knows why s/he applied in a particular country), research of this kind
suffers from two difficulties in particular. First, survey analyses of the
required kind is very costly especially when one is interested in systematic
comparative analyses across countries (let alone over time). Interviews are
especially costly because they often have to rely on interpreters. Second,
and potentially even more problematic, is the fact that asylum seekers
might have a strong incentive to emphasise certain determinants over
others, as they know that certain answers might compromise their asylum
application or residence status.15 It is for these reasons that the
systematic quantitative analysis in this paper, despite its own limitations,
will make a contribution to the existing literature.16
3. Which Host Country? Migration Theory and Pull Factors
Although still an under-theorised area of study, one can identify a number
of prominent theories and models of international migration (Kritz et al.
1992, Massey et al. 1993, Meyers 2000). One of the most commonly known
theoretical migration models is the so-called push-pull model. In its most
abstract form, the push-pull model suggests that there are push factors in
countries of origin that cause people to leave their country, and positive or
pull factors that attract migrants to a receiving country. Although this
model cannot simply be transferred to the area of forced migration,17 it
15 This problem is certainly confounded when the research in funded by the national body
which determines asylum cases, as was the case in the above study by Robinson and
Segrott which was financed by the UK Home Office.
16 Problems with quantitative data analysis stem from the aggregation of data and
difficulties stemming from the incongruence of national definitions. For an extensive
discussion see e.g. Crisp (1999) and the chapter on 'Sources and Comparability of
Migration Statistics'; in: OECD (SOPEMI) (2002: 269-73).
17 In the area of forced migration pull factors are not assumed to be the driving forced
behind persons leaving their country and push factors are often assumed to be limited to
persecution of the kind listed in the Geneva Convention (UN Convention on the Status of
Refugees 1951, as amended by the 1967 New York Protocol). The Convention defines a
refugee as a person who "owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of
race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, is
outside the country ofhis nationality, and is unable to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling
to avail himself of the protection of that country". Refugees must therefore be seen as
distinct from economically motivated labour migrants, as the former move involuntarily,
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