Brexit, uncertainty, and migration decisions
| Published date | 01 August 2023 |
| Author | Daniel Auer,Daniel Tetlow |
| Date | 01 August 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/imig.13079 |
1University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland
2University of Mannheim, Mannheim,
Germany
3Oxford-Berlin Research Partnership, Berlin,
Germany
Correspondence
Daniel Auer, University of Bern, Fabrikstrasse
8, 3012 Bern, Switzerland.
Email: daniel.auer@unibe.ch
Abstract
We leverage the British Brexit referendum decision to leave
the European Union, to demonstrate how changes in uncer-
tainty about a country's future socio-political condition can
impact migratory behaviour. Using official bilateral migration
statistics, we report an excess increase in migration from
the UK to the EU of approximately 16% post-referendum,
compared to movements between the remaining EU coun-
tries over the same period. In addition, we analyse in-depth
interviews conducted with UK migrants in Germany to show
that uncertainty about future bilateral relations, a nega-
tive economic outlook, and perceptions of negative social
consequences in the UK have been by far the most domi-
nant drivers of migration in the post-referendum period.
We further corroborate the effect of changes in uncertainty
on migration-related behaviour with exceptional spikes in
naturalisations, indicating that UK citizens living in other EU
member states are actively taking decisions to mitigate the
negative impact that Brexit is having on their livelihoods.
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Brexit, uncertainty, and migration decisions
Daniel Auer1,2 | Daniel Tetlow3
DOI: 10.1111/imig.13079
Received: 6 February 2022 Revised: 10 October 2022 Accepted: 13 October 2022
INTRODUCTION
Exploring the drivers of migration has been at the centre of research across the social sciences. People move for
numerous reasons, such as escaping conflict or climate change, seeking economic improvement, or pursuing other
personal and family goals (Black et al., 2011; Carling & Collins, 2018; Massey & Espinosa, 1997; Van Hear et al., 2018).
One aspect that has been found to significantly influence migration decisions is subjective beliefs, in particular
perceptions of the future and the uncertainty attached to them (Harris & Todaro, 1970; Stark & Bloom, 1985). Several
micro-level studies have shown that uncertainty about the political, economic, or social state of a home country can
trigger migratory behaviour (Akgüc et al., 2016; Baláz et al., 2016).
88
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License, which permits use,
distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes.
© 2022 The Authors. International Migration published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of International Organization for Migration.
Int Migr. 2023;61:88–103.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/imig
BREXIT MIGRATION89
We leverage the UK Brexit referendum and its subsequent period of political negotiations as a turning point that
altered people's perception of a future life in Britain. That is, the decision by the British voters to leave the European
Union constituted a sudden and isolated shift in the UK's socio-political landscape that altered both the relationship
to the remaining EU member states and the domestic socio-economic prospects. This significantly increased the
uncertainty about the country's future economic performance and social cohesion.
Already prior to the referendum on 23 June 2016, the British public debate was marked by widely differ-
ing forecasts about the economic and political impact of leaving the EU. This was fuelled by negotiations about
border patrols, free trade zones, and regulations, which failed, even to this day, to produce any clear consensus. The
long-term impact of Brexit remains unclear with substantial outstanding issues such as the Northern Irish Protocol.
This study combines qualitative and quantitative findings showing that changes in migration patterns are driven
by an altered perception of future socio-economic and political conditions. Based on official migration statistics in
the United Kingdom and the remaining states of the European Union (EU) and the European Free Trade Association
(EFTA), we show that the vote has led to an annual increase in migration from the UK to the EU by approximately
24,000 persons in the years 2016–2019 (EUROSTAT, 2020). Over the same period, non-UK EU/EFTA migrations –
the natural control group within the free movement area – did not change significantly. Panel regressions allow us
to account for the within-EU migration trend to show that the Brexit referendum has led to an excessive increase
in migration of UK citizens to the EU of approximately 16%. Additional findings show an exceptional impact of the
Brexit vote on naturalisations of British citizens, with a more than 600% increase across continental Europe. To
provide more information on the probable mechanisms at play, we conducted 46 in-depth semi-structured interviews
with British citizens who migrated to Germany between 2007 and 2019. The uncertain implications of the referen-
dum were shown to be the main driving force behind most post-2016 migration events, while personal motivations
dominated prior to the vote. We infer that changes in uncertainty triggered by a national policy change are powerful
enough to alter migratory behaviour at a level that is comparable to economic crises or major political shifts, such as
the EU enlargement of 2004 (Dustmann et al., 2010).
Our study contributes to the literature in several ways: First, to the best of our knowledge, no other study has
so far examined the impact of the referendum on uncertainty-driven migration and naturalisation patterns at the
pan-European level. Second, we combine robust quantitative migration flow data with qualitative interview data to
increase the external validity of probable mechanisms. Third, we answer the call for longitudinal analyses to provide
a more robust picture of changes in migration behaviour. Fourth, we analyse intra-EU mobility of EU/EFTA citizens
outside the UK as a natural control group to account for general trends in European migration, that may otherwise
go unnoticed.
UNCERTAINTY, RISK AND MIGRATION
We draw on two strands of the literature on migration and its drivers. First, most empirical research on the movement
of people has its foundation in standard gravity models of migration. These models assume that (rational) individuals
weigh their utility of staying against the utility of emigrating, whereby the expected pay-off in the destination loca-
tion is lowered by the – monetary and non-monetary – cost of (voluntary) migration (Williams & Baláž, 2012). This is
expressed in the function
Nsrt
=v
rtτ
+u
stδ
+x
srtβ
(1)
where the (log) number of individuals N who migrate from source country s to destination country r in time t is a
function of destination characteristics,
Av
rt
(employment opportunities, quality of life, etc.), source characteristics
Au
st
(wages at origin, social and economic outlook, etc.), and destination-by-source characteristics
Ax
srt
(costs of migrating
from s to r; see Grogger & Hanson, 2011; Ortega & Peri, 2013). Importantly, push-and-pull factors are not limited to
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