劳动力回流的驱动因素与就业行为研究进展

全球化与经济一体化的深入促使劳动力的空间流动更为频繁,并呈现外出与回流并存的格局。作为发展中人口大国,中国的劳动力回流现象不断增多,流动“双向化”趋势日趋明显。本文从劳动力回流理论、回流动因、回流者的就业行为与影响机制入手,对国内外已有文献进行梳理分析,发现在回流理论中,主张成功/失败的经济理论长期占据主导地位,但这一分析范式开始受到社会学理论的挑战。回流决策不仅受外出者自身经济因素所驱使,而是在社会联系、地方经济政策环境等因素的综合影响下产生的。回流劳动力并不是简单的经济上的“失败者”,他们通过物质资本和人力资本积累,表现出更强的就业能力,通过自主创业等活动,促进了家庭收入的增加和家乡经济多元化。但由于制度环境及经济发展特点的差异,中国国内劳动力回流的动因与就业行为具有自身特点。最后,从回流理论、回流的空间效应及新生代农民工回流等方面对中国未来的回流研究进行了展望。

Advances in research on driving factors of return migration and employment behavior of migrants

Labor migration is becoming more frequent in the era of globalization and regional economic integration and involves the parallel processes of out migration and return migration. As a developing country with the largest population in the world, China's return migrants in rural areas have been increasing in number and the trend of bi-directional labor migration is increasingly clear. This article provides a comprehensive overview of international and Chinese research on return migration based on labor return migration theories, motivation of return migration, and employment behavior and mechanism of returnees. We found that the economic theory of success-failure dichotomy was dominant in theoretical explanations of the phenomenon of return migration in the past, but this dichotomy has been increasingly challenged by sociology and other theories. Among the driving factors of return migration, migration duration, wage, and human capital characteristics significantly influence the likelihood of return, but social ties to areas of origin and socioeconomic policy context at home also play an important role in the process of returning home.Returnees have better economic performance because of their accumulation of savings and skills and their entrepreneurial projects improve living conditions and income of the family and promote economic diversification of the home areas. Because of the differences in institutional environment and stage of economic development, return migration within China differ from other countries with regard to driving factors and occupational choice. Finally, perspectives of research on return migration in China were put forward in respect to theory, spatial effects of return migration, and return of new generation rural migrant workers.