International mobility of young Italians is steadily increasing since the beginning of the 2007-2008 financial and economic crisis. This trend is due to two concurrent factors: the natural wish and aspiration of young people, living in mature economies, to broaden their experiences and enrich their biographies, and the specific Italian context, characterized by high youth unemployment rate and low economic growth that make the country unattractive for the younger.

This paper aims at contributing to the long-lasting scientific debate concerning the relationship between migration and development. This debate has been focused on the effects of migration on development in countries characterized by underdeveloped and emerging economies. This paper will try to tackle the issue of international youth mobility and regional development in a mature economy. The youth mobility-regional development nexus will be discussed in core and marginal areas in Italy. Regional development is considered, here, as a multifaceted and complex phenomenon, of which economic growth is just one component.

Moving from a theoretical revision and discussion of the mainstream theories, the analysis will be based on indicators concerning economic, social, environmental and cultural aspects of regional development and on official statistical data concerning youth migration. The results of forty in-depth interviews of young Italians (circular migrants and returnees) and of a panel survey involving 5,000 young Italians (migrants, circular migrants, returnees, and non-migrants) - developed in the framework of the H2020 YMOBILITY project - will help in shading lights on the hidden and non-recorded aspects of youth mobility.