A middle class besieged: Brazilians' motives to migrate

Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork with Brazilian immigrants in Lisbon, this article explores some of the reasonswhy international migration became an alternative strategy for young middle-class people who hoped to maintain their class position. The role of the Brazilian "crisis" of the 1980-1990s is analyzed here in terms of people's decision to leave the country; the argument is that in addition to a situation of relative economic deprivation, many middle-class Brazilians also felt alienated from their country as the promises of a process of modernity were never delivered. Many believed they had nothing to lose by leaving the country. © 2012 by the American Anthropological Association.