ABSTRACT
In the introduction to our book, we argue not only that attitudes towards migrants and migration in Europe and the United States today are at their most negative since World War II but also that this is in part due to the way we have been formulating our immigration and integration policies. Contrary to what is often assumed, immigration policy should not be treated as having precedence over integration policy. In fact, the present migration and refugee crisis and several other decisive moments in Europe’s immigration history – from the guestworker period to the enlargements of the European Union – have demonstrated that the integration policy and its effectiveness later determine a given state’s admissions policy. We argue that the two policies should be much better interconnected. The introduction also presents the structure of the book and briefly introduces the readers to each chapter.
