Transnationalism and Vocabularies of Motive in International Migration: The Case of Israelis in the United States

"The great body of recent work on international migration has generally considered immigration as a permanent movement and explored the phenomenon from either a micro or macro perspective. Transnationalism offers a new model that integrates these dichotomized views. This paper uses the perspective of transnationalism to explore the motives of Israeli immigrants in the U.S. Integrating insights from both micro and world systems perspectives, findings emphasize the importance of personal and macro-level networks as well as Israelis' international culture and experience as both facilitating and giving meaning to their presence in the United States."