The "third option": Oscilliatory migrations of retired guest workers

Abstract

The subject of this study is focused on new migration tendencies of retired guest workers. This paper represents one part of a study conducted during 2014 in eastern Serbia and Vienna regarding life strategies of retired labor migrants. In domestic (Serbian) social sciences this subject was neglected, but recently it has attracted global social scientific attention with an idea of interdisciplinary merge of migration and age studies. To the day, global literature has only covered retired migrant laborers return to their home countries, but recent studies show changes in migration tendencies of retired laborers of many different nationalities, who have spent their work age in Western Europe. These new migration patterns were called “oscillatory movement” or as a new, alternative “third option”. They are only a form of seasonal and circular migrations which present the most dominant fashion of modern migrant mobility in Europe. Therefore we wanted to see what is the situation with labor migrants from Serbia – do they return to Serbia once they retire or not, and what are their reasons for choosing to live on “two addresses”.