International Migration Institute

Joana Sousa Ribeiro presents his paper 'Beyond migrant lives: the rise and fall of meso-level actors' in Parallel session VI(B) of the conference Examining Migration Dynamics: Networks and Beyond, 24-26 Sept 2013 This paper examines the migration from East European countries to Portugal as a particular pattern of the named `southern European model´ (Baldin-Edwards, 1999; King, 2000). It discusses this sub-system through the analysis of the emergence, development and decline of migratory dynamics. Biographic interviews to physicians and nurses coming from Russia Federation, Moldova and Ukraine to Portugal are explored in order to sustain the debate. These non-EU citizens arrived in Portugal without their credentials recognised before they left their country of origin; as a consequence, they do not benefit from any professional, organizational, or supra-national framework. The analysis of the East European doctors and nurses’ pioneer paths into the Portuguese Health Service underlines the importance of multi-