Contribution of our Junior Partner Viktoria Chatzara and our Associate Sotiria Bouranta to the Second Edition of “International Immigration and Nationality Law”, Greek law chapter published by Juris Publishing.
Introduction
Immigration has emerged during the last two decades, and even more dramatically
during the last four years, as a major social issue in Greece, with serious political,
social, and economic repercussions.1 Historically, Greece, since its establishment as
an independent country, has been an immigrant “export” country with hundreds
of thousands of Greek citizens trying to find and shape a better future for themselves
in foreign countries, not only in Europe, but in the United States and Australia as
well.
It is estimated that, between 1881 and 1951, 12 per cent of the Greek population
immigrated to countries such as the United States, Australia, France, Belgium,
and Germany. During recent years, in the course of the financial crisis in Greece, a
new immigration “wave” has been recorded, particularly in connection with young
people with high education, seeking to enter the work market under more favorable
circumstances (known as “brain-drain”).
Immigration to Greece is a rather modern historical phenomenon. Initially, it was
the collapse of the Communist regimes in the Balkans and Central and Eastern
Europe that caused Greece to experience mass immigration of a clandestine or
illegal nature, mainly from the Balkan states. More recently, however, the main
immigrant ethnic groups consist of Asian nationalities, with the crises in Syria
and, more recently, in Afghanistan, playing a dominant role in this relevance,
whereas increases in flows of political asylum seekers have led to the emergence
of immigration as a major social and political issue.
For the full chapter “International Immigration and Nationality Law”, please Download: 