Paper short abstract:

Focusing on the morality of migration, I will look at two waves of recent migration from Estonia, pointing out the voluntary and involuntary dimensions of such mobilities and the value of migration research in understanding the various ways capitalism can be challenged and rejected – or unintentionally reinforced.

Paper long abstract:

My presentation will be focussing on the morality of migration. I will frame my fieldwork since 2012 amongst Estonian migrants to the UK within a broader taxonomy of morality and mobility. This bridges two waves of recent migration and points out the surprising similarities of and differences between those deported to Siberia or escaping the Soviet terror on boats in 1940s and those self-deporting or escaping the relative lack of wealth on bolstered seats of passenger planes since 1990s. Shaking up such emotionally charged divisions enables a discussion on the moral dimensions of migration throughout the era of nationally bound identity and identity-cushioned nation states. Within such frameworks, new relations between those who are mobile and who remain static are formed, contributing to class formation regionally, nationally and globally. Have such migrants and their diasporic efforts contributed to the undermining of the capitalist nation states or have they reinforced its central tenets? What are the obedient and rebellious dimensions of migration? Can migration and diaspora research tell us anything about rejecting capitalism?