Yves Schaeffer (p)

Compact development is promoted by many cities on the grounds of enhancing urban sustainability and livability (Haarhoff et al., 2016). It is expected to reduce sprawl, increase the efficiency of urban service delivery and improve social interactions and public health. However all these benefits are not guaranteed: Liao et al. (2015) argued that the success of compact development plans will ultimately depend on public demand for high-density developments and that scholars must understand residents’ preferences towards them. We can add to this that success will also depend on maintaining this demand in the long term. Planners concerned with investments in compact development should look beyond current generations and speculate on the preferences and aspirations of futures generations.
The study of intergenerational transmission of residential preferences may help to establish such conjectures. The main question asked here is whether people who grow up in dense neighborhoods are more likely to live in dense neighborhoods later in life. If so, we would have reason to believe that a compact city model that attracts current families is likely to remain attractive to future families. To date, this issue has been addressed by very few studies. While ÆRØ (2006) found that people tend to move to residential districts that are similar to where they grew up, Chen and Lin (2011) concluded that those who had lived in high-density locations during their growth periods pursued lower density locations later in life. These contradictory studies suffer a similar limit: they are cross-sectional retrospective surveys based on relatively small samples affected by selection bias.
In this paper, panel econometric models are estimated on large subsamples retrieved from a longitudinal database, l’Echantillon Démographique Permanent, built by the French National Institute of Statistical and Economic Studies (Insee). This database provides demographics and residential locations for a national sample of individuals surveyed at several census dates between 1968 and 2015. Cohorts of individuals can be observed as children in a census and as autonomous adults in subsequent censuses. We conclude that experiencing a higher density as a child increases the likelihood of selecting a high density neighborhood later in life. In addition, the most recent dynamic panel data methods (Moral-Bonito et al., 2018) are applied and show path dependencies insofar as the density experienced by an adult at a given period also affects the density selected by this adult at the following period.

Miriam Marcen (p), Marina Morales

This paper studies the role of cultural differences on the choice of migrants’ destination country. In order to examine this issue, we ran two separate analysis considering on the data concerning international migration flow from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development statistics and data on international migration stock obtained from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series International. Cultural differences between the home and host-countries are measured for observable characteristics that reveal fertility, marriage, and employment cultures among others. Results show a negative and statistically significant relationship between cultural differences and migration flow. This relationship varies when the physical distance is considered pointing to a non-statistically significant effect of cultural differences for migration flow among bordering (neighboring) countries. Interestingly enough, after considering migrant’s heterogeneity in the analysis of migration stock, we detected that cultural differences matter in the location decision depending on whether individuals reside in bordering or non-bordering countries. Our findings suggest that cultural differences play a role in the destination country choice while trying to mitigate the cultural dilemma in migration.

Dimitrios Karkanis (p), Evgenia Anastasiou, Konstantina Ragazou, Marie Noëlle Duquenne

The cohesion of the European Union has undeniably been challenged by the recent global financial crisis, highlighting the slowing down of its integration model as well as the various dissensions between the member countries. At the same time, the EU is facing an additional challenge concerning the massive influx of migrants and more particularly refugees mainly due to the conflicts in the Middle East and Africa. This relatively recent situation inevitably raises the question of their reception and integration in destination countries. The proper understanding of the present diversification of refugee flows during the two last decades – a kind of human flow that significantly differs from economic migration flows both in terms of intensity and migratory route - could potentially contribute to develop more appropriate policies into the spatially changing European Union.
In this context, the objective of the present study is, through the implementation of an augmented gravity model, to identify the spatial, sociopolitical and institutional factors lying behind the asylum flows inside the EU27 area during the 2000-2017 period. The data relative to the numbers of refugees and asylum seekers by country of origin and destination are provided by the UNHCR. In comparison with other official sources as Eurostat and Frontex, the UNHCR database is obviously the most detailed one, covering also a longer period of time. This is fundamental in order to detect the main changes during the period 2000-2017 as regards not only the countries of origin and destination but also the migratory routes.
The empirical findings reveal the discouraging role of the economic crisis towards the asylum flows inside the EU. However, the improving interconnectivity between the European countries, through the gradual integration process, seems to positively contribute towards asylum assignment, demonstrating that the migration process is reshaped by the contemporary spatialities. Once again, space is not neutral: landlocked countries act as nodes to attract asylum flows, while island countries often serve as host poles for asylum seekers due to a) their relative geographic proximity to the conflict zones of the Middle East or b) their economic development levels. Finally, the demographic factor remains crucial: the population of registered refugees among the EU countries acts as an “attraction mass”, in terms of natural sciences, of new asylum applications, showing that human flows moving away from conflict zones are generally directed to countries where there exists a greater chance of asylum application approvals.

Arim Tak (p), Chanyoung Lee (p)

Low fertility has been emerging as an important issue in Korea. The total fertility was o.98 in 2018. Despite considerable financial supports to encourage childbirth, the fertility rate is still on the decline. We are seriously aware of the problem of declining fertility rate and have been preparing countermeasures at central and local levels. However, since the fertility rate can be influenced by socio-economic policy factors, even if the effect of a particular policy is positive, it may be offset by other factors. Under those circumstances, this study analyzed the effect of public services and labor market conditions in the region on the low fertility rate to find out the fundamental cause of the declining fertility rate. We used panel data from 16 metropolitan provinces and 188 municipal areas from 2003 to 2016. The results show that the better accessibility to childcare and the more stable working environment of women, it has positive impact on childbirth. we found that the more number of infrastructures such as the number of medical infrastructures, the number of social welfare facilities, and the number of cultural infrastructures, they have a positive effect on birth. Therefore, facing the problem of low fertility, we need to implement birth policy to improve the overall quality of life rather than the policy providing quantitative incentive scheme.