Immigration Politics Research Articles

Educating for compassion and mutual accommodation

Macdonald (2020) argues that there are four pillars of civilization- freedom, science and technology, mutual accommodation and compassion. The emphasis in the West since the Renaissance has been on freedom and science. The latter two pillars are needed if civilization is to thrive. In contrast to many countries where nativism, authoritarianism, and populism is manifest, Canada has been able to engage in mutual accommodation so that Quebec did not separate and is “unique among Western nations in the absence of seriously poisoned immigration politics”. The paper outlines ways to educate for mutual accommodation and compassion and describes two schools in Toronto that demonstrate these practices.

Jewish Emigration and Soviet Propaganda in Films of the 1920s and 1930s

The article attempts to consider the appeals of the Soviet screen of the 20-30s to the topic of emigration in general and Jewish emigration in particular. The latter appeared most often in connection with the possibility of re-emigration. Unlike the plot about the professional or political immigration of foreigners to the USSR, the plot with the reemigration of Jews had a number of important advantages. It allowed to demonstrate the progress of the Soviet country in time. It exposed at the same time the horrors of the discriminatory policy of tsarist Russia and the illusion of equality, financial well-being and personal freedom of Western countries. Jewish emigration turned out to be justified by external factors for the Soviet authorities, unless, of course, we were talking about leaving for Palestine for Zionist beliefs. The Soviet screen of the 20s and 30s was critical of Zionism, but even this sometimes became insufficient. Some films had not been released like “Against the Will of the Fathers” by Yevgeny Ivanov-Barkov. One of the film’s characters – student Boris despite his Zionist preferences still remained a positive hero. Other films, for example, Mikhail Dubson’s “Border”, were subjected to numerous alterations, reducing the dangerous topic of Zionism to a minimum. The renewed Russia, now oriented towards internationalism and having discarded capitalist habits, appeared in the Soviet cinema of the 30s not only as an ideal old new homeland for Jews, but also as a universal proletarian paradise (“Horizon”, “The Return of Nathan Becker”, “Seekers of Happiness”, etc.). But not all Jewish characters got access to the Soviet “Promised Land”, but only those who were ready to give up their national, cultural, linguistic isolation in the end. After all, the revolution destroyed the main Jewish trait in Russia – the pale of settlement. And now it was time to return and find a share not in the future, but in the present, accomplished Soviet world without borders and hierarchies. The pragmatics of Soviet propaganda becomes more obvious when referring to censorship prohibitions and restrictions (“Against the will of the Fathers”, “Dream”), rejected versions of the script (“Border”), accompanying advertising texts (“Jewish Happiness”), as well as to the analysis of the plots of films based on Jewish material.

Конфессиональные «параллельные» общества в контексте иммиграционной политики Скандинавских стран

The article analyzes potential and real threats to the national security of the Scandinavian countries from Muslim segregated communities of immigrants who form “parallel” societies on the territory of Denmark, Sweden and Norway. Based on the commonality of the historical development, the economic system and the sociopolitical structure of the states in this geopolitical region, the research identifies general trends in the formation of a confessional parallel society and the modern political immigration strategy in Northern Europe. The study of social and political discourse and officially published documents on the problem of “parallel” societies makes it possible to assess the effectiveness of actions taken by state structures to ensure the full integration of isolated Muslim communities in the majority society. The reports of ministries and internal law enforcement agencies in the states of Northern Europe deserve special attention against the background of the widespread exploitation of the problems of Muslim parallel communities in the media and sociopolitical debates that escalate social tension in the Scandinavian countries. Despite the fact that the official reports emphasize the undeniable relevance of this problem, they exclude the possibility of escalating the current situation into a threat of national or international scale since the police keep these territories under control. However, the lack of successful integration policies of Denmark, Sweden and Norway regarding ethno-religious minorities significantly complicates the legal regulation of cultural, religious and ethnic diversity within their national borders. This situation leads to the formation of “vulnerable residential areas” with a high degree of crime against the background of a low socioeconomic standard of living. The population of such areas mainly consists of non-Western immigrants practicing Islam. Discrimination of the rights of ethno-religious minorities in democratic countries to a large extent determines the tendency to the segregation of Muslim communities from the majority society on the basis of their own cultural and religious order, which subsequently may lead to religious radicalization. Despite the positive measures taken by the governments of Denmark, Sweden and Norway to integrate Muslim minorities into the majority society, the prevailing inefficiency of the existing immigration policy in the context of the continuous expansion of cultural, religious and ethnic diversity among the population of the Scandinavian countries is stated. Moreover, the main reason for the emergence of a confessional parallel society as a modern social phenomenon lies in the practical absence of state structures and public institutions capable to ensure full integration of all citizens into a united society.

VASYLVASYLIOVYCH ANDRIYEVSKY DURING THE PERIOD OFTHE UKRAINIAN REVOLUTION IN 1917-1921 IN CHERNIHIV REGION (based on the materials of Vasyl Andriyevsky’s archive-investigation file)

The lack of the scientific literature concerning Vasyl Vasyliovych Andriyevsky’s participation in the Ukrainian revolution in 1917-1921 in Chernihiv region is stated. His surname (as the leader of such immigrant organizations as Ukrainian Society Prosvita, Ukrainian Community, the Union of Ukrainian Organizations in Yogoslavia) is mentioned in solitary publications about the Ukrainian political immigration in the period between two world wars. The documents and materials of Vasyl Andriyevsky’s archiveinvestigation file used by the authors are kept in the Sectoral State Archive of the Security Service of Ukraine. They are representational and fill the gap in the issue concerning his participation in the revolutionary events in Chernihiv region in 1917-1921. The main directions of Vasyl Andriyevsky’s activities while holding the positions of the commissar in Borzna county and the instructor-organizer of the Ukrainian National Rada in Sosnytsia county are covered. The attention to Vasyl Andriyevsky’s participation in the Ukrainian province (Chernihiv) and county congresses (Borzna, Novgorod-Siversky, Sosnytsia), in relevant Ukrainian committees, in founding the detachments of “Ukrainian free Cossacks” is updated. His work in the institutions that ensured functioning of the Labour Congress in Kyiv is emphasized. Vasyl Andriyevsky’s achievements in the field of creative writing and journalism are characterized. The information concerning his publications on the pages of such periodical issues as “Ohni”, “Mayak”, “Muraveinik” (Kyiv) and “Chernihivska Zemska Hazeta” is mentioned. In the author’s opinion the studies of Vasyl Andriyevsky’s immigration period, participation in the immigrant unifying movement and literature efforts are promising.

Socialism and Empire: Labor Mobility, Racial Capitalism, and the Political Theory of Migration

This essay brings together political theories of empire and racial capitalism to clarify the entanglements between socialist and imperial discourse at the turn of the twentieth century. I show that white labor activists and intellectuals in the United States and the British settler colonies borrowed from imperial scripts to mark non-white workers as a threat. This discourse was thus both imperial and popular, because it absorbed the white working class into settler projects and enlisted its support in defense of imperial logics of labor control. While white workers’ demands of enfranchisement were part of a transnational imagination that was both imperial and narrowly emancipatory, this discourse reemerged as one of popular sovereignty and found channels and paths to institutionalization through national states. These institutional formations arose out of the encounter between capitalists interested in facilitating mobility of racialized laboring subjects around the globe, elite projects invested in sheltering settler spaces, and white workers concerned with protecting their own labor from competition by excluding exploitable non-white workers. White labor’s embrace of racial prejudice and the exclusion of workers of color created segregated labor spaces that fit neatly with both capitalist goals of labor control and the protection of the settler status of emerging polities. Bringing to the forefront the imperial genealogy of popular sovereignty and immigration control disrupts liberal political theory frameworks that condemn restrictions as well as those that find migration restrictions permissible. The analysis also illuminates contemporary immigration politics.

The Mexican Revolution in Chicago: Immigration Politics from the Early Twentieth Century to the Cold War

The Mexican Revolution in Chicago: Immigration Politics from the Early Twentieth Century to the Cold War

A New Politics? Symposium on Dauvergne’s The New Politics and the End of Settler Societies

AbstractThis Special Issue presents articles that empirically and theoretically explores the central arguments of Catherine Dauvergne's 2016 book The New Politics and the End of Settler Societies. This multidisciplinary issue comprises five research articles and a closing commentary from Catherine Dauvergne, exploring migration‐related events that have taken place since 2015. As a whole, these articles demonstrate the relevance of The New Politics and the End of Settler Societies to future comparative studies of immigration politics and policies. Contributions to this Special Issue also confirm policy trends and convergence, as argued by Dauvergne. More broadly, the selected articles illustrate the analytical and political challenges associated with imagining research and policies outside of the paradigm of settler societies.

Fight for the City: Policing, Sanctuary, and Resistance in Chicago

abstract In the months following Trump’s 2016 election as U.S. president, scores of cities across the United States instituted or reaffirmed “sanctuary” measures that impede federal immigration enforcement actions in their midst. Yet in the heart of these “sanctuary” cities, many immigrants remain vulnerable to deportation. This article describes one community campaign to identify, track, and stop a mechanism through which urban immigrants are detained and deported: data sharing between local police agencies and federal immigration officials. We draw on Kyle Walker’s (2015) framework of place, scale, and networks of local immigration politics to show how overlapping scales of immigrant policing ultimately jeopardized Chicago’s promise to be a place of immigrant sanctuary. We then describe how community organizers exploited this tension as they exposed the effects of Chicago police data sharing practices on black and Latinx Chicagoans and campaigned for a stronger city sanctuary policy.

Liturgy with Ruth

Abstract How the church thinks about food has everything to do with her politics of immigration. Ruth’s story is one of gratefully receiving the other over a table of food. This is put in the context of what Patrick Deneen calls late modern liberalism’s ‘liberal anti-culture’. Foreigners in American contexts are mere items of consumption like the food we eat. We do not receive food with gratitude, so we do not receive the foreigner with gratitude. Ruth’s story is presented as a eucharistic liturgy that the church can perform, speaking blessings over foreigners as they are invited to eat a morsel of bread, take a sip of wine, and participate in community potlucks. A response follows which engages issues of multiculturalism, double-distancing of immigrants, Ruth’s contribution to the meal at the table, and the eucharist as a space-making event.

The Evolution of Authoritarianism and Restrictionism in Brazilian Immigration Policy: Jair Bolsonaro in Historical Perspective

Research on immigration politics has been focused on countries of the Global North. Latin America is often discussed only as a migrant‐sending region. This study offers a comparative‐historical analysis of Brazilian immigration policy from national independence to the present day. Based on archival research and synthesis of multiple documentation sources, the study finds an affinity between authoritarian politics and immigration restrictionism in the country, which is consistent with theories that link liberal democracy to pro‐immigrant policies. Brazilian authoritarian leaders have framed immigrants as threats to the security, order, and culture of the nation to justify tighter controls on immigration. The study concludes that immigration restrictionism can develop in the Global South with discourses strikingly similar to those circulated in the Global North. The findings also suggest that Brazil is still far from the ideal of a multiracial liberal democracy.

What Drives the Immigration-Welfare Policy Link? Comparing Germany, France and the United Kingdom

Western European states have increasingly linked immigration and welfare policy. This trend has important implications for European welfare-state trajectories, but accounts of the policy reasoning behind it have diverged. Are policymakers attempting to delimit social citizenship to secure welfare-state legitimacy? Pursuing new, market-oriented welfare-state goals? Symbolically communicating immigration control intentions to voters? Or attempting to instrumentally steer immigration flows? These accounts have rarely been tested empirically against each other. Redressing this, we employ 83 elite interviews in a comparative process-tracing study of policies linking welfare provision and immigration status in Germany, France, and the UK during the 1990s. We find little evidence suggesting welfare-guided policy reasonings. Rather, this policy linkage appears “immigration-guided:” meant to control “unwanted” immigration or resonate symbolically in immigration politics. Differences in exclusions from welfare support for migrants grew from existing national differences in welfare-state design and politicizations of immigration, not from policy intentions, which were largely shared.

Nativist policy: the comparative effects of Trumpian politics on migration decisions

AbstractFirms in the USA rely on highly skilled immigrants, particularly in the science and engineering sectors. Yet, the recent politics of immigration marks a substantial change to US immigration policy. We implement a conjoint experiment that isolates the causal effect of nativist, anti-immigrant, pronouncements on where skilled potential-migrants choose to immigrate to. While these policies have a significantly negative effect on the destination choices of Chilean and UK student subjects, they have little effect on the choices of Indian and Chinese student subjects. These results are confirmed through an unobtrusive test of subjects’ general immigration destination preferences. Moreover, there is some evidence that the negative effect of these nativist policies are particularly salient for those who self-identify with the Left.

Revisiting The New Politics of Immigration

AbstractThis article follows from the workshop that Professor Mireille Paquet organized in Montreal in June 2018, to discuss my book, The New Politics of Immigration and the End of Settler Societies (Cambridge, 2016; Dauvergne 2016). In relation to this event and the articles of this special issue, this paper embarks on revisiting The New Politics of Immigration, now more than three after it first appeared in print. In this paper, I reflect on whether my arguments stand up to the test presented by the events of the past three years. Recent events lead me to nuance some of my original arguments, but on the whole even the most recent surprises fit well into the New Politics framework that points to increasing salience, legalization and urgency in politicizing immigration.

Beyond the Usual Suspects and Towards Politicisation: Immigration in Quebec's Party Manifestos, 1991-2018.

Immigration is increasingly politicised: issues surrounding immigration are more salient and party immigration positions are becoming more polarised. Literature on this topic has overwhelmingly focused on Europe and the USA, while identifying radical right parties and particular social dynamics as the main drivers of politicisation. In this paper, we consider a case that exhibits growing politicisation, yet does not fit existing measures and explanation of this phenomenon: Quebec, Canada. Considering party manifestos between 1991 and 2018, we ask: how have Quebec major political parties treated immigration policy issues over time? We argue that Quebec’s immigration partisan space is organised by a liberal-restrictive immigration policy continuum and a jurisdictional axis. Mapping provincial political parties’ positions, we document a stable clustering towards liberal policy positions but a clear cleavage on the jurisdictional axis. We show that the emergence in 2012 of a highly moderate centre right party—the Coalition Avenir Québec—broke with these established positions and drove a politicisation of the issue. These results demonstrate the importance of considering alternative drivers to explain the politicisation of immigration, as well as of paying attention to the politics of immigration in contexts where pro-immigration discourses dominate.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (10.1007/s12134-020-00764-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

The Dynamic Relationship between Immigrant Politics and Urban Policy Making: Protecting the Rights of Undocumented Immigrants in Boston and Amsterdam

With the advancement of comparative studies within the field of immigration and sociopolitical movements, scholars have attempted to understand how politico-institutional contexts influence the mobilization strategies of immigrant rights organizations at the local level. In this article, I make use of a field approach to explain how these organizations face different group-and issue-specific conditions regarding their involvement in local policy-making processes. Empirically, I examine the advocacy work of immigrant rights organizations in their aim to protect the rights of undocumented immigrants in Boston (USA) and Amsterdam (the Netherlands). By approaching power and resistance as relational phenomena, the results indicate that the intersection of distinct institutional and organizational mechanisms has differently impacted the local fields of immigrant politics. Taking different routes, in both cities immigrant rights organizations have found ways to constitute an affirmative institutional and discursive counterpower that challenges the national exclusionary citizenship regimes from the ground.

Crafting a ‘liberal monarchy’: regime consolidation and immigration policy reform in Morocco

ABSTRACT This paper demonstrates that Moroccan immigration policymaking is intrinsically tied to the monarchy’s authoritarian consolidation agenda. Drawing on archival research and 87 semi-structured interviews conducted between 2011 and 2017 with Moroccan high-level civil servants, international and national civil society representatives, the paper dissects power dynamics among state and societal actors involved in Morocco’s 2013 immigration reform. The analysis shows that immigration policy liberalisation not only emerged out of Morocco’s autocratic political structures – a dynamic I call the ‘illiberal paradox’ – but at the same time consolidated them. In particular, the Moroccan monarchy used the 2013 ‘liberal’ immigration reform to pursue three interrelated goals: (1) to perform Morocco’s human rights commitment on the world stage and the regime’s responsiveness to domestic pressure for political reform, (2) to consolidate the monarchical institution within Morocco’s state apparatus and (3) to (at least partially) co-opt Moroccan civil society for humanitarian migration management, thereby silencing dissent in other arenas. At the same time, however, the analysis reveals that the regime consolidation strategy and the King’s portrayal as a ‘liberal’ monarch did not cancel out deeply rooted dynamics among and between state and civil society actors, which required both sides to adapt their cooperation or resistance strategies. Ultimately, the paper showcases that immigration politics reflect the power dynamics within and the legitimation strategies of the Moroccan monarchy. Immigration policy research thus offers a privileged vantage point from which to analyse broader political regime dynamics.

Will my patients get their residence permit? A critical analysis of the ethical dilemmas involved in writing medical certificates for residence permits in France

BackgroundFrance has long been a country of immigration and in some respects may be seen to have a generous policy with respect to asylum seekers and access to health care for migrants. The French state notably provides healthcare access for undocumented migrants, through state medical aid and since 1998 has had a humanitarian policy for granting temporary residence permits for medical reason (TRPMR) to migrants. Within a context of political debate, reform and tightening immigration control we will examine this latter policy focusing especially on the dilemmas that arise for physicians of migrant patients when they are requested to write medical certificates as part of a TRPMR application. In a 2017 reform the key role of making recommendations on the granting or not of permits was handed over to Ministry of the Interior health inspectors. Recommendations are made after perusal of medical certificates established by the migrant’s physician and complementary evidence.Main bodyThe writing of medical certificates by a physician would seem straightforward. This is far from the case since it raises a number of ethical dilemmas. These occur within a physician-patient relationship embedded within a social contract between the State, the physician and the migrant patient. To clarify the ethical issues arising 3 vignettes based on practice within an infectious disease unit at a large Paris hospital have been developed. The vignettes highlight ethical dilemmas in the care for migrants with tuberculosis (dilemma in defining health and disease), chronic hepatitis (dilemma between beneficence and do not harm), and HIV / AIDS (issue of deservingness). We will go on to reflect on issues of social justice and responsibility for the health of migrants within a globalized world.ConclusionsCriteria for residence permit delivery appear less than clear-cut and are interpreted in a restrictive way. Neither are the consequences of refusing a residence permit taken into account. We call for an empirical transnational ethics study involving countries implementing similar TRPMR policies. We also call for inclusion of lobbying competences into the medical undergraduate curricula, in order to breed future generations of physicians skilled in defending social justice.

The Politicization of Immigration in Portugal between 1995 and 2014: A European Exception?

AbstractImmigration is envisaged as part of an ‘emergent cultural cleavage’ across Western Europe. Within this context, this article explores the politicization of immigration in Portugal between 1995 and 2014. Politicization is interpreted as being formed by two distinct dimensions: salience and polarization of the political claims found within news articles extracted from newspapers. Notwithstanding the doubling of the foreign population settled in the country in the early 2000s, the diminished salience and the absence of significant political conflict suggest that immigration failed to become politicized in Portugal. Drawing on a comparative analysis with seven other European states between 1995 and 2009, Portugal observed the lowest rate of politicization. Rather than being related with socio‐economic factors, the lack of politicization of immigration was associated with the strategies of the mainstream parties, which successfully prevented the emergence of this topic as a significant political cleavage.

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.

Proposition 187 and Its Political Aftermath: Lessons for U.S. Immigration Politics After Trump

This Article critically examines how Proposition 187 set in motion a chain of events that forever transformed California politics. That history poses an important — and seemingly incongruous — series of questions for the future of U.S. politics: will the aggressive enforcement measures of the Trump administration have political ramifications for the entire nation similar to those that Proposition 187 had on California? Might the responses to President Trump’s immigration policies lead to a political realignment on a national scale similar to that which occurred in California? Ironically enough, the actions of President Trump, similar to those of California Governor Pete Wilson, who championed Proposition 187, might ultimately have wholly unintended consequences. The administration’s harsh immigration policies, in fact, may pave the way for a more immigrant-friendly national political climate. Such political change might lead to the passage of comprehensive immigration reform, which has been proposed for many years but is yet to be passed by Congress. That change might also spur the passage of other pro-immigrant legislation. Part I of the Article reviews Proposition 187, the racially-tinged campaign that led to its passage, and the litigation successfully barring most of the measure from going into effect. Part II analyzes how the initiative forever changed California politics. Nothing less than a political watershed, Proposition 187 set into motion a chain reaction that, if replicated on the national level, may reverse the contemporary trajectory of immigration law and enforcement. Part III draws parallels between the campaign for Proposition 187 and Donald Trump’s harsh immigration rhetoric and agenda. Finally, Part IV contends that, if current trends continue, the Trump administration’s immigration policies might well boomerang, triggering a national political transformation like that seen in California in the wake of Proposition 187.