The Real Crisis at the Mexico-U.S. Border: A Humanitarian and Not an Immigration Emergency

Misguided U.S. policies since 1980 have created a large undocumented population within the United States. Border militarization curtailed circular undocumented migration from Mexico, and Cold War politics precluded the acceptance of refugees from Central America fleeing violence and economic turmoil unleashed by America’s intervention in the region. Although undocumented migration from Mexico has ended, resources devoted to border apprehensions and internal deportations continue to rise, pushing an ever larger number of Central Americans into an immigrant detention system that is ill-equipped to handle them. Although the Trump administration portrays the situation as an immigration crisis, what is really unfolding along the border and within the United States is an unprecedented humanitarian cross that in so many ways is one of our own making.     

Unauthorized Migrants and the (Il)Logic of “Crime Control”: A Human Rights Perspective on US Federal and Local State Immigration Policies

Immigration control, widely regarded the sovereign right of nation states, has often been pursued at the expense of civil and human rights. More than a century ago, nativists legitimated a punitive approach to immigration control that treated migrants’ rights as secondary by branding millions of newcomers to the United States as a “dangerous class”. In many ways, recent policies similarly criminalize immigrants and deploy crime control strategies in response. This article reviews the most significant of these policies at the federal and local state level, including: border security measures, detention and deportation, the 287(g) program, anti‐immigrant city ordinances, and the Arizona law (SB1070). Each initiative has been framed as necessary to protect American citizens from serious crime. We focus on four ways in which these policies violate human rights: first, border security measures that result in migrant deaths violate the right to life; second, detention and deportation violate the right to liberty; third, detention and deportation punish unlawful residents as though they were guilty of criminal rather than civil violations of the law, imposing penalties that are arbitrary and disproportionately harsh; and fourth, local state policies to counter illegal immigration encourage racial profiling, a practice that violates the right to freedom from discrimination.     

The Past is Ever Present: Transnationalism Old and New – Italian and Mexican Immigrants in the US

The paper focuses on what is old and what is new in transnationalism by analyzing extraterritorial attempts of the Italian and Mexican governments. During the large southern/ eastern European immigration to the US from 1890 to the 1920s, Italian immigrants reached 24 percent of the immigrant wave. Mexican documented and undocumented immigrants from the 1980s until 2010s made up 30 percent of the immigrant wave almost a century later. Transnational immigrants live in a country in which they do not claim citizenship rights and claim citizenship rights in a country they do not live in. Therefore migration and immigrant policies challenge both sending and receiving states. Foreign governments are limited in the policies and practices that they can enforce. A comparison of state policies from Italy and Mexico challenges the fact that transnationalism is significantly different and new.     

Health Insurance,from a Child Language Broker's Perspective

In the midst of dramatic changes to American health care law there is need to understand the challenges that vulnerable populations encounter in obtaining and managing health insurance. Research has found that child language brokers, children who mediate language and culture for their immigrant families, assist with health‐related matters. We report on focus groups with 17 language brokers living in Central Los Angeles. In this article we detail their experiences language brokering for health insurance and their knowledge of health insurance and policies that apply to their immigrant families. We illuminate some barriers immigrant families face as well as how they navigate them. We conclude with policy implications, particularly in relation to making health insurance more accessible to non‐English speaking and immigrant populations.     

Everyday Disputes and Negotiations: A Video Observational Analysis of Mexican‐origin Mother–Daughter Conversations

Little is known about the nature of normative mother–daughter everyday disagreements in Mexican family contexts in which daughters are socialized to avoid conflict out of respect and deference to authority. Observations of videotaped conversations of 130 Mexican‐origin mothers and their adolescent (13‐ to 16‐year‐old) daughters discussing their disagreements were systematically coded. Analyses of the conversations showed that the most frequently recurring conflicts involved autonomy privileges (appearance, friendships, going out, media use), household responsibilities (chores, sibling caretaking), and family dynamics (sibling tensions, sibling differential treatment, mutual respect in communication). Daughters from traditional immigrant families who had lived longer in Mexico were just as assertive in expressing their viewpoints as daughters from less traditional families, although they were less likely to display negative affect.     

Explaining Undocumented Migration to the U.S.

Using data from the Mexican Migration Project and the Latin American Migration Project, we find that undocumented migration from Mexico reflects U.S. labor demand and access to migrant networks and is little affected by border enforcement, which instead sharply reduces the odds of return movement. Undocumented migration from Central America follows primarily from political violence associated with the U.S. intervention of the 1980s, and return migration has always been unlikely. Mass undocumented migration from Mexico appears to have ended because of demographic changes there, but undocumented migration from Central America can be expected to grow slowly through processes of family reunification.     

Migration and Human Rights on the Mexico-Guatemala Border

This paper identifies the protections in place for irregular migrants on the Mexico‐Guatemala border and analyzes Mexican government immigration enforcement policies and levels of compliance with international standards and national law. The history of the Mexico‐Guatemala border region and different types of migration flows into and through the area are also explored, as well as the linkages between migration, trade, security, and US immigration policy. It is argued that the Mexican government has partially complied with international conventions and national laws to protect the human rights of transmigrants in the Guatemalan border region, but that compliance is not complete and that an international response is required to ensure that human rights standards are upheld.     

Self‐Employed Mexican Immigrants Residing along the U.S.‐Mexico Border: The Earnings Effect of Working in the U.S. versus Mexico1

This study uses U.S. census data from the year 2000 to analyze the earnings of Mexican immigrants along the U.S.‐Mexico border while accounting for the location in which they work. The empirical results indicate that Mexican entrepreneurs who live in U.S.‐border cities but primarily operate in Mexico accrue a significant earnings premium over their entrepreneurial and salaried counterparts working on the U.S. side of the border, even after controlling for differences in observable characteristics. This work‐location earnings gap widens when focusing on Mexican business owners lacking U.S. citizenship. It follows that policies which reduce trade and labor flows across the U.S.‐Mexico border may inadvertently dampen the entrepreneurial activities of foreign‐born residents in U.S.‐border cities.     

DACA and the Surge in Unaccompanied Minors at the US‐Mexico Border

Apprehensions of unaccompanied minors from Central American countries have been on the rise since 2008, but news reports particularly caught up with the increase after 2012. Some politicians posited that the 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) contributed to the surge by creating the expectation that children would be allowed to stay in the country. Immigration advocates, however, believe that the two are not related. Using data on apprehensions of unaccompanied minors by border patrol sector, nationality and year, we find that DACA did not significantly impact those apprehensions. Rather, the 2008 Williams Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, along with violence in the originating countries and economic conditions in both the countries of origin and the United States, emerge as some of the key determinants of the recent surge in unaccompanied minors apprehended along the southwest US‐Mexico border.     

“The Politics of the HealthCare Reform Debate: Public Support of Including Undocumented Immigrants and Their Children in Reform Efforts in the U.S.”

Although U.S. immigration and health care policies appear to be highly correlated, scholarship has yet to gauge the public's views toward providing undocumented immigrants with health coverage at the state level. We analyze support for including undocumented immigrants in health care reform in New Mexico. Utilizing an original public opinion survey of New Mexico adults, we find that individuals are more supportive of the state providing health care to the children of undocumented immigrant than to their parents. Multivariate logistic regression analyses suggest that factors such as liberal ideology and perceptions of commonalities with Latinos increase support levels. Despite a lack of support among a majority of respondents, the influence of perceived commonalities with immigrants suggests that reform advocates and political elites who mobilize along ethnic or human solidarity may be successful in creating conditions for the inclusion of undocumented immigrants in the public provision of health care at the state level.     

Affecting Lives: How Winning the US Diversity Visa Lottery Impacts DV Migrants Pre‐ and Post‐Migration

Usual debates about the diversity visa (DV) programme revolve around the impact of DV initiated mass migration on African countries’ development, on whether the programme sufficiently diversifies U.S. immigrant streams, and on whether there is a tradeoff in immigrant quality for diversity. This article seeks to extend the focus of these debates by examining the impact of the diversity visa programme on DV migrants at the micro‐level pre‐ and post‐migration. Based on in‐depth interviews with sixty‐one diversity visa lottery winners from Ghana and Nigeria, the article examines how this immigration policy has become a contextual determinant of immigrant incorporation. It argues that an account of the impact of immigration policies on immigrants pre‐ and post‐migration must be added to theorization of state agency in shaping migration flows. It concludes with a discussion on ways the diversity visa programme can be modified to facilitate incorporation of DV migrants in the United States.     

Immigrant Children: Their Experience of Violence at School and Community in Host Country

This article describes our qualitative sociological study of immigrant children's life experiences of violence. We conducted interviews with 42 first‐generation immigrant children from any country, aged 9–13 years old, living in the Quebec City region (Canada). Results from three main themes are presented: representations of violence and concrete violent acts experienced; perceived effects of violence on children health and well‐being; and reactions and coping strategies. Overall, the narratives show that they may experience racist peer violence in school that leads to suffering situations, and they consequently have to develop strategies to maintain their well‐being. Social implications are discussed.     

At Yesenia’s House…

This paper explores the multiple expressions of Central American immigrant Pentecostalism in the Pico Union district of Los Angeles. Drawing on in-depth ethnographic fieldwork in three temples and informal conversations with over 30 active Pentecostals, this paper shows that Central American immigrant Pentecostals tend to congregate on the basis of “congregational homophily,” or shared social and cultural characteristics, especially in terms of age, marital status, presence of infirmities or ailments, and national/regional origin. This paper also explores the ways in which Central American immigrant Pentecostals tailor their religious practices to reflect their “congregational homophily” through the differential inclusion/exclusion of practices such as healing, “roommating,” and formal and informal discussions of shared histories. By focusing on “congregational homophily” and the active constructions and reconstructions of Central American immigrant Pentecostalism, we gain more insight into the ways some Central American immigrants negotiate their lives and experiences in the increasingly fettered social, cultural, and political topography of contemporary Los Angeles.

Predicting Children's Asthma Hospitalizations: Rural and Urban Differences in Texas*

Abstract Asthma is the number one chronic health condition facing children today; however, little is known about rural‐urban inequalities in asthma. This “area effects on health” study examines rural‐urban differences in childhood asthma hospitalizations within the state of Texas using negative binomial regression models. Effects associated with residence on the Texas‐Mexico border, where the majority of rural Texas children live, are also considered. Neighborhood‐level social class and proportion of the population that was native‐born Hispanic were significant predictors of asthma hospitalizations, independent of rural‐urban location. Conversely, proportion African American, Native American, and foreign‐born Hispanic, not a citizen; median year of home construction; and neighborhood location on the Texas‐Mexico border were conditional on urban‐rural location, and the strength of these predictors was stronger in rural areas. This suggests that locational and social factors intersect in marginalized spaces (like the rural and border regions of Texas) to create vulnerability to asthma hospitalizations.     

Crimmigration and militarization: Policing borders in the era of social control profitability

As no other time in U.S. history, policing involves a wide variety of local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies, with a unified mission of patrolling the 2,000‐mile U.S.‐Mexico border in the name of national security. As a culturally and socially diverse geographic setting, the U.S.‐Mexico border has intertwined notions of ethnicity, race, and skin color with citizenship, community safety, and national security. Invariably, this geographic, economic, political, and social boundary has the power to shape the experience of not only law enforcement officers, but also border communities. The multiple issues that exist along the U.S.‐Mexico border provide a more nuanced view of the challenges involved in patrolling the border and policing communities, while seeking to respect privacy and honor international treaties and human rights. Subsequently, with pressing shifts in demographics, police tactics, border security, and social control profitability, in the midst of globalization, the central objective of this article is to further delineate, through analysis of existing data, the dynamics of border policing in the twenty‐first century.     

‘We Were All Involved’: The ‘Great Violence of 2008–2012’ on the El Paso–Ciudad Juárez Border

Abstract

This article discusses El Paso–Ciudad Juárez residents’ experiences of the ‘Great Violence of 2008–2012’ in the border region between the United States and Mexico. As a result of the Mexican government’s ‘war’ on organised crime, launched by President Felipe Calderón in 2016, the region saw a wave of violence that created mayhem, thousands of deaths, and a vast sense of insecurity among the border community. The physical sites border residents had access to – or were denied entrance to – had a fundamental significance for their everyday existence. By the same token, the refusal to succumb to spatial restrictions, or claiming space for oneself despite ongoing atrocities, served as an empowering way to deal with the threat of violence. Drawing on 54 interviews and 22 written testimonies, the article claims that the intersection of spatiality and agency is central in conceptualising experiences of security/insecurity caused by the violence. It argues that spatial strategising provided tools with which the various parties involved exercised their agency in imposing, coping with and countering violence. The discussion concludes by problematising the intersecting issues of agency, involvement and complicity as broader ethical and epistemological questions invoked by the study of violence.     

STEM Education and STEM Work: Nativity Inequalities in Occupations and Earnings

The recruitment of skilled workers with expertise in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) is a core component of North American immigration policies. However, few studies examine the labour market integration of immigrant STEM educated workers. Multivariate analysis of the 2011 National Household Survey show that STEM educated immigrants who arrive as adults are less likely than the Canadian born to have STEM jobs and they earn less than their Canadian born counterparts. These patterns partly reflect their socio‐demographic characteristics, particularly their lower language proficiencies (measured as a combination of mother tongue and languages spoken at home) and the receipt of their degrees in institutions outside of Canada. These immigrant workers arrived primarily in the skilled worker programme that did not require pre‐arranged employment. Policy changes in recruitment and their implications for future STEM immigrant workers are discussed in the conclusion.     

“Where the Danger Lies”: Race,Gender, and Chinese and Japanese Exclusion in the United States, 1870–19241

Race too often is used as the explanatory variable for understanding immigration exclusion, marginalizing the significance of race making, ethnic differentiation, and gender construction in particular. This article explores these processes by examining exclusionary policies implemented against Chinese and Japanese immigrants from the mid‐1870s to 1924, the year the National Origins Act was passed. Politicians, intellectuals, and moral reformers used a gendered logic—the construction of idealized gender norms, roles, and sexual propriety and the attachment of these meanings to male and female bodies—to distinguish Japanese immigrants from the Chinese immigrants they followed, allowing for ethnic differentiation and dissimilar policies. The convergence toward exclusion rested on a racialized logic—the construction and attachment of inferior status and meanings to immigrant groups through discourse, formal and informal categorization, or social closure—which claimed that the Japanese were unassimilable and racially undesirable like the Chinese. Exclusionists focused on the immigrant women, decrying their sexual and gender impropriety as evidence of the groups’ threats to the sanctity of white families, which imperiled the nation. Gender and race both mattered in these logics and their meanings were constructed as their salience interconnected.