Return migration and ageing: Introduction to a Special Issue

Whilst the mainstream literature on return migration focuses on issues of the reintegration of younger returnees, their families and linkages to development, attention to older returnees remains scarce. In this Special Issue, we shift focus to the diversifying realities of return in older age by extending debates on the theory and practice of return and non-return in older age. We argue that research on return migration and ageing needs to be examined in various contexts across the globe. Such research is needed both theoretically and empirically to illuminate the potential of human wellbeing in increasingly larger populations of ageing migrants who decide to return or not, or live their lives in-between, with considerable consequences for themselves, their relatives, and the states and places where they live (trans)locally. The Special Issue contributions push forward this debate by critically interrogating the concepts of preparedness, aspirations and capabilities. We examine these established concepts in return migration theory in a new light through wider questions of identity, the relevance of narrativity, emotions, active agency, and complex processes of transnational return and decisions not to return.