The golden record's location on Voyager (middle-bottom-left)
The Voyager Golden Records are two phonograph records that were included aboard both Voyager spacecraft launched in 1977.
The records contain sounds and images selected to portray the diversity
of life and culture on Earth, and are intended for any intelligent extraterrestrial life form who may find them. The records are a sort of time capsule.
The Voyager 1 probe is currently the farthest human-made object from Earth. Both Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 have reached interstellar space, the region between stars where the galactic plasma is present. Like their predecessors Pioneer 10 and 11, which featured a simple plaque, both Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 were launched by NASA with a message aboard—a kind of time capsule, intended to communicate to extraterrestrials a story of the world of humans on Earth.
This is a present from a small,
distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our images, our
music, our thoughts and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our
time so we may live into yours.
The contents of the record were selected for NASA by a committee chaired by Carl Sagan of Cornell University.
The selection of content for the record took almost a year. Sagan and
his associates assembled 115 images and a variety of natural sounds,
such as those made by surf, wind, thunder and animals (including the
songs of birds and whales).
To this they added audio content to represent humanity: spoken
greetings in 55 ancient and modern languages, including a spoken
greeting in English by U.N.Secretary-GeneralKurt Waldheim and a greeting by Sagan's six-year-old son, Nick; other human sounds, like footsteps and laughter (Sagan's); the inspirational message Per aspera ad astra in Morse code; and musical selections from different cultures and eras. The record also includes a printed message from U.S. president Jimmy Carter.
The collection of images includes many photographs and diagrams both
in black and white, and color. The first images are of scientific
interest, showing mathematical and physical quantities, the Solar System and its planets, DNA, and human anatomy and reproduction.
Care was taken to include not only pictures of humanity, but also some
of animals, insects, plants and landscapes. Images of humanity depict a
broad range of cultures. These images show food, architecture, and
humans in portraits as well as going about their day-to-day lives. Many
pictures are annotated with one or more indications of scales of time,
size, or mass. Some images contain indications of chemical composition.
All measures used on the pictures are defined in the first few images
using physical references that are likely to be consistent anywhere in
the universe.
The Golden Record also carries an hour-long recording of the brainwaves of Ann Druyan.
During the recording of the brainwaves, Druyan thought of many topics,
including Earth's history, civilizations and the problems they face, and
what it was like to fall in love.
After NASA had received criticism over the nudity on the Pioneer plaque
(line drawings of a naked man and woman), the agency chose not to allow
Sagan and his colleagues to include a photograph of a nude man and
woman on the record. Instead, only a silhouette of the couple was
included. However, the record does contain "Diagram of vertebrate evolution", by Jon Lomberg, with drawings of an anatomically correct naked male and naked female, showing external organs.
The person waving on the diagram was also changed: on the Pioneer
plaque, the man is waving, while on the "Vertebrate evolution" image,
the woman is waving.
The pulsar map and hydrogen molecule diagram are shared in common with the Pioneer plaque.
The 115 images are encoded in analogue form and composed of 512
vertical lines. The remainder of the record is audio, designed to be
played at 16+2⁄3 revolutions per minute.
Jimmy Iovine, who was still early in his career as a music producer, served as sound engineer for the project at the recommendation of John Lennon, who was contacted to contribute but was unable to take part.
Sagan's team wanted to include the Beatles song "Here Comes the Sun" on the record, but the record company EMI, which held the copyrights, declined. In the 1978 book Murmurs of Earth,
the failure to secure permission for the song is cited as one of the
legal challenges faced by the team compiling the Voyager Golden Record.
In the book, Sagan said that the Beatles favoured the idea, but "[they]
did not own the copyright, and the legal status of the piece seemed too
murky to risk."
When asked about the obstacle presented by EMI with regard to "Here
Comes the Sun", despite the artists' wishes, Ann Druyan said in 2015:
"Yeah, that was one of those cases of having to see the tragedy of our
planet. Here's a chance to send a piece of music into the distant future
and distant time, and to give it this kind of immortality, and they're
worried about money ... we got this telegram [from EMI] saying that it
will be $50,000 per record for two records, and the entire Voyager
record cost $18,000 to produce."
However, this was denied in 2017 by Timothy Ferris; in his
recollection, "Here Comes the Sun" was never considered for inclusion.
In July 2015, NASA uploaded the audio contents of the record to the audio streaming service SoundCloud.
This is a photograph of Egypt, Red Sea, Sinai Peninsula and the Nile
from Earth orbit annotated with chemical composition of Earth's
atmosphere.
Playback
Explanation of the Voyager record cover diagram, as provided by NASA
In the upper left-hand corner of the record cover is a drawing of the phonograph record
and the stylus carried with it. The stylus is in the correct position
to play the record from the beginning. Written around it in binary notation
is the correct time of one rotation of the record, 3.6 seconds,
expressed in time units of 0.70 billionths of a second, the time period
associated with a fundamental transition of the hydrogen atom.
The drawing indicates that the record should be played from the outside
in. Below this drawing is a side view of the record and stylus, with a
binary number giving the time to play one side of the record—about an
hour (more precisely, between 53 and 54 minutes).
The information in the upper right-hand portion of the cover is
designed to show how pictures are to be constructed from the recorded
signals. The top drawing shows the typical signal that occurs at the
start of a picture. The picture is made from this signal, which traces
the picture as a series of vertical lines, similar to analog television
(in which the picture is a series of horizontal lines). Picture lines
1, 2 and 3 are noted in binary numbers, and the duration of one of the
"picture lines," about 8 milliseconds, is noted. The drawing immediately
below shows how these lines are to be drawn vertically, with staggered
"interlace" to give the correct picture rendition. Immediately below
this is a drawing of an entire picture raster, showing that there are 512 (29)
vertical lines in a complete picture. Immediately below this is a
replica of the first picture on the record to permit the recipients to
verify that they are decoding the signals correctly. A circle was used
in this picture to ensure that the recipients use the correct ratio of
horizontal to vertical height in picture reconstruction.
Color images were represented by three images in sequence, one each for
red, green, and blue components of the image. A color image of the
spectrum of the sun was included for calibration purposes.
The drawing in the lower left-hand corner of the cover is the
pulsar map previously sent as part of the plaques on Pioneers 10 and 11.
It shows the location of the Solar System with respect to 14 pulsars, whose precise periods are given. The drawing containing two circles in the lower right-hand corner is a drawing of the hydrogen atom
in its two lowest states, with a connecting line and digit 1 to
indicate that the time interval associated with the transition from one
state to the other is to be used as the fundamental time scale, both for
the time given on the cover and in the decoded pictures.
Manufacturing
Gold
plating at the James G. Lee Record Processing center in Gardena,
California (left), and preparation for the record's packaging before the
launch of Voyager 2
Blank records were provided by the Pyral S.A. of Créteil, France. CBS Records contracted the JVC Cutting Center in Boulder, Colorado to cut the lacquer masters which were then sent to the James G. Lee record-processing center in Gardena, California
to cut and gold-plate eight Voyager records. After the records were
plated they were mounted in aluminum containers and delivered to JPL.
The record is constructed of gold-plated copper and is 12 inches (30 cm) in diameter. The record's cover is aluminum and electroplated upon it is an ultra-pure sample of the isotope uranium-238. Uranium-238 has a half-life of 4.468 billion years. It is possible (e.g., via mass spectrometry)
that a civilization that encounters the record will be able to use the
ratio of remaining uranium to the other elements to determine the age of
the record.
The records also had the inscription "To the makers of music – all worlds, all times"
hand-etched on its surface. The inscription was located in the "takeout
grooves", an area of the record between the label and playable surface.
Since this was not in the original specifications, the record was
initially rejected, to be replaced with a blank disc. Sagan later
convinced the administrator to include the record as is.
Journey
The golden record is attached to the spacecraft.
Voyager 1 was launched in 1977, passed the orbit of Pluto in 1990, and left the Solar System (in the sense of passing the termination shock) in November 2004. It is now in the Kuiper belt. In about 40,000 years, it and Voyager 2 will each come to within about 1.8 light-years of two separate stars: Voyager 1 will have approached star Gliese 445, located in the constellation Camelopardalis, and Voyager 2 will have approached star Ross 248, located in the constellation of Andromeda.
In March 2012, Voyager 1 was over 17.9 billion km from the Sun and traveling at a speed of 3.6 AU per year (approximately 61,000 km/h (38,000 mph)), while Voyager 2 was over 14.7 billion km away and moving at about 3.3 AU per year (approximately 56,000 km/h (35,000 mph)).
In May 2005, it was reported that Voyager 1 had entered the heliosheath,
the region beyond the termination shock. The termination shock is where
the solar wind, a thin stream of electrically charged gas blowing
continuously outward from the Sun, is slowed by pressure from gas
between the stars. At the termination shock, the solar wind slows
abruptly from its average speed of 300–700 km/s (670,000–1,570,000 mph)
and becomes denser and hotter.
Of the eleven instruments carried on Voyager 1, four are
still operational and continue to send back data. It is expected that
there will be insufficient energy to power any of the instruments beyond
2025.
On September 12, 2013, NASA announced that Voyager 1 had left the heliosheath and entered interstellar space, although it still remains within the Sun's gravitational sphere of influence.
Several works of science fiction, such as the 1979 film Star Trek: The Motion Picture, the 1984 film Starman, the 2000 film Battlefield Earth, and the animated television show Beast Wars feature extraterrestrial intelligences discovering the record and turning their attention to Earth as a result.
In a Saturday Night Live segment ("Next Week in Review") in episode 64 of the show's third season (originally aired 1978), Steve Martin's
character, a psychic named Cocuwa, announced that extraterrestrials had
responded to the record with the four words "Send more Chuck Berry".
It was also referenced in the 2005 animation known as Fafner in the Azure as being one of the objects that the aliens discover.
In 2014, the podcastThe Truth produced an episode titled "Voyager Found", where the Voyager crash-lands on the property of Dawn and Tad, an alien couple, who decide to play the record.
In 2014, composer Dario Marianelli wrote a Voyager Concerto for Violin and Orchestra, which was premiered in Brisbane, Australia in November that year by the Queensland Symphony Orchestra
(QSO), and in Stockholm the following April (2015), by the Swedish
Radio Orchestra. The QSO, with British violinist Jack Liebeck, performed
the piece over several concerts at the Queensland Performing Arts
Centre; each performance was preceded by a lecture by physicist
professor Brian Cox,
who talked at length about NASA's Voyager Mission, and introduced the
concerto. The 30-minute piece, in one single movement, depicts the
journey of the Voyager through the Solar System, using as references some of the music that is on board each probe, on the Golden Record.
The Voyager probes are a visitable landmark in the 2014 space-trading/simulation game Elite: Dangerous. It is possible to see the golden record on the probe models.
English folk artist Jim Moray released the song "Sounds of Earth" on his 2016 album Upcetera.
Named after the golden record, it tells the story of the project with a
particular focus on the relationship between Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan.
Grace Petrie, an English songwriter and folk singer, released a track by the name of "The Golden Record" on her 2017 album Heart First Aid Kit,
which is a love song based upon the story of Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan,
referencing the additions made to the record intended to depict the
sound of human beings in love.
The 2017 documentary The Farthest, directed by Emer Reynolds, features those who worked on the Golden Record and Voyager missions including Frank Drake, Timothy Ferris, and Nick Sagan.
Troop Zero, a 2019 American comedy-drama film, inspired by Alibar's 2010 play Christmas and Jubilee Behold The Meteor Shower, focuses on the story of a scout group competing to have their voices included on the Golden Record.
The 2019 death metal album Death Atlas by Cattle Decapitation opens with a track that samples the greetings on the golden record in their entirety.
The 2020 indie rock album Possession by Joywave features sounds from the record.
Publications
Most
of the images used on the record (reproduced in black and white),
together with information about its compilation, can be found in the
1978 book Murmurs of Earth: The Voyager Interstellar Record by Carl Sagan, F. D. Drake, Ann Druyan, Timothy Ferris, Jon Lomberg, and Linda Salzman. A CD-ROM version was issued by Warner New Media in 1992. Author Ann Druyan, who later married Carl Sagan, wrote about the Voyager Record in the epilogue of Sagan's final book Billions and Billions (1997).
To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the record, Ozma Records launched a Kickstarter project to release the record contents in LP format as part of a box set also containing a hardcover book, turntable slipmat, and art print.
The Kickstarter was successfully funded with over $1.4 million raised.
Ozma Records then produced another edition of the three-disc LP vinyl
record box set that also includes the audio content of the Golden
Record, softcover book containing the images encoded on the record,
images sent back by Voyager, commentary from Ferris, art print,
turntable slipmat, and a collector's box. This edition was released in
February 2018 along with a 2xCD-Book edition. In January 2018, Ozma Records' "Voyager Golden Record; 40th Anniversary Edition" won a Grammy Award for best boxed or limited-edition package.
Immigration to Europe has a long history, but increased substantially in the later 20th century.
Western Europe countries, especially, saw high growth in immigration after World War II and many European nations today (particularly those of the EU-15)
have sizeable immigrant populations, both of European and non-European
origin. In contemporary globalization, migrations to Europe have
accelerated in speed and scale. Over the last decades, there has been an
increase in negative attitudes towards immigration, and many studies
have emphasized marked differences in the strength of anti-immigrant
attitudes among European countries.
Beginning in 2004, the European Union has granted
EU citizens a freedom of movement and residence
within the EU, and the term "immigrant" has since been used to refer to
non-EU citizens, meaning that EU citizens are not to be defined as
immigrants within the EU territory. The European Commission defines
"immigration" as the action by which a person from a non-EU country
establishes his or her usual residence in the territory of an EU country
for a period that is or is expected to be at least twelve months.
Between 2010 and 2013, around 1.4 million non-EU nationals, excluding
asylum seekers and refugees, immigrated into the EU each year using
regular means, with a slight decrease since 2010.
From the late 15th century until the late 1960s and early 1970s, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom were primarily sources of emigration,
sending large numbers of emigrants to the Americas, Australia, Siberia
and Southern Africa. A number also went to other European countries
(notably France, Switzerland, Germany and Belgium). As living standards
in these countries have risen, the trend has reversed and they were a
magnet for immigration (most notably from Morocco, Somalia, Egypt to
Italy and Greece; from Morocco, Algeria and Latin America to Spain and
Portugal; and from Ireland, India, Pakistan, Germany, the United States,
Bangladesh, and Jamaica to the United Kingdom).
Migration within Europe after the 1985 Schengen Agreement
As a result of the Schengen Agreement, signed on June 14, 1985, there is free travel within part of Europe — known as the Schengen area — for all citizens and residents of all 27 member states; however, non-citizens may only do so for tourism purpose, and for up to three months.
Moreover, EU citizens and their families have the right to live and work anywhere within the EU; citizens of non-EU or non-EEA states may obtain a Blue Card or long-term residency.
A large proportion of immigrants in western European states have
come from former eastern bloc states in the 1990s, especially in Spain,
Greece, Germany, Italy, Portugal and the United Kingdom. There are
frequently specific migration patterns, with geography, language and
culture playing a role. For example, there are large numbers of Poles who have moved to the United Kingdom and Ireland and Iceland, while Romanians and also Bulgarians have chosen Spain and Italy.
With the earlier of the two recent enlargements of the EU, although
most countries restricted free movement by nationals of the acceding
countries, the United Kingdom did not restrict for the 2004 enlargement of the European Union and received Polish, Latvian and other citizens of the new EU states. Spain was not restricted for the 2007 enlargement of the European Union and received many Romanians and Bulgarians as well other citizens of the new EU states.
Many of these Polish immigrants to the UK have since returned to Poland, after the serious economic crisis in the UK.
Nevertheless, free movement of EU nationals is now an important aspect
of migration within the EU, since there are now 27 member states, and has resulted in serious political tensions between Italy and Romania, since Italy has expressed
the intention of restricting free movement of EU nationals (contrary to
Treaty obligations and the clear jurisprudence of the European Court of
Justice).
Another migration trend has been that of Northern Europeans moving toward Southern Europe.
Citizens from the European Union make up a growing proportion of
immigrants in Spain, coming chiefly from the United Kingdom and Germany,
but also from Italy, France, Portugal, The Netherlands, Belgium, etc.
British authorities estimate that the population of British citizens
living in Spain is much larger than Spanish official figures suggest,
establishing them at about 1,000,000, with 800,000 being permanent
residents. According to the Financial Times, Spain is the most
favoured destination for Western Europeans considering to move from
their own country and seek jobs elsewhere in the EU.
While most immigrant populations in European countries are dominated
by other Europeans, many immigrants and their descendants have ancestral
origins outside the continent. For the former colonial powers France,
Britain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, and Portugal, most immigrants,
and their descendants have ties to former colonies in Africa, the
Americas, and Asia. In addition, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, the
Netherlands, and Belgium recruited Turkish and Moroccan guest workers
beginning in the 1960s, and many current immigrants in those countries
today have ties to such recruitment programs.
Moroccan immigrants also began migrating substantially to Spain and Italy for work opportunities in the 1980s.
In the Scandinavian countries of Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and Finland,
the bulk of non-Western immigrants are refugees and asylum seekers from
the Middle East, East Africa, and other regions of the world arriving
since the 1980s and 1990s.
Increasing globalization has brought a population of students,
professionals, and workers from all over the world into major European
cities, most notably London, Paris, and Frankfurt. The introduction of
the EU Blue Card in May 2009 has further increased the number of skilled professional immigrants from outside of the continent.
Illegal immigration and asylum-seeking in Europe from outside the
continent have been occurring since at least the 1990s. While the
number of migrants was relatively small for years, it began to rise in
2013. In 2015, the number of asylum seekers arriving from outside Europe
increased substantially during the European migrant crisis (see timeline).
However, the EU-Turkey deal enacted in March 2016 dramatically reduced
this number, and anti-immigrant measures starting in 2017 by the Italian
government further cut illegal immigration from the Mediterranean
route.
Some scholars claim that the increase in immigration flows from the 1980s is due to global inequalities between poor and rich countries. In 2017, approximately 825,000 persons acquired citizenship of a member state of the European Union, down from 995,000 in 2016. The largest groups were nationals of Morocco, Albania, India, Turkey and Pakistan. 2.4 million non-EU migrants entered the EU in 2017. In addition, cheaper transportation and more advanced technology have further aided migration.
Immigrants in the Nordic countries in 2000–2020
The
Nordic countries have differed in their approach to immigration. While
Norway and Sweden used to have generous immigration policies, Denmark
and Finland had more restricted immigration. Although both Denmark and
Finland have experienced a significant increase in their immigrant
populations between 2000 and 2020 (6.8% points in Denmark and 5.0% in
Finland), Norway (11.9%) and Sweden (11.0%) have seen far greater
relative increases.
The table below shows the percentage of the total population in
the Nordic countries that are either (1) immigrants or (2) children of
two immigrant parents:
For decades, Danish immigration and integration policy were built
upon the assumption that with the right kind of help, immigrants and
their descendants will eventually tend to the same levels of education
and employment as Danes. This assumption was proved by a 2019 study by
the Danish Immigration Service and the Ministry of Education,
while the second generation non-Western immigrants do better than the
first generation, the third generation of immigrants with non-Western
background do even better education and employment wise than the second
generation. One of the reasons was that second-generation immigrants
from non-Western countries
marry someone from their country of origin and so Danish is not spoken
at home which disadvantages children in school. Thereby the process of
integration has to start from the beginning for each generation.
In January 2015 the "immigrant population" in Norway consisted of
approximately 805,000 people, including 669,000 foreign-born and 136,000
born in Norway to two immigrant parents. This corresponds to 15.6% of
the total population. The cities with the highest share of immigrants are Oslo (32%) and Drammen (27%). The six largest immigrant groups in Norway are Poles, Swedes, Somalis, Lithuanians, Pakistanis and Iraqis.
In the years since 1970, the largest increase in the immigrant population has come from countries in Asia (including Turkey), Africa and South America,
increasing from about 3500 in 1970 to about 300,000 in 2011. In the
same period, the immigrant population from other Nordic countries and Western Europe has increased modestly from around 42,000 to around 130,000.
Immigrants (red) and emigrants (blue), Sweden 1850-2007
In 2014 the "immigrant population" in Sweden consisted of
approximately 2.09 million people, including 1.60 million foreign-born
and 489,000 born in Sweden to two immigrant parents. This corresponds to
21.5% of the total population.
Of the major cities Malmö has the largest immigrant population, estimated to be 41.7% in 2014. However, the smaller municipalities Botkyrka (56.2%), Haparanda (55.5%) and Södertälje (49.4%) all have a higher share of immigrants. In the Swedish capital Stockholm 31.1% (in 2014) of the population are either foreign-born or born in Sweden by two foreign-born parents.
In 2014 127,000 people immigrated to Sweden, while 51,000 left the country. Net immigration was 76,000.
Sweden has been transformed from a nation of emigration ending after World War I to a nation of immigration from World War II onwards. In 2009, Sweden had the fourth largest number of asylum applications in the EU and the largest number per capita after Cyprus and Malta. Immigrants in Sweden are mostly concentrated in the urban areas of Svealand and Götaland and the five largest foreign born populations in Sweden come from Finland, Yugoslavia, Iraq, Poland and Iran.
Immigration has been a major source of population growth and cultural change throughout much of the history of Finland.
The economic, social, and political aspects of immigration have caused
controversy regarding ethnicity, economic benefits, jobs for
non-immigrants, settlement patterns, impact on upward social mobility, crime, and voting behavior.
At the end of 2017, there were 372,802 foreign born people residing in Finland,
which corresponds to 6.8% of the population, while there are 384,123
people with a foreign background, corresponding to 7.0% of the
population.
Proportionally speaking, Finland has had one of the fastest increases
in its foreign-born population between 2000 and 2010 in all of Europe.
The majority of immigrants in Finland settle in the Helsinki area,
although Tampere, Turku and Kuopio have had their share of immigrants in
recent years.
As of 2008, the French national institute of statistics (INSEE)
estimated that 5.3 million foreign-born immigrants and 6.5 million
direct descendants of immigrants (born in France with at least one
immigrant parent) lived in France. This represents a total of 11.8
million, or 19% of the population. In terms of origin, about 5.5 million
are European, four million Maghrebi, one million Sub-Saharan African, and 400,000 Turkish.
Among the 5.3 million foreign-born immigrants, 38% are from Europe, 30%
from Maghreb, 12.5% from Sub-Saharan Africa, 14.2% from Asia and 5.3% from America and Oceania. The most significant countries of origin as of 2008 were Algeria
(713,000), Morocco (653,000), Portugal (580,000), Italy (317,000), Spain
(257,000), Turkey (238,000) and Tunisia (234,000). However, immigration
from Asia (especially China, as well as the former French colonies of
Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos), and from Sub-Saharan Africa (Senegal, Mali,
Nigeria and others), is gaining in importance.
The region with the largest proportion of immigrants is the Île-de-France (Greater Paris), where 40% of immigrants live. Other important regions are Rhône-Alpes (Lyon) and Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (Marseille).
Among the 802,000 newborns in metropolitan France in 2010, 27.3% had at least one foreign-born parent and about one quarter (23.9%) had at least one parent born outside Europe.
Including grandparents; almost 40% of newborns in France between 2006
and 2008 had at least one foreign-born grandparent. (11% were born in
another European country, 16% in Maghreb, and 12% in another region of
the world.)
London has become multiethnic as a result of immigration.
In 2014 the number of people who became naturalised British
citizens rose to a record 140,795 - a 12% increase from the previous
year, and a dramatic increase since 2009. Most new citizens came from Asia (40%) or Africa (32%); the largest three countries of origin were India, Pakistan and Bangladesh with Indians making the largest group.
In 2005, an estimated 565,000 migrants arrived to live in the United
Kingdom for at least a year, primarily from Asia and Africa, while 380,000 people emigrated from the country for a year or more, chiefly to Australia, Spain and the United States.
In 2014 the net increase was 318,000: immigration was 641,000, up
from 526,000 in 2013, while the number of people emigrating (for more
than 12 months) was 323,000.
The total immigrant population of the country is now of 5 million and
73 thousand, about 8.3 percent of the population (2014). However, over 6
million people residing in Italy have an immigration background. Since
the expansion of the European Union, the most recent wave of migration
has been from surrounding European nations, particularly Eastern Europe,
and increasingly Asia, replacing North Africa as the major immigration
area. Some 1,200,000 Romanians are officially registered as living in
Italy, replacing Albanians (500,000) and Moroccans (520,000) as the
largest ethnic minority group.
Others immigrants from Central-Eastern Europe are Ukrainians (230,000),
Polish (110,000), Moldovans (150,000), Macedonians (100,000), Serbs
(110,000), Bulgarians (54,000) Germany (41,000), Bosnians (40,000),
Russians (39,600), Croatians (25,000), Slovaks (9,000), Hungarians
(8,600). Other major countries of origin are China (300,000),
Philippines (180,000), India (150,000), Bangladesh (120,000), Egypt
(110,000), Peru (105,000), Tunisia (105,000), Sri Lanka (100.000),
Pakistan (100,000), Ecuador (90,000) and Nigeria (80,000). In addition,
around 1 million people live in Italy illegally. (As of 2014, the
distribution of foreign born population is largely uneven in Italy:
84.9% of immigrants live in the northern and central parts of the
country (the most economically developed areas), while only 15.1% live
in the southern half of the peninsula.)
Caravan protesting European closed borders policies in Pamplona
Since 2000, Spain
has absorbed around six million immigrants, adding 12% to its
population. The total immigrant population of the country now exceeds
5,730,677 (12.2% of the total population). According to residence permit
data for 2011, more than 710,000 were Moroccan, another 410,000 were Ecuadorian, 300,000 were Colombian, 230,000 were Bolivian and 150,000 were Chinese; from the EU around 800,000 were Romanian, 370,000 (though estimates place the true figure significantly higher, ranging from 700,000 to more than 1,000,000) were British, 190,000 were German, 170,000 were Italian and 160,000 were Bulgarian. A 2005 regularisation programme increased the legal immigrant population by 700,000 people that year. By world regions, in 2006 there were around 2,300,000 from the EU-27, 1,600,000 from South America, 1,000,000 from Africa, 300,000 from Asia, 200,000 from Central America & Caribbean, 200,000 from the rest of Europe, while 50,000 from North America and 3,000 from the rest of the world.
Portugal, long a country of emigration, has now become a country of net immigration, from both its former colonies
and other sources. By the end of 2003, legal immigrants represented
about 4% of the population, and the largest communities were from Cape Verde, Brazil, Angola, Guinea-Bissau, the United Kingdom, Spain, France, China and Ukraine.
Slovenia
On 1
January 2011 there were almost 229,000 people (11.1%) living in Slovenia
with foreign country of birth. At the end of March 2002 when data on
the country of birth for total population were for the first and last
time collected by a conventional (field) census, the number was almost
170,000 (8.6%).
Immigration from abroad, mostly from republics of former Yugoslavia, was
the deciding factor for demographic and socioeconomic development of
Slovenia in the last fifty years. Also after independence of Slovenia
the direction of migration flows between Slovenia and abroad did not
change significantly. Migration topics remain closely connected with the
territory of former Yugoslavia. Slovenia was and still is the
destination country for numerous people from the territory of former
Yugoslavia. The share of residents of Slovenia with countries of birth
from the territory of former Yugoslavia among all foreign-born residents
was 88.9% at the 2002 Census and on 1 January 2011 despite new
migration flows from EU Member States and from non-European countries
still 86.7%.
Middle East migrants pass through Slovenia on their way to Germany, 22 October 2015
According to a Yougov
poll in 2018, majorities in all seven polled countries were opposed to
accepting more migrants: Germany (72%), Denmark (65%), Finland (64%),
Sweden (60%), United Kingdom (58%), France (58%) and Norway (52%).
A February 2017 poll of 10 000 people in 10 European countries by Chatham House
found on average a majority (55%) were opposed to further Muslim
immigration, with opposition especially pronounced in a number of
countries: Austria (65%), Poland (71%), Hungary (64%), France (61%) and
Belgium (64%). Except for Poland, all of those had recently suffered jihadist terror attacks
or been at the centre of a refugee crisis. Of those opposed to further
Muslim immigration, 3/4 classify themselves as on the right of the
political spectrum. Of those self-classifying as on the left of the
political spectrum, 1/3 supported a halt.
Denmark
In Denmark, the parliamentary party most strongly associated with anti-immigration policies is the Danish People's Party.
According to a Gallup poll in 2017, two out of three (64%) wished
for limiting immigration from Muslim countries which was an increase
from 2015 (54%).
According to a 2018 Yougov poll, 65% of Danes opposed accepting more migrants into the country.
On August 14, 2020, the Ministry of Immigration and Integration
in Denmark revealed that it denied 83 people Danish citizenship in the
past two years because they have committed serious crimes.
Finland
According to a 2018 Yougov poll, 64% of Finns opposed accepting more migrants into the country.
France
In France, the National Front
seeks to limit immigration. Major media, political parties, and a large
share of the public believe that anti-immigration sentiment has
increased since the country's riots of 2005.
According to a 2018 Yougov poll, 58% of the French opposed accepting more migrants into the country.
In 2018, a poll by Pew Research
found that a majority (58%) wanted fewer immigrants to be allowed into
the country, 30% wanted to keep the current level and 10% wanted to
increase immigration.
According to a 2018 Yougov poll, 72% of Germans opposed accepting more migrants into the country.
Greece
In February 2020, more than 10 000 individuals attempted to cross the border between Greece and Turkey after Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan opened its border to Europe, but they were blocked by Greek army and police forces. Hundreds of Greek soldiers and armed police resisted the trespassers and fired tear gas
at them. Among those who attempted to cross were individuals from
Africa, Iran and Afghanistan. Greece responded by refusing to accept
asylum applications for a month.
In March 2020, migrants set fires and threw Molotov cocktail
firebombs over to the Greek side in order to break down the border
fence. Greek and European forces responded with tear gas and by trying
to keep the fence intact. By 11 March, 348 people had been arrested and
44,353 cases of unlawful entry had been prevented.
Italy
Public anti-immigrant discourse started in Italy in 1985 by the Bettino Craxi
government, which in a public speech drew a direct link between the
high number of clandestine immigrants and some terrorist incidents. Public discourse by the media hold that the phenomenon of immigration is uncontrollable and of undefined proportions.
According to poll published by Corriere della Sera,
one of two respondents (51%) approved closing Italy's ports to further
boat migrants arriving via the Mediterranean, while 19% welcomed further
boat migrants.
In 2018, a poll by Pew Research
found that a majority (71%) wanted fewer immigrants to be allowed into
the country, 18% wanted to keep the current level and 5% wanted to
increase immigration.
According to a 2018 Yougov poll, 52% of Norwegians opposed accepting more migrants into the country.
Poland
A 2015 opinion poll conducted by the Centre for Public Opinion Research
(CBOS) found that 14% thought that Poland should let asylum-seekers
enter and settle in Poland, 58% thought Poland should let asylum-seekers
stay in Poland until they can return to their home country, and 21%
thought Poland should not accept asylum-seekers at all. Furthermore, 53%
thought Poland should not accept asylum-seekers from the Middle East
and North Africa, with only 33% thinking Poland should accept them.
Another opinion poll conducted by the same organisation found
that 86% of Poles think that Poland does not need more immigrants, with
only 7% thinking Poland needs more immigrants.
Despite above in year 2017, 683 000 immigrants from outside of EU
arrived to Poland. 87.4% out of them immigrated for work.
"Among the EU Member States, Poland issued the highest number (683
thousand) of first residence permits in 2017, followed by Germany (535
thousand) and the United Kingdom (517 thousand)."
Sweden
In response to the high immigration of 2015, the anti-immigration party Sweden Democrats rose to 19.9% in the Statistics Sweden poll.
In late 2015, Sweden introduced temporary border checks on the Øresund Bridge
between Denmark and Sweden and public transport operators were
instructed to only let people with residence in Sweden board trains or
buses. The measures reduced the number of asylum seekers from 163 000 in
2015 to 29 000 in 2016.
In 2018, a poll by Pew Research
found that a small majority (52%) wanted fewer immigrants to be allowed
into the country, 33% wanted to keep the current level and 14% wanted
to increase immigration.
According to a 2018 Yougov poll, 60% of Swedes opposed accepting more migrants into the country.
In February 2020 finance minister Magdalena Andersson
encouraged migrants to head for other countries than Sweden. Andersson
stated in an interview that integration of immigrants in Sweden wasn't
working since neither before nor after 2015 and that Sweden cannot
accept more immigration than it is able to integrate.
Switzerland
During the 1990s under Christoph Blocher, the Swiss People's Party started to develop an increasingly eurosceptic and anti-immigration agenda. In 2014, they launched a popular initiative titled "Against mass immigration" that was narrowly accepted. They are currently the largest party in the National Council with 53 seats.
United Kingdom
Anti-immigration sentiment in the United Kingdom has historically focused on non-indigenous African, Afro-Caribbean and especially South Asian migrants, all of whom began to arrive from the Commonwealth of Nations in greater numbers following World War II. Since the fall of the Soviet Union and the enlargement of the European Union, the increased movement of people out of countries such as Poland, Romania and Lithuania has shifted much of this attention towards migrants from Eastern Europe. While working-class migrants tend to be the focus of anti-immigration sentiment, there is also some discontent about Russian, Chinese, Singaporean and Gulf Arab multimillionaires resident in the UK, particularly in London and South East England.
These residents often invest in property and business, and are
perceived as living extravagant "jet-set" lifestyles marked by
conspicuous consumption while simultaneously taking advantage of tax
loopholes connected to non-dom status.
Policies of reduced immigration, particularly from the European Union, are central to the manifestos of parties such as the UK Independence Party. Such policies have also been discussed by some members of the largest parties in Parliament, most significantly the Conservatives.
Statistics
By host country
Statistics for European Union 27 (post-Brexit)
Immigration and emigration between EU-27 countries and non-EU-27 countries. Source: Eurostat 2020
EU-27 data source Eurostat.
Country
Refused entry
illegally present
Order to leave
Returned outside the EU
EU 27 (2018)
454600
456700
145900
EU 27 (2019)
717600
627900
491200
142300
2018-2019 change (%)
+58%
+10%
+8%
-2.5%
2013 UN data
This is a list of European countries by immigrant population, based on the United Nations report Trends in International Migrant Stock: The 2013 Revision.
Country
Number of immigrants
Percentage of total number of immigrants in the world
In
2010, 47.3 million people lived in the EU, who were born outside their
resident country. This corresponds to 9.4% of the total EU population.
Of these, 31.4 million (6.3%) were born outside the EU and 16.0 million
(3.2%) were born in another EU member state. The largest absolute
numbers of people born outside the EU were in Germany (6.4 million),
France (5.1 million), the United Kingdom (4.7 million), Spain (4.1
million), Italy (3.2 million), and The Netherlands (1.4 million).
The European countries with the highest proportion or percentage of non-native residents are small nations or microstates. Andorra is the country in Europe with the highest percentage of immigrants, 77% of the country's 82,000 inhabitants. Monaco is the second with the highest percentage of immigrants, they make up 70% of the total population of 32,000; and Luxembourg is the third, immigrants are 37% of the total of 480,000; in Liechtenstein they are 35% of the 34,000 people; and in San Marino they comprise 32% of the country's population of 29,000.
Eurostat data reported in 2006 that some EU member states as receiving "large-scale"
immigration. The EU in 2005 had an overall net gain from international
migration of 1.8 million people, which accounted for almost 85% of
Europe's total population growth that year. In 2004, a total of 140,033 people immigrated to France. Of them, 90,250 were from Africa and 13,710 from elsewhere in Europe. In 2005, the total number of immigrants fell slightly, to 135,890.
In the
European union, in 2019, 706 400 persons acquired citizenship, the main
nation of origin for citizenship grant were by decreasing number:
Morocco, Albania, the United Kingdom, Syria and Turkey.
the largest groups were Moroccans
(66 800, or 9.5 %), followed by Albanians (41 700, or 5.9 %), Britons
(29 800, or 4.2 %), Syrian (29 100, or 4.1 %) and Turks (28 600, or
4.0 %). The majority of Moroccans acquired citizenship of Spain (37 %),
Italy (24 %) or France (24 %), while the majority of Albanians received
Italian citizenship (62 %). Almost half of the Britons received German
citizenship (46 %) and more than half of the Syrians received Swedish
citizenship (69 %). The majority of Turks acquired German citizenship
(57 %)
— eurostat
Previous years
This
is a breakdown by major area of origin of the 72.4 million migrants
residing in Europe (out of a population of 742 million) at mid-2013,
based on the United Nations report Trends in International Migrant Stock: The 2013 Revision.
Area of origin
Number of immigrants to Europe (millions)
Percentage of total number of immigrants to Europe
Approximate populations of non-European origin in Europe (about 20 -
30+ millions, or 3 - 4% (depending on the definition of non-European
origin), out of a total population of approx. 831 million):
Black Africans (including Afro-Caribbeans and others by descent): approx. 9 to 10 million in the European Union and around 12.5 in Europe as a whole. Between 4 and 5 million Sub-Saharan and Afro-Caribbeans live in France but also 2.5 million in the United Kingdom, Italy, Germany, Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands and Portugal. (in Spain and Portugal Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latin American are included in Latin Americans)
Turks
(including Turks from Turkey and Northern Cyprus): approx. 9 million
(this estimate does not include the 10 million Turks within the European portion of Turkey); of whom 3 to over 7 million in Germany but also the rest in France and the Netherlands with over 2 million Turks in France and Turks in the Netherlands,
Austria, the United Kingdom, Belgium, Sweden, Switzerland, Denmark,
Italy, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Greece, Romania, Finland, Serbia and Norway.
(see Turks in Europe)
Arabs (including North African and Middle Eastern Arabs): approx. 6 to 7 million Arabs live in France but also Spain with 1.6 to 1.8 million Arabs, 1.2 million Arabs in Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, Greece, Sweden, the Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium, Norway, Switzerland, Finland and Russia. (see Arabs in Europe) Many Arabs in Europe are Lebanese and Syrian.
Indians: approx. 2.5 million; 1.9 million mostly in the United Kingdom but also 473,520 in France including the overseas territories, 240,000 in the Netherlands, 203,052 in Italy, 185,085 in Germany, Ireland and Portugal.
Pakistanis: approx. 1.1 million in the United Kingdom, but also 120,000 in France, 118,181 in Italy, Spain, and Norway.
Bengali: approx. 600,000 mostly in United Kingdom, but also 85,000 in Italy, 35,000 in France, Spain, Sweden, Finland and Greece.
Armenians: approx. 2 million; mostly in Russia but also 800,000 in France, Ukraine, Greece, Bulgaria, Spain, Germany, Poland, the United Kingdom and Belgium.
Berbers: approx. 2 million live in France but also Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium and Spain.
Kurds: approx. 2 million; mostly in Germany, France, Sweden, Russia, the Netherlands, Belgium and the United Kingdom.
Chinese: approx. 1 million; 600,000-700,000 of them live in France, 433,000 live in the United Kingdom, Russia, Italy, Spain, Germany and the Netherlands.
Vietnamese:
approx. 800,000; mostly in France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Poland,
Norway, the Netherlands, Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Russia.
Filipinos: approx. 600,000; mostly in the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, Austria and Ireland.
Iranians:
approx. 250,000; mostly in Germany, Sweden, the United Kingdom, Russia,
the Netherlands, France, Austria, Norway, Spain and Denmark.
Somalis: approx. 200,000; mostly in the United Kingdom, Sweden, the Netherlands, Norway, Germany, Finland, Denmark and Italy.
Assyrians/Chaldeans/Syriacs: approx. 200,000; mostly in Sweden, Germany, Russia, France and The Netherlands.
Irregular border crossings
The EUBorder and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex) uses the terms "illegal" and "irregular" border crossings for crossings of an EU external border but not at an official border-crossing point. These include people rescued at sea.
Because many migrants cross more than one external EU border (for
instance when traveling through the Balkans from Greece to Hungary), the
total number of irregular EU external border crossings is often higher
than the number of irregular migrants arriving in the EU in a year. News
media sometimes misrepresent these figures as given by Frontex.
Frontex tracks and publishes data on numbers of crossings along
the main six routes twice a year. The following table summarises the
number of "irregular crossings" of the European Union's various external
borders. Note that the figures do not add up to the total number of
people coming into the EU illegally in a given year, since many migrants
are counted twice (for instance, once when entering Greece and a second
time upon entering Hungary).
Studies
Gallup has published a study estimating potential migrants in 2010.
The study estimated that 700 million adults worldwide would prefer to migrate to another country.
Potential migrants were asked for their country of preference if they were given free choice.
The total number of potential migrants to the European Union is estimated at 200 million, comparable to the number for North America (USA and Canada).
In addition, an estimated 40 million potential migrants within the EU
desire to move to another country within the EU, giving the EU the
highest intra-regional potential migration rate.
The study estimates that from 2015 to 2017, there were about 750
million potential migrants. One in five potential migrants (21%), or
about 158 million adults worldwide name the U.S. as their desired future
residence. Canada, Germany, France, Australia and the United Kingdom
each appeal to more than 30 million adults. Apart from the United
States, the top desired target countries were:Canada (47 million), Germany (42 million), France (36 million), Australia (36 million) and the United Kingdom (34 million).
The study also compared the number of potential migrants to their desired destination's population, resulting in a Net Migration Index expressing potential population growth.
This list is headed by Singapore, which would experience population growth by +219%.
Among European countries, Switzerland would experience the highest growth, by +150%, followed by Sweden (+78%), Spain (+74%), Ireland (+66%), the United Kingdom (+62%) and France (+60%). The European countries with highest potential population loss are Kosovo and North Macedonia, with -28% each.
