Greece is one of the main suppliers of two types of skilled people, skilled professionals and students for the west countries for mostly the US and the UK,It has been reported that Greek students are the most mobile among their European counterparts:
“In absolute terms, we find that 4,000 Greeks, 3,900 Germans and 3,600 Italians are pursuing doctoral studies in a Member State other than their country of citizenship.” (Moguerou and Pietrogiacomo, 2008, p.77)
Of course the significance of these statistics is further underlined considering that Greece is a small country of 11 million residents. In addition, Greece had one of the highest ratio (17.8%) of expatriate doctoral candidates in 21
European countries to the total number of doctoral candidates in the country12, consequently 17.8 doctorates were conferred to Greek citizens for every 100 doctorates granted from Greek Universities in 2005. Similarly, Greece also
12
The data exclude Malta and Cyprus that have ratios such as 257% and 144% respectively because of the small number of doctoral candidates domestically.
34 contributes to the PhD graduate and scholar community of the US to a greater extent13.
Many Greek graduates from foreign universities remain abroad to pursue, what is considered a more rewarding – both financially and socially – career outside Greece. As the EU Science and Research Commissioner Janez Potocnik said:
“Greece needs to invest more in research, infrastructures and reward systems in order to safeguard its most precious commodity: its researchers”.
He highlighted examples of Greek scientists14 who have left Greece and Europe to pursue their careers in the US, referring to the ‘Greek paradox’ lying in the talented Greek scientists remaining abroad. This increasing trend of researchers and doctoral holders – educated within Greece or abroad – shows more investments towards developing highly skilled human capital and
knowledge creation. Nevertheless, while there is evidence on R&D personnel on qualification level in Greece, there is no information15 on foreign-educated doctoral graduates, whether they return to Greece and how they compare to their counterparts – PhD holders from Greek universities – in the Greek labour market. As Lianos et al. (2004) note:
13
Comparing the number of doctoral degrees granted in US with the number of doctoral degrees conferred from home universities, Greece has the second highest ratio with 8,6% meaning that for every 100 PhD graduates from Greek Universities, there are 8,6 doctoral degrees conferred to Greek citizens by US universities. In terms of foreign scholars in the US, it was found that in 2005-2006 Greece ranks 26th (with about 605 scholars) in the top 50 countries of origin [(China is leading, with Germany (5th) -5100, France (7th), UK(8th) with 3334 scholars, Italy(9th)] (Moguerou and Pietrogiacomo, 2008,p.104).
14
He used the examples of Michael Dertouzos, former Director of MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science and Fotis Kafatos, Chairman of the Scientific Committee of the European Research Council, former Professor in Harvard University)
15
Greek LFS provides figures for share in the public sector, self-employed but it does not capture research/academic/administrative posts within the public sector and also it does not distinguish doctoral holders from foreign universities
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“no research effort has been devoted to examining how well foreign university graduates perform in the Greek labour market when they return home after completion of their studies”.
The authors reported that the majority of foreign-educated graduates were integrated in the Greek labour market within 18 months after completing their studies abroad, while less than half were employed in occupations that were not relevant to the subject of their studies. However, the results are limited since disciplinary differences and comparison with Greek University graduates was not allowed. In addition, it did not report on PhD graduates.
This study aims to provide further information on Greek PhD graduates who pursued their studies abroad and how they compare to their counterparts, who studied in Greece, in terms of career development. Mobility is intertwined with educational and career decisions of the study participants and thus, it is explored in this study through the discussion on decision making for doctoral education and career choices. At the same time, mobility is employed as a criterion to compare different groups and understand the similarities and differences that these groups present in relation to their careers. For example, it will explore which factors affected doctoral education decisions for the Greek and UK-educated and how this education-led migration experience influenced the subsequent career paths and choices.
In this study, it is explored how participants with current employment abroad (both the ones who remained abroad and the ones who moved abroad after the PhD) compare to those that work in Greece (the ones who were educated and worked in Greece and the ones who returned to Greece after the PhD) in terms of job satisfaction with their employment and utilisation of the doctorate
36 in their career to date. What were the push and pull factors in their career decisions? To what extent personal or structural factors determine employment-led migration?
In the 2000s, the brain drain was reconsidered since studies showed temporary character of movement and the repatriation of the highly skilled, enhancing knowledge transfer, introducing the notion of ‘brain circulation’ (Saxenian, 2000; Johnson and Regets, 1998; Kritz and Caces, 199216). This has triggered research on return of highly skilled migrants to confirm whether migration can entail positive benefits for the home country (Regets, 2001; Gill, 2005). However, it is still a rather neglected area in academic literature, not least due to the difficulty in collecting relevant data (Saxenian, 2002; Moguerou, 2006; Kobayashi and Preston, 2007). Gill (2005) and Delicado (2010) found that there was a great tension in the return decision of scientists and students to their home countries between structural barriers pushing away from home (e.g. under-funded research in academic and private sector, lack of meritocracy) and personal reasons pulling them back (family ties, quality of life, culture, food and climate). Since these issues are explored in the qualitative stage of this study, it is also investigated to some extent whether and under which conditions participants considered returning to Greece in the future to understand further the related barriers and incentives of such a decision.
16
They use the example of Malaysians who after studying in Australia, they returned to their country contributing to knowledge transfer activities.
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