A “Good Enough” Choice: Bounded Rationality in Migration Destination Choice

The study intends to fill a gap in the literature on migration destination choice, which focuses on the outcome of a decision process, while largely neglects the very process of arriving at an outcome. Using qualitative material collected during 150 face-to-face interviews with Polish migrants to four EU countries and Australia, this article develops a general typology of decision makers involved in choices of migrant destinations. It applies the concept of bounded rationality to analyse the ways in which these migrants have chosen their host locations and, focusing on their rationality, explores manifestations of its boundedness. It also discusses the issue of information search by destination choice, showing that under relatively low perceived risks associated with migration, the process of knowledge building tends to be based on experience rather than on in-depth research.