Temporariness has become an increasingly salient feature in international migration that presents itself as fragmented, non-linear, including different intermediate stops and multiple returns and new departures. This book proposes a new analytical framework that brings together the role of policies defining migrants as temporary and the role of migrant’s own agency in perceiving their migration project as temporary or permanent. The proposed analytical framework is conceived taking into account both low-skill and high-skilled, legal and irregular migratory flows, and also different visa and citizenship regimes. The aim of this book is to highlight the interplay between the lived reality and the policy and legal concepts on temporary migration and point out to the tensions and contradictions inherent in the latter. Contributions to this book cover different country cases including Canada, Australia, Nepal, Taiwan and Germany, Italy, Russia, and several former Soviet Republics as well as a variety of sectors ranging from opera singers to construction and domestic workers.

This book will be a key resource for academics, researchers, and advanced students of sociology, politics, law, migration studies, and ethnic and racial studies. It was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies.