The debate on ‘sense of place’ has been widespread in geography since the mid-1970s, yet with few exceptions the analytical potential of this concept has not been fully realized as far as the study of migration movements is concerned. A major reason for this has been methodology, or specifically the difficulties in capturing and evaluating the relevance of ‘place’ for migration processes. From a multidisciplinary standpoint, the article assesses the potential of both qualitative and quantitative methodologies, and also identifies several conflicting aspects that arise when analysing senses of places and international migration, such as ‘scale’, ‘representation’, ‘sensibilities’ and ‘consciousness’.

El artículo relaciona la inmigración internacional con el turismo en municipios de menos de 500 habitantes de Cataluña, los denominados micropueblos. Primero, se analizan a nivel de Cataluña datos agregados sobre turismo e inmigración internacional en estos lugares. Posteriormente, se estudia a partir de entrevistas las relaciones entre tipos de turismo e inmigración en la comarca de L’Alt Empordà, focalizando en emprendedores turísticos de origen extranjero. Como conclusión, se destaca que en variadas ocasiones estos negocios responden más a estrategias vitales que a pautas de rendimiento económico. This article relates international immigration and tourism in municipalities with fewer than 500 inhabitants in Catalonia, i.e. small villages. Firstly, aggregate data on tourism and international immigration in small villages are analyzed at Catalan level. Posteriorly, the relations between different types of tourism and immigration in L’Alt Empordà county are explored thanks to interview analysis, focusing on tourism entrepreneurs of foreign origin. The conclusions under line that these businesses respond more to lifestyle strategies of these immigrants rather than a strict economic rationale.

The academic literature on international immigration into rural areas has clearly identified two main international migration flows: retirement migration and low-skilled migration in farming. Yet, the emphasis on these two types of international immigrants has overlooked other types of incomers, such as professionals, lifestyle movers, immigrant entrepreneurs and self-employed workers who may potentially have positive impacts on local rural economies and societies. Filling a gap in the literature, this paper concentrates on immigrant entrepreneurship in the Spanish Pyrenees. In doing so, it explores connections between local economies, entrepreneurship, and lifestyle immigration. It also analyses the potential of immigrant entrepreneurs to contribute to local economic growth with the different types of capital they possess (e.g. human capital, social capital). Methodology, it is based on a fieldwork carried out in the Spanish Pyrenees between February and May 2022. Specifically, it has been carried out 31 in-depth interviews with foreign-born immigrants in two areas of the Spanish Pyrenees (Girona and Huesca). The non-representative sample is equally distributed among immigrant entrepreneurs, self-employed workers, and employees, and it was also balanced by sex and covered different ages, covering, thus, a broad spectrum of immigrants’ labour incorporations. Our results add new evidence to previous discussions on immigrant entrepreneurship and lifestyle immigration, from the viewpoint of rural mountain areas. Interviewed immigrant entrepreneurs occasionally play a key role in the creation and introduction of innovative products in very specific market niches in farming and tourism in the Pyrenees. In this way, immigrants stimulate local economies, and help to strengthen values on sustainability, community and sense of place. Yet the companies they create are often limited in both size and capital, and these circumstances generally produce only a slight impact on local economic development and job creation in the Pyrenees

The article studies connections between local economics, entrepreneurship and lifestyle immigration in municipalities with fewer than 500 inhabitants in Alt Empordà, Spain. Using a qualitative methodology, it analyses the economic incorporation of immigrant entrepreneurs by considering in which ways they contribute to the local economies. It also studies to what extent immigrant businesses follow purely economic benefit logics (or rather they are set up in search of a better quality of life). The interviewed immigrant entrepreneurs usually fit themselves in distinctive niches in local labour markets (e.g. cultural-oriented services). Their success partially relies in their capacities for creating locally based social networks, which are not only key aspects for business development, but also a source of wellbeing. This is in line with most lifestyle immigration literature, which argues that immigration is not only triggered by professional success, but also represents the search for self-realization and a higher quality of life.