As part of the PopMed-SuSDeV secondment at the IQS, Barcelona, Dr Martina Bofulin from the Slovenian Migration Institute (ZRC SAZU) held a seminar on the study of migration flows to China with a focus on lesser-known migrants from the Western periphery. The seminar took place on 15 November 2024 as part of the IQS seminar series and presented some of the research results of the recent study conducted by the Slovenian team during their secondment at Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University (XJTLU), China between March and April 2024.

The presentation focussed on Slovenian citizens in 21st century China. The author explored their small number and national non-recognition as a distinctiveness in the rapidly developing research field of immigration in China. She dealt with the immigration of Slovenian citizens by contrasting it with the economy in China and proposed the analytical categories of “managers” and “entrepreneurs”. While the managers are associated with local emplacement based on the production units of Slovenian companies in China and the pursuit of national group affiliation, the entrepreneurs are related to the search for niche opportunities in the vast Chinese market. The author also addressed the temporality of this migration process and showed the interplay between macroeconomic factors and the individual decisions of its protagonists.