Desired Temporariness? Serial Family Migration from Vietnam to South Korea

• In Event: 20862 - Section on International Migration Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 8: Migration Experiences in East Asia

Abstract

Migration scholarship predominantly views temporariness as a source of exclusion and precarity. This paper, however, highlights how temporariness in family migration can also create opportunities, giving rise to “serial family migration” - a pattern of repeated, temporary cross-border movement that follows the migration of an earlier family member. This migration is not automatically granted but is made possible because the migrant is a family member of someone already settled, whose invitation plays a crucial role in facilitating their entry. While states formally frame family migration as primarily for caregiving or social support, serial family migration is often driven by work opportunities. Using the case of Vietnamese family members of marriage migrants in South Korea, and drawing from interviews and textual data, I argue that temporariness paradoxically functions as an enabling factor by aligning the interests of established migrants, invited family members, new family members in the host society, and the receiving state. This study advances discussions on temporary labor migration and family migration by illustrating how serial family migration blurs state-assigned immigration categories, as family ties not only facilitate migration but also create pathways to potential employment and permanent migration in desirable destinations.

Author

• Dasom Lee, University of California-San Diego