ABSTRACT
International migration is a central concern of social science research in the early 21st century. It is a locus of tremendous political challenges, as well as policy innovation. Because immigration is a matter of importance to scholars and policy-makers inavarietyoffields, it is important tobridge thegapsbetween thesefieldssothatinnovationsinlegal,economic,sociological,geographic,and political science research can inform each other. This volume is designed to promote such cross-disciplinary discussion. It examines the challenges and opportunities created bymigration at the start of the 21st century. Our focus extendsbeyondeconomicimpacttoquestionsofinternationallaw,humanrights, and social and political incorporation. We examine immigrant outcomes and policyquestionsattheglobal,national,andlocallevels.Ourprimarypurposeis to connect ethical, legal, and social science scholarship from a variety of disciplinesinordertoraisequestionsandgeneratenewinsightsregardingpatternsof migration and the design of useful policy. PartIconsidersmigrationatthegloballevel,focusingonquestionsofhuman rights,theevolutionofinternationallaw,andtheresponsibilitiesofprivatecorporations thatemploymigrant labor.Thesequestionsare in thebackgroundof muchresearchonmigration,butwemakethemtheexplicitcontextwithinwhich we will examine patterns of migration, migrant outcomes, and the impact of migrants on receiving countries and communities. InChapter1,JamesBohmanconsiderstheproblematicstatusofmigrantsata very fundamental level: How should communities treat people who reside among thembutwhoarenotcitizensorwhoarepresent“illegally”?Bohmanarguesin favor of Arendt’s conception of a fundamental human “right to have rights.” Recognizingsuchastatuswillrequirenewinstitutions,newdomesticcourtsof appeal for such persons as well as transnational institutions in which the rights of migrants are made more concrete. Tony Anghie and Wayne McCormack then trace the legal history of migrant rights, distinguishing between the “right to enter a place” and “rights of individualsoncetheyhaveentered”(thelatterofwhichisBohman’smainconcern). Their very long-term analysis allows them to track the switch in the nature of migrants and of receiving countries over the past few centuries: from migrants as citizensofcolonialpowersenteringnewlandstomigrantsasdisplacedpersons,
refugees, and laborers entering industrialized nations. It also allows them to identify the evolution of migrant rights from essentially a recognition of the rights of the individual’s home country to, in the 20th century, a recognition of the rights of the individual himself or herself. Anghie and McCormack illustrate the tight historical entanglement of migration and commerce, as early versions of migrant rights were derived from rights to trade.Ortiz,Agyeman-Budu, andCheney emphasize that the conditions of migrants are still tied up with the rules governing economic activity, though now the relevant issues have more to do with the rights of workers. They illustrate someparticularlychallengingaspectsofthe“transnationalregulation”questions raisedbyBohman,focusingontheregulationandconductofprivatefirmsoperatinginmultiplecountriesandemployingmigrantlabor. Withthesemattersofrightsandlawasbackground,PartIIturnstoinvestigations of the nature of recent migrant flows, the socioeconomic outcomes of migrants in receiving countries, and their impact on the economies and cultures ofthosecountries.RichardE.Bilsborrowprovidesaglobaloverviewofthesize and composition ofmigrant populations. He emphasizes the fact thatmigrant flowsinanygivenyearareusuallysmall,asapercentageofasendingorreceiving country’s total population. This fact creates challenges for researchers who want to study the determinants and effects of migration at the individual level foranarrowtimewindow,asstandarddatasources(likecensuses)willgenerallycontainonly smallnumbersof recentmigrants.Researchersoftenneed to gather theirowndata through surveys,orbecreative in theiruseof statistical sourcesandtechniques.Thequantitativeinvestigationsinthisvolumedisplaya variety of these creative methods. Giovanni Peri’s investigation of the economic market impact of immigrants in the United States is an example of the careful and creative application of statisticalmethods toexistingsources.WhileAnghieandMcCormackemphasize historic ties in the laws governing economic activity and migration, Peri emphasizes the behavioral connections between economicperformance andmigration patterns,intermsofboth“pushfactors”(homecountryeffectsonout-migration rates) and “pull factors” (receiving country effects on immigration rates and areasofsettlement).Henotesthatwemustcontrolforvariationintheeconomic conditions thataffectbothpushandpullbeforewecanrigorously identify the impact of migrants on the economies of the countries they move to. Peri also emphasizesthatmigrantsarenotmonolithic.Inparticular,theyvaryinskilland education,whichmeans that theywill competewith some nativeworkers but complementothers.Again,theserelationshipsmustbeaccountedforinorderto identify the economic impact of immigrationon the labormarket. Peri’sfindings, after he creatively controls for these factors, are rather optimistic: immigrants generally do not displace native workers, and they also do not increase incomeinequality. Whilemuchof thedebateabout immigrationrevolvesaroundtheeconomic impactsstudiedbyPeri,thereisalsocontroversyabouttheprocessofpolitical incorporationofrecentmigrants.ThisistheissueaddressedbyAlejendroPortes,
Cristina Escobar, and Renelinda Arana. They are particularly interested in whetherrecentimmigrantstotheUnitedStateshavebecomelessengagedinUS civil society due to their maintaining close political and cultural ties with their homecountry.TheyovercomethemethodologicalhurdlesidentifiedbyBilsborrowbycarryingouttheirowndatacollection,surveyingbothindividualimmigrantsand leadersof immigrantpoliticalandculturalorganizations.LikePeri, theytellalargelyoptimisticstory.Individualswhoareinvolvedinorganizations withhome-countrytiestendalsotobevigorousparticipantsinUSciviclife.In addition, allowing for some variation across country of origin, transnational organizations are also heavily involved in developing programs that promote greater engagement in civil society in the US. Theeffectsofinstitutionalandorganizationaltiestoone’shomecountryare alsoattheheartofthestudyofdisplacedcommunitiesandviolencebyJudkins andReynolds,thoughtheirmethodsarequitedifferent.Theyanalyzetheimpact oftransnationalorhome-countrybasedinstitutionsthroughatheoreticalmodel ofthedevelopmentofsocialcapital.Theyarguethatthespecificformofthese institutions may have an important influence on the development of social capital, which facilitates the peaceful incorporation of large communities of migrants.Suchresourceswilldevelopmorefullywhenthereisanentitysufficiently largeenough to internalizemanyof thebenefitsof institution-building. TheythenillustratetheirmodelthroughcasestudiesoftheTibetanandCambodian diasporas. CatherineCooper’s andRebecaBurciaga’s study of academic achievement amongimmigrantsintheUSalsoemphasizestheroleofcommunityresources andsocialcapital.LikePorteset al., their methods incorporate newly collected data (in the formofbothsurveysand interviews).LikeJudkinsandReynolds, they argue that the specific form and function of community institutions is important. They find that resources that help students “bridge” home-country and receiving-country customs are important to the promotion of educational success for immigrant students. Inthefinalchapterinthispartofthebook,PatriciaFernándezKellysurveys recent policy controversies related to migration, mainly in the US, reinforcing manyofthethemesinpriorchapters.Shearguesthatthefailuretorecognizethe connections betweenmigration patterns and trade has led to particularly great challengesintheAmericas,astheNorthAmericanFreeTradeAgreementmakes little provision for addressing the population movements arising from its alterationofinternationaltrade.Shealsoemphasizesthedetrimentaleffectsofabsorbingimmigrationregulationintosecuritypolicy,inthereorganizationtiedtothe creation of the Department of Homeland Security after the terrorist attacks of September11,2001. Havingconsideredquestionsofmigrantrightsatthegloballevel,andissues of economic and political incorporation and impact primarily at the national level, we turn in Part III to a case study of several of these phenomena at the state and local levels, focusing on the state of Utah and particularly on the Salt LakeCitymetropolitanarea.WhileUtahmayseemanunusualsettinginwhich
tosetacasestudyofimmigration,thisstatehasinthepasttwodecadesbecome an increasingly important destination for people immigrating into the US. In this setting, then, we can examine how a community responds to very rapid growth in the economic and political challenges (and opportunities) created by immigration. As the federal government has largely failed to develop new immigration policy in the face of new challenges, state and local governments have increasinglysteppedintothisvoid.JulieStewartandKenJamesonexaminethepolitics surrounding one particular policy in the Utah case: that of issuing driver licenses orsimilardocumentstoundocumentedimmigrants.Thisprovidesaveryspecific and concrete example of the problem analyzed byBohman – how to create a legalcontextforresidentsof“irregular”statusinordertopromoteacommunal goal; in thiscase, thegoalofmonitoringdriversbetterandpromotingthepurchase of auto insurance. Stewart and Jameson track changes in these policies in Utah, emphasizing the importance of “causal stories” and “policy entrepreneurs,”aslaw-makerstrytocreatepolicythatwillcatchuptonewlyemerging challenges in this era of rapid change in migration patterns. Maloney and Kontuly examine the socioeconomic progress of migrants in Utah,asrevealedintheirpatternsofresidence.Theirabilitytodosoarisesfrom theavailabilityofunusualdatainUtah,connectedtothedriverlicensepolicies describedbyStewartandJameson.UsingrecordsfromthestateDriverLicense Division,MaloneyandKontulycanidentifytheneighborhoodsofresidenceof immigrants inSaltLakeCounty,Utah, distinguishbetween legal andundocumented immigrants, compare the socioeconomic conditions in the immigrants’ neighborhoods to conditions in natives’ neighborhoods, and track changes in these neighborhood conditions over time as individuals move. They find that both legalandundocumented immigrantsgenerallyexperience improvingconditions over time relative to natives, though this improvement is more limited for the undocumented. WhileUtahhasreceivedincreasingnumbersofimmigrantsingeneralinthe pasttwodecades,ithasalsobecomeanimportantlocationforrefugeeresettlement.MacleansGeo-JaJaexaminestheconditionsfacedbythispopulation.He emphasizes the need to adapt policy and formal institutions of resettlement to changing realities, particularly changes in the source-country composition of the refugeepopulation.Likemanyotherauthorsinthisvolume,heemphasizesthe importanceofsocialcapitalandinstitutionsbasedwithintherefugeecommunity in promoting successful resettlement in the long-term. Each of these individual chapters makes an important contribution to our understanding of immigration in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. We think that the whole is somewhat greater than the sum of these parts, though, as a number of common themes emerge here in studies applying themethods and conceptsofavarietyofdisciplines.Onesuchthemeisthechallengeofdesigningsoundimmigrationpolicyduetochangesinthenatureofmigrantflowsover time; the complex connections of migration to economic, political, and cultural spheres; and the sometimes distinct goals of the migrants and the receiving com-
munities. The methodological challenges of studying immigration add to the complexity of these questions, in that the research required to inform policy designisexpensiveanddifficulttocarryout.Incorrectperceptionsofthecomposition of the immigrant community, its effects on the economy, and the desire ofitsmembersforconstructiveinvolvementinciviclifemaythereforepersist. The result is sometimes policy which is out of tune with realities in the migrant community. A second theme is the growth of “transnationalism” among migrants. Cheaper transportation and communication allow migrants to maintain stronger tieswith theircountryoforigin.This raisesconcernsabout the likely success of political and cultural incorporation of these migrants, though those concernsmaybeunfounded.Indeed,suchtiesmaypromotesocialcapitalwhich will aid the success of migrants in their new home. A third, related theme is the importance of institutions in the immigrant community, of varying degrees of formality, in the development of skills and social capital that will increase the likelihoodofsuchsuccess.These institutionsperhapscannotbecreatedoutof wholeclothbypolicy,buttheymightbesupportedbywell-designedpolicy,and localgovernmentsmightbeattunedtocaseswheresuchinstitutionsandrelated social capital are lacking. We comment on these themes and draw out further implications in the concluding chapter. Thisvolumewasinspiredbyaconferenceon“Migration,RightsandIdentities:ExaminingtheRangeofLocalandGlobalNeeds,”heldattheUniversityof Utah,February28-29,2008.TheconferencewashostedbytheBarbaraL.and Norman C. Tanner Center for Nonviolent Human Rights Advocacy at the University of Utah. We are grateful to the Tanner family, to the Center’s director, George Cheney, and to the Center’s staff, including Victoria Medina and Aleta Tew,fororganizingtheconferenceandinvitingustoparticipate.Wealsowant to thank theorganizations inSaltLakeCity, includingChamadeand theFirst Unitarian Church, and at the University of Utah, including the Honors College, theCollegesofHumanities,Law,andSocialWork,theDepartmentsofCommunication, Economics, Philosophy, Political Science, and Psychology, the Institute of Public and InternationalAffairs, theMiddle East Center, theOffice of the AssociateVicePresidentforDiversity,theOfficeofInternationalPrograms,and the Office of Undergraduate Studies, whose co-sponsorship helped make the conferencepossible.WearealsogratefultoKirstenSwiftforhelpineditingthis volume,andtoRobertLangham,ThomasSutton,SimonHolt,andEmilySenior at Routledge for their patience and guidance.
