Voting here and there: political integration and transnational political engagement among immigrants in Europe

In this article, I examine voting patterns in origin and receiving country national elections among immigrants in Europe. The existing scholarship on transnational political engagement offers two competing interpretations of the relationship between immigrant integration and transnational engagement, which I classify as the resocialization and complementarity perspectives. The resocialization perspective assumes that transnational political engagement gradually declines as immigrants become socialized into the new receiving society. Conversely, the complementarity perspective assumes that immigrant integration increases transnational political engagement. I test these competing perspectives with survey data collected between 2004 and 2008 for 12 different immigrant groups residing in seven European cities. The analysis examines how immigrant political and civic participation in receiving countries affect their proclivities to vote in homeland elections. I also analyse the effects of receiving and origin country contexts on immigrant voting behaviour in homeland elections. While my findings support both the resocialization and complementarity perspectives, they also highlight the ways in which a set of origin‐country contexts shape immigrant propensities to engage in transnational electoral politics. I observe a degree of complementarity among immigrants with resources who are motivated and eligible to participate in both receiving and origin‐country elections.     

Citizenship beyond politics: the importance of political,civil and social rights and responsibilities among women and men1

Previous research has suggested that men are more engaged as citizens than are women. Yet, little is known about gender cleavages across a variety of citizenship norms. To what extent do men and women define citizenship differently? To address that question, this study examines the importance men and women assign various citizenship rights and responsibilities using 2004 ISSP data from 18 Western, industrialized nations. Using a disaggregated approach to understanding definitions of citizenship, we examine political, civil, and social rights and responsibilities. After controlling for a variety of demographic and attitudinal influences, we find that men and women are not different in their views regarding the importance of political responsibilities. However, women do view political rights as significantly more important than do men. Further, in comparison to men, women view both civil and social responsibilities and rights domains as significantly more important.     

Services for the elderly in Europe: a cross-national survey

In 1989, a cross-national comparative survey on services for the elderly in Europe was initiated and funded by the Commission of the European Communities. It included the 12 countries of the current European Community (EC). Those services for the elderly studied were classified as temporary vs. permanent and conventional vs. innovative residential and community services. This article discusses developments within the EC relevant to public policymaking on aging and reports on the services for the elderly examined by the survey. It also delineates various new tasks for the EC to safeguard the appropriate use of services and thereby promote a dignified old age for all Europeans involved.     

Institutions and the adoption of rights: political and property rights in Colombia

Citizenship rights are the result of specific political bargains between different collective actors and state authorities (Tilly Theory and Society 26(34):599–602, 1997). The political bargains for rights are encoded in institutions, and these institutions develop independently from each other and take organizational characteristics that make certain rights easier to adopt than others. I argue that these institutions vary along two dimensions that affect the extent to which states can adopt rights successfully: one dimension is distributional and the second is the depth or extension of the rules that frame a given right. This article focuses on the institutional differences between property rights, especially land property, and political rights, and on the consequences of those differences on their adoption. I then illustrate my argument with examples from Colombia since 1980.     

Citizenship, immigration, and the European social project: rights and obligations of individuality

As envisioned by T.H. Marshall, social citizenship was a corrective to the injustices caused by the capitalist market. Entitlements and protections guaranteed by the welfare state would prevent social and economic exclusions that civil and political rights, on their own, simply could not. Such protections consequently would ensure social cohesion and solidarity, as well as a productive economy and market. European welfare states successfully followed this formula for the most part of the post-World War II period, however the last couple of decades witnessed significant changes. For one, the very meaning of 'work' and 'worker' on which the welfare state is based has changed - flexibility, risk, and precariousness have become defining elements of working life. The welfare state itself has gone through a transformation as well, increasingly moving away from a system of 'passive benefits' to 'social investment' in human capital. These developments are coupled with an emphasis on education in 'active citizenship', which envisions participatory individuals who are adaptable in an increasingly globalized society, and ready to contribute at local, national and transnational levels. The emergent European social project draws on a re-alignment between these strands: work, social investment, and active participation. In this article, I consider the implications of this project for immigrant populations in Europe in particular and for the conceptions of citizenship and human rights in general. In contrast to the recent commentary on the neoliberal turn and the return of nation-state centered citizenship projects in Europe, I emphasize the broader trends in the post-World War II period that indicate a significant shift in the very foundations of good citizenship and social justice. The new social project transpires a citizenship model that privileges individuality and its transformative capacity as a collective good. Thus, while expanding the boundaries and forms of participation in society, this project at the same time burdens the individual, rather than the state, with the obligation of ensuring social cohesion and solidarity, disadvantaging not only non-European migrants but also the 'lesser' Europeans. The new social project brings into focus the relationship between universalistic individual rights and their effective exercise. I conclude that rather than treating human rights and citizenship as a dichotomy we should pay attention to their entangled practice in order to understand the contingent accomplishments and possible expansions of citizenship in Europe.     

Feeling Europe: political emotion,knowledge, and support for the European Union

Theories of political emotion suggest that feelings towards an issue or candidate are often better predictors for support than attitudes or preferences. We investigate whether this conjecture also holds for more abstract political entities, such as the European Union (EU), and test whether EU citizens’ feelings toward the EU are significant predictors of their EU support. We first review existing research and provide theory-driven propositions of how positive and negative emotion may influence EU-related attitudes. Second, using multilevel regression models fitted to Eurobarometer data, we estimate how feelings toward the EU are associated with support for the EU. In line with our hypotheses, analyses show that positive emotions are positively associated with EU-support, while negative affect is negatively associated with it. Contrary to some theoretical predictions, however, these effects are not mediated by individuals’ use of EU-related information.     

Integration as a sociological concept and national model for immigrants: scope and limits

This article introduces the special issue on the contemporary validity of national models of immigrant integration in Europe. From a historical perspective, we address integration as a sociological concept for the social cohesion of European societies and for the integration of their immigrants; subsequently, we discuss the current ‘crisis’ facing both. We then outline seven country studies in order to compare the differences and similarities of their integration models. Although the importance of national integration has decreased with urban segregation, cultural pluralisation, European integration and globalisation for citizens and immigrants, most of the contributions in this issue show that national models of immigrant integration have not completely failed.     

US and them: Job quality differences between natives and immigrants in Europe

Using microdata from the European Union Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS) and aggregate indicators of labour market institutions, this article compares the job quality of native and non-native workers across European countries and analyses the impact of the institutional settings on the job quality differential between both groups. The LFS is used to measure a job quality index for the period 2005–2017. We find that some immigrant groups fare worse than natives, the contribution of the “composition effect” to explain this differential is large, and the institutional framework affects the immigration gap in job quality. In particular, some labour market institutions (more centralized wage bargaining, stricter employment protection legislation) tend to be detrimental for immigrants relative to natives, while integration policies seem to work well in reducing these differences.     

Chinese Labor Migration to Europe, 2008-16. Implications for China-EU Mobility in the Post-crisis Context

The article examines the evolution of Chinese labour migration to the UK, France, Germany, Netherlands, Spain and Italy in order to elucidate how the flows and stocks of Chinese workers have evolved since the Global Economic Crisis, and what implications this has have for Sino-European mobility partnerships in the post-crisis context. It explains: (1) What comparative data are available on Chinese labour migration to the six principal countries of destination in Europe; (2) How have Chinese labour migration flows and stocks evolved since the GEC; (3) How may the new Chinese workers’ mobility to Europe affect their rights?     

Traditional society, political society and Québec sociology: 1945–1980

L'analyse de la production sociologique au Québec, de 1945 à 1980, ne saurait être entreprise sans faire référence à la transformation des conditions generates d'enonciation qu'a connue la société québécoise durant la période. On peut schématiquement regrouper cette sociographie en quatre courants distincts. Le premier, de 1945 à 1960, se donne comme un savoir critique dc l'adaptation illustrant l'inadéquation de la référence au traditionalisme. Le début des années soixante marque le passage à la dominance d'une forme de la représentation présentant désormais le Québec comme une société politique. Une sociologie fonctionnelle de l'adaptation se développe dés lors, liée à la mise en place de L'État keynésien. Les années soixante-dix voient au contraire l'affirmation d'une sociologie de l'émancipation. Divisée en deux courants antagonistes, culturaliste et politiste, cette sociologie travaille à la redéfinition d'une société québécoise dorénavant soumise aux pleines déterminations de la modernité. The modernity of sociological production in Québec from 1945 to 1980 cannot be attempted without referring to the transformation in the general conditions of Québec's expression of itself as a society during this period. We can regroup this sociography schematically into four distinct approaches: the first, from 1945 to 1960, presented itself as a form of critical knowledge of adaptation which illustrated the inadequacy of references to traditionalism. The beginning of the 1960s marked the transition towards the predominance of a representational form which thereafter presented Québec as a political society. In the third tendency a functionalist sociology, linked to the consolidation of the Keynesian state, took root. The 1970s saw in contradistinction the affirmation of a sociology of emanicipation. Divided between two mutually antagonistic approaches, culturalist and political, Québec sociology is working towards the redefinition of a Québecois society henceforth caught in the determining web of modernity.     

Capital,conflict and convergence: a political understanding of neoliberalism and its relationship to capitalist transformation

ABSTRACT

In this article we argue against influential analyses of neoliberalism that prioritize variegation and the role of ideas as key theoretical foci relevant to understanding neoliberalism’s diffusion into myriad national and political settings. Rather, we contend that crucial to understanding neoliberalism is the role of politically-produced convergence around market rationality that reflects two core processes: the reorganization of production and the ascendency of financialization. We present a theorization and analysis of neoliberalism’s political production and diffusion over time, explaining its contested evolution and impact across diverse settings (both ‘North’ and ‘South’) and emphasizing its ever-intensifying symbiotic relationship with the consolidating world market in which the former has increasingly come to serve as the latter’s operating system (OS). Further, we posit that neoliberalism’s form, function and impact demand analytically prioritizing the leverage of constellations of ideological and material interests within the contradictory context of consolidating relations of production and financialization. Our analysis thus challenges many previous expositions of neoliberalism for their failure to locate neoliberalism’s manifestation as arising out of social conflict within particular junctures that privilege certain social forces and ideas over others. We also distinguish our position by highlighting how manifestations of neoliberalism in various settings have combined to yield a greater world market in which variegation has gradually given way to ever-intensifying disciplinary pressures towards market-policy conformity (mono-policy). While current populist movements may well turn out to be important counter movements to neoliberal hegemony, especially if they can internationalize, the disciplining effect of the world market renders many nationally-oriented policy alternatives costly and politically fraught.     

Female immigrants and labor in colonial Malaya: 1860-1947

"The role of Chinese and Indian women as immigrants and workers in colonial Malaya is examined using data from censuses, immigration records, official reports and secondary sources. The article discusses the main types of work of female immigrants and their contribution to the economic development of colonial Malaya during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in an attempt to redress the neglect of female immigrants' economic role in Malaya's history. Comparisons between male and female immigrants' labor and between Chinese and Indian immigrants, are drawn to highlight the different conditions of migration and labor for the different groups of immigrants."     

Migration,international relations and the new Europe: theoretical perspectives from institutional political sociology

The author examines the sociopolitical effects of recent political transformations in Eastern and Central Europe and the formation of the European Community on migration and international relations. Some policy implications are discussed.     

From political opportunities to niche-openings: the dilemmas of mobilizing for immigrant rights in inhospitable environments

This article examines how undocumented immigrants mobilize for greater rights in inhospitable political and discursive environments. We would expect that such environments would dissuade this particularly vulnerable group of immigrants from mobilizing in high profile campaigns because such campaigns would carry high risks (deportation) and have little chance of success. However, we have witnessed many mobilizations by undocumented immigrants in both Europe and the United States over the past 20 years. This article uses the case of undocumented youths in the United States (DREAMers) to examine how a group of undocumented immigrants have overcome important barriers and become a powerful voice for immigrant rights in the country. The article suggests that while undocumented immigrants faced inhospitable contexts, cracks and “niche-openings” they continued to present themselves to groups with the right set of cultural, legal, and economic attributes. Immigrants in possession of these attributes (in this case, youth) could target a niche-opening and argue that they are particularly deserving of legalization. This article also highlights an important dilemma: In contexts characterized by general closure and hostility, narrow mobilizations targeting niche-openings provide the only path to legal status for some, but they can also differentiate (discursively and legally) between “deserving” and “undeserving” undocumented immigrants. Differentiation can contribute to stratifying the immigrant population, with those deemed more deserving facing greater rights and entitlements and those deemed less deserving facing greater restrictions and repression. This carries the risk of magnifying normative and legal inequalities between immigrant groups while introducing many points of conflict within the broader immigrant rights movement.