heterogeneity. Displacement of Dominican and Brazilian population to Spain shares the role of women as the first link of migration chains. In both cases women are the economic support of transnational families and they lead reunification's processes. Nevertheless, differences in the time spent in the destination country, migratory status, origin (rural-urban), level of education, class and labor insertion in destination country, affect differently, the planning and start up of migration projects, the organization of care and family reunification strategies. These findings question the predominant place granted to national origin in the study of international migration.

Projeto InOut Expat

O Projeto InOut Expat foi desenvolvido para apoiar e ajudar os expatriados em fase de mudança para um país estrangeiro, através de uma plataforma eletrónica que oferece os serviços de uma secretária virtual para auxiliar em situações burocráticas e/ou pessoais. Oferece também, formação intercultural focada em cultura/costumes, etiqueta e linguagem não-verbal. O website tem informações gratuitas de todos os países do mundo como, o custo de vida, a língua oficial, o PIB, a capital, a bandeira que são informações facilmente encontradas num motor de busca na internet. Também apresenta links e publicações com noticias, ofertas de emprego e entrevistas a expatriados. Os expatriados envolvidos no projeto estão felizes pela decisão que tomaram em mudar de país, mas a maioria sentiu tristeza, insegurança, choque e outros sentimentos negativos na adaptação ao país de destino, a InOut Expat pretende colmatar estes sentimentos. O projeto está a cumprir o que promete desde fase embrionária. É sem dúvida uma ferramenta útil para quem opta por emigrar ou imigrar, principalmente no auxilio de uma secretária virtual para procurar casa ou trabalho.