Lifestyle Migration

Expectations, Aspirations and Experiences

Michaela Benson, Karen O'Reilly

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN: 9781317105152
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

Relatively affluent individuals from various corners of the globe are increasingly choosing to migrate, spurred on by the promise of a better and more fulfilling way of life within their destination. Despite its increasing scale, migration academics have yet to consolidate and establish lifestyle migration as a subfield of theoretical enquiry, until now. This volume offers a dynamic and holistic analysis of contemporary lifestyle migrations, exploring the expectations and aspirations which inform and drive migration alongside the realities of life within the destination. It also recognizes the structural conditions (and constraints) which frame lifestyle migration, laying the groundwork for further intellectual enquiry. Through rich empirical case studies this volume addresses this important and increasingly common form of migration in a manner that will interest scholars of mobility, migration, lifestyle and culture across the social sciences.

Chapter 1
Lifestyle Migration: Escaping to the Good Life?

Karen O’Reilly and Michaela Benson

At first glance, it is not immediately apparent what British migrants in rural France, Swedish seasonal visitors to the Spanish coasts, Westerners in Varanasi, ‘residential tourists’ in Spain and Turkey, and ‘corporate refugees’ in the mid-western United States could possibly have in common. They travel from and to very different places with apparently diverse motivations; they demonstrate distinct mobility patterns, some returning annually while others migrate permanently; finally, they migrate at various points in the life course and in different familial situations. However, the authors in this volume have spent long periods of time living amongst and collecting the in-depth narrative accounts offered by these relatively affluent twenty-first-century migrants. The accounts offered here reveal in intimate detail the meanings, dreams and aspirations that inspired each individual migration trajectory, the impetus supplied by personal tragedy or simply the dread of more of the same, and the inspiration provided by specific landscapes. What is revealed is the singularity of a fascinating phenomenon sharing several important themes in common, albeit with disparate threads, with the common pursuit of the ‘good life’ uniting these lifestyle migrants.

The chapters in this collection explore the lives and lifestyle choices of a range of contemporary migrants, including both international migrants and domestic, downsizing, migrants, backpackers and retirement migrants, second-home owners and those in cross-cultural marriages, and reveal a common narrative through which respondents render their lives meaningful (Cortazzi 2001). Each and every one of these mobile individuals presents migration as a route to a better and more fulfilling way of life, especially in contrast to the one left behind. This way of life can be distinguished from that sought by other migrants, such as labour migrants, refugees and asylum-seekers, in its emphasis on lifestyle choices specific to individuals of the developed world; migration for these migrants is often an antimodern, escapist, self-realization project, a search for the intangible ‘good life’ (Benson and O’Reilly forthcoming).

The volume offers a dynamic and holistic analysis of contemporary lifestyle migration, incorporating decision-making processes and experiences of migration (and continuing mobility and settlement). It demonstrates similarities in rhetoric, as well as the disparate ways migrants imagine a better way of life, the places where they hope to find it, the ways in which they try to realize it, and the realities and experiences of everyday life following migration. Several of the chapters also contextualize migrations, exploring how lifestyle goals emerge from individual histories as well as from specific historical and material conditions. As a whole this volume thus illustrates some of the impacts and impetuses of global social transformations and the ways individuals and groups interpret and respond to changing circumstances (Castles 2008).

Lifestyle Migration as a Conceptual Framework

Despite the significant and increasing incidence of various privileged forms of migration (with an increasing number of locations involved as both sending communities and destinations), in general they remain poorly understood and collectively conceptualized (Amit 2007). Previous research has attempted to link the mobilities to wider phenomena using umbrella concepts such as retirement migration, leisure migration, (international) counterurbanization, second-home ownership, amenity-seeking and seasonal migration (Buller and Hoggart 1994; King et al. 2000; Rodríguez et al. 2005; Casado-Díaz 2006). As a result of their restricted scope, to date none of these conceptualizations has succeeded in uniting the various elements of what we believe is a wider phenomenon or thereby addressing its full complexity. We are therefore using lifestyle migration as a conceptual framework, through which to examine both the similarities and differences within this growing trend as well as to begin to draw attention to its location in wider structural and historical forces and its local and global impacts. To offer a dynamic definition, which remains open to amendment in the light of new empirical data, lifestyle migration is the spatial mobility of relatively affluent individuals of all ages, moving either part-time or full-time to places that are meaningful because, for various reasons, they offer the potential of a better quality of life (Benson and O’Reilly forthcoming).

The different lifestyles sought by respondents in the chapters in this volume share some fundamental features, including alternative lifestyles (the ‘good’ or ‘simple’ life), escape from individual and community histories, or from changing circumstances, and the opportunity for self-realization. These are often reflected in the migrants’ everyday lives in the new destination. Lifestyles following migration thus involve the (re)negotiation of the work-life balance, the pursuit of a good quality of life and freedom from prior constraints. It is through these strategies of reorientation that the migrants seek the greater good in life; lifestyle migration is thus a search, a project, which continues long after the initial act of migration. Examining these strategies within the context of the wider lifestyle choices that individuals make in their daily lives both before and after migration enables migration to be seen as a part of the individual’s trajectory through life, avoiding a narrow focus on the decision to migrate (which is often reconstructed after the event), and concentrating instead on the entire migratory process as it develops across space and over time (Castles 2008).

However, these personalized stories of what appears to be a typically Baumanesque pursuit of the individual good life (Bauman 2008) must also be understood within their wider sociological, historical and material contexts. The search for a better way of life, which on the surface appears no different to that held by all migrants, is distinctive, reflecting the wider lifestyle choices that individuals in the late, liquid or post-modern world make on a daily basis. Indeed, although personalized quests for utopia have persisted for centuries, the recent increase in this phenomenon implies it emerges partly as a result of the reflexive assessment of opportunities (whether life will be better here or there) that Giddens (1991) identified as only recently made possible, rather than a direct outcome of relative economic privilege. There are a host of social transformations that have given rise to, or enabled, this type of migration and which explain its emergence as a distinct phenomenon over the last 50 or 60 years, These include, for example, globalization, individualization, increased mobility and ease of movement, flexibility in working lives, and increases in global relative wealth (Benson and O’Reilly forthcoming; cf. Giddens 1991; Bauman 2000; Amit 2007; Urry 2007). Finally, the material and social construction of particular places offering an alternative way of living is crucial; this is what explains the exact destinations chosen, revealing the role of imagination, myth and landscape within the decision to migrate.

Explaining ‘Lifestyle’

The stories here – from middle-class professionals in the United States escaping the drudgery of city living, to young Westerners seeking spiritual enlightenment (or good vibrations) in India; from second-home owners constantly on the move between two or more homes, to British people in rural France, who only leave once a year to visit friends and family – reflect the drive towards a better way of life, the meaningfulness and values ascribed to particular places, but also the potential for self-realization that is embedded within the notion of spatial mobility. The ‘good life’ takes many shapes and forms; narratives articulate ongoing quests to seek refuge from what they describe as the shallowness, individualism, risk and insecurity of contemporary (Western) lifestyles in the perceived authenticity of meaningful places. As the examples presented in this book (as well as many previous studies) demonstrate, lifestyle migration is about escape, escape from somewhere and something, while simultaneously an escape to self-fulfilment and a new life – a recreation, restoration or rediscovery of oneself, of personal potential or of one’s ‘true’ desires.

The Quest for a Better Way of Life

Lifestyle migrants’ quest for a better way of life is a relative endeavour, pitted against negative presentations of life before migration. Migration is therefore described as ‘getting out of the trap’, ‘making a fresh start’, or ‘a new beginning’ (e.g. Helset et al. 2005; Karisto 2005; Salvá Tomás 2005). Overwhelmingly, the migration stories told in these chapters (cf. Benson, Hoey, Nudrali and O’Reilly) include tales of escape, from monotony and routine, or from the individualism, materialism and consumerism of contemporary lifestyles. Sometimes the migrants are fleeing as a result of real experiences such as redundancy, divorce or crime; at other times it is unpredictability and risk in their working lives, uncertainty about economic futures or anxiety about crime that they describe as driving their mobility (Benson this volume; cf. O’Reilly 2007 and Benson forthcoming-a). They want to avoid the futures they both foresee and dread, involving predictable monotony, the burden of debt, lack of security, dead-end jobs or a lonely and isolated retirement (Nudrali and O’Reilly this volume). But in many cases these were only imagined futures, perceptions of a life not worth living had they not migrated (Casado Diaz this volume; Oliver 2008). What is relevant is the way they narrate their migration in terms of a trajectory away from negative lifestyles towards a fuller and more meaningful way of life.

In Korpela’s chapter, on Westerners who sojourn in Varanasi for six months each year, this sense of escape is writ large. These lifestyle migrants wholly and actively reject life in ‘the big, bad West’, condemning voraciously the excessive consumption, stifling working practices, unpalatable futures and daily misery they have willingly fled. Alternatively, they warmly embrace what they perceive as the spiritual and community ethos, the slow pace of life and the closeness to nature provided through the ‘good vibes’ of life in India. The lives the migrants anticipate in the destination thus gain their value in opposition to negative depictions and predictions of life ‘back home’. Desiring refuge or retreat from those personalized and societal-level features of contemporary Western lives discussed above, they seek community, neighbours, family and togetherness with people who share similar ideals (O’Reilly this volume; Casado Diaz this volume; and cf. Oliver 2008; Benson forthcoming-a). As expressed in several chapters (Benson, Casado Diaz, Gustafson, Korpela), they desire a slow and more meaningful way of life that is characterized, at least in part, by leisure and relaxation.

Despite the focus on leisure, some migrants work after migration but they portray this in terms of the improvement to their lives brought about by downshifting or increased autonomy. Many of the migrants express an entrepreneurial spirit, establishing their ‘dream’ businesses or demonstrating their flexibility within the labour market. In these cases, migrants explained that they had wanted to be their own boss; working for themselves was seen as a more fulfilling alternative, allowing them greater control over their working lives (Hoey this volume). Others work in low-paid jobs in order to realize the quality of life they aspired to. In some cases, lifestyle migrants even return to their countries of origin in order to earn enough money to finance their next trip to the migration destination (Korpela this volume). For many of the migrants, establishing a more favourable work–life balance was a key feature of the ‘good life’ of imagined future lives.

But the key feature of the imagined new ‘way of life’ is that it should be more meaningful. A meaningful way of life is often described in terms of authenticity, implying simplicity, purity and originality; it allows migrants to get ‘back to basics’, or to the things that are important in life (Hoey this volume; Korpela this volume; and cf. Benson forthcoming-a). This desire is reflected in migrants’ practices as well as their descriptions of the new life. For example, as described in chapters by Benson, Hoey and Korpela, they celebrate their consumption of locally produced and non-processed foods, of ‘simple’ or ‘pure’ religion, of an unalienated relationship with the products of their labour, and/or of a slow pace of life. Finally, many of the migrants in these chapters emphasize the desire to provide a better way of life for their children, who they wish to protect from the materialism, excessive consumption and insecurity of Western lifestyles (Benson this volume; O’Reilly this volume; and cf. Matthews et al. 2000).

The Rhetoric of Self-realization

Behind the expansive (post-hoc) justifications and rationalizations for migration discussed above lies a belief that spatial mobility in itself enables some form of self-realization. As Caroline Oliver (2007, 2008) has shown for retirement migrants living in Spain, migration can be perceived as an opportunity to recast one’s identity, to wipe clean past mistakes, misadventures, and even ties and commitments (cf. O’Reilly 2000; Amit 2007). Migration is thus aspirational, not only in the sense of what it holds in store for you, but also in terms of what you can become. Nudrali and O’Reilly’s chapter describes the migration of British working-class people living in Didim, Turkey, for whom migration operates as an individualized escape strategy, a turning point in their ‘DIY biographies’. Similarly, Trundle’s chapter explains how ‘Anglo’ women now living in Florence, married to Italian men, had initially travelled to Italy as ‘romance tourists’. Their tales of travel, to a Florence which enabled them to embrace their creative spirits, symbolized also the freedom inherent in the transition phase between childhood and adulthood (and see Korpela this volume). When placed within the context of lives before migration (or lives imagined without migration), narratives of self-realization demonstrate the transformative potential of lifestyle migration (cf. O’Reilly 2000; Oliver 2008). However, as we reveal later in this introduction, it is not so easy in practice for the migrants to shed the skins that are their past lives.

How the migrants understand the decision to migrate and its impact on their lives and identities is also revealing of a wider rhetoric of self-realization. They present themselves as pioneers, breaking new ground, a metaphor underpinned by the belief that they are somehow different, committed to their new lives while others may not be (Benson this volume). Many claim a pioneering spirit, rejoicing in their bravery and courage in making such a move (Korpela this volume); or portraying themselves as worthy risk-takers (Nudrali and O’Reilly this volume). Several migrants’ narratives also emphasize migration as an unmediated personal choice (Trundle this volume), through which they gain personal agency that was otherwise out of their reach (Oliver 2008). Finally, migration may emerge as a response to some kind of personal crisis, a watershed event in life (Hoey 2005, this volume; Benson forthcoming-a). Ironically, their migration to escape the horrors of the contemporary world, many of which stem from excessive individualism, is facilitated and explained precisely by the migrants’ own individuality.

Geographies of Meaning

One theme that unites the chapters in this volume is the search for, or move to, specific geographical places which hold certain meanings for the migrants in terms of their potential for self-realization. Lifestyle migrants seek literal and figurative places of asylum or rebirth, characterized as therapeutic (Hoey 2007, this volume), as self-making and enabling (Korpela this volume; Nudrali and O’Reilly this volume; Trundle this volume), as hedonistic (Casado Diaz this volume; Korpela this volume) and as providing escape. These representations of the destinations chosen were drawn from both personal experiences of the places through prior tourism and travel, but were also derived from wider cultural narratives. They can be categorized under three main headings: the rural idyll, the coastal retreat and the cultural/spiritual attraction (Benson and O’Reilly forthcoming).

Both Benson’s and Hoey’s chapters highlight the role of imaginings of rurality in migration. For Hoey’s downshifting middle-class American workers, the Grand Traverse in rural Michigan has been imagined in the American psyche as a therapeutic and restorative landscape. It is thus through mobility that these lifestyle migrants, whose migration often coincides with a specific watershed event in their lives, restore their health and emotional well-being, but also their faith in the American dream of personal fulfilment. ‘The rural’ offers them the possibility of belonging, but also of self-transformation and personal renewal. Benson’s chapter highlights the persistence of an idealized and romantic rurality – the rural idyll – within the migrants’ renderings of the Lot, arguing that these representations are later reflected in their discussions of how to live following migration (cf. Benson forthcoming-a). By presenting themselves as adhering to the moral principles of rural living, principally community involvement and social integration, they distinguish themselves from other lifestyle migrants.

Alternatively, the most widely studied lifestyle migrants have been heliotropic, retirement (and younger) migrants in the Mediterranean and the southern United States. The chapters by Casado Diaz, Gustafson, Nudrali and O’Reilly, and O’Reilly explore some of these mobilities to coastal destinations. Here the social construction of tourism spaces as places for leisure, pleasure and escape from routine is relevant for migrants’ expectations of their lifestyles post-migration and for their performance of mobility (O’Reilly 2009). Leisured lifestyles and visits to the tourist destination from friends and family facilitate a particular style of sociability in Casado Diaz’s chapter, while Gustafson’s chapter describes migrants who want to have the ‘best of two worlds’, seeking regular dwelling in the good life.

In contrast, Trundle’s chapter tells a tale of the initial enchantment with Florence as a ‘renaissance wonderland’, a unique urban idyll with a long history of culture, which was also characterized, at least for her respondents visiting as young women, by an undeniable spirit of play. Korpela’s chapter similarly describes how Varanasi, a large sprawling city in India, has come to represent ‘good vibrations’ and a more spiritually engaged life (see also D’Andrea 2007). These associations between places and the imaginings of life available there are not just drawn out of the air; they rely on long histories of prior engagements and reflect wider cultural imaginings about particular places. The destinations chosen have culturally specific meanings derived from long histories – for example, Florence as a destination on the Grand Tour (Trundle this volume), and India due to colonialism (Korpela this volume) – which imply the privilege underlying these particular manifestations of lifestyle migration (cf. Amit 2007).

Investigating Everyday Lives

The explanations given for migration (even where reconstructed after the event) are important not only in what they reveal about the motivations behind migration, but also because they provide insights into the lives the migrants envisage leading following migration. Several of the chapters in this collection take as...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Notes on Contributors
• Series Editor S Preface
• 1 Lifestyle Migration: Escaping to the Good Life?
• 2 When a Trip to Adulthood becomes a Lifestyle: Western Lifestyle Migrants in Varanasi, India
• 3 Pursuing the Good Life: American Narratives of Travel and a Search for Refuge
• 4 Romance Tourists, Foreign Wives or Retirement Migrants? Cross-cultural Marriage in Florence, Italy
• 5 Your Home in Spain: Residential Strategies in International Retirement Migration
• 6 Social Capital in the Sun: Bonding and Bridging Social Capital among British Retirees
• 7 The Children of the Hunters: Self-realization Projects and Class Reproduction
• 8 A Desire for Difference: British Lifestyle Migration to Southwest France
• 9 Taking the Risk: The British in Didim, Turkey
• 10 Lifestyle Afterthoughts
• Index