Albanian Return-migrants from Greece and Italy

The paper focuses on two of the most important challenges that contemporary Albania has to face: emigration, which has divested the country of about one-fifth of its population, and internal migration, resulting in unprecedented spatial disparities devastating most of the country, particularly rural areas, and substantially increasing the population of Tirana and to a lesser extent Durres.This paper specifically addresses the issue of how emigration and internal migration are interrelated; in particular, whether returning Albanian emigrants from the principal destination countries (i.e. Greece and Italy) exacerbate spatial disparities. The paper is based on the empirical findings of a questionnaire survey of 324 respondents conducted in Albania in early 2002 as well as more recent fieldwork conducted in 2004 with more qualitative questionnaires addressed to 39 recent migrants to Tirana. Our empirical findings support the idea that return migration does not exacerbate recently increased spatial disparities within the country, thus placing a further burden on the development trajectory of the country. At most, one might argue that returning migrants, bringing back money with them or having sent back remittances beforehand, may facilitate an ongoing process of internal migration stemming from more fundamental causes such as a search for more job and business opportunities and a better quality of life.