Dynamics of adaptive migration aspirations in Nepal and beyond

At the heart of migration studies lies a fundamental question: how and why people desire to move. Over the past two decades, the concept of migration aspirations has emerged as a useful and widely applied lens to approach this question. Yet, a remaining fundamental blind spot is how and under what conditions a person’s migration aspirations change and evolve over time, including through actual migration. This omission is particularly grave because (changing) migration aspirations likely affect the wellbeing of individuals and their social environments decisively—a second acute blind spot in research on migration. This project is dedicated to these issues. Specifically, it focuses on how (1) changing personal circumstances, (2) migration opportunity structures, and (3) migration-related experiences bring about changes in migration aspirations among people living at their country of origin. Further, it investigates how and why migrants’ initial aspirations to settle, return, or migrate onward when arriving at a destination may change during their stay at the destination. Finally, the project examines how changing migration aspirations affect the wellbeing of individuals and their communities at the origin. To lay the groundwork for these insights, the project conceptualises key dimensions of migration aspirations to record subtle changes over time and further nuance migration aspirations as a concept. It then employs a two-wave survey, interviews, and participant observation with young Nepalis living in Nepal’s urban centre Kathmandu Valley and the rural district Gorkha, as well as young Nepalis living in Lisbon, Portugal—an emerging destination hub for Nepalis with both settlement and onward migration aspirations. The project uses an interdisciplinary lens, engaging with literature from sociology, geography, psychology, anthropology, and economics. The project aims to break new ground in foundational migration research by contributing to a better understanding of migration aspirations and their transient nature, as well as their links with human wellbeing.