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This paper takes as a reference, empirical analyses conducted in northern European countries and the United States which associate socioeconomic factors to the location patterns of immigrants. It has been suggested that the socioeconomic context of southern Europe could impact immigrants' location choices. We analyze data on the location of immigrants in municipalities of the Andalusian region in southern Spain with respect to the factors that most influence immigrants' location preferences as discussed in the literature: a pre-existing immigrant community, economic dynamism, population size and other scarcely investigated factors such as the territorial characteristics of the municipality and its productive structure. We conclude that immigrant location patterns in Andalusia are very similar to those found in geographical areas outside Spain, with the exception of specific characteristics related to the social and labor model of the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The questions asked in the paper are whether and to what extent the employment situation among recent third-country immigrants differs across European Union countries and how it is related to these countries' labor market characteristics. The European Labor Force Survey data for the 1990s are used to disentangle the roles that the individual characteristics of immigrants, on the one hand, and the structural features of the receiving societies, on the other, play in the process of immigrants' labor market integration. The results of multilevel regression analyses confirm that in receiving countries with stronger demand for low-skilled labor, unprivileged immigrants are less disadvantaged at employment entry. Among men immigrants' employment disadvantages are found to be lower in liberal welfare states marked by their flexible labor markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]