Comparative study of Russian highly skilled immigrants in the United States of America and in European Union (example: Italy)

Based on the problem of thousands of educated Russians leaving their country for work in the United States of America or in European Union, I pose the following main research question which will guide me through the research and work of composing this Master thesis: to what extent is keeping the relation with the motherland and keeping identity and belonging (diaspora) helps Russian immigrants integrate or slows down the process of integration into the host society. The main research question will be supported by the sub-questions, which will guide chapters two, three and four respectively: 1. how do theories of migration could be translated into the “Russian” context and what is the key theory for this research? 2. to what extent the American legal framework is beneficial or discriminatory towards Russian highly skilled immigrants? 3. to what extent the European (Italian) legal framework is beneficial or discriminatory towards Russian highly skilled immigrants? The structure of this thesis will include an introductory chapter, a common chapter which introduces different migration theories and their intersections, along with a literature review of the issue, a chapter devoted to the case study of highly skilled immigration of Russians to the United States of America, a chapter devoted to the case study of highly skilled immigration of Russians to Italy, a chapter analyzing convergence and divergence in legal framework, and a concluding chapter analyzing the integration of Russians in two regions. The quantitative data for this research such as demographic information about the immigrant populations will be gathered via the national Censuses and from other formal collection bodies. The qualitative data in this field can be gathered by analyzing historical data on Russian emigration, current scientific articles on international migration, immigration laws, data provided by international organizations dealing with the international migration, such as IOM (International Organization for Migration), media resources and popular social media sites and networking platforms, such as LinkedIn, Twitter, AmBAR, InterNations, etc.