Immigrant Political Incorporation Research Articles

What’s new about new destinations? Cinderella states and the comparative study of migration

ABSTRACT Immigrant political incorporation is a concern of Europe and the U.S., but the process in the latter is seen as more successful owing to its immigration history, minority politics, and institutions. While comparative analysis has largely focused on post-war receiving states, since the 1990s, migration flows have significantly changed. What’s new about new destinations? And what might these cases suggest for the future of comparative research on political incorporation? This article uses existing frameworks for transatlantic comparisons and applies them to a broader pool of European cases. It argues that new destinations may have more in common with the U.S. than their old destination neighbors due to their emigration history, minority politics, and distinct welfare and labor institutions. It also finds more points of Europe-U.S. convergence than often allowed for in the literature. Together, this suggests opportunities for new comparative research to better understand incorporation dynamics within and beyond Europe.

Exploring The Complexities of “Alien Suffrage” in American Political History

Abstract Although historians and political scientists have long acknowledged the significant place of immigrants in American political history, the role of “alien suffrage” has not been well appreciated, and gaps remain in the scholarship about the nature of its practice. How extensively was “alien voting” practiced and what were its effects? This study addresses these questions by examining eleven of the forty states that allowed non-citizens to vote before obtaining citizenship. These states, located in the Midwest, South and West, were selected because immigrants comprised a significant proportion of their total population and allowed alien suffrage for an extended period of time (1848–1920). We develop estimates of non-citizen voters and examine ethnic voting patterns in these states to gauge their impacts on partisan dynamics in gubernatorial elections. Our findings show non-citizens voted and factored into election outcomes, furthering the incorporation of European immigrants. We also shed light on the unsavory side of alien suffrage, which contributed to a form of settler colonialism and functioned to block or delay the enfranchisement of African Americans and women. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of these findings for our understanding of immigrant political incorporation in American political history, as well as for contemporary debates about the revival of the legal practice of non-citizen voting in the United States.

Negotiating civic identity across different political contexts: Immigrant participation in social movements and political incorporation

AbstractThis article examines the understudied intersection between migration and contentious politics, focusing specifically on immigrant participation in social movements within their host societies. Drawing upon data from the Anti‐Extradition Law Amendment Bill (Anti‐ELAB) Movement in Hong Kong, it illuminates the process through which Chinese immigrants become politicized, evolve collective identities, and mobilize against civil dominance. Further, it underscores the transformative potential of social movements in facilitating immigrant political incorporation. However, it also recognizes the unilateral acceptance determined by mainstream society, which often leaves immigrants sidelined in discussions regarding their qualifications for unconventional political participation. To address civil inequality, immigrants establish their civil identities, challenge dominance, and amass political capital for future incorporation. This study extends the migration and social movements literature by shedding light on the political dynamics of immigrant participation and the hurdles they encounter during their journey toward political incorporation. It also underscores the significant role of progressive social movements in fostering immigrant political participation. Furthermore, the research highlights the unique immigrant political identity that emerges and evolves through participation in social movements, contesting exclusion and monopolistic dominance over democratic realization.

When local political opportunity structures matter in political agency: the multipronged incorporation of Latinos in Chicago

ABSTRACT This paper analyses immigrant political incorporation through the political opportunity structure (POS) approach. This research acknowledges the contemporary interactions between the agency of Latinos and the political context of Chicago. The agency has three dimensions in the analysis: organisation, mobilisation, and policy incidence. The research design consists of a qualitative case study that includes observation and elite interviews. The main finding is how the degree of political inclusiveness of the city and the contextual factors merge with the multipronged agency, leading to complex interactions. Latinos in Chicago are experiencing the following dilemmas: 1) mainstreaming vs. autonomy in the case of organisation, 2) the simultaneous use of contentious and uncontentious mobilisations, and 3) the generation of community innovations to avoid depoliticisation.

When Local Political Opportunity Structures Matter in Political Agency: The Multipronged Incorporation of Latinos in Chicago

This paper analyses immigrant political incorporation through the political opportunity structure (POS) approach. This research acknowledges the contemporary interactions between the agency of Latinos and the political context of Chicago. The agency has three dimensions in the analysis: organisation, mobilisation, and policy incidence. The research design consists of a qualitative case study that includes observation and elite interviews. The main finding is how the degree of political inclusiveness of the city and the contextual factors merge with the multipronged agency, leading to complex interactions. Latinos in Chicago are experiencing the following dilemmas: 1) mainstreaming vs. autonomy in the case of organisation, 2) the simultaneous use of contentious and uncontentious mobilisations, and 3) the generation of community innovations to avoid depoliticisation.

Framing racial position and political standing: Hmong Americans in the Wisconsin State Journal and the Chico Enterprise-Record

Although membership is regarded as an important condition of immigrants’ capacities to influence the political system, the literature on immigrant political incorporation has tended to focus on formal citizenship status, giving the impression that other forms of membership matter less for immigrants’ political capacity. Arguing for the need to account for ethnic groups’ perceived racial position within local contexts, this paper explores how media outlets, as public institutions, construct the identity of Hmong Americans in ways that affect their political standing. Using a textual analysis approach, we examine how two newspapers within two US communities frame Hmong’s group identity. Our findings show that the papers situate Hmong within a field of racial positions, albeit, not in the same ways that past research predicts would apply to Asian Americans. While differing in the particulars, the two newspapers are quite similar in the frames they use to depict Hmong Americans: civic ostracism, racial ambiguity, and threat. The media neither refer to Hmong as Asians nor valorize them vis-a-vis another racial category. Nevertheless, media representations frequently sully Hmong as a threat to the community. We discuss the implications of our findings for immigrant political incorporation.

Bridging city environments: A contextual approach to the mobilisation of immigrant groups

Although cities are thought of as environments conducive to collective mobilisation, we know less about the collective processes by which marginal social groups take advantage of these environments to advance their claims. This article uses the concept of bridging social capital to explain the process by which immigrants living in cities with high diversity mobilise. It introduces the concept of bridging environments to show how city context shapes the collective mobilisation of immigrants. Mobilisation is contingent on the bridging environments with which immigrants can connect within the cities in which they settle. This argument is exemplified by a comparative analysis of the collective mobilisation of Ecuadorian immigrants in New York City and Madrid. This research contributes to how city context matters for the mobilisation and political incorporation of immigrants in liberal democracies.

Beyond Academic Achievement Outcomes: The Impact of School on the Immigrant Political Incorporation of Undocumented Latinx Youth

The immigrant political incorporation scholarship tends to stress the positive role that schools play in integrating undocumented Latinx youth. Yet, the racialization in school literature indicates that school is often a disempowering place for students of color. This study helps to explain this divergence. It draws from a case study of a struggling high school undergoing state-led reform in a new immigrant destination and analyzes data from school ethnography and student interviews. Deploying the concept of “critical bureaucratic incorporation,” this study explores how school reforms emphasizing high-stakes testing affected the students’ political incorporation. The findings show how these reforms disproportionately negatively affected the Latinx students, nearly all of whom were undocumented immigrants. The results suggest that future studies of immigrant political incorporation consider the case of struggling schools and insights from average students; and that the racialization in school literature address how school reforms affect students beyond academic achievement outcomes.

Effects of deportation fear on Latinxs’ civic and political participation

ABSTRACT As deportations have increased, fear of removal has risen. However, few scholars have addressed the effects of deportability on civic and political engagement. Using the Pew Hispanic Center's 2010 National Survey of Latinos (data file and codebook accessed 3 March 2014 from http://www.pewhispanic.org/category/datasets/), I explore the effects of fear of deportation (FOD), encounters with the homeland security state, and racial discrimination on Latinxs’ political participation. Findings reveal that FOD, discrimination, and encounters with the homeland security state produce distinct trajectories of political integration. These indicators catalyzed nonelectoral action around immigration reform. Experiences of discrimination positively affected Latinx citizens’ plans to vote, though FOD and encounters with the homeland security state were not significant. Notably, when accounting for FOD, encounters with the homeland security state, and discrimination, citizenship and immigration status did not have significant effects. These results bring together the literatures on crimmigration and immigrant political incorporation, revealing concrete ways that deportability and racialization of Latinx communities shape participation.

Glendale's Ethnopolitical Entrepreneurs: Suburban Immigrant Political Incorporation

Concentrated immigrant settlement of US suburbs is transforming how many newcomers become politically incorporated. While the scholarship traditionally assumed political incorporation takes place after social or cultural incorporation, novel political agents—or ethnopolitical entrepreneurs—have arisen from within immigrant communities and inverted this assumption. In these dynamic ‘ethnoburbs’, ethnopolitical entrepreneurs play an increasingly important role in constructing, organizing, and mobilizing internally diverse first generation, co-ethnic constituents. And they do so before their prospective constituents have become socially or culturally incorporated. But the existing scholarship on ethnopolitical entrepreneurs is very limited. Because entrepreneurs’ approaches to political incorporation vary based upon their individual experiences and backgrounds, this article seeks to broaden the framework through two case studies of Armenian ethnopolitical entrepreneurs in Glendale, California—Rafi Manoukian and Ardashes (Ardy) Kassakhian. While they manifest considerable overlap in terms of their career trajectories and incorporation strategies, these entrepreneurs’ individual experiences—particularly as a first and second-generation immigrant, respectively—have influenced the ways in which they incorporate newcomers and run campaigns.

More Royalist Than the King? Immigration Policy Attitudes Among Naturalized Citizens

Social psychological research has analyzed immigration attitudes mostly from the perspective of natives without an immigrant background. Nevertheless, an increasing number of migrants obtain national citizenship and take a stance towards immigration policies. By studying immigration policy attitudes reported by naturalized citizens, this article develops a dual‐pathway model of immigrant political incorporation featuring pathways of either absorption or transformation. Based on a unique sample of immigrants who just accomplished the naturalization procedure (N = 566), we investigate participants' preferences for permissive or restrictive immigration policies as a function of their naturalization motives and expectations about how immigrants should acculturate in the receiving society (i.e., acculturation orientations). Our findings provide evidence for both processes of political absorption and transformation. On the one hand, belongingness motives underlying naturalization were connected to orientations towards host culture adoption, which in turn predicted support for restrictive immigration policies. On the other hand, instrumental motives were connected to orientations towards heritage culture maintenance, which in turn predicted support for permissive immigration policies. To conclude, we discuss the social psychological dynamics involved in the transition from national outsiders to national insiders and highlight the effects of naturalization on power relations between national majority and immigrant minority groups.

Transportation and immigrant political incorporation

ABSTRACT The literature on political participation focuses on resources such as income and social capital in promoting individual engagement. This article highlights the role of transportation as a resource for the political incorporation of immigrants. Using data from 111 interviews with undocumented youths and community organisers in New York and New Jersey, results indicate that youths living in suburban and rural areas are more likely to encounter transport disadvantage than youths in urban areas. This had a negative impact on their ability to mobilise. In addition, the article provides information on the coping mechanisms employed by youths and their allies to deal with transport disadvantage. The article sheds light on the complex role of transportation in the political incorporation of immigrants.

Perceptual Disconnect: An Ethnographic Account of Immigrant Political Incorporation

AbstractScholarship often assumes that there is a correlation between successful immigrant political incorporation and newcomers’ ability to make sustained claims and reallocate city or state resources. By influencing or nominating legislators, scholars assume immigrants become civically engaged and politically empowered. However, these assumptions have not been tested. This article explores the personal experiences and perceptions of Armenian immigrants in Glendale, California, where nearly 40 per cent of the city's 200,000+ population is of Armenian descent, 70 per cent of whom are first‐generation immigrants. Furthermore, over 70 per cent of Glendale's elected officials claim Armenian ancestry. Nonetheless, many of Glendale's Armenian residents do not perceive the benefits of their electoral achievements. That is, there exists a perceptual disconnect between the city's ethnic‐leaning reallocations and the residents’ recognition thereof. This article argues, therefore, that electoral incorporation may not, after all, prove the final step in the achievement and perception of inclusion.

Superficial Equality: Gender and immigration in Asian American political participation

ABSTRACTAsian American men and women have voted at roughly similar rates across the last three presidential elections. This sets Asian Americans apart; women in America have generally voted at higher rates than men since the 1980s. The women in politics and immigrant incorporation literatures suggest that pathways to participation may be distinct for women and men. Yet, there is scant attention to gender in studies of Asian American political participation. As a result, little theoretical or empirical foundation exists for explaining why the gender gap in participation is so different for Asian Americans. To better understand this puzzle, we analyze pooled data from the National Asian American Surveys of 2008, 2012, and 2016. The data show that women are less likely to vote than men once we account for variables related to resources, mediating institutions, and immigrant incorporation. We also demonstrate that Asian American women who are foreign-born citizens are less likely to participate across a range of modes of political action, and across ethnic groups. We argue that this is evidence that gender and ethnicity simultaneously condition the processes of immigrant political incorporation, and the study of gender gaps must be approached more broadly as a political and comparative phenomenon.

The Political Incorporation of Undocumented Youth

AbstractThis article develops and empirically tests a model of political incorporation for undocumented youth in the United States, focusing on nonvoting forms of political engagement. Using one of the first nationwide surveys of undocumented millennials between the ages of 18 and 35 (n = 1,472), we show that (1) undocumented youth express much higher levels of political efficacy and participation than the literature on immigrant political incorporation leads us to expect, (2) membership in organizations that work on immigration-related issues is a main determinant of this sense of political efficacy, and (3) through mediation analysis, that organizational membership (the mediator) influences how political efficacy affects political participation, and not the other way around. The literature on immigrant political incorporation is vast, but precedent studies too often focus on formal acts of political participation, such as naturalization and voting, by those with lawful immigration status. With an analytical focus on youth without lawful immigration status, this article contributes to theoretical and empirical knowledge about how and to what extent undocumented youth become politically active and engaged despite the many obstacles that exist to their formal participation in politics.

Teachers Navigating Civic Education When Students Are Undocumented: Building Case Knowledge

Currently, a knowledge gap exists at the intersection of immigration, citizenship, and education. We have little knowledge of how teachers teach about citizenship when they anticipate that some of their students are undocumented. Conceptually, we distinguish between formal and cultural citizenship and draw from immigrant political incorporation theories. We investigate how high school civics teachers navigated the tensions of teaching youth in settings meant to socialize them for future political participation when some students did not have formal citizenship rights. Based on 88 hours of observational and interview data, we analyze three cases of U.S. government teachers selected from a pool of 39 secondary social studies educators. We ask: How did skilled and experienced civics teachers who supported immigrants’ rights teach about elections in mixed-citizenship settings where some youth had formal citizenship rights and others did not? We argue that key features of teaching in mixed-citizenship classrooms were context, safety, and legitimacy. We also generate a set of propositions to be tested in future research. As scholars increasingly discuss what civic education should look like in light of immigration and globalization, we offer grounded perspectives about the situated roles of teachers in mixed-citizenship contexts. Understanding how skilled and experienced teachers address the possibilities of inclusion despite structural exclusions opens a window into how schools can be sites that defy the formal boundaries of citizenship.

Polish Immigrants and the Challenges of Political Incorporation in the Republic of Ireland

Poles constitute the largest immigrant community in the Republic of Ireland and, according to the 2011 census, more than 2.5 per cent of its population. Polish has become the country's second most commonly spoken language. Notwithstanding efforts by immigrant organisations, most notably Forum Polonia, and efforts by Polish candidates to contest local government elections in 2009 and 2014, the current picture is one of chronic under-representation. Bloemraad's model of ‘structured mobilisation’ suggests two principal routes for immigrant political incorporation: (i) mobilisation via the ethnic community itself (ethnic organisations and community leaders) and (ii) mobilisation via mainstream actors (political parties). In respect of the first, we examine efforts by the Polish community in Ireland to mobilise voters and garner support for Polish candidates in the 2014 local elections. In respect of the second, we draw on 10 years of longitudinal research on responsiveness by Irish political parties to immigrants. 2014 witnessed a sharp decline in efforts by political parties to reach out to immigrants entitled to vote compared to 2009. This institutional response, we suggest, had much to do with justifiable perceptions that immigrants were unlikely to mobilise, register to vote in large numbers or exercise their franchise.

Reflections on the value of citizenship – explaining naturalisation practices

The article raises the question of why immigrants become or do not become citizens of their destination country. Political incorporation of immigrants through naturalisation is driven by several factors, including opportunities to naturalise on the one hand and the (perceived) added value of naturalisation on the other hand. We argue that naturalisation propensities are almost exclusively driven by policies, while settlement in a country raises the value of citizenship and leads to the acceptance of higher costs. Based on data from the Austrian Mikrozensus we examine the factors that drive citizenship status of immigrants from the main countries and regions of origin in Austria. We find that indicators related to the settlement of immigrants as well as indicators for having easier access to citizenship, most notably higher socio-economic resources, reduce the likelihood of being a foreign citizen.

Outsiders No More? Models of Immigrant Political Incorporation. Edited by Jennifer Hochschild, Jacqueline Chattopadhyay, Claudine Gay, and Michael Jones-Correa. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. 305p. $99.00 cloth, $39.95 paper.

Outsiders No More? Models of Immigrant Political Incorporation. Edited by Jennifer Hochschild, Jacqueline Chattopadhyay, Claudine Gay, and Michael Jones-Correa. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. 305p. $99.00 cloth, $39.95 paper.

Intergenerational Family Relations, Civic Organisations, and the Political Socialisation of Second-Generation Immigrant Youth

We build upon research on immigrant political incorporation, intergenerational family relations, and civic organizations in order to investigate the relationship between parents' political engagement and their children's civic and political participation. Drawing on survey data from a representative sample of California's 1.5 and second generation youth population, our analyses demonstrate support for the top-down model of political socialization in which barriers to immigrant parents' political engagement suppress the civic and political participation of their US-raised children. However, this is not the case for our unique sample of youth who participated in activist civic organizations. Our findings from follow-up in-depth interviews with survey respondents indicate that, while most youth do not actively politicize their immigrant parents, those who gained significant political experience through activist organizations often seek to orient their immigrant parents to US politics. In describing the efforts of some youth to educate their foreign-born parents about politics and encourage their participation, we evidence trickle-up effects in the political socialization of immigrant families. We argue that future research on activist civic associations should consider the impact of individual-level organizational membership on family-level patterns of political engagement.