ABSTRACT

In the comparative literature on immigrant integration, Germany and the United States are frequently placed in distinct and opposing regime categories. Using cross-sectional data from the 1997 German Socio-Economic Panel and the 1997 Panel of Income Dynamics, we compare the process of integration of four generational cohorts of Turks in Germany and Mexicans in the United States, focusing on markets, welfare, and culture. The comparative analysis of the data supports Gary Freeman’s ‘patchwork’ hypothesis that integration in Western democracies is happening not monolithically, or in a linear fashion, but rather in the form of irregular patchworks. The specific patchworks revealed by our data include some progress toward integration, in particular in the market sector, as well as stagnation, and perhaps exclusion, in others.