Undocumented Migration in Europe: a Comparative Perspective

Abstract

This chapter emphasises, compares and discusses some significant findings from the case studies. It will show that legal and illegal immigrants cannot be clearly distinguished and that illegal immigrants, in sociological terms, are not all the same. Seemingly different types of migrants, such as the globally mobile elites and undocumented immigrants have more in common than is generally assumed. It is equally difficult, if not impossible, to draw a clear demarcation line along the criteria of migration purposes between groups such as asylum seekers, economic migrants, family members and education migrants. And to make things even more difficult, countries with less strict internal controls such as the UK, the Netherlands in the recent past and, to some extent, Belgium and Spain, host quasi-legal ‘illegals’. In the Netherlands these have been called ‘white illegals’ and in Spain the Immigration Act includes a category for ‘registered illegals’. In contrast, countries with a comprehensive internal control system, and who enforce a strict rule of the law, such as Germany, do not admit this feature. The immigrants, documented or undocumented, are young and middle aged, male and female, singles and couples, with or without children, high and low skilled; any generalisation about them, such as describing them as being ‘young, male and well-educated’, is unjustified.