Temporary migration and middle class nation building in Canada

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article explores the relationship between temporary labor migration programs (TLMPs) in the post-war era and middle-class nation-building. The analysis centers on Canada, an exemplary case of balancing the rights of foreign workers and national concerns. By examining two eras of Canadian TLMPs – one Keynesian and the other neoliberal – I foreground how and why temporariness has reemerged as a norm in (im)migration policy. Relative to TLMPs before 1990, contemporary ones emphasize merit, skill, and private actors with implications for how countries like Canada imagine political belonging. In the neoliberal era, the normative emphasis on permanence is challenged by a more transactional view of people’s standing in a political jurisdiction. If this is a global shift, this analysis raises questions about whether we are now experiencing a doubling down on the market logics of migration and national membership, a backlash against it, or something different.