Families migrating together

At the outset, when considering the impact of migration on families, it is important to differentiate between, at least, two broad categories of migration: that which is undertaken voluntarily and that which is undertaken involuntarily. Although it is impossible to claim that there is an absolute clear-cut distinction between these two categories, nevertheless, I would argue that this differentiation is important as it distinguishes two, essentially, distinctive (but interrelated) groups of phenomena. Nobody would disagree that the impact of migration on a family that decides to move to another country due to a job promotion of one of the parents, for example, will be radically different from when a family’s home is destroyed by war and, as refugees, the surviving members of the family are desperately seeking a place of safety outside their own country.