From: The Encyclopedia of Canada's Peoples/Albanians/Robert Austin
Statistics on the Albanian community in Canada are relatively scarce. Prior to 1981, the Canadian census relegated Albanians either to the category “Other” or to the equally broad heading “Balkans.” Tracking the migration patterns of Albanians to Canada is thus a difficult task.
The first Albanians to arrive in North America were Orthodox Tosks from the region of Korçë in southern Albania who settled in and around Boston towards the end of nineteenth century. Oral testimony suggests that the first Albanian immigrants to Canada came around the same time, but the numbers were very small and probably did not exceed twenty-five. Since the southern regions of Albania enjoyed the most contact with the outside world, it is highly probable that Canada’s Albanian pioneers were also Orthodox Tosks from that part of the country. They had left Albania for Canada because of poor economic conditions, religious persecution, and, in some cases, a desire to avoid serving in the military forces of the Ottoman Empire. As was the case in the United States, many of these early arrivals returned to Albania when the country’s independence was proclaimed in 1912.
Until World War II, Albanian migration to Canada continued, albeit in very small numbers, and consisted primarily of bachelors and of married men who had left their wives at home to find prosperity abroad. After the war and the coming to power of the communists in both Yugoslavia and Albania, Albanians with ties to King Zog and the nationalist Balli Kombetar, and especially Catholics in the north, were forced to flee or face death or imprisonment. Owing to strict controls imposed throughout the Communist period, legal migration from Albania almost ceased; the only people to leave were small numbers of refugees who made often harrowing escapes across Albania’s borders. In Yugoslavia, however, the political climate was more relaxed and Albanians from Kosovo and Macedonia continued to emigrate.
After 1989 Albania’s Communist government effectively lost control over migration as thousands of refugees, prompted by worsening economic conditions, fled by boat to Italy or over land to Greece. According to some estimates, approximately 300,000 people – or 10 percent of the entire population – left Albania between 1990 and 1992. That figure may be high, but there is no doubt that the migration was considerable. Because of factors of cost and distance, the majority of the refugees went to Greece, Italy, and Germany. By mid-decade Italy had closed its doors to Albanian immigrants, but Albanians continued to cross the difficult-to-police land border separating their country from Greece. Both Canada and the United States also experienced a marked increase in the number of Albanians seeking refugee status. Since Albania’s Communists had fallen from power in 1992, few of these refugees could claim political persecution and many were deported from Canada. Yet many others remained, bolstering a community whose growing size will no doubt be reflected in the next census.
According to the 1986 census, there were then only 1,435 people in Canada who claimed Albanian ancestry, either wholly or in part; 875 of these cited Albanian as their only ethnic origin. By 1991 these numbers had almost doubled, to 2,565 and 1,550 respectively. In the census of that year, some 420 people cited Albania as their place of origin. Of these, the vast majority (330) were located in Ontario, with smaller groups in Quebec, Manitoba, British Columbia, and Alberta. Of the people who cited Albanian as their only ethnic origin, most of them, again, lived in Ontario. Given the strength of Albanian national identity, one may assume that this includes all ethnic Albanians, including those from Greece and Yugoslavia. Nevertheless, it is possible that some ethnic Albanians identified themselves as either Greek or Yugoslav. A metropolitan breakdown revealed that there were Albanian communities – composed of people of single-origin Albanian ancestry – in Toronto, Calgary, Edmonton, Hamilton, Kitchener, London, and other cities as well; the largest concentration (810) was in the metropolitan Toronto area, primarily Mississauga.
Albanians themselves offer estimates of their community’s size that are considerably larger than that of the census; one such estimate claims that as many as 20,000 people of Albanian heritage live in the Toronto area alone. This is an exaggeration. While the census figure may be low because of the confusion caused by the questions on country of origin versus ethnic identity, it is doubtful that the Canadian community exceeds 3,000 immigrants and their descendants. In contrast, there are some 70,000 Albanian immigrants and their descendants in the United States, with especially large and vibrant communities in Boston, New York City, Chicago, and Detroit.
The statistics make clear that the vast majority of Albanians in Canada are from areas outside Albania. For the most part, they are economic migrants from Kosovo and Macedonia and primarily Moslems. The vast majority came to Canada in the 1970s and 1980s.
