The article examines whether parental migration is changing the dynamics of power within families. It is based on in-depth interviews with young people between 14 and 20 years who experience parental migration from Romania. It is argued that despite factors that may facilitate less authoritarian relations in transnational families, migration does not neutralize pre-existing power relations. In different stages of the migration cycle, different levels of authority and freedom occur. The article advises that parents’ migration is simultaneously empowering and burdensome for young people. It increases their ability to negotiate, but may also create discriminatory dynamics of roles among siblings.
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