Human Migrations and Borderland Dynamics: Mapping Research Problems Using Systematic Literature Review

The aim of our analysis is to identify potential interdependences between human migrations (forced population transfers, refugee flows, voluntary migrations) of people into/out of borderlands and the social dynamics of border (and cross-border) areas. We would also like to map the main research problems within this topic of study, as well as the spatial distribution of analyzed cases. We use the method of systematic literature review, following the PRISMA principles. As a source of literature, we use the Scopus database. 1389 records were selected, using the keywords for automatic searching. After three stages of screening, we finally chose 102 items for further quantitative and qualitative analyses. The preliminary conclusions concern the coverage of border areas, studied around the world, identifying the most popular case studies and their temporal dynamics; contexts of investigating human migrations on borderlands and the motivations behind them (climate-, political-, economic-induced).