Erasmus Students: Frenzied Euro-enthusiasts?

Abstract

The initial migration process can be divided into several stages: the decision to leave, the departure, the journey, the arrival, and settling in the host-country. Migrants’ arrival and settling processes often go together with adaptation processes, as they may arrive in unfamiliar environments. Several authors have shown how migrants’ adaptation processes can lead to identity changes (see for example Boekestijn 1988; Duany 2003; Salih 2003), which are both the result of being confronted with a different — social, economic, political — setting, as well as due to specific efforts by the state, particularly through immigration policies that aim to integrate migrants in the host society.