Lives in limbo: Temporary Protected Status and immigrant identities

The United States formulates much of its immigration and refugee policy to match economic and political circumstances. We interpret these policy shifts as a set of graduated positions on immigration and refugee flows that attempts to discipline the lives of newcomers and, in so doing, shapes immigrant identities. In this article, we analyse the interplay between the US government and Salvadoran asylum applicants negotiating procedures that grant only temporary relief from deportation via the policy of Temporary Protected Status (TPS). We find that each policy shift results in the strategic renegotiation of asylum applicants’ identities so as to achieve the best opportunity for a successful outcome. Based on Foucault’s ideas of governmentality and Ong’s concept of flexible citizenship, we argue that what appears more superficially as a patchwork strategy of immigration laws and asylum practices may be theorized more deeply as a set of flexible responses by the state that turn on identity construction at different scales, and that aim to mediate transnational relations.     

Strategic Grading in the Product Acquisition Process of a Reverse Supply Chain

Most recommerce providers have moved to a quality‐dependent process for the acquisition of used products. They acquire the products via websites at which product holders submit upfront quality statements and receive quality‐dependent acquisition prices for their used devices. Motivated by this development of reverse logistics practice, the aim of this study is to analyze the product assessment process of a recommerce provider in detail. To this end, we first propose a sequential bargaining model with complete information which captures the individual behavior of the recommerce provider and the product holder. We determine the optimal strategies of the product holder and the recommerce provider in this game. We find that the resulting strategies lead to an efficient allocation, although the recommerce provider can absorb most of the bargaining potential due to his last mover advantage. In a second step, we relax the assumption of complete information and include uncertainty about the product holder's valuation of the product. We show the trade‐off underlying the recommerce provider's optimal counteroffer decision and analyze the optimal strategy, using a logistic regression approach on a real‐life dataset of nearly 6,000 product submissions. The results reveal a significant improvement potential, compared to the currently applied strategy.     

Long‐Term Effects of Language Course Timing on Language Acquisition and Social Contacts: Turkish and Moroccan Immigrants in Western Europe

This article investigates long‐term effects of the timing of language course participation among immigrants, focusing on self‐assessed immigration country language skills and interethnic social contacts among immigrants from Turkey and Morocco who came to Western Europe mainly during the guest worker period. Data stem from the 2008 Six Country Immigrant Integration Comparative Survey. We find a positive, long‐term impact of course participation in the first four years after immigration on language skills and social contacts. Results support linguistic theories on the benefits of early language instruction and sociopsychological theories on long‐term effects of (even short) social belonging interventions on participants' perseverance in achieving educational success.     

Citizenship rights for immigrants: national political processes and cross-national convergence in western Europe, 1980-2008

Immigrant citizenship rights in the nation-state reference both theories of cross-national convergence and the resilience of national political processes. This article investigates European countries' attribution of rights to immigrants: Have these rights become more inclusive and more similar across countries? Are they affected by EU membership, the role of the judiciary, the party in power, the size of the immigrant electorate, or pressure exerted by anti-immigrant parties? Original data on 10 European countries, 1980-2008, reveal no evidence for cross-national convergence. Rights tended to become more inclusive until 2002, but stagnated afterward. Electoral changes drive these trends: growth of the immigrant electorate led to expansion, but countermobilization by right-wing parties slowed or reversed liberalizations. These electoral mechanisms are in turn shaped by long-standing policy traditions, leading to strong path dependence and the reproduction of preexisting cross-national differences.     

The Impact of Cultural Events on Community Reputation and Pride in Maribor,The European Capital of Culture 2012

Social Indicators Research - This paper examines the cultural and social impacts of the European Capital of Culture (ECOC) on the case of the Slovenian city Maribor, the cultural capital of Europe...     

Regional Differences in the Gender Wage Gap in Spain

This study examines regional differences in the gender wage gap in Spain using matched employer–employee microdata, two different econometric decomposition methods and panel data techniques. Our findings suggest that Spain shows a significant regional heterogeneity in the size of the raw gap, roughly comparable to cross-country differences observed in the European context. The results from the decomposition analysis show that although the bulk of the gender wage gap in Spanish regions is due to differences in the endowments of productive characteristics between males and females there is still a substantial part of the gap that remains unexplained. The analysis of the causes behind the variation of both, the raw and the unexplained gender wage gap by region highlights that several economic, institutional and demographic elements identified in previous studies analysing international differences in the gender wage gap are also relevant to explain regional differences in the gender wage gap in Spain.     

Gender differences in labour market integration trajectories of recently arrived migrants in the Netherlands

This study investigates gender differences in recently arrived migrants’ labour market activity and occupational status both shortly after arrival and with increasing length of stay. We examine the role of education, household composition and traditional gender role values by estimating multi-group multilevel models based on three waves of the New Immigrants to the Netherlands Survey. In line with findings regarding gender gaps in labour market behaviour, recent female migrants are less active on labour market than their male counterparts, and we observe a clear motherhood penalty and fatherhood premium on the number of hours worked. Men and women show only marginal differences in their occupational statuses. Changes over time do not differ between men and women, indicating persistent gender inequality in labour market attainment. Moreover, interesting differences between the nationalities were found. Polish migrants show the highest activity levels and lowest occupational status, also when compared to Bulgarians. Spanish migrants hold the highest occupational statuses. Recent Turkish migrants seem to be better integrated and show fewer gender differences than the more established Turkish minority in the Netherlands.     

The emergence of thanatology and current practice in death education

Thanatology is a recent field that contemplates death studies and employs an interdisciplinary approach to practice. This science emerged in a historical context marked by intense social, economic, and political changes that contributed to the concept of death being excluded from social life. This literature review aims to outline the history and evolution ofthanatology in Western society, delineating the contextual circumstances that led to its origin and drawing special attention to current works on death education. In our post-modern society, the call for studies in the field of thanatology appears to be increasing. However, although there have been significant contributions and promising research is underway, there are still many questions to be answered.