American Public Opinion on Immigration: Nativist,Polarized, or Ambivalent?

For Dauvergne (2016), one consequence of the “end of settler societies” is nativism, or what she calls “mean-spirited politics”: anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim, anti-Multiculturalism. This accords with the prevailing tone of public opinion literature on the subject, which links anti-immigrant hostility in settler societies to influxes of diversity and associated racial threat. In this essay, we determine just how closely this stylized vision of anxiety-fuelled nativism resembles the true state of mass opinion about immigration. Using a variety of surveys fielded in recent years, we show that Americans: 1) hold generally positive views about immigration, though with a substantial dose of ambivalence about its consequences; 2) are not especially consistent in their policy attitudes over time; 3) express policy attitudes that readily depart from their underlying predispositions, and; 4) have only become more pro-immigrant in recent years, and whatever partisan polarization exists on the issue stems from the fact that Republicans are becoming more positive at a slightly slower pace than Democrats. All of this suggests that, while there is a hard core of ethnocentrism and "mean-spiritedness" in the U.S., the prevailing tone is much less negative than the standard portrayal assumes.     

State Immigration Policies: The Role of State Compacts and Interest Groups on Immigration Legislation

US states are active in enacting immigration policies, which vary widely and have substantial impact on the lives of immigrants. Our understanding of what produces these divergent state laws remains limited. Qualitative research demonstrates the importance of a 2010 immigration compact, supported by a powerful religious organization, in shaping immigration policies in Utah, and the Utah Compact was held up as a model for other states. But is the experience of Utah applicable across other states? We test the effects of compacts and interest groups on immigration policy adoption across all 50 states between 2005 and 2013. Our findings suggest that compacts are actually associated with more restrictive immigration policy. Although states with compacts are more likely to pass inclusive immigration laws, these are counterbalanced by higher numbers of exclusive laws. Both religious and non‐religious interests groups are associated with policy, but they do not explain the effects of compacts.     

Analysing US State Legislative Resolutions on Immigrants and Immigration: The Role of Immigration Federalism***

Immigration in the United States is traditionally thought of as a federal‐level policy, but in recent years, states have been exceedingly active in this domain. We analyse the context and discourse of immigration‐related legislative resolutions from Southern border‐states, recipients of the heaviest immigration flows, and find that states do not respond in the same way to immigration challenges, and these differences occur over time and space. Some states seek to federalize the issue and push Congress to take action, while others are slowly incorporating immigrants into domestic politics and have begun to treat them as yet another state constituency. These findings have significant implications both for federal‐state relations in the immigration realm, and for immigrants themselves.     

Beyond Profitability: The Dutch Transatlantic Slave Trade and its Economic Impact

Dutch research into the slave trade and its importance to the Dutch economy has often limited itself to investigating the financial success of slave trading companies, calculating the success of slaving by its profit rates. The central argument made in this article is that gross margin is a better indicator for the importance of the slave trade to the Dutch Republic. Even if a slave trading company did not make a net profit on a voyage, such a voyage led to extra activities such as shipbuilding or the production of trade goods. This article provides a reconstruction of this gross margin for the entire period that the Dutch were engaged in the trans-Atlantic slave trade by combining the most recent data on the size of the slave trade (including illicit trade) with data on both African and American price data of slaves.     

Transatlantic Roundtable on High–skilled Migration and Sending Countries Issues

Globalization and the advent of the knowledge economy have created a new context where there is a greater demand for the highly skilled, especially in the information technology (IT) industry. High–skilled migration has become increasingly more complex, even if in recent years the term "brain drain" has become a generic reference to "high–skilled migration" of all types. It has also become clear that brain mobility does not automatically translate into "brain drain", and that impacts vary by the types of skills held by migrants.
The meeting demonstrated that while much is known about high–skilled migration and its effects on source countries, there is also a great deal yet to be learned in a dynamic environment. Many participants deplored the lack of reliable data, which makes it difficult to know what is really going on and to establish appropriate policies. Clearly, there are an array of policies that can offset possible adverse effects of skilled mobility and even leverage the flow into positive outcomes for source countries. A key element is improvement of the population's general level of education. Low levels of skills keep average labour productivity and wages low and therefore retard development. Long–term strategies to promote economic growth are needed to enable developing countries to retain and draw back their highly skilled and address the negative effects of the brain drain. Migrants themselves can play an important role through their remittances, diaspora networks, and own willingness to return – at least temporarily — to share their skills and contribute to economic progress. Finally, destination countries can facilitate the process through policies that promote circulation of highly skilled migrants.     

Immigration in two federations: Canada and Australia

The need for increasingly widespread application of a policy or program, settlement, and multiculturalism is urgent in both Canada and Australia. For both countries there is a clear pattern of coalescence and divergence and the distinct growth of immigration as a federal function. While Australia has strengthened federal functions in a area of increasingly geo-political need, Canada is moving towards a looser model of federalism. By 1918 both countries were strengthening their federal functions in immigration as discussions within the British Empire on the recommendations of the 1917 Dominions Royal Commission took root. Both countries were interested in agricultural immigration and land settlement. The Great Depression caused a major reduction in population growth rates. From 1933-1948 Canada had a poor record of providing sanctuary for Jews. In Australia, however, Jewish voluntary agencies were aiding the reception of refugees by 1937. The 1st permanent embodiment of commonwealth jurisdiction over immigration was the establishment of an Immigration Branch within the Department of Interior around 1938. Australia needed extra population for defense. The major structural link between government and the immigrant communities was through the Good Neighbor Movement, which began on a nationwide basis in 1950. Both Canada and Australia are major receiving countries for refugees. In 1973 Australia reached the position of effective, practical nondiscrimination achieved by Canada in 1967. Prime Minister Trudeau's policy was multiculturalism within a framework of bilingualism. By 1978 Australia had a new federalism policy, which in all areas concerned with immigrants, refugees and ethnicity, rationalized resources allocation and imposed a political philosophy. The foci of multiculturalism in Australia are 1) community languages; 2) creation of a tolerant, non-discriminatory society; and 3) equity and participation. In 1978 Australia specified population replacement and increase as the major aim of immigration policy. In 1984 Australia showed a significant movement forward in understanding by many, but it confirmed a resistance to change on regional, gender, race, and age criteria with others. The fundamental problem for both countries will be to combine the core federal function in immigration, needed both for international and domestic politics, with an increasingly flexible response to regional factors.     

Immigration and learning: the vulnerable age*

Cet article poursuit la discussion d'un effet originellement rapporté par Inbar et Adler (1976a). Cet effet suggére que les jeunes agés de six à onze ans sont probablement plus vulnérables à certaines crises dans leur environement que ne le sont les enfants qui sont ou bien plus jeunes ou plus agés. En particulier, il a été documenté que les enfants qui immigrent durant cette periode de leur enfance ont une nette tendence a faire plus tard moins d'études universitaires que leurs congènéres. Cet effet a été maintenant repliqué pour le Canada. Dans leur communication originelle traitant de l'existence d'un age vulnérable, les auteurs de la communication ont montré que le phénomène n'est pas affecté par l'ordre de géniture. Les analyses presentées dans cet article suggérent que l'effet est independant de la cohorte d'age, du niveau socio-economique des parents, et de la culture d'origine. Il appert, toutefois, que pour l'échantillon Canadien l'effet n'est répliquable que pour les garçons. Les implications qu'a l'existence d'un age critique, tel que l'effet est prisentement documenté, sant discutées. The present paper is a follow-up of the serendipitous finding reported by Inbar and Adler (1976a). This finding suggests that children from about six to eleven years old may be more vulnerable to crises in their environment than are either younger or older youths. In particular, children who immigrate during this period have been shown to exhibit later a significantly smaller rate of college attendance. This finding is shown to be replicated for Canada. In the original report on the Vulnerable Age phenomenon the authors have presented evidence to the effect that the finding is independent of birth-order. The present analysis suggests that it is independent of age cohort, parental ses, and culture of origin. At the same time it would appear that in the Canadian sample the finding holds essentially for males only. The implications of the Vulnerable Age Phenomenon as it presently stands are discussed.     

Slave Ships and Coffin Ships: Transatlantic Exchanges in Irish-American Blackface Minstrelsy

Abstract

Irish participation in blackface minstrelsy underwent complex transatlantic exchanges as it jumped from the US to Ireland and back again from the era of the Great Famine through the end of the nineteenth century. Most research on Irish-American blackface minstrelsy treats the Irish in America as a homogenous group that used ‘blacking up’ to establish its ethnic whiteness. However, there were at least two distinct groups of Irish Americans who participated in blackface minstrelsy: Irish Catholics and Irish Protestants. The latter’s incorporation into the history of minstrelsy means that we must reconsider assumptions about how and why the Irish performed blackface in both Ireland and America. Because Irish Protestants’ whiteness was never in question, theories of ethnic assimilation and working class anxieties do not adequately account for Irish gravitation to minstrel shows. Something else about Irish identity captivated performers and audiences. Moving beyond the racial assimilation mode, I argue that blacking up carried tensions of land dispossession, national identity, and ethnic conflict in Ireland into American culture.     

Immigration and Settler-Colonies Post-UNDRIP: Research and Policy Implications

It is now common to identify a policy convergence around migration which is eroding the longstanding distinction made in the migration literature between “traditional” countries of immigration (like Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States) and other Western states. Taking the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as instructive, this article focusses on the case of Canada, arguing that its settler-colonial foundation has impacted and continues to impact three areas relevant to the comparative study of migration: 1) national discourse; 2) land and forms of social power; and 3) politics and forms of solidarity. The implications of settler-colonialism for the study of international migration are broader than the case of Canada and suggest the need to link considerations of Indigeneity systematically in migration studies, and to address the particularities of settler-colonial states in relation to other Northern states by being attuned to “divergence within convergence.”     

Partisanship and Views about Immigration in Southern California: Just How Partisan is the Issue of Immigration?

ALLÉGEANCE PARTISANE ET POINTS DE VUE SUR L'IMMIGRATION EN CALIFORNIE DU SUD: LA QUESTION DE L'IMMIGRATION EST-ELLE ASSOCIÉE À UNE ATTITUDE PARTISANE ?
Étant donné les divisions partisanes qu'affichent les élites politiques sur la question de l'immigration, on peut s'attendre, sur ce même sujet, à voir l'attitude des masses reproduire les mêmes clivages. Nous étudions l'incidence de l'attitude partisane sur cette question en analysant les attitudes populaires à l'égard des immigrants en Californie, oú le regard porté sur l'immigration et les immigrants a été au centre de campagnes éminemment politiques. Pourtant, même en Californie, nous constatons que des types très différents d'électeurs partagent des préoccupations étonnamment semblables face à l'immigration. Nous nous intéressons tout particulièrement à la question de savoir si les démocrates et les républicains perçoivent de façon semblable ou différente l'incidence de l'immigration sur l'action des pouvoirs publics. Nous constatons que, comme on pouvait s'y attendre, les républicains ont davantage tendance à penser que l'immigration aura des effets néfastes sur les plans social et politique aux États-Unis, mais aussi que les démocrates tendent à partager les mêmes préoccupations. Cette tendance a pour conséquence que le Parti républicain - tout du moins en Californie - pourrait être en mesure d'utiliser la question de l'immigration pour obtenir l'adhésion de personnes qui soutiennent habituellement les candidates démocrates, censés être plus ouverts à l'égard des immigrants.     

Contextualizing Gender and Migration: Galician Immigration to Switzerland

Focusing on two main aspects of the Spanish‐Galician migration experience, this article attempts to analyze how migrants' actions and discourses are shaped by notions of gender. First, the discourse of returning will question notions of family and how differently men and women define their positions as members of a family. While men seem to link their social identity to immovable goods of prestige back in Galicia, women are able to redefine their social identity as they base it on social relations. The second aspect deals with the fact that cleaning is defined as women's work, but at the same time it is — under certain conditions — performed by men.     

Conceptualizing and Measuring Immigration Policies: A Comparative Perspective

In the last decade, researchers have developed many innovative ideas for the construction of indices measuring immigration policies. Methodological considerations have, however, been largely absent from the discussion. To close this gap, this paper investigates the characteristics of existing indices by critically comparing and discussing them. We start by providing a definition of immigration policy which may serve as a benchmark when assessing the indices. By means of the analytical framework developed by Munck and Verkuilen (2002), which we adapt and customize for our analysis, we then evaluate the conceptualization, measurement, and aggregation, as well as the empirical scope of thirteen immigration policy indices. We discuss methodological strengths and weaknesses of the indices, how these affect the research questions that can be answered and what the next steps in index building within the field of immigration policy should be.     

Worries of the poor: The impact of financial burden on the risk attitudes of micro-entrepreneurs

We randomly expose the owners of small retail businesses in Vietnam to scenarios that trigger financial worries and study the effect of this intervention on risk attitudes using an incentive-compatible elicitation method. We find that entrepreneurs exposed to financial worries behave less risk-averse than those assigned to a placebo treatment. This effect is stronger for owners of shops which are smaller and those less exposed to large income shocks in their everyday business. We further show that the effect of financial worries on risk attitudes is not explained by changes in the cognitive functioning of the treated. The findings are consistent with previous results from laboratory experiments with students in developed countries. As such, the paper provides evidence for the external validity of these findings in the context of micro-entrepreneurship in a developing country and points to financial worries as one understudied psychological channel for the effect of material deprivation on decision-making.