Portugal 2010: the return of the country of emigration?

Abstract

For about 15 years between the beginning of the 1990s and the end of the first decade of the twenty first century, Portuguese emigration acquired a status of near-invisibility in addressing migration issues associated with Portugal, both on the part of politicians and academics. Immigration, for many synonymous with developed country, in a context of modernization and economic growth, not only ensured employment for all indigenous people but also needed to fill various sectoral deficits (from the "classics" like those found in construction, public works or in domestic service to the "new ", such as agriculture, some segments of the industry and, increasingly, retail), took almost all the space reserved to the phenomenon of international migration in the political, academic and social agendas.