Failure of "Myth of Homeland": delay of return migration to Albania

Albania is the country with the highest migration flow in Europe with a multifaceted Diaspora. The increasing flows of asylum-seekers during the last three years have re-brought Albanian migration to the attention of international and European context. The Albanians "economic asylum seekers" were labor emigrants who were self-nominated so in order to incentivize their accommodation and a tactic to be admitted in Germany and other EU member countries. The almost three decade's experience of Albanians' migration shows that some of the myths which inspired, encouraged and pushed Albanians to leave their country after 1990 failed to be realized. Most of people who emigrated to Greece, Italy and other Western countries were motivated by their desires to ensure a better education for their children. Three decades later, the gap between expectations of the parents and education of their children is visible. Employment, rather than education, seems to be the life path of Albanian migrants second generation. The myth of children education remained only a myth. Albania experienced a delay in the return of successful emigrants. Return migration first became significant in 2005 and the increase in returned migrants started to be a trend of Albanian migration after 2008. However, the ideology of return has mostly been the ideology of failure. The domination of failure was explicable in the conditions of the illegal emigration, during the first decade of Albania's contemporary migration. After 1999, as the immigration legislation of Italy and Greece became more liberal and favorable, the rhythms of forced return started to decrease. The recent trend to revert to the ideology of success is also related with some positive features of the migration of Albanians and the collapse of the so-called "myths" about their emigration: the replacement of myth of demon and criminal by the myth of neighbor; the replacement of the myth of usurper of the jobs of the natives by the myth of competitor; and the replacement of the myth of burden on welfare system by the myth of sponsor of the system, as the Albanian emigrants contribute to the receiving countries as tax payers.