Dynamic Migration Intentions and the Impact of Socio-Institutional Environments: A Transit Migration Hub in Turkey

Abstract

Transit migration is generally defined by migrants having the intention to move onwards to a third country. Based on an empirical investigation in Izmir, a transit migration hub in Turkey, this paper critically discusses intentionality as a valid dimension in conceptualisations of transit migration. The study found that migrants' intentions in this transit migration hub are highly fluctuating because of their embeddedness in socio-institutional environments, which continuously affect migrants' social capital, risk perceptions and coping strategies, causing new migration intentions to arise. The study argues that intention is a problematic criterion in conceptualising transit migration, due to a conceptual fallacy where transit migration flows are taken as the unit of analysis whereas intentions are individual attributes.