La fuga dei cervelli dall’Albania

Albania is one of the countries with the highest migratory rate in the world. In 20 years more than 1/4 of the total population has emigrated abroad. A considerable share of this flows includes highly skilled individuals (Tafaj 2001). This phenomena called “brain drain” has involved about 50% of all lecturers, research staff and intellectuals of the Universities and research institutes of the country since 1990s (CESS 2004). From preliminary studies has emerged as the migration of skilled individuals has particularly affected the middle class of professors and researchers. In the early ‘90s the most important destinations were Greece, Italy, France and Germany, whereas from the second half of the ‘90s, these countries were replaced by Canada and the USA, currently representing the first country in order of importance for the Albanian brain drain . Our study describe the phenomenon of the brain drain in relation to the migratory project. It will also provide a mapping of the destination countries of migrants in relation to their main socio-demographic characteristics.