What Makes an Entrepreneur and Does it Pay? Native Men,Turks, and Other Migrants in Germany

This paper focuses on the entrepreneurial endeavours of immigrants' and natives in Germany, concentrating on Turks, Germany's largest immigrant group and one under‐studied in the literature. Self‐employed Turks in Germany represent about 70 per cent of all Turkish entrepreneurs in the European Union. We use data from the German Socio‐economic Panel to study patterns of self‐employment. First, we identify the characteristics of the self‐employed individuals and understand their underlying drive into self‐employment. Next we investigate how immigrant entrepreneurs fare in the labour market and compare their earnings to those of the natives. It is important for decision makers to understand entrepreneurial patterns so that they can shape policy that better fosters entrepreneurial activities. This paper presents several findings that can inform better policymaking. First, our investigation indicates that education is not decisive in determining whether one will choose self‐employment over salaried work nor in explaining earnings. The estimated age‐earnings profiles are the same for natives and immigrants, while the proclivity to become self‐employed is concave with respect to age for both groups. Immigrants' start with a higher probability to work than natives but have a slower increase in the self‐employment probabilities thereafter. The earnings of self‐employed immigrants' are higher initially, but their earnings path crosses eventually that of the natives. Second, we find some suggestion of ethnic entrepreneurial spirit. Turks are 70 per cent more likely to be self‐employed than any other immigrant group, although they do not necessarily earn more. These patterns should be further explored.     

No Room for Respectability: Boundary Work in Interaction at a Shanghai Rental

This article examines the dramaturgical challenges of doing boundary work for a group of college women living with non‐college women at an overcrowded rental. To regulate tenant conduct and maintain their sense of self‐worth, the college women engaged in defensive othering and constructed their identity as “high‐quality” people on the basis of their characterization of their less‐educated roommates as “low‐quality” people. Their strategy of gaining self‐worth at their roommates' expense violated basic rules of social interaction that require participants to give face to gain face. This study shows that, in addition to weakening group solidarity and reproducing social inequalities, defensive othering also undermines subordinates' effort to gain self‐worth in the co‐presence of other subordinates. A video abstract is available at http://tinyurl.com/yath4o65     

The Relational Contexts of Migration: Mexican Women in New Destination Sites

This article assesses Mexican immigrant women's experiences of isolation and autonomy in three new destination sites in Montana, Ohio, and New Jersey. We highlight six case studies from our cross‐comparative data set of in‐depth interviews and field work with 98 women to illustrate the intersections between contexts of reception and gender relations in shaping women's settlement experiences. We find that women in sites with a concentrated Mexican population and a well‐developed social service infrastructure are relatively autonomous in accomplishing daily activities independent of their relationships with husbands or partners. In contrast, for women living in sites with few social support services, relationships with the men in their lives, what we call their “relational contexts,” matter for women's experiences of isolation or autonomy outside the home. Relational contexts have not been emphasized in previous literature on gender and migration but may be significant in shaping women's experiences across varying contexts of reception.     

Everyday Restriction: Central American Women and the State in the Mexico‐Guatemala Border City of Tapachula

Media coverage and emerging scholarship have brought increasing international attention to the urgent humanitarian crisis facing Central American transmigrants as they navigate landscapes of violence in Mexico. While stories of Central American immigrants who remain in Mexico are largely absent from this coverage, there is arguably a “Central Americanization” occurring on the southern border through this permanent settlement. Central Americans choosing to establish themselves in the border state of Chiapas do so in a socio‐spatial and political context defined by the introduction of “progressive” state‐ and national‐level migration policies on the one hand and the persistence of discrimination and violence on the other. We know little about the implementation of these policies on the ground, namely how they are applied and the impacts they have on the immigrant experience in Mexico. To begin to fill this gap, this paper focuses on the experiences of Central American immigrant women living in the Mexico‐Guatemala border city of Tapachula. Employing a feminist geopolitical lens, which encourages conducting research and analysis at diverse scales, it examines their everyday interactions with low‐ to mid‐level representatives of the Mexican state as they seek to avail themselves of their legal and social citizenship rights, and the impacts of these interactions on their livelihoods. This article argues that low‐ to mid‐level officials’ actions reveal the importance of a form of extra‐official, subtle, yet pervasive regulation through which immigrant women are denied rights they are entitled to, inducing negative impacts to their livelihoods, which I term everyday restriction.     

A town recalls its past: narratives about Jewish craftsmen and handicrafts

There exist two major ways of dealing with the Jewish past in the former Pale of Settlement: to forget this past as something not prestigious and thus not worth remembering, or to use it in the “romantic‐nostalgic” context. Contemporary materials collected among the inhabitants of provincial townships in Ukraine show that the Jewish past has become very “popular” nowadays; it is not only a part of the familial history of Jews, but also a key element of the local history. Jewish age‐old professions (handicraft, trade, etc.) is an important theme in people’s narratives; this article focuses on stories of this type from the point of view of how they “ethnicise” and “exoticise” the local past.     

‘Survival Employment’: Gender and Deskilling among African Immigrants in Canada

Recent research points to a growing gap between immigrant and native‐born outcomes in the Canadian labour market at the same time as selection processes emphasize recruiting highly educated newcomers. Drawing on interviews with well‐educated men and women who migrated from countries in sub‐Saharan Africa, this paper explores the gendered processes that produce weak economic integration in Canada. Three‐quarters of research participants experienced downward occupational mobility, with the majority employed in low‐skilled, low‐wage, insecure forms of “survival employment”. In a gendered labour market, where common demands for “Canadian experience”, “Canadian credentials” and “Canadian accents” were uneven across different sectors of the labour market, women faced particular difficulties finding “survival employment”; in the long run, however, women’s greater investment in additional post‐secondary education within Canada placed them in a somewhat better position than men. The policy implications of this study are fourfold: first, we raise questions about the efficacy of Canadian immigration policies that prioritize the recruitment of well‐educated immigrants without addressing the multiple barriers that result in deskillling; second, we question government policies and settlement practices that undermine more equitable economic integration of immigrants; third, we address the importance of tackling the “everyday racism” that immigrants experience in the Canadian labour market; and finally, we suggest the need to re‐think narrowly defined notions of economic integration in light of the gendered nature of contemporary labour markets, and immigrants’ own definitions of what constitutes meaningful integration.     

Explaining Attitudes towards Self-employment among Immigrants: A Canadian Case Study

Implicit in Canada's immigration policies is that some immigrants are endowed with a particular entrepreneurial spirit, and that this spirit relates to immigrants’ origin. This paper examines whether attitudes towards entrepreneurship indeed relate to origin, or whether they can be explained through labour market circumstances at the place of settlement and/or Canada's immigrant selection procedure. The empirical study focuses on the reported attitudes towards entrepreneurship. A survey of 509 Vancouver residents of a predominantly Chinese immigrant neighbourhood, a predominantly South Asian immigrant neighbourhood, and a neighbourhood of non‐immigrants reveals that ethnic origin is a weak indicator of entrepreneurial attitudes. Instead, urban or rural background emerges as a more powerful predictor. The results also raise doubts about whether the Canadian government's immigration policy, which selects immigrants on the basis of economic potential, indeed selects immigrants with a greater desire to become self‐employed. Furthermore, the amount of time immigrants have spent in Canada does not significantly affect attitudes towards entrepreneurship.     

Ages,Life Stages,and Generational Cohorts: Decomposing the Immigrant First and Second Generations in the United States1

This article focuses on problems with the definition and empirical identification of immigrant “first” and “second” generations in the United States. These loosely conceived aggregates are decomposed into a typology of distinct generational cohorts defined by age and life stage at migration for the foreign born and by parental nativity for the U.S. born. Differences in educational and occupational attainment and in language and other aspects of acculturation are then examined to consider whether the practice of “lumping” these generational cohorts together, or “splitting” them into distinctive units of analysis, is empirically supported by available evidence. The paper concludes with some thoughts on data needs and methodological considerations in the study of immigrant generations.

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Dynamics of Social Support

Abstract

This study challenged the current conceptualization of social support as a static process and attempted to explore how the sources and types of social support unfolded over time during mainland Chinese immigrant women's first year of resettlement in Hong Kong. A longitudinal qualitative method was used and 15 immigrant women were recruited. In-depth interviews using a semi-structured interview guide were conducted at three-monthly intervals. Results supported our view on the “stages within stage” assumption of the resettlement period of the migration-integration process. In the first quarter of resettlement, immigrant women mobilized a great deal of instrumental and information support from family members and kin to resolve survival issues such as finances, housing and childcare. However, the demand for instrumental support declined over time, and the need for emotional support appeared to peak at the second stage of the resettlement period. Fellow immigrant women were found to be the most significant providers of information, emotional and social companionship support to immigrant women throughout the resettlement period while the supporting roles of husbands and kin diminished. Lastly, immigrant women were less inclined to seek help from formal networks and rarely sought support from neighbors and co-workers. Socio-economic and cultural reasons were used to explain these differential support patterns during immigrants' first year of resettlement in Hong Kong, and implications for social work practices were discussed.     

Self‐Employment as a Strategy for Dealing with the Competing Demands of Work and Family? The Importance of Family/Lifestyle Motives

In this paper, we test the argument that self‐employment may be a strategy for dealing with competing demands of work and family. We do this by comparing work–family conflict experienced by self‐employed and employed men and women. By examining to what extent the self‐employed versus regularly employed value time for themselves and their family — i.e., whether they are driven by family/lifestyle motives in their working life — we examine whether self‐employment can help reduce work–family conflict among those guided by family/lifestyle motives. Using data from a 2011 Swedish survey of 2483 self‐employed and 2642 regularly employed, the analyses indicate that experiences of work–family conflict differ between self‐employed and employees. Self‐employed men and women, especially those with employees, generally experience more work–family conflict than do employees. However, self‐employment can sometimes be a strategy for dealing with competing demands of work and family life. The presence of family/lifestyle motives generally decreases the probability of experiencing work–family conflict, particularly among self‐employed women with employees.     

Role Conflict and Self‐Efficacy Among Employed Parents: Examining Complex Statistical Interactions

In response to growing concerns with explaining how work and family interfere with each other and with statistical approaches that do not capture the way in which predictors interact, this study tested statistical interactions involving personal and social resources of 410 full‐time employed women and men. The results indicate that self‐efficacy is a strong predictor of family interfering with work (FIW) and work interfering with family (WIF). Gender moderates the relation between supervisor support and WIF moderates the impact of efficacy beliefs and instrumental support at home on FIW. Specifically, while supervisor support is negatively related to WIF in women and men, high levels of support more strongly affected men's perceptions of WIF. In low self‐efficacy men, high levels of support at home improved their perceptions of FIW but these perceptions worsened in women. These findings contrast with earlier research that focus predominantly on the predictive value of structural demands (for example, the number of hours worked per week and family size). This study shows that gender plays a critical yet intricate role as a predictor of the successful management of work and family roles: it is not gender per se but its interaction with personal and social variables that informs us about differences in the experience of employed parents.     

The Latina/o Racial and Citizenship Divide on Perceptions of the Influence of Immigrant Mobilizations*

In spring 2006, the United States witnessed immigrant marches throughout the nation. Although Latina/os are often depicted as the “face” of the immigrant marches, we know little about how racial and citizenship statuses shaped Latina/os’ perceptions of how the marches influenced public perceptions of undocumented immigrants. Using logistic regression on data from the 2006 National Survey of Latinos, we find that Latina/os identifying as white are less likely to be supportive of the immigrant marches than those who defied standard racial classifications, and instead identified as “Latina/o.” Moreover, Latina/os who are born in the United States are not as supportive of the immigrant marches in comparison with naturalized citizens and non‐citizen Latina/os, accounting for demographic and human capital factors. This study suggests there is a “racial‐ and citizenship divide” among Latina/os that fragments perceptions on the immigrant mobilizations in the United States.     

Economic growth,labour flexibilization and employment quality in Colombia, 2002–11

Over the period 2002–11, the Colombian labour market saw a marked improvement in employment opportunities, accompanied by an increase in nonstandard forms of employment. The authors look at how this affected employment quality, using a composite index based on Categorical Principal Components Analysis (CATPCA). They observe a small but widespread improvement in employment quality – mainly for self‐employed women – brought about by higher earnings, increased social protection and less time‐related underemployment. However, a considerable “quality deficit” remains, which calls for policies to strengthen labour market institutions and stimulate productivity and investment.     

“Anarchy all over Baščaršija”: Yugoslavia's new socialist culture and the New Primitives poetics of the local

The paper analyses Sarajevo's music movement of New Primitives and its “poetics of the local” as a struggle against the cultural hypocrisy of Yugoslavia's “new socialist culture” and its privileging of “external‐cosmopolitan” as apotheosis of cultured refinement and sophistication while denigrating “local‐parochial” as epitome of uncultured primitiveness. I argue that the movement's praxis is best understood as a call to reject externally‐imposed frames of reference as the basis for self‐understanding, and to embrace a socio‐cultural awareness that the only way to be in the world is to be authentically “primitive”– i.e. to exist as a distinct and autochthon socio‐cultural self.     

The Native‐Immigrant Income Gap among the Self‐Employed in Sweden

During recent years we have observed that non‐western immigrants are overrepresented among the self‐employed in Sweden. A reason for this might be the difficulties faced by immigrants in the labour market. The unemployment rate among non‐western immigrants in Sweden is higher than among natives with similar human capital characteristics. While this is a well‐established result, we do not know much about how self‐employed immigrants perform economically compared to their native counterparts. The purpose of this paper is to describe and analyse the incomes of self‐employed immigrants and natives in Sweden. We will also discuss possible explanations for the income gap we find. We use Swedish register data for the period 1998 to 2002 and the population studied consists of individuals who have been continuously self‐employed during this period. By performing the analysis on this group of self‐employed we get a measure of the difference among the long‐term self‐employed. The outcome of interest is the average income over the period. Income regressions are estimated using both OLS and quantile regressions. We find that self‐employed immigrants receive significantly lower incomes than their native counterparts when controlling for individual characteristics, industry and start‐up year of the firm. The income gap is larger for non‐western immigrants than for western immigrants. Quantile regressions show that the native‐immigrant income gap is smaller at the top than at the bottom of the income distribution. Several possible explanations for the native‐immigrant income gap are discussed. One possible explanation is that immigrants have a lower reservation wage and accepts staying in business receiving a lower income than comparable natives. Another explanation might be that there is discrimination against self‐employed immigrants that will lead to lower incomes. There can be consumer discrimination or discrimination from banks and real estate owners.     

Analgesia produced in women by genital self‐stimulation

This study investigated the relative effectiveness of specific genital regional self‐stimulation in elevating pain thresholds. Anecdotal reports in humans suggest that sexual activity and orgasm decrease a wide variety of human responses to pain and touch, but the phenomenon has not been evaluated objectively. Two types of self‐stimulation, pressure and pleasurable, were applied by 10 women to the anterior vaginal wall, the posterior vaginal wall, and the clitoris. Significant increases in pain thresholds but not tactile thresholds occurred when pressure stimulation was applied to the anterior wall of the vagina or when “pleasurable” self‐stimulation was applied to any of the three areas. Tactile thresholds were not significantly affected by any genital stimulation condition. However, there was a significant increase in tactile threshold but not pain thresholds in the distraction control condition. On the basis of these findings, we conclude that (a) a sensation of pleasure evoked by genital stimulation can elevate pain thresholds, (b) these pleasurable stimuli were not general “distractants” because they elevated pain thresholds but not tactile thresholds differentially, and (c) genital pleasurable stimuli activate an analgesic process that is distinct from a distraction process.     

Capacity and Solidarity: Foundational Elements in the Unionization Strategy for Immigrant Day Labourers

Recent scholarship has been reasonably optimistic about unionization as a mechanism of labour justice for immigrant workers in casual and contingent work. This optimism rests on two assumptions: (1) that unions have the capacity to absorb immigrant workers in nonstandard work and (2) that casual, immigrant labourers enjoy the kind of solidarity that underpins collective action. This paper examines these assumptions critically through a case study of construction unions and Latino immigrant day labourers in Denver, Colorado and Baltimore, Maryland. I use participant observation and in‐depth interviews with nine labour unions, 19 Latino immigrant day labourers, and two (non‐union) day labour organizing projects in the cities to examine questions of capacity and solidarity. I find that the existing foundations for unionizing day labourers may be weak in certain cities and communities. Union capacity is undermined by structural fragmentation and specialization in market segments that are inaccessible to day labourers. Strategically, in an age of de‐unionization, unions also face pressures to “add value” for employers by sorting the workforce into high quality and low quality categories. Locals indicate day labourers would likely fall into the latter category, thus precluding membership. The foundations for solidarity are similarly weakened in the cases studied. Culturally, day labourers in Denver and Baltimore emphasize self‐reliance and material well‐being over collective action and the pursuit of justice. To work toward unionization, organizers should be prepared to confront deficits of capacity and solidarity in other cities as well, especially those where homelessness is prevalent among day labourers, where immigrant populations are newly arrived, or where local union cultures are unreformed. I suggest that union collaboration, a cooperative type of occupational unionism, and commitments to training day labourers may help boost union capacity to absorb day labourers, while the creative use of material incentives should figure prominently in organizing strategies.