Based on survey and interview data from over 2,500 potential immigrants from mainland China, in this event, Jacob Thomas will expose novel data, knowledge, and theories about potential immigrants – those who might have immigrated but did not due to social forces and immigration policy. Drawing from his book, he will examine three mechanisms: governments denying visas, policies and social forces deterring many from applying for visas and potential immigrants becoming disenchanted with immigration. In his research, Thomas expands the push-pull model to a push-retain-pull-repel model that helps explain why many do not immigrate. Potential immigrants confront an (im)mobility paradox: factors facilitating migration – socioeconomic resources and social ties – also hinder it. Finally, he will illustrate how different types of potential immigrants are socioeconomically stratified relative to one another and to immigrants.

Jacob Thomas is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Corvinus University of Budapest in Europe and a Research Fellow at Princeton University's Center for Migration and Development. He was previously a Research Assistant Professor at the Department of Sociology of the Chinese University of Hong Kong and a Postdoctoral Research Associate at Princeton University's Center for Migration and Development. His book The Denied, the Deterred and the Disenchanted: Why a Variety of Potential Emigrants Never Immigrated, has been published by Cambridge University Press.