Emigration Policies in the Context of the European Union Enlargement: the Case of the Baltic States

In the light of the EU enlargement in 2004, this project has looked into emigration policies in the New Member States. The main goal of the research was to find an explanation for the improvement of emigration policies, i.e. strategies that regulate international emigration flows or stimulate the return of emigrants to their home country. The three cases – Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia – have been chosen and scrutinized. In order to explain ongoing emigration policies in these countries, the author, on the grounds of migration systems theory and historical institutionalism, has screened literature to find factors that hypothetically influence emigration policies: EU accession, socio-economic factors, emigration flows, emigration costs/benefits and emigration policies in other countries. In the course of the research, all these factors, as well as current global financial crisis, have been found to be influential on framing emigration policies in the Baltic States.