Migration Attempts – Who Tries, Who Succeeds, Who Fails? Evidence from Senegal

Cora Mezger, Institut National d'Études Démographiques (INED)
Amparo Gonzalez-Ferrer, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC)

The distinction between migration attempts and actual migration is of increasing interest to policy-makers and researchers, as political and financial barriers to international moves are considered to build up “pools of migrant candidates” in the origin countries. However, the existing empirical literature is mostly restricted to either realized migrations or stated intentions. This study investigates those processes jointly, with an application to Senegal. More specifically, it examines whether determinants of migration attempts differ from determinants of actual migration, in particular with regard to the role of networks and contextual factors at origin and destination. The data comes from the MAFE survey (Migration between Africa and Europe, 2008), which collected retrospective life histories at origin (Senegal) and in European destination countries (France, Spain, Italy). The survey provides dated information on migrations as well as on migration attempts.