Migration
Migration means a change of residence that involves crossing a settlement boundary. Internal migration refers to the movement of people within a country, while international migration refers to the movement of people across national borders. Regarding the direction of migration, we can distinguish between emigration, immigration, return migration, pendulum migration and circular migration. Depending on the nature of migration, it can be permanent or temporary, short-term or long-term. The most generally accepted principle for distinguishing the latter is given by the 1998 United Nations recommendations on statistics of international migration, according to which an international migrant is a person who moves to a country other than that of his or her usual residence for a period of at least twelve months. Furthermore, depending on whether the change of location complies with the laws of the destination country or not, we can talk about regular and irregular or illegal migration. With regards to the causes of migration, it could be voluntary or forced. The motivations behind migration can be examined in more detail by taking into account the push factors of the country of origin and the pull factors of the country of destination. The difference between the number of persons having entered the territory and the number of people having left the territory in the course of the year is called migration balance.