Brain drain means the transfer of talents from a less developed country to a developed one through temporary or permanent migration. This phenomenon takes place across the continents characterized by South-to-North migration, chained or permanent migrations are inevitably hindering the development of countries of origin by vacuuming the talents who have been nurtured and educated there throughout their youths, leading to an indirectly net transfer of capitals from a poorer country to a well-off one. Recognizing the inherent gap between Southern and Northern countries in economy and social stability, the slides show how brain drain can be utilized constructively and how the fundamental weaknesses of less developed countries can be tackled. Politically, Southern countries should strive for enhancing national security and formulating measures to tackle local issues such as corruption and democracy; secondly, clear direction of development is indispensible to especially propagandize to attract migrants and foreign investments, frequent connections with emigrants can definitely fuel the effectiveness; in the area of localism, national consciousness and cultural attractions are key elements in promoting return migration or even north-to-south migration, that is, making the country livable, vibrant, attractive and comfortable to stay and work.

1. YU Yau Hing/ Hong Kong

2. + Brain Drain: transfer of talents from a less
developed country to a developed one
through temporary or permanent migration
+ Lead to indirect net transfer of capitals
+ Way out:
– Resolve fundamental weaknesses of less
developed countries
– Utilize brain drain constructively

3. + Globalization has significantly attributed to the reduction of
limitation of human migration
+ internal migrant stock in 2013 has increased by half to
231.5 million with reference to 1990 (OECD & UNDESA,
2013)
+ Eurasian and African emigrants accounted for 10.6% and
59.6% of the entire share respectively
+ Southern Countries: political instability, poorer
development
+ Attraction of talents has been vigorous

4. + South-to-North migration
+ Cases in Eurasia and Africa
+ Labour migration, seasonal migration and
impelled migration and forced migration
(excluding asylum seekers and the stateless)
+ Documented and orderly migration assumed
+ Political, developmental and nationalistic
issues are focused

5. + Literature Review
+ Contemporary international cases

6. A. Political Status
- National and Public Security
- Corruption
B. Developmental Basis
- Clear Developmental Goal
- Key Centre of Development
C. Nationality
- National Consciousness
- Cultural Attraction

7. + Forced migration due to
+ Political instability (national security)
– Casualty
– Damage of premise and property
– E.g. Ukraine + Iraq and Syria
+ Prolonged criminal offences (public security)
– Drug smuggling, human trafficking, kidnapping
– E.g. South Africa, 60% of men and 49% of women desire
to leave for more than 2 years (Dodsan, 2002)

8. + To maintain its integrity and public security
+ To prove the community is safe to stay at
+ To avoid the country becoming ‘failing state’/ To
remove the country from the list of ‘failing state’
+ To fight against national and transnational crime
+ To be accomplished by:
– Suffering countries
– Regional organizations
– International bodies

9. + Social equity is an extensive core value
+ Corruption brings out inequality and poverty
+ E.g. Bribery in China between government officials
and developers over the land use
+ Citizens feel insecure about their rights and lose
confidence to judicial system
+ Solution:
– To establish unique anti-corruption department
– To authorize it with power to investigate

10. + Economic prosperity, including employment
condition, poverty, technological basis and
international trading, of country of origin
decide its ability in holding human capital
+ Talents have the ability and willingness to
achieve higher economic status

11. + To prove a countries is ambitious to make
improvement
+ E.g. Kazakhstan 2050 strategy + Singaporean
development since 1960s
+ To retain human capitals
+ To attract immigrants as the provision of
workforce and technology

12. + Key centre of development: a city or town
with particular focus to invest
+ E.g. Special Economic Zones of Shenzhen and
Hainan in China
+ Farmer in Rural area can work as a labourer in
Urban area, within the country
+ To switch external migration to internal
migration
+ To retain workforce in national level

13. + Brain Drain, in form of temporary migration,
can be beneficial to national development by
introduction of technologies and brand-new
perspectives
+ Negative side: from temporary migration to
permanent migration
+ E.g. Uzbeks to Russia due to higher living
standard, chain migration maybe facilitated

14. + To have frequent connection with immigrants,
diasporas and expatriates
+ To emphasize in national identity
+ To facilitate cirular migration with economic
and cultural incentives
+ To propagandize national employment and
development opportunities + update of
national news
+ To demonstrate a sense of welcome

15. + Reason of cultural promotion: facilitate export of
national culture and costumes leading to the interest
of people to stay and work
+ E.g. Korea
+ Cultural promotion can:
– Prosper tourism and related industries
– Give a viable and livable image to diasporas and foreigners
+ Solution:
– To consider cultural promotion as one of the main strategy
to keep the competitiveness in inhabitation for migrants
and foreigners
– To fully express its unique civilization on heritage, dinning
habit and any others features

16. + Human capitals serve as the foundation of
national flourish due to the ability to provide
workforce and innovations that nations compete
+ Southern nations may suffer from conflicts and
economic recession leading to massive brain
drain
+ Therefore, national weaknesses should be
addressed with proactive measures to retain and
attract intelligentsia
– To give confidence to locals
– To provide stable condition for development
– To attract non-locals to inhabit