Transatlantic and North American International Migration

The aim of this survey is to provide background for discussion of the North Atlantic flows of goods and services between Europe and North America by indicating the magnitude and timing of population and labour-force movements. The point of view will be almost entirely that of North America, that is of a region of immigration. This is just as well, for, seen as the continuation of the great European waves of nineteenth-century migration to the countries of new settlement, the movements of the past two decades have been disappointly unworthy of notice. They have had little impact on the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany or Scandinavia, countries which until 1890 were continuously adjusting to the outflows of young artisans and peasants. Among north European countries, probably only Holland and England took post-war overseas emigration seriously, as a force which, if properly guided, could work to the advantage of both emigrants and those remaining behind. But just as northern European migrants were, in the decades before 1914, overshadowed by new flows from southern and eastern Europe, so the British, Germans and Scandinavians have again been overhauled by flows from Italy and other countries along the Mediterranean and east of Germany and France. Moreover, the countries of northern and western Europe, far from concerning themselves with their role in the peopling of America, are bemused and concerned about their capacity to employ and absorb the circuits of migration across their borders from Europe and North Africa.