Native Friends and Host Country Identification among Adolescent Immigrants in Germany: The Role of Ethnic Boundaries

Many studies find that high shares of native friends are positively related to immigrant youths' identification with the host country. By examining various immigrant groups together, these studies imply that having native friends matters in the same way for the national identification in different immigrant groups. In contrast, we argue that the extent to which having native friends affects immigrants' national identification depends on both immigrant group characteristics and the receiving context, especially on ethnic boundaries and related group differences in perceived discrimination and the compatibility of ethnic and national identities. Analyses based on data from the National Educational Panel Study in Germany that are representative of 15‐year‐old adolescents in secondary schools indeed reveal pronounced group differences: While national identification of ethnic German repatriates as well as of adolescents of former Yugoslavian and Southern European origin is related to the share of native friends, as hypothesized, we do not find this association for immigrants of Turkish and Polish origin. Our finding underlines the importance of theoretically as well as empirically accounting for group differences.     

Albanian and Polish Migration to Italy: The Micro‐Processes of Policy,Implementation and Immigrant Survival Strategies1

This article examines how undocumented immigrants take advantage or react to the windows of opportunity opened to them by immigration policy design and implementation practices in the country of destination. The study concentrates on the case of Albanian and Polish immigrants in Italy. Looking into the policy provisions regarding entry, stay and immigrant employment in Italy, as well as the practices of implementation adopted by the public administration, we study how immigrants prepare and execute their migration plans, how they find employment once in Italy, and how they adapt their plans to the institutional and social environments of the host country as well as their own wishes and needs. We thus highlight the micro‐level of the migration phenomenon and the dynamic relationship between policy design, implementation and immigrant strategies.     

Problems and possibilities in the study of American immigration and ethnic history

In the study of the history of immigration and ethnicity scholars often write about their own ethnic groups. For several reasons that pattern has led to an over-emphasis on the new immigrants of the early 20th century, a limitation of focus to the experiences of the 1st and 2nd generations of individual immigrant groups, and a disinterest in immigration and ethnicity as processes. Efforts to produce comparative studies of various kinds and to use survey data as a source of primary information about later generations may help correct those shortcomings. Today, the study of immigrant and ethnic history is at an important moment in its evolution. The concentration of attention on individual nationalities, the focus on the immigrants and their children to the neglect of the experiences of later generations in America, and the imposition of interpretive schemas that tell more about the ideology of the host society than about the experiences of the newcomers have left disturbing gaps and imbalances in the investigation.     

Immigration,Ethnicity, and Conflict: The California Chinese, 1849–1882*

Drawing on Bonacich's split market theory, the work of Hechter and Blalock on ethnic conflict, and the literature on social movements, the authors develop a model of factors producing conflict between native and immigrant workers. The model identifies the relative size of the immigrant group, the growth of the immigrant population, the desirability of jobs held by immigrant workers, economic conditions, the development of racist ideology among native workers, and the organization of native workers as factors possibly explaining the frequency of incidents of overt ethnic conflict and efforts to institutionalize discrimination through government action. The model is assessed by examining the situation of Chinese immigrants in California between 1849 and 1882. The data suggest that poor economic conditions, a well-developed racist ideology, and well-organized native workers best explain incidents of ethnic conflict and successful efforts to obtain discriminatory government action.     

Immigrants working with co‐ethnics: Who are they and how do they fare?

Participation in ethnic economies has been regarded as an alternative avenue of economic adaptation for immigrants and minorities in major immigrant‐receiving countries. This study examines one important dimension of ethnic economies: co‐ethnic concentration at the workplace. Using a large national representative sample from Statistics Canada’s 2002 Ethnic Diversity Survey, this study addresses four questions: (1) what is the level of co‐ethnic concentration at the workplace for Canada’s minority groups? (2) How do workers who share the same ethnicity with most of their co‐workers differ from other workers in socio‐demographic characteristics? (3) Is higher level of co‐ethnic concentration at the workplace associated with lower earnings? (4) Is higher level of co‐ethnic concentration at the workplace associated with higher levels of life satisfaction? The results show that only a small proportion of immigrants and the Canadian‐born work in ethnically homogeneous settings. In Canada’s eight largest metropolitan areas about 10 per cent of non‐British/French immigrants share a same ethnic origin with the majority of their co‐workers. The level is as high as 20 per cent among Chinese immigrants and 18 per cent among Portuguese immigrants. Among Canadian‐born minority groups, the level of co‐ethnic workplace concentration is about half the level for immigrants. Immigrant workers in ethnically concentrated settings have much lower educational levels and proficiency in English/French. Immigrant men who work mostly with co‐ethnics on average earn about 33 per cent less than workers with few or none co‐ethnic coworkers. About two thirds of this gap is attributable to differences in demographic and job characteristics. Meanwhile, immigrant workers in ethnically homogenous settings are less likely to report low levels of life satisfaction than other immigrant workers. Among the Canadian‐born, co‐ethnic concentration is not consistently associated with earnings and life satisfaction.     

Adolescent Independence across Immigrant Generations: Age and Ethnic Variations

Abstract

This study examines differences in the level of independence in decision-making experienced by three generations of immigrants and the moderating effects of age, sex, and ethnicity. Data for this study were obtained from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. Results indicate generally less independence in decision-making among first-generation immigrants relative to their higher-generation counterparts; however, the relationship varies significantly with ethnicity and age. Among Latinos, adolescents' level of independence increases across successive immigrant generations to a much greater degree than among other ethnic groups. Age further contributes to this interaction, with evidence of greater increases in independence with age among first-generation immigrant Latinos. Findings demonstrate that cultural traditions with regard to parenting and adolescent socialization are important not only within ethnic groups but also within immigrant generations.     

Immigrant Retail Entrepreneurship and Urban Black Population Size in the Late Nineteenth-Century United States

Building on the idea that immigrant merchants often operate in black consumer markets, this study tests the hypothesis that late nineteenth-century European immigrants’ highest odds of retail enterprise in the United States were in cities with the largest black populations. Regression analyses of census data show that the positive association between the odds of retail enterprise and percent black was strongest for men from European immigrant groups and especially strong for men of Polish and Russian ancestry, many of whom were Jewish immigrants. The analyses reveal that the association between the odds of retail enterprise and percent black was not significant for native white or black men. The findings accord with the proposition, derived from theories of middleman minorities and ethnic queuing, that immigrant retail entrepreneurship is most strongly associated with black population size for recently arrived immigrant groups that are often socially or spatially close to urban black communities.     

Emotional Integration across Immigrant Generations in Baden‐Württemberg,Germany: the Role of Discrimination

Immigrants’ integration is a multi‐faceted process, involving structural, cultural, social, and emotional dimensions. This study focuses on the emotional dimension of integration, investigating immigrants’ emotional attachments to their national origin and their host country. Specifically, we ask what role perceived discrimination plays in shaping identification preferences among immigrants and immigrant descendants in Germany. The contribution of this study is twofold: First, we present results for three generations of post‐WWII labour migrants of Turkish and Italian descent. Second, we estimate the consequences of perceived individual discrimination for national and ethnic identification separately. The findings indicate that while discrimination is not related to ethnic identification, it is negatively correlated with national identification. Regarding future challenges, we believe that our findings suggest that the German society can come closer to achieving integration of migrants by reducing perceptions of rejection by the immigrant population, or better yet, fighting off discrimination against immigrant minorities.     

Ethnic Enclaves,Networks and Self‐Employment among Middle Eastern Immigrants in Sweden

The proportion of immigrants from countries in the Middle East living in Sweden has increased since the 1970s, and it is a well‐known fact that immigrants from the Middle East suffer from low earnings and high rates of unemployment on the Swedish labour market. There are often great hopes that self‐employment will enable immigrants to improve their labour market situation. Further, in Sweden as in many other countries, the question of whether the existence of ethnic enclaves are good or bad for immigrants’ earnings and employment opportunities has also been widely debated. This paper presents a study of the extent to which Middle Eastern ethnic enclaves and networks in Sweden enhance or hinder immigrants’ self‐employment. The results show that the presence of ethnic enclaves increases the propensity for self‐employment. Thus, immigrants in ethnic enclaves provide their co‐ethnics with goods and services that Swedish natives are not able to provide. The results also show that ethnic networks seem to be an obstacle to immigrant self‐employment. One explanation is that an increase in network size implies increased competition for customers among self‐employed immigrants. The question of whether ethnic enclaves are good or bad for the integration of immigrants into the labour market has been widely debated. The results of this paper provide us with information about the integration puzzle. Ethnic enclaves seem to enhance self‐employment propensities among Middle Eastern immigrants in Sweden.     

Identity Patterns among Immigrants from the Former Soviet Union in Israel: Assimilation vs. Ethnic Formation

This paper deals with identity patterns among the 1990s immigrants from the former Soviet Union (FSU) in Israel. It presents the complex set of identity types among immigrants in the context of their cultural and socio-demographic characteristics and their dynamic relationships with the Israeli host society.
The findings show that immigrants from the FSU in Israel form a distinct ethnic group within the Israeli social and cultural fabric. This is reflected in their closed social networks, ethnic information sources, strong desire to maintain ethnic-cultural continuity, and the fact that the ethnic component (Jew from the FSU or immigrant from the FSU) is central for self-identification. However, ethnic formation among these immigrants is not a reactive-oriented identity, which is mainly generated by alienation from the host society, it is rather an instrumentalized ethnicity, which is the outcome of ethnic-cultural pride and pragmatic considerations.     

Black Immigrants in the United States and the "Cultural Narratives" of Ethnicity

This article argues that social science representations of post-1965 Black immigrants in the United States employ the concept of "ethnicity" in ways that reinforce the racialist myth of Black (American) cultural inferiority. Specifically, the discursive use of Black immigrant "ethnic" and "cultural distinctiveness," while admittedly reflecting an important recognition of the heterogeneity of the United States Black populations, is in fact predicated upon a repackaged "culture of poverty" discourse that serves to reaffirm the overarching racial order. In a discussion of the theoretical and historical development of the concept, I show how the current discourse of "ethnic distinctiveness" perpetuates a form of racism under a theory that denies the relevance of race while it continuously recodes the biological notions of race as "culture." Thus, Black immigrant distinctiveness, when presented through the prism of the cultural narratives of ethnicity, allows for the perpetuation of a "cultural racism" that adversely affects all Blacks in this country. I therefore call for a rejection of ethnicity theory as it is currently conceptualized and suggest the need to ground theories of Black distinctiveness within analyses of power relations and ongoing practices of racial subjugation.     

Racialization and Black multiplicity: Generative paradigms for understanding Black immigrants

Black immigrants occupy a liminal space on the race ethnicity spectrum that defies traditional assimilation theories. The social distancing paradigm has emerged as one of the most influential theories to address this shortcoming in the field and explain the incorporation of Black immigrants. However, because this paradigm implicitly rests on an analogy to White immigrants, the articulation of Black ethnic options can often times be more derivative than generative. As a result, accounts of Black immigrant racialization reify provincialized notions of Blackness by relying on problematic comparisons to African American culture and outcomes. In this paper, I argue that moving away from these provincialized characterizations of Blackness requires building on theories of immigrant racialization that take Black multiplicities as its starting point. This review takes up that perspective in analyzing how narratives of Blackness emerge in segmented, classic, canonical, and neoclassical theories of assimilation. I then map out some theoretical and empirical trends that emerge across three waves of Black immigrant research agendas and outline the need to move beyond the White immigrant analogy in order to more aptly redefine Black immigrants for future research.     

Ethnic‐Controlled Economy or Segregation? Exploring Inequality in Latina/o Co‐Ethnic Jobsites1

Recent research has increasingly focused on how ethnicity operates within labor markets. Due to perceptions of intragroup homogeneity and assumptions that inequality only occurs between majority whites and people of color, most research has neglected intragroup economic inequality. This study examines how skin color, immigration/nativity status, and gender influence wage differentials in Latina/o co‐ethnic jobsites (where workers are the same ethnicity). Using data from the Los Angeles Study of Urban Inequality (LASUI), it is found that there are skin color, immigration/nativity status, and sex wage gaps among Latina/os working in co‐ethnic jobsites. Moreover, illustrating intersectionality, immigrant women and dark‐skinned immigrants suffer from wage gaps in co‐ethnic jobsites. Unexpectedly, some Latinas experience a wage advantage, in comparison with Latinos, which is associated with lighter skin. The author suggests that Latinas are subjected to multiple‐jeopardy situations in which they experience an intersection of inequalities in jobsites saturated by co‐ethnics but that lightness of skin color functions as a form of social capital. Thus, research on the benefits or costs associated with working with co‐ethnics cannot be extended to the entire ethnic group. The conclusion is that for Central Americans and Mexicans, co‐ethnic jobsites are generally forms of segregated employment with limited protection from discrimination.     

Predicting Earnings Among Immigrants To Canada: The Role Of Source Country

The current study examines the importance of country of origin in predicting the labour market earnings among recent immigrants to Canada. The authors argue that, in addition to individual‐level characteristics associated with immigrant capital, macro‐level features associated with immigrant origins must be taken into account when considering the economic performance of immigrants in their host country. Country‐level factors are said to accompany immigrants to their destination country, which generate disparities in the “quality” of immigrants’ human and social capital across origin groups, as well as differences in how they are received by the resident population. The present study uses random effects multilevel modelling to investigate the extent to which immigrant incomes vary randomly across source country while taking into consideration individual‐level characteristics selected on the basis of human capital, social capital, and discrimination theories. Multilevel regression analysis confirms that immigrant incomes indeed vary significantly by country of origin, though the effect is small. Furthermore, it is revealed that the gross domestic product (GDP) of the sending country explains much of the level 2 variability in the labour market earnings of recent immigrants, as well as the relationship between racial minority status and immigrant incomes. The practical significance and policy implications of these findings are discussed.     

Source country culture and labor market assimilation of immigrant women in Sweden: evidence from longitudinal data

This paper analyzes the role of source country culture on gender roles for labor market assimilation of immigrant women in Sweden. Sweden ranks as one of the world’s most gender-equal countries and at the same time a recipient of many immigrants from countries with more traditional views on gender roles and gender equality. I find that the labor force participation of immigrant women in Sweden is related to their source country culture, in the sense that women from countries where women’s labor market participation is low (high) also have low (high) participation in the Swedish labor market. However, all immigrant women assimilate towards, but do not reach parity with, the participation rate of native women, and the difference between women from high- and low-participation countries diminishes with length of residence in Sweden. This indicates that source country culture on gender roles does not have a persistent effect on immigrant women’s labor market participation in Sweden. Furthermore, the results highlight the importance of taking into account unobservable time-constant individual and source country factors when estimating the relationship between source country culture and immigrants’ labor market outcomes. Neglecting to control for these factors could lead researchers to misrepresent the rate of assimilation and overstate the effect of source country culture.     

Immigrant and native fertility during the 1980s: adaptation and expectations for the future

Many immigrants have come to the US since the mid-1960s. The demographic effects of this phenomenon may be seen in both the changing racial and ethnic composition of the population and in the increasing contribution of immigration to sustaining population growth. Given the current below replacement level of fertility in the country, US population growth depends increasingly upon the entry of new immigrants each year and their subsequent fertility. Over much of the 20th century, immigrants had consistently lower fertility than native-born women. This situation changed, however, since the 1970s with the arrival of large numbers of immigrants from countries with high fertility. Studies based upon the US census have shown that, despite considerable variation according to country of origin, recent immigrants have higher fertility on average than native-born women. Moreover, the gap between immigrant and native fertility levels appears to have increased during the 1980s. By 1986, immigrant women aged 18-44 had about one-quarter child more than similarly aged native-born women. This article compares both the fertility behavior and expectations for future childbearing of foreign and native-born women in the US with the goal of analyzing the sources of the growing fertility gap between immigrant and native women, and exploring the extent to which immigrants adapt their fertility once in the US. Data are drawn from the 1980 US Census and the 1986 and 1988 June Current Population Surveys. The author found that the immigrant-native fertility gap increased during the 1980s, not because immigrant fertility increased, but because fertility dropped at a faster rate for natives than for immigrants. The relatively high fertility of immigrants compared to natives can be explained by compositional differences with respect to age, education, income, and ethnicity. The two analyses of adaptation, however, yielded different results. The synthetic cohort analysis, which traced the fertility behavior of a fixed cohort of immigrants during the 1980s, found little evidence of adaptation or assimilation, except for immigrants from southeast Asia. On the other hand, the analysis of fertility expectations suggests that although immigrants expect to have higher fertility than similar natives, they tend to adapt their fertility goals over time, both within and across generations.     

What is ethnic in an ethnic economy?

This article examines critically the relationship between ethnicity and entrepreneurship in the sociology of immigrant economies. It argues that what is ethnic in an ethnic economy has often been confusingly conceptualised and that several factors now call for re-assessing the ethnic nature of immigrants' business activities. On the basis of a review of recent research, three such factors are outlined: the porosity of ethnic boundaries to cross-group business interactions; the diversity within immigrant economies in terms of status, gender, class and generation; and the political and institutional context in which immigrant economies take place. The conclusion stresses the need for multiple explanations of how and why immigrants become entrepreneurs, which take into account not only the meso-level constituted by ethnicity and social capital, but also micro-individual factors and macro-institutional settings.     

Ethnic conflict without ethnic groups: a study in pure sociology1

Despite growing awareness of the limitations of group‐level analyses in ethnic studies, research on ethnic conflict has paid virtually no systematic attention to variation at the individual or micro level. Addressing that gap, the present paper draws upon data from interviews conducted with members of two broadly‐defined categories recently arrived in the Republic of Ireland, Muslims and Nigerians. Results indicate that while members of both immigrant categories experience a good deal of ethnic conflict or hostility, such conflict is rarely collective and invariably varies across individuals. The research data are consistent with Donald Black's theory of moralism. Black's theory, based on his theoretical system known as pure sociology, predicts that ethnic hostility increases with the social inferiority and cultural distance of the immigrant, and that higher status immigrants are more assertive in responding to hostility, though they experience less of it (the status paradox).     

IMMIGRANT NETWORKS AND THE TAKE‐UP OF DISABILITY PROGRAMS: EVIDENCE FROM THE UNITED STATES

We examine the role of ethnic networks in disability program take‐up among working‐age immigrants in the United States. Controlling for country of origin and area of residence fixed effects, immigrants residing amid a large number of co‐ethnics are more likely to receive disability payments when their ethnic groups have higher take‐up rates. Differences in satisfying the work history or income and asset requirements of the disability programs explain part of this relationship, but social norms also play an important role. Information sharing appears influential for Supplemental Security Income take‐up but not for Social Security Disability Income. (JEL J61, H55, I18)     

The imprint of autocracy on immigrant political participation: Reluctance to participate or to disclosure?

The study investigates the relationship between premigration experiences with autocracy and immigrants' participation in politics in the host country. Using a survey of about 2000 immigrants in Quebec (Canada) interviewed over telephone or with an online questionnaire, it assesses two possible pathways regarding the effect of premigration with autocracy on participation in the host country politics. One pathway emphasizes a reluctance to participate where experiences with autocracy would hinder participation in the host country. The second pathway posits a reluctance to disclosure where experiences with autocracy leave immigrants with a lasting hesitation to reveal the extent of their participation. Our findings lend weak support for a reluctance to participate and instead suggest a reluctance to disclosure. These findings raise questions about our capacity to accurately portray the preferences and behaviours of immigrants, here those who experienced autocracy in the country of origin, and highlight the sensitivity of findings regarding immigrant integration to interview modes.