Immigration Reform Research Articles

Chinese Soft Power and Immigration Reform: Can Beijing’s Approach to Pursuing Global Talent and Maintaining Domestic Stability Succeed?

During the past few years, the Chinese government has enacted laws and issued regulations to attract foreign talent, facilitate the return of skilled Chinese nationals and better regulate the entry, residence and employment of foreigners. China is quickly becoming a “new immigration country,” with all the political, economic, and social challenges that entails. This article examines the strategic and policy approaches of China’s recent immigration reform within the context of Chinese soft power. It reviews China’s new immigration laws, policies and practices, and analyzes how immigration reform fits into the new generation of Chinese leaders’ agenda of deepening and broadening China’s post-Mao reform. The article also explicates how key changes in China’s new immigration laws and regulations demonstrate that China is entering the global competition for talent while at the same time that its authoritarian government is attempting to maintain domestic stability by improving immigration-related social management.

From Ephemeral to Enduring

From 2005 to 2009 the National Museum of American History embarked on one of its most ambitious collecting projects, focused on documenting experiences around the Bracero Program, the largest guest worker program in American History. This article focuses on the dilemmas of documenting memory through oral history for the Bracero History Archive and the reception of the National Museum of American History’s exhibit, Bittersweet Harvest: The Bracero Program, 1942–1964. The present day political and social context in which these oral histories were collected left indelible marks on how the program is remembered. The retelling of bracero history also reveals contemporary concerns with the role that Mexican agricultural workers play in American society and sheds light on the national dilemma of immigration reform.

Does Information Change Attitudes Towards Immigrants? Representative Evidence from Survey Experiments

Many people in the U.S. and in Europe have biased beliefs about immigrants. In this paper, we examine whether providing information about immigrants affects people’s attitude towards them. We first use a large representative cross-country survey experiment with more than 19,000 participants to show that people who are told the actual share of immigrants in their country become less likely to state that there are too many of them. We also conduct an online experiment in the U.S., where we provide information about immigration to half of the participants, before measuring their attitude towards immigrants with self-reported and behavioral outcomes. We find that participants in the treatment group update their beliefs about immigrants, and they donate more money to a pro-immigrant charity. However, their self-reported policy preferences remain broadly unchanged, and they do not become more willing to sign a petition in favor of immigration reform. Interestingly, Republicans and people who are worried about immigration respond more strongly to the information treatment, both in terms of their views on immigrants and their policy preferences. Finally, we also measure people’s self-reported policy preferences, attitudes, and beliefs in a four week follow-up, and we show that the treatment effects persist

Commentary: Fractured Families: US Asylum Backlog Divides Parents and Children Worldwide

This commentary focuses on the detrimental effects of the US asylum backlog on families around the world. It puts a spotlight on the backlog of the 82,175 individuals who are currently (as of March 2015) waiting to have their asylum cases heard. These individuals fleeing torture, political persecution, or persecution due to their race, religion, ethnicity, or membership in a particular social group are especially vulnerable. We identify the essential human rights of asylum seekers who are children and their family members, including the right to seek asylum, the right of family members to be protected from harm, and the right to family life, family unity, and reunification. Throughout, the principle of what is in the best interest of the child is highlighted. Using the example of how resources have been shifted to process the cases of Central American families crossing the US southern border, the authors question the effectiveness of a crisis-focused US immigration policy. We call for broad immigration reform in the USA with resulting policies that do not focus on the needs and rights of one group of vulnerable children at the expense of another. Thus, we call for an immigration policy that puts the rights of all children at its center.

The effect of legal status on immigrant wages and occupational skills

ABSTRACTNative and foreign-born workers with a high school degree or less education work in different types of occupations. This article exploits the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act to examine whether legal status causes immigrants to work in occupations that use skills similar to those of natives. Legal status decreases the manual skill intensity of immigrants’ occupations by about two percentiles. It increases communication skill intensity by a similar amount. This reduces the skill gap between Mexican-born and native-born American workers by 11–15%.

Not One More: Linking Civil Disobediences and Public Anti‐Deportation Campaigns

AbstractThis article analyzes the recent development of an anti‐deportation movement with distinct strategies and tactics that distinguish it from previous immigrant rights activism centered on immigration reform. We study the strategies and tactics of the anti‐deportation movement, focusing on the strategies of non‐staged civil disobediences and anti‐deportation campaigns. We argue that the specific tactics used in these alternative strategies a) depart from normative activism and b) challenge dominant perceptions about undocumented immigrants.

Divided and Conquered: Immigration Reform Advocates and the Passage of the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act

Research Article| April 01 2016 Divided and Conquered: Immigration Reform Advocates and the Passage of the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act Maddalena Marinari Maddalena Marinari Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Journal of American Ethnic History (2016) 35 (3): 9–40. https://doi.org/10.5406/jamerethnhist.35.3.0009 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Permissions Search Site Citation Maddalena Marinari; Divided and Conquered: Immigration Reform Advocates and the Passage of the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act. Journal of American Ethnic History 1 January 2016; 35 (3): 9–40. doi: https://doi.org/10.5406/jamerethnhist.35.3.0009 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All Scholarly Publishing CollectiveUniversity of Illinois PressJournal of American Ethnic History Search Advanced Search The text of this article is only available as a PDF. Copyright 2016 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois2016 Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

The Politics of Expulsion: A Short History of Alabama’s Anti-Immigrant Law, HB 56

IN JUNE 2011, THE REPUBLICANCONTROLLED Alabama legislature passed a tough immigration law, known as House Bill 56 (or HB 56) that endorsed a policy of expulsion of undocumented immigrants from the state. One of several state antiimmigrant laws enacted around the same time, HB 56 targeted Latinos, hoping to make life so difficult for them that they would “selfdeport.” The U.S. Congress has persistently failed to pass some type of immigration reform to deal with the twentyfirstcentury surge of Mexican and Central American border crossers. Democrats insisted on a “path to citizenship” for undocumented workers, but Republicans wanted tighter border controls and a means of reducing the number of illegal immigrants, mostly Latinos, in the United States. The impasse in Congress opened the door for states to take action. Tea Party Republicanism surged during the 2010 midterm elections, putting Republican politicians in control of many southern state legislatures. Nativist fears of large numbers of ethnically different newcomers, especially over job competition and unwanted cultural change, sometimes referred to as “cultural dilution,” provided political cover for politicians who sought to control and regulate immigration within state borders, but also to push illegal immigrants out. Conservative Republicans, according to historianjournalist Mike Davis, had been promoting antiimmigrant policies since the 1990s. As Davis noted in his book, No One Is Illegal (2006), “the Far Right has sought to mobilize against immigrants (and a guestworker program) on the grounds that it ‘dilutes American culture’ and ‘burdens’ the social welfare system. This racist component is omnipresent in the media and interlocks neatly with the more acceptable economic alarmism.” The intensity of the political war over immigration only got worse as the first decade of the twentyfirst century ended. In the severity of its 2011 immigration law, Alabama became the “poster boy” for recent American nativism. The state’s harsh, aggressive, and discriminatory antiimmigrant policy also brought back memories from a halfcentury earlier, when statesponsored racial discrimination targeted African Americans.

The "New Selma" and the Old Selma: Arizona, Alabama, and the Immigration Civil Rights Movement in the Twenty-First Century

IN APRIL 2010, WHEN ARIZONA PASSED its infamous antiimmigrant law, SB 1070, many commenters—including myself—observed that, in the struggle for immigrants’ rights, Arizona had become to Latinos what Alabama was to African Americans during the Civil Rights struggle of the 1950s and 1960s. More specifically, Arizona was dubbed the “New Selma” in recognition of the importance of the Bloody Sunday events during the Selma to Montgomery March on March 7, 1965, in the fight for the passage of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) in August 1965. Now, on the fiftieth anniversary of both the Selma March and the passage of the VRA, we are still awaiting comprehensive immigration reform at the federal level. As Congress continues to deprive the millions of unauthorized migrants living and working in the United States the opportunity to regularize their immigration status, and as the racist and xenophobic undertones of antiimmigrant rhetoric only increase over time, the similarities between the New Selma and Old Selma as a cultural flash point in the struggle for equality and human dignity become more and more pronounced. In his unfinished manuscript, “The Politics of Expulsion: A Short History of Alabama’s AntiImmigrant Law, HB 56,” the late Raymond A. Mohl, Distinguished Professor of History at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, directly and succinctly identified the true nature of the motivations behind the passage of HB 56 in the Alabama legislature. Professor Mohl observed that “nativist fears of large numbers of ethnically different newcomers, especially over job competition and unwanted cultural change, sometimes referred to as ‘cultural dilution,’ provided political cover for politicians who sought to control and regulate immigration within state borders, but also to push illegal immigrants out.” By recognizing that HB 56 and other antiimmigrant laws that followed nationwide in the wake of SB 1070 were driven by racist and nativist politicians, Professor Mohl cut

Activism After DACA: Lessons from Chicago's Immigrant Youth Justice League

AbstractScholars of unauthorized migration have generally agreed that a lack of legal status can constrain undocumented workers’ resistance to their marginalization and exploitative treatment. Yet in recent years, undocumented workers and youth have been at the forefront of immigrant rights mobilizations and have organized around their status as undocumented people. In this article, we explore how the conferral of a conditional immigration status has affected undocumented youth activism. In particular, we show that the implementation of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program in 2012 had varied and complicated consequences for youth activism in Chicago—at once stifling the urgency of comprehensive immigration reform and galvanizing efforts to expand and strengthen protections against deportation. More broadly, we consider how prolonged states of liminal legality (Menjivar 2006) bring people more tightly under the purview of state surveillance without removing their vulnerability to deportation.

The Political Segregation of the United States

The federal bicameral legislature of the United States of America (U.S.) is currently dysfunctional, in that it is unable to pass legislation to address important issues such as immigration reform and economic development. I show that dysfunctional government in the U.S. is largely a byproduct of segregation: a phenomenon in which liberals tend to relocate to live in areas where liberal voters are in the majority, and conservatives tend to relocate to live in areas where conservative voters are in the majority. I analyze U.S. presidential election data by state from 1976-2012, and show that a shift occurred in voting behavior for key American states after 1976. I explore some of the reasons for these political trends and I review and discuss the psychological literature related to voting behavior.

Circumventing deadlock through venue-shopping: why there is more than just talk in US immigration politics in times of economic crisis

ABSTRACTThis article addresses the question of how the financial and economic crisis that hit the USA in the late 2000s impacted immigration policies. We find that the crisis has not significantly changed dynamics. Instead, it has highlighted and aggravated persisting trends. Drawing on Kingdon’s multiple streams model and combining it with the notion of two-level games, we find that while the policy stream and the problem stream would call for both restrictive and liberalising changes, the political stream impedes change: the fact that Congress has been divided for a long time over comprehensive immigration reform (CIR) impedes any restrictive or liberalising changes. With problems resulting from current policies being intensified through the global economic crisis, however, actors favouring either restrictive or liberal policy change look for alternative venues to pursue their policy aims. Through legislative changes on the state level or via executive orders by the president, policies can be changed on a lower level without CIR.

Why Utah? The “Reddest of Red States” and inclusive immigration reform

In Spring 2011, the Utah Legislature crafted a series of primarily inclusive immigration bills that became known as the “Utah Solution” to immigration reform. This package of bills passed both the Utah House and Senate and was signed into law by the Republican Governor. This case study provides an in-depth answer to the question “why Utah?”—a state with a rapidly growing foreign-born population, highly Republican both in its citizenry and legislative body, lacking a professional legislature and bordering a state that passed the toughest immigration law in the country—passed inclusive immigration policy. Detailed interviews with those responsible for producing the Utah Compact and involved in the policy process suggest important factors that have gone unexamined in previous work on state immigration policies, in this case a state Compact on immigration and the role of religion. Examination of both aid in providing a fuller understanding of predictors of state immigration policy.The findings make several contributions to the emerging literature on predictors of state policies. First, our study advances this research by incorporating two variables understudied in the literature to date—a state Compact on immigration and the role of the dominant religion in the state. Second, our study shows the importance of a better understanding of dynamics as they play out in influencing state immigration legislation. The study findings also show the need for multiple methods to gain a fuller understanding of why states pass the immigration legislation they do. A fuller understanding of predictors may then help to anticipate the legislation that will be passed, and the impacts of this legislation on immigrants.

Potential Beneficiaries of the Obama Administration's Executive Action Programs Deeply Embedded in US Society

The Obama administration has developed two broad programs to defer immigration enforcement actions against undocumented persons living in the United States: (1) Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents (DAPA); and (2) Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). The DACA program, which began in August 2012, was expanded on November 20, 2014. DAPA and the DACA expansion (hereinafter referred to as “DACA-plus”) are currently under review by the US Supreme Court and subject to an active injunction. This paper offers a statistical portrait of the intended direct beneficiaries of DAPA, DACA, and DACA-plus. It finds that potential DAPA, DACA, and DACA-plus recipients are deeply embedded in US society, with high employment rates, extensive US family ties, long tenure, and substantial rates of English-language proficiency. The paper also notes various groups that would benefit indirectly from the full implementation of DAPA and DACA or, conversely, would suffer from the removal of potential beneficiaries of these programs. For example, all those who would rely on the retirement programs of the US government will benefit from the high employment rates and relative youth of the DACA population, while many US citizens who rely on the income of a DAPA-eligible parent would fall into poverty or extreme poverty should that parent be removed from the United States. This paper offers an analysis of potential DAPA and DACA beneficiaries. In an earlier study, the authors made the case for immigration reform based on long-term trends related to the US undocumented population, including potential DAPA and DACA beneficiaries (Warren and Kerwin 2015). By contrast, this paper details the degree to which these populations have become embedded in US society. It also compares persons eligible for the original DACA program with those eligible for DACA-plus. As stated, the great majority of potential DAPA and DACA recipients enjoy strong family ties, long tenure, and high employment rates in the United States. Nearly one-half of the DAPA population and far higher percentages of the two DACA populations speak English well, very well, or exclusively. An unknown, albeit not insubstantial percentage of both the DAPA- and DACA-eligible may already qualify for an immigration benefit or relief that would put them on a path to permanent residency and US citizenship. These mostly low-wage populations have relatively high rates of poverty and low rates of health insurance. Not surprisingly, the educational attainment, school enrollment rates, and English-language proficiency of the DACA-eligible substantially exceed those of the DAPA-eligible. Both populations enjoy high levels of computer and Internet access. The Center for Migration Studies (CMS) derived its estimates on the DAPA- and DACA-eligible from statistics on the foreign-born population collected in the US Census Bureau's American Community Survey (ACS), as described in Warren (2016). It first derived detailed estimates for all undocumented residents, and then used the characteristics of this population (e.g., year of entry, age at entry, etc.) to tabulate the numbers of those who would be eligible for DAPA and DACA in 2014, which is the most recent year available.

Leaving the ‘perfect DREAMer’ behind? Narratives and mobilization in immigration reform

This paper focuses on the consequences of the narrative used to support immigration reform by some immigrant activists, and especially how this narrative may negatively impact potential allies. Policies and policy proposals such as the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act, and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals have been consistently championed using a specific narrative of undocumented youths which presents them as well-assimilated, driven, and US-educated. The paper is drawn from 60 in-depth interviews conducted with undocumented youths in 2013 in New York City and northern New Jersey. The paper builds on the literature relative to narratives in social movements, framing and policy-making. Findings indicate that recent campaigns continue to make extensive use of this narrative, even though it creates a divide within the undocumented community. This unintended consequence has recently led some activists to step away from the ‘perfect DREAMer’.

Legalization and human capital accumulation

This paper presents new evidence regarding the effects of legalization on the training of immigrants who were granted legal status through the US Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) of 1986. Our findings point to a large increase in the immigrants’ incidence of training relative to comparable groups of natives following legalization. While training gains are higher for males, wage gains are higher for females. We also show that an important part of these changes in labor market outcomes occurs through occupation changes by newly legalized immigrants.

Welfare reform and immigrant fertility

Immigration policy is at the forefront of US policy discussions, and the use of welfare benefits by immigrants has been hotly debated. In 1996, Congress enacted welfare reform legislation, which imposed strict restrictions on welfare eligibility for noncitizens. However, a number of states restored access to welfare benefits to immigrants that had been cut out in the federal welfare reform law. Using data from the Current Population Survey, we examine whether immigrant women adjusted their childbearing in response to changes in the generosity of welfare benefits at the state-level. We find that noncitizen women reduced their fertility in response to cutbacks imposed by the legislation. Our findings, which prove robust to a number of identification and robustness checks, underscore how immigrants respond to state-level policies and provide insight into the potential impacts of comprehensive immigration reform, particularly the components related to the path to citizenship and access to public benefits.

A Qualitative Analysis of the Lived Experiences of a Small Group of Filipino Immigrants

Demographers have forecasted that the U.S. is rapidly moving closer to becoming a majority-minority country, this fact and the politically divisive nature of recent debates and attempts at immigration reform have fostered increased conversations about citizenship, diversity, assimilation/s, and other im/ migration discourses. Often these dialogues surround boarder-crossings and the political, economic, and social implications of im/migration. One unfortunate outcome is frequently the perpetuation of stereotypes and the “othering” of many migrant groups to which this research offers a counter narrative. This counter narrative is built on the lived citizenship of a small group of Filipino im/migrants in the U.S. The paper demonstrates that—contextually—working abroad is common practice in the Philippines; this phenomenon is woven into the political, social, and economic jurisdictions of the country. This research fills one gap in im/migration studies as it chronicles the stories of these Filipino im/ migrants while examining their perceptions about their identity, sense of belonging, right to place, and the legitimacy of their citizenship socio-culturally. The paper places these and other narratives from this group of im/migrants within the theoretical framework of Critical Theory, hence offering a voice to a group of individuals not frequently heard in academia.

The networked grassroots. How radicals outflanked reformists in the United States’ immigrant rights movement

ABSTRACTThis paper accounts for important shifts in the debate on immigration reform by considering the geographies of protest. Our findings point to the importance of urban hubs of activists and organisations that have worked with one another over extended periods of time. While these urban hubs constitute distinctive activist worlds, they have also connected to one another and coordinated nation-wide actions through a variety of networks (social media, interpersonal, and inter-organisational). Using interviews, network analysis, and data on funding, we show how this decentralised network evolved and eventually outflanked nationally centred and reformist advocacy organisations in recent anti-deportation campaigns.

Opening Borders: African Americans and Latinos Through the Lens of Immigration

African-American and Latino voter turnout during the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections hit record numbers. Polls show that the immigration debate influenced Latino voter turnout and preference. Presidential candidate Barack Obama’s voiced support of comprehensive immigration reform strengthened his lead among Latino voters in 2008 and, once in office, his executive policy of granting temporary protection to DREAMers solidified his lead among Latino voters in 2012. Both elections showed the power that minority groups can exert when they vote in support of the same candidate. If the demographic changes continue as currently estimated, African Americans and Latinos will contribute in large part to the making of the United States into a “majority-minority” nation and will play an increasingly important role in local and national politics. Therefore, it is important for Americans to become more inclusive of all minority groups and to expand discussions of race relations beyond the Black-White paradigm and discussions about immigration beyond the Latino-White paradigm. As the polarized reactions to the Zimmerman verdict showed, there is much work to be done as the people of the United States continue the project of forming “a more perfect Union.” Honest assessments of how individuals and groups interact are crucial to opening borders and encouraging exchanges beyond socially constructed boundaries, like race, and racialized politics. African Americans and Latinos often compete with each other for political representation and other resources. In addition, the political consideration of immigration law and policy includes a racial dimension that is often camouflaged, but denial and silence about this reality do nothing to move the country forward. Therefore, immigration provides an opportunity to examine race relations and the potential for inter-group coalitions between African Americans and Latinos. For this reason, this Article also explores, through the lens of immigration, the role that race may play in the attitudes of African Americans and Latinos toward each other. One of the goals of this Article is to spark a candid dialogue that promotes a better understanding of race and its impact on interactions between African Americans and Latinos in the United States.