WG 5: Labour and Migration

Working Group 5 deals with Chinese migration and other forms of human mobility in Europe and with labour relations arising from Chinese investments and migration. These topics relate to the remit to the other working groups as most forms of Chinese engagement in Europe are accompanied by human flows. Issues discussed in the group include:

  • various migrations (small entrepreneurs; individual labour migrants; contract labour migrants working on construction projects; white-collar transferees in Chinese-owned or –acquired enterprises; students; investment immigrants) that have successively taken place to various European regions since the late 1980s;
  • labour issues arising from Chinese investments, including changing management practices and relations between Chinese managers and European workers/unions,
  • various forms of non-migratory mobilities, including tourism;
  • urban change resulting from Chinese immigration and investment, including commercial real estate development, residential clustering, and themed tourism development;
  • changes in Chinese-local relations and host society attitudes to/perceptions of Chinese immigrants;
  • changes in the politics of Chinese ethnicity in Europe as a result of recent immigration and capital flows, including the ethnic economy, Chinese organisations, schools, and media, and relations between China and the Chinese in Europe.


Currently, WG 5 includes five subgroups: dealing respectively with tourism (led by Đorđije Vasiljević), elite migrations (Sofia Gaspar), labour relations (Du Juan), interethnic relations and xenophobia (Beck Fanni), methods and data (Martina Bofulin).

CoordinatorNyíri Pál

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

Nyíri Pál is Professor of Global History from an Anthropological Perspective at the Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam. His research focuses on the international mobility of the emerging Chinese middle class. His most recent books are Reporting for China: How Chinese Correspondents Work with the World and Chinese Encounters in Southeast Asia: How People, Money, and Ideas from China are Changing a Region (edited with Danielle Tan). Nyíri is series editor of New Mobilities in Asia (Amsterdam University Press).

Coordinator: Antonella Ceccagno

University of Bologna

Professor Antonella Ceccagno teaches Sociology of Migration and China in Africa at the University of Bologna, Italy. Based on long-term ethnographic research, her work builds upon the fields of critical migration studies, labor studies, and urban studies. Her main research areas are the role of migrants in processes of urban, regional, and industry restructuring, and the ethnicization of a migrant workforce. Her most recent book is City Making and Global Labor Regimes. Chinese Immigrants in Italy’s Fast Fashion Industry, 2017, Cham: Pagrave McMillan.

www.unibo.it/sitoweb/antonella.ceccagno/cv-en   

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