Should I stay or should I go? Romanian migrants during transition and enlargements

Abstract

Before the collapse of its communist regime in December 1989, Romania had been one of the most closed Eastern European countries, resulting in several demographic, economic, social and political characteristics referred to as the initial conditions. These are used to explain some of the differences in performances and behavior when comparing Romania and/or Romanians to their ex-communist peer countries from Europe. Although Romania became the first country in Central and Eastern Europe to establish relations with the European Community in 1974, together with Bulgaria, it was not invited to join the European Union in 2004, when eight former socialist countries from Central and Eastern Europe became EU member states (i.e., the EU8 countries). However, there is no systematic evidence that Romania or Bulgaria (i.e., the EU2 countries) have been backsliding or that their trajectories differ significantly from the EU8 countries (Levitz and Pop-Eleches Europe-Asia Studies 62(3): 461-479, 2010). The authors are grateful to the editors of this volume Martin Kahanec and Klaus F. Zimmermann and, as well as the anonymous referee for providing a number of suggestions that helped to improve the chapter significantly. We thank the participants at the 5th IZA/CEUR Workshop on EU Enlargement and the Labor Markets: Migration, Crisis and Adjustment in an Enlarged E(M)U II for useful comments and suggestions. We remain responsible for any mistakes still present.