From communist past to capitalist present: labour market experiences of Albanian immigrants in Greece

Abstract

This paper examines Albanian migrants' labour market adaptation in Greece through comparing and contrasting their work and life experiences under the Albanian socialist past and the current Greek capitalist milieu. Migration from one to the other presents migrants with challenges and experiences previously unknown to them. Such an approach is necessary when researching migration from Albania and former socialist countries more broadly, where work experiences and realities were structured around totally different concepts and philosophies from those in the capitalist world. Through comparing experiences of Albanian migrants from rural and urban areas I also unravel how migration reconstructs social status and class. Where there was a hierarchical structure in Albania in the past, in Greece they are all Alvanos (Albanian migrants).

Acknowledgements

I would like to express my thanks to the anonymous reviewer and Professor Russell King for the valuable comments they provided on an earlier draft of this paper.

Notes

¹ L. W. Warner and L. Srole, The Social Systems of American Ethnic Groups, Yale University Press, New Haven, CT, 1945; M. M. Gordon, Assimilation in American Life, Oxford University Press, New York, 1964.

² B. Chiswick, ‘The effect of Americanization on the earnings of foreign-born men’, Journal of Political Economy, 86(5), 1987, pp. 897–921.

³ S. Sassen, The Mobility of Labor and Capital: A Study in International Investment and Labor Flow, Cambridge University Press, New York, 1988; S. Sassen, The Global City, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 1990.

⁴ J. G. Reitz, Warmth of the Welcome. The Social Causes of Economic Success for Immigrants in Different Nations and Cities, Westview Press, Boulder, CO, 1998; A. Portes and R. Rumbaut, Legacies. The Story of the Immigrant Second Generation, University of California Press and Russell Sage Foundation, Berkeley, 2001; N. Lewin-Epstein, M. Semyonov, I. Kogan and R. A. Wanner, ‘Institutional structure and immigrant integration: a comparative study of immigrants’ labor market attainment in Canada and Israel', International Migration Review, 37(2), 2003, pp. 389–420; A. Portes and R. Rumbaut, Immigrant America. A Portrait, University of California Press, Berkeley, CA, 2006; Y. Cohen and I. Kogan, ‘Next year in Jerusalem… or in Cologne? Labor market integration of Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union in Israel and Germany in the 1990s’, European Sociological Review, 23(2), 2007, pp. 155–68; I. Kogan, Working Through Barriers. Host Country Institutions and Immigrant Labor Market Performance, Springer, The Netherlands, 2007.

⁵ I. Light, Ethnic Enterprise in North America: Business and Welfare among Chinese, Japanese, and Blacks, University of California Press, Berkeley, CA, 1972; I. Light and E. Bonacich, Immigrant Entrepreneurs: Koreans in Los Angeles 1965–1982, University of California Press, Berkeley, CA, 1988; I. Light and S. J. Gold, Ethnic Economies, Academic Press, San Francisco, 2000; G. A. Barrett, T. P. Jones and D. McEvoy, ‘United Kingdom: severely constrained entrepreneurialism’, in R. Kloosterman and J. Rath (eds), Immigrant Entrepreneurs: Venturing Abroad in the Age of Globalization, Berg/University of New York Press, Oxford/New York, 2003, pp. 101–22; J. Collins, ‘Australia: cosmopolitan capitalists down under’, in Kloosterman and Rath, op. cit., pp. 61–78; R. Haberfellner, ‘Austria: still a highly regulated economy’, in Kloosterman and Rath, op. cit., pp. 213–31; J. Rath and R. Kloosterman, ‘The Netherlands: a Dutch treat’, in Kloosterman and Rath, op. cit., pp. 123–45.

⁶ M. Castells and A. Portes, ‘World underneath: the origins, dynamics, and effects of the informal economy’, in A. Portes, M. Castells and L. A. Benton (eds), The Informal Economy. Studies in Advanced and Less Developed Countries, John Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, MD, 1989, pp. 11–37; A. Portes, ‘Economic sociology and the sociology of immigration: a conceptual overview’, in A. Portes (ed), The Economic Sociology of Immigration: Essays on Networks, Ethnicity, and Entrepreneurship, Russell Sage Foundation, New York, 1995, pp. 1–40; A. Stepick, Pride against Prejudice: Haitians in the United States, Allyn and Bacon, Boston, MA, 1998; M. Baldwin-Edwards, ‘Where free markets reign: aliens in the twilight zone’, in M. Baldwin-Edwards and J. Arango (eds), Immigrants and the Informal Economy in Southern Europe, Frank Cass, London and Portland, OR, 1999, pp. 1–15; R. King, ‘Southern Europe in the changing global map of migration’, in R. King, G. Lazaridis and C. Tsardanidis (eds), Eldorado or Fortress? Migration in Southern Europe, Macmillan Press, London, 2000, pp. 1–26.

⁷ R. G. Anghel, ‘Changing statuses: freedom of movement, locality and transnationality of irregular Romanian migrants in Milan’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 34(5), 2008, pp. 787–802; M. P. Garapich, ‘The migration industry and civil society: Polish immigrants in the United Kingdom before and after EU enlargement’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 34(5), 2008, pp. 735–52; C. Boswell and O. Ciobanu, ‘Culture, utility or social systems? Explaining the cross-national ties of emigrants from Borşa, Romania’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, 32(8), 2009, pp. 1346–64.

⁸ T. Iosifides, ‘Immigrants in the Athens labor market: a comparative survey of Albanians, Egyptians, and Filipinos’, in R. King and R. Black (eds), Southern Europe and the New Immigrations, Sussex Academic Press, Brighton and Portland, 1997, pp. 26–50; G. Lazaridis and K. Romaniszyn, ‘Albanian and Polish undocumented workers in Greece: a comparative analysis’, Journal of European Social Policy, 8(1), 1998, pp. 5–2; T. Iosifides and R. King, ‘Socio-spatial dynamics and exclusion of three immigrant groups in Athens conurbation’, in Baldwin-Edwards and Arango, op. cit., pp. 205–229; G. Lazaridis and I. Psimmenos, ‘Migrant flows from Albania to Greece: economic, social and spatial exclusion’, in King et al., 2000, op. cit., pp.170–85; P. Hatziprokopiou, ‘Albanian immigrants in Thessalonica, Greece: processes of economic and social incorporation’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 29(6), 2003, pp. 1033–57; M. Baldwin-Edwards, ‘Albanian emigration and the Greek labor market: economic symbiosis and social ambiguity’, South-East Europe Review for Labor and Social Affairs, 1, 2004, pp. 51–66; P. Hatziprokopiou, Globalisation and Contemporary Immigration to Southern European Cities: Social Exclusion and Incorporation of Immigrants in Thessaloniki, Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam, 2006.

⁹ Hatziprokopiou, 2003, op. cit.; Iosifides and King, 1999, op. cit.

¹⁰ T. Iosifides, M. Lavrentiadou, E. Petracou and A. Kontis, ‘Forms of social capital and the incorporation of Albanian immigrants in Greece’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 33(8), 2007, pp. 1343–61.

¹¹ Iosifides and King, 1999, op. cit.

¹² R. King and J. Vullnetari, Migration and Development in Albania, Working Paper C5, Development Research Centre on Migration, Globalisation and Poverty, University of Sussex, Brighton, 2003, pp. 38–39.

¹³ S. J. Gold, From the Workers' State to the Golden State. Jews from the Former Soviet Union in California, Allyn and Bacon, Boston, MA, 1995.

¹⁴ Gold, op. cit.; E. Morawska, ‘Structuring migration: the case of Polish income-seeking travellers to the West’, Theory and Society, 30(1), 2001, p. 47–80; R. van Boeschoten, ‘Gendered memories: from communist past to migrant present’, in The Conference on Gendered Aspects of Migration in South Eastern Europe, Volos, 30 November to 2 December 2007, available online at: < http://extras.ha.uth.gr/pythagoras1/images/downloads/R4.pdf>, (accessed December 2010); E. Morawska, ‘Immigrant transnationalism and assimilation: a variety of combinations and the analytic strategy it suggests’, in C. Joppke and E. Morawska (eds), Toward Assimilation and Citizenship: Immigrants in Liberal Nation-States, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, 2003, pp. 133–77.

¹⁵ Boeschoten, op. cit.

¹⁶ Morawska, 2003, op. cit.

¹⁷ C. Robson, Real World Research. A Resource for Social Scientists and Practitioner-Researchers, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, 1993, p. 229.

¹⁸ B. L. Berg. Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences. Allyn and Bacon, Boston, MA, 2007.

¹⁹ Like me, other researchers have conducted research with their own communities. See for instance, R. M. Abusharaf, Wanderings: Sudanese Migrants and Exiles in North America, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY, 2002; V. Kishinevsky, Russian Immigrants in the United States: Adapting to American Culture, LFB Scholarly Publishing, New York, 2004; L. Remennick, Russian Jews on Three Continents: Identity, Integration, and Conflict, Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick, NJ, 2007.

²⁰ Most of those from rural areas had worked as manual labourers in agriculture, while those from urban areas had worked as factory workers and men overwhelmingly as mechanics. A group of around 16 respondents had done semi-skilled jobs as supervisors, quality controllers in factories, laboratory assistants, tailors, technicians etc. Those with university and postgraduate degrees had worked in highly skilled professions, including as teachers.

²¹ R. Fakiolas, ‘Migration and unregistered labour in the Greek economy’, in King et al., 2000, op. cit., pp. 57–78, p. 60.

²² Hatziprokopiou, 2003, op. cit., p. 1042.

²³ S. Drobnić, ‘Part-time work in Central and Eastern European countries’, in H-P. Blossfeld and C. Hakim (eds), Between Equalization and Marginalization. Women Working Part-Time in Europe and the United States of America, Oxford University Press, New York, 1997, pp. 71–89, p. 72.

²⁴ S. Drobnić, ‘Part-time work in Central and Eastern European countries’, in H-P. Blossfeld and C. Hakim (eds), Between Equalization and Marginalization. Women Working Part-Time in Europe and the United States of America, Oxford University Press, New York, 1997, pp. 71–89, p. 72

²⁵ Gold, op. cit.

²⁶ J. Bernstein, ‘“Sometimes I feel that this is the Russia we had always dreamed of…” Transnationalism and Capitalism: Migrants from the Former Soviet Union and their Experiences in Israel and Germany’, Working Paper 7, Institute of Cultural Anthropology and European Ethnology, Johan Wolgang Goethe University Frankfurt am Main, 2006, available online at: < https://bscw.server.unifrankfurt.de/pub/nj_bscw.cgi/d2031732/*/wp/download/wp007_bernstein.pdf>, (accessed 23 July 2008).

²⁷ E. Jacques, The Albanians. An Ethnic History from Prehistoric Times to the Present, McFarland and Company, Jefferson, NC, 1995.

²⁸ M. Vickers and J. Pettifer, Albania: From Anarchy to a Balkan Identity, New York University Press, New York, 1997, p. 12.

²⁹ T. Judt, Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1944, William Heinemann, London, 2005.

³⁰ Hatziprokopiou, 2003, op. cit.; Iosifides et al., op. cit.; T. Lianos, ‘Brain drain and brain loss: immigrants to Greece’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 33(1), 2007, pp. 129–40.

³¹ Hatziprokopiou, 2003, op. cit.

³² S. J. Mahler, America Dreaming: Immigrant Life on the Margins, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1995.

³³ S. B. H. Stafford, ‘Haitian immigrant women: a cultural perspective’, Anthropologica 26(2), 1984, pp. 171–89; N. Foner, ‘Sex roles and sensibilities: Jamaican women in New York and London’, in R. J. Simon and C. Brettell (eds), International Migration: The Female Experience, Rowman and Allanheld, Totowa, NJ, 1986, pp. 133–51; Y. Prieto, ‘Cuban women and work in the United States: a New Jersey case study’, in Simon and Brettell, op. cit., pp. 95–112; M. L. Margolis, Little Brazil. An Ethnography of Brazilian Immigrants in New York City, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 1994; Mahler, op. cit.; M. Tress, ‘Refugees as immigrants: revelations of labor market performance’, Journal of Jewish Communal Service, 72(4), 1996, pp. 263–79; A. Vinokurov, D. Birman and E. Trickett, ‘Psychological and acculturation correlates of work status among Soviet Jewish refugees in the United States’, International Migration Review, 34(2), 2000, pp. 538–59; A. Orleck, ‘Soviet Jews: the city's newest immigrants transform New York Jewish life’, in N. Foner (ed), New Immigrants in New York, Columbia University Press, New York, 2001, pp. 111–140; Abusharaf, op. cit.; E. Sabogal, ‘Viviendo en la sombra: the immigration of Peruvian professionals to South Florida’, Latino Studies 3(1), 2005, pp. 113–31; Remennick, op. cit.

³⁴ Abusharaf, op. cit.

³⁵ Margolis, op. cit.

³⁶ Stafford, op. cit.; Foner, op. cit.; Prieto, op. cit.; Mahler, op. cit.

³⁷ F. Markowitz, A Community in Spite of Itself. Soviet Jewish Émigrés in New York, Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington and London, 1993; Tress, op. cit.; Vinokurov et al., op. cit.; Orleck, op. cit.; Remennick, op. cit.

³⁸ For these policies, see D. Hall, Albania and the Albanians, Pinter, London, 1994.

³⁹ Markowitz, op. cit., noted the existence of similar perceived hierarchies in the accounts of Russian Jews who had moved to Brighton Beach, New York. Geographical location (as well as occupation) was an important criterion upon which immigrants assessed and ranked each other. The highest prestige was accorded to those who hailed from urban areas (mainly in Russia: Moscow, Leningrad) given that the living conditions (i.e., housing, availability of consumer goods, and cultural amenities) in urban areas were much better than those in towns and villages. Moreover, urban areas were equated with progress and modernization.

⁴⁰ Alvanos is a derogatory word Greeks use to refer to Albanian immigrants.

⁴¹ P. Hondagneu-Sotelo, Gendered Transitions: Mexican Experiences of Immigration, University of California Press, Berkeley, CA, 1994; O. J. Martinez, Border People: Life and Society in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands, The University of Arizona Press, Tuscon and London, 1994; L. Chavez, Shadowed Lives: Undocumented Immigrants in American Society, Harcourt Brace College Publishers, Fort Worth, 1998.

⁴² Martinez, op. cit., p. 146.

⁴³ Hatziprokopiou, 2003, op. cit.; T. Maroukis, ‘Albanian migrants in Greece: transcending “borders” in development’, Journal of Southern Europe and the Balkans, 7(2), 2005, pp. 213–33; Iosifides et al., op. cit.

⁴⁴ Exploitation and discrimination were experiences that loomed large in immigrants' stories. However, given the space limitations, I decided not to include them in this paper. They are extensively dealt with in Hatziprokopiou, 2006, op. cit.