A Spatial Analysis of Inflows of Foreigners by Citizenship in Italy

Emma Barone , Roma Tre University
Oliviero Casacchia, Sapienza University of Rome
Laura Marbán Martínez, Centre d'Estudis Demogràfics
Cecilia Reynaud, Università Roma Tre

Since the early 2000s, immigration has become a structural component of Italy’s demographic landscape, making the country one of Europe’s main destinations. This paper analyses the spatial dimension of foreign inflows by citizenship between 2002 and 2022, investigating how proximity and contiguity relations shape the territorial distribution of migration flows. Using registry data on foreign citizens entering Italy from abroad, disaggregated by province (NUTS3) and nationality, we focus on six of the largest foreign communities: Albanians, Romanians, Moroccans, Ukrainians, Chinese, and Bangladeshis. Immigration rates by province are first examined to describe the evolution of spatial patterns over time. Spatial autocorrelation is then measured through the global Moran’s I and Local Indicators of Spatial Association (LISA), followed by a spatiotemporal Poisson regression model including demographic and economic covariates. Preliminary findings highlight strong spatial differentiation and temporal evolution of immigration flows in Italy. The results reveal the coexistence of diffusion and concentration processes, suggesting that migration patterns are shaped by both established networks and local socio-economic contexts. The study is innovative in applying spatial analysis to migration inflows disaggregated not only by province but also by foreign community, thus demonstrating how different national groups settle unevenly across Italian territories over time. These differences reflect the interaction between the specific migration patterns of each community and the distinctive socio-economic characteristics of the local areas. This approach provides new insights into the spatial dimension of migration and its role in shaping territorial diversity.

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 Presented in Session 92. Flash Session International Migration