54 pages • 1 hour read
Exodus: How Migration Is Changing Our World
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PrologueChapter Summaries & Analyses
Prologue Summary
Collier recounts his grandfather’s immigration experience during World War I to illustrate how swiftly newcomers can become targets when national anxieties run high. He then shifts his focus to modern migration patterns, particularly the flow of people from impoverished regions into wealthier locales, where they often cluster in familiar enclaves.
He examines how such movement affects both the nations left behind and those receiving newcomers, noting that the poorest societies may suffer “brain drain” while host countries grapple with social tensions and security concerns. Collier questions the idea of a postnational future, suggesting that national identities offer a sense of cohesion that purely cosmopolitan visions overlook.
Prologue Analysis
In the Prologue, Collier establishes the book’s central argument: That migration, while often framed as an economic necessity or a moral imperative, has profound and overlooked consequences for both the societies people leave behind and those they enter. Collier situates migration as a defining force of modern global dynamics, one that reshapes economies, cultures, and national identities in ways that are both beneficial and destabilizing. His approach challenges dominant liberal narratives that celebrate migration as an unqualified good, instead presenting it as a complex phenomenon that demands more nuanced policy responses.
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