Europe and Its Immigrants in the 21st Century...regime, tackling issues ranging from immigration’s...

Edited by Demetrios G. Papademetriou

MIGRATION POLICY INSTITUTE

Europe and

Its Immigrants in

the 21st Century

A New Deal

or a Continuing

Dialogue of the Deaf?

LUSO-AMERICANFoundation

Europe is at a crossroads. Demography, labor market realities, andalready overwhelmed social protection systems mean that immigrationwill play a larger role in Europe in the decades ahead. The policy challenge is this: How can the European Union absorb new flows ofimmigrants when the 35 to 40 million foreign-born people already inits midst continue to face difficulties in becoming a full part of the economic, cultural, social, and political lives of their adopted societies?

In this volume, the Migration Policy Institute has gathered some of the finest thinkers to offer insightful counsel and, wherever possible, solutions to Europe’s immigration challenges. They piecetogether the puzzle of a well-managed, comprehensive migrationregime, tackling issues ranging from immigration’s economic costsand benefits, to effective selection systems, citizenship, the welfarestate, and integration policies that work.

This volume marks another milestone in MPI’s deep commitment to European policy and transatlantic cooperation on immigration policy. In addition to working closely with the European Commission,Member State governments, and other EU institutions, MPI collaborates on several long-term research and policy initiatives with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Developmentand other international institutions. This work is generously supportedby the Luso-American Foundation in Portugal, the Stavros S. NiarchosFoundation, and the King Baudouin Foundation, among others.

Price: $24.95

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Europe and Its

Immigrants in the

21st Century

A New Deal

or a Continuing



© 2006 Migration Policy Institute. All rights reserved. No part of this

publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, or by any means,

without prior permission, in writing, from the Migration Policy Institute.

iii

Foreword

v

Preface and Plan of the Book

ix

Introduction

Managing International Migration

Better: Principles and Perspectives for

Gaining More from Migration

Demetrios G. Papademetriouxiii

Integration

The Challenge of Integration in Europe

Sarah Spencer1

Integration Processes of Migrants:

Research Findings and Policy Lessons

Rinus Penninx31

Citizenship

T. Alexander Aleinikoff and Patrick Weil53

Building Successful Urban Policy

in the New Era of Migration

Jorge Gaspar and Maria Lucinda Fonseca71

Practices and Policies for Immigrant

Integration in the United States

Maia Jachimowicz and Kevin O’Neil89

Economics

and Labor Migration

Migrants and the European

Labor Market

Rainer Münz and Thomas Straubhaar121

Is Immigration an Enemy

of the Welfare State?

Grete Brochmann and Jon Erik Dölvik155

The New Role of Migrants in the Rural

Economies of Southern Europe

Charalambos Kasimis179

Future Demographic Change in Europe:

The Contribution of Migration

Wolfgang Lutz and Sergei Scherbov207

Selecting Economic Migrants

Demetrios G. Papademetriou and Kevin O’Neil223

About the Authors

257

About the Editor

265

About the Luso-American

Foundation

267

About the Migration

Policy Institute

271

Acknowledgements

275

Contents

Foreword

Rui Machete

President, Executive Council

Luso-American Foundation

vi

Few issues are likely to prove moreconsequential for the economichealth and social and cultural

well-being of an increasing number ofdeveloped countries than internationalmigration. In fact, it may be only aslight exaggeration to argue that whatwe do on international migration, andhow we do it, will help define howwell we do as societies in the years and decades ahead. This includes how we regulate migration’s size andcomposition and how wisely webalance the interests and manage theconcerns of the broader society thatincreasingly feels that “their” jobs,culture, and value systems are erodedby the presence of large numbers ofimmigrants. But the challenge goeswell beyond that to issues of how wellwe incorporate both newcomers andthose who by now have become ethnic minorities into our economic,social, and political institutions; howwe work side-by-side with thesecommunities in a common effort tobuild socially robust and economicallyviable societies; how intelligently andhonestly we work with immigrant-sending and transit countries; and,perhaps most tellingly, how we replaceillegality and the social chaos thatrunaway immigration fuels withthoughtful and progressive rules thatwe are able and willing to enforce.

This is neither to say that all is lostnor to encourage the view, all toocommon among many in the democraticwest, that the issue is so complex thataddressing it effectively is beyond ourgovernance capabilities as they standtoday — and that we thus need to

resort to increasingly illiberal tacticsthat curtail the rights and liberties ofall who live under our states’ sover-eign protection. Rather, this is a call tothoughtful and informed action. This is a call to the research communityin and out of government for betterdata and better analyses. This is a call to our governments for greaterintrospection and truth about the rolethat immigration plays and will play in our demographically challengedsocieties in the years ahead. This is acall for much greater and far-sightedleadership including much largerinvestments in public education. This is a call for a more tough-mindedapproach to “horizontal” policymakingand execution, in which all governmentagencies with competencies that affector are affected by different aspects ofmigration, such as labor, socialprotection, education, foreign affairs,international development, and borderand interior police agencies, workclosely together to devise and deliverpolicies that serve host societies’interests and priorities best. And this is a call for Europe’s institutions — the Council, the Commission, theParliament, and the Court of Justice— to begin in earnest to give this issuethe centrality it commands.

This is also a call to our socialinstitutions to reflect on how open and inclusive they really are, and howto be more so, and to civil society tobe ever more imaginative in strength-ening and, when needed, repairing thesocial fabric that diversity strains—and, many will say, threatens. Finally, this is a call to all of us, citizens and

Europe and Its Immigrants in the 21st Century

Foreword vii

immigrants (new and “old” ones)alike, to engage in what amounts tonothing less than “national projects”whose express and noble aim is tobuild the effective and cohesivemulti-ethnic societies in which manyof us already live and the rest of us are fast approaching.

Europe and Its Immigrants in the21st Century: A New Deal or aContinuing Dialogue of the Deaf?moves us further towards these objec-tives than any other volume to date. Its chapters top the list of issues thatwe must address head-on and onwhich we must make measurableprogress. Its authors, the leadingresearchers in their disciplines, arethose upon whom policymakers areincreasingly relying as they try to come to terms with internationalmigration. Although most authors, and in many ways, the book’s “topics”are “European,” the analyses andrecommendations are transatlantic intheir essence and are addressed to allimmigrant-receiving societies. In fact,in many ways, the book is a worthy“read” for both migrant-sending andtransit countries, as well as forinformed readers and thoughtfulobservers wherever they are. Thevolume’s editor, Demetrios G.Papademetriou, is a widely known andrespected analyst who regularly advisessenior government officials onmigration across the developed world.His judgment and expertise, as well as his ability to tap into the mosttalented pool of writers and policyadvisors, is clearly demonstrated in the book’s collection of essays.

Finally, this volume is both a culminating activity and the beginningof a new phase in the relationshipbetween the two institutions that have sponsored it: The Luso-AmericanFoundation (FLAD) and the MigrationPolicy Institute (MPI). The relationshipis nearly ten years old and goes back towhen MPI’s principals were the leadersof the International Migration PolicyProgram of the Carnegie Endowmentfor International Peace. During thisdecade, the two institutions have co-sponsored nearly a dozen seminars,workshops, and conferences on variousaspects of international migration andhave co-produced and co-published anumber of books and reports, mostnotably, a three-volume study oncitizenship thought and practice acrossa dozen states. The present volumecompletes that phase of the relationship.

With this as a background, FLAD and MPI now enter into a new phasein their relationship — that of astrategic partnership. Accordingly,FLAD becomes MPI’s strategicpartner in all of MPI’s European workon migration and related issues, whileMPI minds FLAD’s analytical andresearch interests on Portuguese andmore broadly Lusophone communi-ties and their concerns in the UnitedStates. This transatlantic cooperationis expected to add value to importantinterests within each organization’spriorities and enhance the effective-ness of their work on both sides ofthe Atlantic.

Rui MacheteLisbon, 2006

viii Europe and Its Immigrants in the 21st Century

Preface and

Plan of the Book

x

This volume, which focuses onthe current state of immigra-tion in Europe and suggests a

way forward, is the product of a uniquetransatlantic collaboration amongexperts, policymakers, and a pathbreaking foundation.

The collaboration has its roots in an initiative of the former GreekForeign Minister, George A.Papandreou, who was determined touse his country’s 2003 EU Presidencyto offer Europe a thoughtful, progressive blueprint for immigrationreform. Papandreou gathered together some of Europe’s and America’sleading immigration experts under theaegis of the Athens Migration PolicyInitiative (AMPI). Led by theMigration Policy Institute andcoordinated by MPI Senior FellowGregory A. Maniatis, AMPI’s expertsworked closely with the Greekgovernment and the EuropeanCommission to develop a comprehen-sive vision for managing migration andintegration in Europe.

The first result of these efforts wasinscribed in the European Council’sThessaloniki conclusions, whichplaced a heavy emphasis on immigrantintegration. The conclusions called forthe development of Common BasicPrinciples on integration and of anAnnual Report on Migration andIntegration in Europe. The GreekPresidency also shepherded throughthe first-ever EU legislation governinglegal migration, in the form ofdirectives on family reunification andlong-term residents.

In the years that followed, the AMPIteam worked with successive EUPresidencies on their immigration-related efforts. Its most fruitfulpartnership was with the Dutchgovernment, leading to the adoptionby the European Council in December2004 of the Common Basic Principleson integration and the HagueProgramme. AMPI, which has evolvedinto an ad hoc global think tank,continues its work on a variety ofprojects that involve the EuropeanCommission, the European Parliament,EU Member State governments, andinternational organizations.

As a longtime partner of MPI and itspredecessor, the International MigrationPolicy Program at the CarnegieEndowment for International Peace,the Fundaçao Luso-Americana (FLAD)was involved from the beginning withthe effort to advise governments andpolicymakers, and supported thegroup’s efforts and insights. This bookis the result of FLAD’s commitment tothis important work.

In his opening chapter, Demetrios G.Papademetriou discusses the dimensions of the internationalmigration system and offers a globaloverview of what drives it, where it isgoing, and the major trends he sees init. He then focuses on why governments(and societies) find internationalmigration so difficult to tackleeffectively and uses that discussion to launch into a treatise on migrationmanagement fundamentals. Heconcludes with a discussion about the complex relationship between


Preface and Plan of the Book xi

demography and immigration andhazards a look ahead to 2020.

Sarah Spencer offers an overview ofhow the European Union’s policiesrelated to immigrant integration havedeveloped since the 1990s, as well as acompelling vision for how these can beenhanced in coming years. RinusPenninx, while summarizing theinsights gleaned from the research onintegration policies, argues that theUnion is handicapped by the ambiva-lence of Member States towardsworking collectively on integration; ingoing forward, he underscores the needfor comprehensive efforts that weavetogether the contributions of all levelsof government and civil society.

T. Alexander Aleinikoff and Patrick Weil then tackle the issue thatis arguably at the heart of integration,the question of citizenship; theysystematically address concernsrevolving around access to citizenship,dual nationality, political integration,and economic and social rights.

Jorge Gaspar and Maria LucindaFonseca discuss how urbanization andimmigration interact, and what theimplications of this interacion are forEuropean cities. We then cross theAtlantic, where Maia Jachimozicz andKevin O’Neil offer a valuable overviewand assessment of US integrationpractices, while also elaborating oncurrent integration trends, challenges,and controversies.

Rainer Münz and Thomas Straubhaaropen the economic section of this

volume with a unique analysis of theEuropean Labor Force Survey thatcompares the labor-market perform-ance of foreign-born residents withthat of native-born ones; theyconclude with recommendations forhow European countries can betterrecruit migrants who match theirlabor-market needs. Grete Brochmannand Jon Erik Dölvik then address thevexing political question of whetherimmigration subverts the welfare state;they shed light on the complex gameof labor-market and welfare-regimecompetition among states, in whicheach is trying to strike a balanceamong attracting needed workers,fending off welfare seekers, andprotecting national working condi-tions. Charalambos Kasimis shifts thefocus to the countryside, summarizingthe findings from his multi-yearresearch on the impact of immigrationon Greek rural areas and agriculture.

Wolfgang Lutz and Sergei Scherbovoffer a look into the future, exploringEurope’s demographic dynamics, therole immigration will play in themduring the coming decades, and thepolicy options available to governmentsfor addressing the demographic deficit.

Finally, in the volume’s concludingchapter, Demetrios G. Papademetriouand Kevin O’Neil drill down into thequestion of how governments currentlyselect economic immigrants, dissectingthe US selection mechanisms and thepoint systems of Canada, Australia,and the UK, before concluding with aseries of recommendations for howsuch selection can be improved.

xii Europe and Its Immigrants in the 21st Century

Managing International

Migration Better: Principles

and Perspectives for Gaining

More from Migration

Demetrios G. Papademetriou

xiv

Introduction

and Background

For nearly two decades now, capital and the market for goods,services and workers of many

types have weaved an ever moreintricate web of global economic and,increasingly, social interdependence.1

In the last few years, however, such“globalization”-fueled interdependenceseems to be on the defensive asgovernments and publics alike acrossthe globe begin to reexamine some ofthe phenomenon’s main principles and practices and look more carefullyat its effects.

No component of this introspectionhas fared more poorly than the labor market effects of deeperinterdependence — effects that hadlong been posited to be positive acrossthe board. Evidence is mounting thatsubstantial segments of the populationof rich and poor countries alike areindeed affected adversely by thereigning form of interdependence —at least in the short-to-medium term— and that governments along thedevelopment continuum have beencaught unprepared to help them adjustto the new competitive environment.Concerns that openness could also befacilitating the financing of terroristmovement and activity have added tothe sense of skepticism about furtheropenness along the lines promoted by

the World Trade Organization (WTO),which has itself become a lightning rodfor anti-globalization animus. As aresult, and rather suddenly and inmany ways unexpectedly, the road todeeper global interdependence hasdeveloped enough bumps, diversions,and detours to make predictions about the timing and direction of the next big “breakthrough” ininternationalization uncertain.

Few by-products of globalization arepricklier for the publics of theadvanced industrial societies than themovement of people. Such movement,of course, also preoccupies the lessdeveloped countries, albeit fromdifferent perspectives. For them,movement is an essential lifeline toboth their citizens and to theireconomies — because of theiremigrants’ financial remittances, nowestimated by the World Bank at wellover $200 billion per year.2 (This sumis more than three times the amountof overall development assistance.)

Their preoccupation does not stopthere, however. They are deeplyconcerned about three additionalissues. First, that some of the behaviorof the authorities and the people inthe countries in which their citizenslive and work borders on a grossdisregard for their citizens’ human,labor, and other basic rights. Second,that the trafficking industry that has


1 The “Uruguay Round” of global trade negotiations and the various regional trade accords (particularly the NorthAmerican trade agreements) — all starting in the late 1980s — are somewhat arbitrarily chosen as the beginningpoints of the newest and most intense phase of globalization.

2 The World Bank had estimated the amount at $111 billion for 2001. The growth reflects primarily more “daring”assumptions and better estimation techniques.

Introduction xv

grown around the unauthorizedmovement of their nationals endangerstheir citizens’ lives. (At the same time,and by virtue of the fact that suchsyndicates operate in so many lessdeveloped countries with nearimpunity, they undermine thelegitimacy of these countries’ publicinstitutions and complicate theirrelationships with migrant transit anddestination country governments.)Third, that increasingly selectiveimmigration policies of advancedindustrial societies may be tapping toodeeply into their human capital pool,whose upbringing and education hasbeen paid for by scarce public funds.

At the root of these sets of contradictoryinterests and reactions to internationalmigration is the plain fact that thephenomenon’s reach is now nearlyuniversal. Migration today touches thelives of more people and looms larger inthe politics and economics of morestates than at any other time in themodern era. With the United Nations(UN) estimating the immigrant stock tobe as high as 200 million,3 almost nocountry is untouched by internationalmigration or is immune to its effects.This reality alone guarantees thatmigration will remain a top agenda itemin national, regional, and “global”conversations for the foreseeable future.

Few social phenomena in recordedhuman history are as consequentialfor civilizations as migration. Historyis in fact dotted with “ages of

migration” — from the establishmentof the Greek colonies and the Romanconquests, through the Byzantine,Arabic, Ottoman, and the variousAsian empires, and from theEuropean colonizations to the greatmigrations of the 19th and early andlate 20th centuries. Furthermore, fewother large social phenomena are asentwined with human progress orhave been as deeply implicated in therise and decline of organized politicalentities as migration.

Remarkably, however, such long-standing human experience withmigration does not seem to havetranslated into models of goodmanagement practices that can bereadily adapted to and then appliedeffectively in different settings. A largepart of the explanation for thisanomaly lies with the fact that large-scale migration, by challenging thereceiving society’s sense of identity andexposing the weaknesses of its socialand economic model of governance —as well as its capacity to enforce itslaws — quickly leads to politicalcontentiousness. Deeply fracturedpolitics, in turn, interfere with theability of governments to pursuedomestic and foreign policies that dealwith the phenomenon thoughtfullyand, more importantly, to thesystematic advantage of most of thoseinvolved in or affected by migration.

Furthermore, when support forimmigration collapses (something that

3 There are immense definitional and measurement issues associated with such grand estimates. See also thediscussion later in the text about the relative lack of robustness of such estimates.

xvi

occurs with pendulum-like regularity),the duration and depth of a society’sengagement with the process does notseem to inoculate it against excessivereactions to it. This is as close to a“law” of migration as anyone mightposit. And, as with most laws, it seemsto hold independently of such factorsas the size of organized immigration’simprint on a society’s evolution andeconomic progress or the benefits andexperience that a society has gainedfrom immigration.

A. The plan of the chapter

This introduction is written primarilywith policymakers in mind and isaddressed mostly to the advancedindustrial world.4 As a result, at timesit moves too quickly over issues thatare best discussed in the context ofspecific migration relationships orseemingly papers over (by over-generalizing about) the circumstancesand perspectives of the less developedworld, whose nationals are migration’sprotagonists. This choice results in aregrettable loss in the precision thatcomes from focusing on a single caseor the comprehensiveness that comesfrom a truly global perspective.

The discussion dwells briefly on someof migration’s key causes, paints abroad picture of the phenomenon’s sizeand likely evolution over the next twodecades, and then bores deeply intothe issues of migration management —the chapter’s principal focus. In this

regard, it outlines and explores some ofthe philosophical and practical issuesthat policymakers must understandand address better as they search formore effective policy interventions.The chapter admonishes both readerand policymaker to be mindful of thelimitations in the capacity ofgovernment to change important anddeeply embedded social processesexclusively through tougher domesticregulations and other unilateralpolicies in an increasinglyinterdependent world. It concludes bymaking the case for more thoughtfulpolicies that work with both themarket and human nature, as well asin cooperation with countries fromand through which immigrants — andparticularly irregular or unauthorizedones — get to advanced industrialdemocracies.

The chapter sets the policy target atdrawing out the benefits ofimmigration better and moresystematically for all principals in theprocess while controlling for its mostnegative and perverse consequences.Managing international migration tocollective advantage, the chapterargues, can be done best through lawsand regulations grounded in a realisticpolicy vision, a sensitivity to domesticrequirements (itself a balancing act ofthe first order), and clarity aboutinternational obligations andobjectives. The ambitiousness of theserequirements suggests that managing


4 The terms “advanced industrial countries/democracies/societies/economies,” “industrial countries,” “first world,”“developed world,” “advanced West,” “North,” “wealthy nations” and OECD countries are all referring to the 24states that were members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in the early 1990s,before Mexico and some other developing states also became members.

Introduction xvii

uncertainty and learning to deal withimperfection may be absoluterequirements to, and the only realisticpolicy goals in, a policy domain ascomplex as international migration.

The International

Migration System:

Measuring the Inexact

The international migration systembinds together sending, receiving, andtransit countries in increasinglycomplex wholes. Altogether, morethan half of all the world’s states “play”in this system in significant ways, and,increasingly, more countries playmultiple roles simultaneously — asplaces from and through whichimmigrants come and as places inwhich immigrants settle or,increasingly, may just work for a periodof time. One also notes an almostsymbiotic coincidence of partiesinterested in migration. In addition tothe immigrants, they include employers,consumers of all goods and services,families, transnational networks of alltypes (including criminal syndicates),and a variety of local, state, andnational-level social and even publicinstitutions.

Immigrant Stocks

As noted, the UN Population Divisionestimates the stock of those currentlyliving outside their country of birth fora minimum of one year (its definitionof an immigrant) at about 200 million.This estimate would put the immigrantstock at about 3.2 percent of theworld’s population. Among this

estimate’s many limitations, the mostprominent is that the base data aregovernment statistics. Such statisticsare subject to political determinationsabout what to collect or not collectand, more importantly, what to reportor not report.

For instance, the UN figure includesthe roughly 30 million persons (mostof them ethnic Russians) who hadbeen internal migrants until the early 1990s but were reclassified asinternational migrants when theSoviet Union collapsed and broke upinto a large number of independentstates. At the same time, mosttemporary immigrants whose visaslast more than a year, plus half ormore of all unauthorized immigrants,are typically not included in theseestimates, because government datasystems do not include them.

There are important exceptions to this“rule.” For instance, the US andseveral South American countrieseither produce themselves or otherwisedo not contest unauthorizedpopulation estimates by reputableanalysts. Another group of countriesproduces estimates but does not reportthem for political reasons. Forinstance, a closely held Britishestimate of about half-a-millionunauthorized immigrants was leaked in2005 and caused great embarrassmentto the government. A third category ofcountries has “working guesstimates”— Canada’s is somewhat lower butotherwise in the same range as theBritish one. The overall lesson? It is important both to disaggregate

xviii

“global” estimates and to look at their component parts as carefully as possible before making anythingother than the most approximate of judgments.

Yet approximations are important ifone is to make observations about theoverall scale, distribution, anddirection of immigration flows. Forinstance, of the UN PopulationDivision’s total estimated number ofimmigrants, about 30 percent are foundin the Americas; Canada and the USaccount for about 42 million of thatshare. (The Western Hemisphere’snumbers may be among the mostrobust because many key immigrationplayers in the region include the largestproportions of irregular immigrants intheir statistics.) Continental Europe’sshare is in the low-to-mid 20 percentrange. The uncertainty level is higherin that continent because of thereasons articulated earlier. The otherhalf or so of the total is found in therest of the world, with Asia having thelargest number of immigrants of allworld regions.

Illegal/irregular/unauthorized/undocumented migration has been by far thefastest rising single form of migrationduring the past ten years. A roughestimate about the size of unauthorizedimmigrants in the world’s trueimmigrant stock might put it atbetween 30 and 40 million immigrants.Among them, the US has the largestabsolute number of irregular immigrants(about 11 million — about 30 percentof its total foreign-born population).South Africa and Russia also have

several million irregular immigrantseach, but estimates vary wildly. Finally,continental Europe also has a largenumber of unauthorized immigrants,with the southern parts of theEuropean Union (EU) accounting forthe largest numbers. Altogether,continental Europe probably “hosts”between 6 and 8 million unauthorizedimmigrants, although that numberfluctuates in accordance with the“latest” regularization program. (Suchprograms typically offer temporarylegal status while the “legalization”programs in the Americas have tendedto offer permanent legal status). These fluctuations, however, are morecyclical than one might think becauselarge proportions of those whoregularize typically fall back intoirregular status when they cannot meetthe conditions that would allow themto maintain their legal status.

Nor is illegal immigration theexclusive domain of rich- or middle-income countries. Mexico, theworld’s most consistently proficientsource of unauthorized (and legal)immigrants, may also be hosting closeto a million irregular immigrants ofits own, many of them Americanretirees who have settled in Mexicowithout official permission.

Migrant Flows

Estimates about migration flowsreinforce this picture. Althoughannual migration flows are even harderto estimate than stocks — as parts ofthem amount to a snapshot in anotherwise incomplete migrationjourney — a best guess may be that


Introduction xix

they stand at between 10 and 15million. That number is again verysensitive to who does the counting, asit determines who is counted. Thebroad range used has three componentparts: (a) legal permanent and longer-term temporary stays, which can becounted with some (only some)confidence; (b) unauthorized entriesand stays, which are extremely difficultto count (discussed in a later section);and (c) asylum seekers who arerelatively easy to count but particularlyhard to classify.

Among the key components of thefirst part are the following groups: � Family immigration and work and

skills’ related streams; � Most all international students

(language students attending acourse of study that lasts threemonths or less might be excluded);

� Temporary workers at all skill levels (except thoseperforming short duration andtruly seasonal jobs5);

� Business executives who have theright to stay in another countryfor more than one year; and

� Investors and entrepreneurs of all types.

Counting asylum seekers is morecomplicated. A possible way to do thatis to count those asylum seekers whoseapplications are successful during thecourse of the year in question in the

stock part of the estimate. Asylumseekers who stay in the countries inwhich they have made claims, pendingthe outcome of those claims, could bereported as part of the flow estimate.Finally, those asylum seekers who stayon regardless of the outcome of thatadjudication would be counted underthe “unauthorized entries and stays”part of the estimate.

The United States, Canada,Australia, and New Zealand — theso-called traditional countries ofimmigration — probably account forabout 40 percent of all such annualflows. The other advanced industrialsocieties combined probably takeanother one-quarter of that total,with the UK having been by far themost active player on internationalmigration in that group in recentyears. (Within this same group, alarge proportion of entrants enterthrough the asylum route.) Theremainder is distributed amonggrowing regional economies in thetop quintile of the developing worldand countries adjacent to advancedindustrial countries. It is in this lastgrouping of countries where manyirregular immigrants are oftenstranded (or “temporarily deposited”by their traffickers/smugglers) formore or less extended periods of timewaiting for an opportunity to reachtheir desired destinations. Few amongthose are thought to be interested in

5 In this classification, many “holiday-makers,” a one or two year tourism/work visa that is found mostly in somecountries of the British Commonwealth, would be counted, as would most agricultural workers in the US becausethey follow a nearly year-long growing “season” by moving from area to area and crop to crop. Most seasonalagricultural workers in Europe would not be counted because the seasons in any one country tend to be highlydefined and short and there is no single European Union wide agricultural worker visa.

xx

returning to their home countries or in staying there if they are forcibly returned.

Migration composition

In terms of gender composition, the immigrant stock is probablyroughly equally divided between men and women. Some internationalorganizations, such as the InternationalLabor Office (ILO), suggest thatwomen have exceeded men in theoverall immigrant stock in recent years,in large part because some Asian flowsare dominated by women and severalclasses of movers (see immediatelybelow) are now majority women. Thefastest rising immigrant cohorts,however, both in terms of the stock butparticularly in terms of the flow, arethose of children, followed by women.(The number of children is still smallbut the development is a troubling onenonetheless.)

Immigrant entry classes

In terms of immigrant entry classes,the largest category by far has beenand continues to be that of families.Family (re)unification remains thebasic unit and building block, thekey multiplier, of every immigrationsystem. In fact, even in the mosthighly selective immigration systems,such as that of Canada with itshighly emulated points-basedimmigrant selection system, familiesremain the formula’s principal pillar.That is because even the skills-basedpart of the Canadian point system,which accounts for about half of thatcountry’s total permanent immigrantadmissions (“landings”), only tests

the principal immigrant for skills.This means that less than a quarterof all foreigners admitted to Canadafor permanent residence in any givenyear are skills tested.

The rest of the class-of-entry sequencestands as follows. Family immigrantsare followed in overall size by thoseentering with work visas, whethertemporary or permanent. With theexception of unauthorized entries, thisis the fastest rising entry class. Many inthe legal-worker group enter with theirimmediate family while others are ableto (re)unify with their families sometime after entry. (The administrativedefinition of “immediate family” variesfrom place to place.)

Asylum seekers and refugees are thethird basic entry stream but represent asmall proportion of the overall stock.The Office of the UN HighCommissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)estimates that less than 10 millionpersons have gained legal entrythrough the refugee resettlement andasylum routes since 1980. Overall, lessthan 10 percent of the total immigrantstock is thought to be composed ofasylum seekers or refugees at mostpoints in time.

One last category is of particularinterest (and is discussed separatelybelow): illegal migration. As noted,this migration form has been by farthe fastest rising single form ofmigration during the past ten years.


Introduction xxi

Forms and Definitions of

Illegal Immigration

As the preceding discussion hasalready suggested, illegal immigrationtakes several forms, four of which arethe most common.

Undocumented/unauthorized entrants.These are nationals of one state whoenter another state clandestinely. Most such entrants cross land borders,but sea routes are also employedregularly, and, wherever inspectionregimes are permeable, so are airroutes. In all instances, the entrantmanages to avoid detection and hence,inspection. (In the US, where personswho use this type of entry account forabout two-thirds of all illegallyresident immigrants, the category iscalled “entry without inspection,” or“EWI.”) Increasing proportions of suchclandestine immigrants are smuggledor trafficked.

Individuals who are inspected upon entryinto another state but gain admission byusing fraudulent documents. The fraudin question may involve the person’sidentity and/or the documentation insupport of admission. A variant of thisclass of entry involves the making offraudulent asylum claims where issuesof identity and the documentation andthe narrative in support of the asylumclaim may be falsified.

Violators of the duration of a visa.Individuals who enter another stateproperly but “willfully” (see below)overstay their period of legal stay, thuslapsing into illegal status.

Violators of the terms and conditions of a visa. Nationals of one state whoenter another state with the properdocuments and procedures but atsome point violate the terms of theirvisa. The most frequent suchviolation is the acceptance ofemployment. In a nearlyinstitutionalized variant of thisviolation, language schools in somecountries, such as Japan, have becomenotorious for admitting studentswhose course of study becomes the nominal activity while (often full-time) employment, a commonlyallowed ancillary activity to studying,is in fact the principal activity.Another variant of this class ofviolation is when persons with specialvisa privileges — such as holders of“border crosser visas” that allowborder residents from an adjacentcountry to reside and be employed inthe other country within strictlyprescribed time and geographicparameters — systematically abusethese parameters.

While these four classes of illegal entries and stays capture theoverwhelming majority of allimmigration violations, it is importantto note that many foreigners may alsofind themselves in brief temporaryviolation of the host nation’simmigration laws in what are otherwiselegal entries and fundamentally legalstays. For instance:

� A tourist may exceed his or herduration of stay pending adecision on the application for anextension of that term;

xxii

� A business visitor may engage in abusiness activity that may requirea different visa classification;

� A student may work for shortintervals of time in violation ofthe terms of his or her visa, eitherby working more than themaximum allowed whileattending school or working in anunapproved occupation during thepractical training part of his orher education;

� Workers on temporary work visasmay change employers (or evenemployment sectors) withoutobtaining the proper authorizationfrom the immigration authorities.

While these sorts of violations ofimmigration laws happen withconsiderable frequency, and some areimportant, most are relatively“innocent,” that is, they are notsystematic and are of short duration. In fact, most statistical systems eitherignore these infractions or are otherwiseincapable of capturing and countingthem. Furthermore, in administrativeand regulatory terms, many of theseviolations are typically the result ofinflexible rules and understaffed (andthus overworked) immigrationbureaucracies that do not have theresources to adjudicate immigrationpetitions in timely fashions.

For instance, more than 6 millionimmigration petitions — many ofthem requests for a change inimmigration status — were pendingin the US in 2004. (More recent dataare difficult to reconcile with thisfigure because the US Department of

Homeland Security (DHS) has sincechanged the way it reports thesedata.) Many of these petitioners willtypically lapse into illegality duringlengthy adjudication delays.

Distribution of the

immigrant stock

The distribution of the immigrantstock stands roughly as follows. Thepolitical space occupied by the NorthAmerican Free Trade Agreement(NAFTA), that is, the United States,Canada, and Mexico, probablyaccounts for about 43 millionimmigrants out of the world’s entireimmigrant stock and about 3.5 millionof the annual immigrant flow. The EU25 plus the European Economic Area(EEA) host a slightly lower proportionof the total immigrant stock in apopulation base that is roughly equalto NAFTA’s at about 440 million. Thismakes Europe, broadly defined, aremarkably significant (if much newer)destination area for immigrants.

Yet, and as noted, both the largestabsolute number of immigrants and thelargest proportion of the immigrantstock are in Asia. In fact, Asia has heldthat preeminent position for each of thelast four decades. Asia is also the mostlikely locus of large-scale migrationactivities in the decades ahead as thelargest continent (by far) and the spacewith the two largest multistate/ethniccountries poised for an economic take-off: China and India. Instability inSouth Asia, the Middle East, and theGulf states only adds to the region’svolatility — and hence to its potentialfor large-scale migration flows.


Introduction xxiii

Immigrant density

Finally, in terms of per capitaimmigrant density (here I use thebroadest and most politically neutralmeasurement for “immigrants” — theforeign born), the leading advancedindustrial countries in terms of theforeign born as a proportion of thoseborn in the country of immigrantdestination are as follows. The top tieris composed of Luxembourg, with arate of between 35 and 40 percent,Australia with somewhat more than25 percent, and Switzerland with a bitless than 25 percent. The second tieris led by Canada, at about 17 percent,Germany at about 13 percent, and theUnited States at a little more than 12percent. These two sets of countriesare followed by a third tier ofcountries with foreign-born densitylevels of between 8 and 11 percent.Among them, one finds Sweden,France, the Netherlands, Belgium,Russia, and Greece.

Summary

By way of summary, three observationsmay be worth reiterating here. First,countries include widely differentpopulations in their immigrationstatistics. For instance, some countriesreport all foreign-born persons withpermanent residence permits in theirimmigration statistics. The US alsoincludes in its estimates most of the 11million unauthorized immigrants andabout 1.6 million of its longer-termtemporary residents. France excludesfrom its official immigration statisticsforeigners who have naturalized.Germany will not report the millionsof Aussiedler — returning ethnic

Germans, virtually all of whom havebeen born and have lived in othercountries for many generations — inits immigration statistics. ManyEuropean countries include the locallyborn children of their immigrants intheir statistics on “foreigners,” andnone of them include estimates ofunauthorized immigrants.

Second, if one takes out of the totalstock of immigrants the approximately30 million, mostly Russians, whobecame international migrants underrather “technical” circumstances (stateborders moved, not the people), theimmigrant stock today stands at about2.7 or 2.8 percent of the earth’spopulation. This is a proportion that isonly marginally higher (by about 15 to20 percent) than that for the 1960s,1970s, 1980s and much of the 1990s. Itis only since the second half of the1990s that migration seems to havespiraled higher, led by increasinglyorganized flows of unauthorized entries.

Third, although there are a number oftrends in international migration thatare more or less valid for mostadvanced industrial societies, there is only one that is truly global incharacter. Much of the growth in and maintenance of high levels ofinternational migration is as much theresult of market realities in advancedindustrial societies as of “them”(migrants) somehow crashing theNorth’s gates and “imposing”themselves on it. This point goes tothe root of an analytical perspectivethat provocatively and controversiallyincorporates fully the fact that

xxiv

receiving countries are deeplyimplicated in international migrationof all forms. Receiving countriesprovide conditions and circumstancesin which immigration survives andthrives — a perspective that is oftenmissing or, more frequently,underemphasized in manygovernmental analyses. It is not asurprise, then, that the resultingpolicies are ineffective.

Triggers, Drivers, and

Facilitators of

International Migration

Wars and large-scale disasters, whethernatural or man-made, are obviousmigration triggers as people flee for their lives. The triggers ofinternational migration can also befound in the quest to protect oneselfand one’s family from sustainedphysical and economic jeopardy and toescape dramatic and persistent declinesin economic opportunities. (Colombianand Argentinean emigration duringthe last few years are both examples ofthis phenomenon.) This migrationcause is qualitatively different than thesearch for economic improvement,which is one of the migration constants.

Two elements within those broadcauses are likely to remain importantmigration drivers in the next twodecades. The first is political, social,and cultural intolerance or, at theextreme, group-based gross violationsof human rights. The second is thesystematic failure (some will say willfulindifference) of governments to redress

issues of cumulative disadvantage —meaning the various forms of economicexclusion and ethno-racial, religious,or linguistic discrimination thatsystematically disadvantage certainsegments of a population.

Both of these migration drivers arealways more or less in evidence. Inmost instances, however, they are notsufficient either to start a large newmigration flow or to suddenly expandsubstantially an existing one. For thatto happen, a number of preconditions(“facilitators”) must be in place. The following are among the mostnotable facilitators.

A. A tradition of migration

The preexistence of a long-termpolitical, social, and economicrelationship between a sending anddestination society that includes atradition of migration is a most potentfacilitator of migration. When such atradition exists, it simply leads tomore migration until either asignificant new variable enters thepicture or the value of one of theexisting variables changes decisively.An example of the former would be adramatic and regime-wide change inattitudes towards some or allimmigrants at the receiving-societyend. Terrorism concerns that provereal and sustained may in fact act insuch a way, as might ethnic orreligious violence that is thought tobe exacerbated by migration. (In thisregard, it will be worth watching inthe years ahead the acceptance ofimmigrants and other entrants frompredominantly Muslim and Arab


Introduction xxv

countries throughout the industrialWest.) An example of the latterwould be the persistent reduction inthe economic, but especially theopportunity, differential betweencountries. The story of the dramaticdecline in West European immigrationto the United States and the rest ofthe traditional countries ofimmigration that began in the 1960sor the stabilization of intra-EUmigration since the 1980s areinstances of this phenomenon.

B. Economic and

internationalist elites

When receiving-society elites areconvinced of the economic benefits of legally authorized and orderlymigration (and, within certainparameters, even of unauthorizedmigration) they can typically organizethemselves to open the immigrationvalve further. In this scenario,migration’s benefits will have to bethought of as being substantial enough— and government policies asinadequate in meeting perceived labor market and other needs — tomotivate economic and internationalist(what Immanuel Kant referred to as“cosmopolitan”) elites and theirpolitical allies to support significantopenings to immigration flows.Canada’s sustained interest inimmigration is an example of suchelite-driven legal opening, as are recentopenings to migration in the UK and elsewhere in the EU. The United States’ glaring tolerance ofunauthorized immigration is anexample of how far some pro-immigration elites may go when

adequate legal openings to immigrationare politically unachievable.

In general, the twin forces mostresponsible for the growth in irregularmigration can be found in two actions.The first is the developed world’spronounced bias against low-skilledmigration in the face of market forcesthat strongly value it (and broadclasses of people who need and availthemselves liberally of such migrantlabor.) The second is what broadsegments of the developed world’snon-governmental sector view asextreme parsimony towards variousforms of social and humanitarianimmigration.

The former is most obvious when avariety of personal and low-value-added service jobs go begging. Amongthese jobs are assistants and child- andelder-caretakers, hospitality industrystaff that goes beyond the more visiblerestaurant kitchen and waiting staff,some retail service providers, as well asseasonal and other types of difficultand low-wage work — work to whichfirst-worlders no longer aspire or areinterested in accepting. The latterplays itself out in Europe’s intensearguments about the asylum systemand in much of the developed world’sunease about the growth in familyimmigration.

C. Communities of coethnics

Mature and influential “anchor”ethnic communities in the country ofdestination can and do mobilize tobecome “enablers” of substantialmigration flows when faced with a

xxvi

sharp deterioration in the circumstancesof their coethnics/coreligionists inanother country. This enablingfunction often includes offering toassist with the initial integration of thenewcomers. Much of post-1970 Jewishemigration to the United States andelsewhere in the West fits well underthis model.

“Enablers,” however, do not stopthere. If the receiving society isunresponsive to their advocacy, theywill often provide the essential“lubricants” for the unauthorizedmigration of their brethren. Thesemay include the commitment of thenecessary capital for their travel andentry and the provision of anincubating social and economicenvironment within their owncommunity upon arrival. Examples ofsuch “network” migration behaviorabound throughout the advancedindustrial world, although the role ofthe Mexican and Mexican-Americancommunities in the United Statesmay be classified as archetypical.

D. Civil society

When key civil society institutions inthe prospective destination country,such as religious and human rightsorganizations, stand in strongphilosophical opposition to thecircumstances migrants are attemptingto escape — and are willing to usetheir political capital in support of amigration “solution” to the problem —they are often at least partiallysuccessful. The examples of the

resettlement of many Southeast Asians in the 1970s and 1980sthroughout much of the West or theadmission of those who manage toleave such places as Afghanistan, Iran,and much of the Middle East in thelast two decades are good examples ofsuch “success.” (Foreign policy elitesare ready civil society allies in many of these instances.)

Civil society institutions typicallypursue their pro-“protection” and,secondarily, pro-immigration work inalliance and through coalitions withethnic, ideology-driven, andeconomic interests. In doing so, theyand their allies quickly become keystakeholders in the effort to sustainand widen an opening to migration tothe point where it becomes apermanent feature of a society. Oncesuch coalitions mature, unilateralefforts by state bureaucracies tochange the migration status quo standlow probabilities of success —particularly when other importantsocietal actors, such as certainprogressive or self-interested6 tradeunions, also join in. The support ofmany labor unions in the US foroffering illegally resident immigrantslegal permanent status, and theircountenance of most forms ofimmigration, are examples of alliancesthat cross interests in ways that haveearned them the name “strangebedfellows.”


6 That is, unions that see in immigrants the prospect for expanding their membership rosters.

Introduction xxvii

Trends to Watch for in


At the dawn of the 21st century, andlooking ahead to the next twodecades, three types of situationsrequire separate mention because theyhave recently gained in both virulenceand migration-importance. � The first one is outright

ethno-racial and/or religiousconflict in which forcing atargeted group to abandon thecontested area is a major policyobjective (the many variants ofso-called ethnic cleansing).Examples from Rwanda, theCaucasus region, Sudan, and the former Yugoslavia make thispoint all too obvious.

� The second form involves thedeterioration of ecosystems tothe point where life becomesalmost unsustainable — withaccess to water and extensivedegradation in water quality, thecontamination of basic foodstuffs,and the consequences ofdesertification being primeconcerns in this regard. The longconflict in Sudan may be aclassic example of this migrationcause, while the Middle East maybecome even more of a cauldronof instability because of it.

� The third type of situationconcerns flight from various formsof natural and man-made disasters.(This situation is often related tothe one immediately above inthat climactic change and thedeterioration of the ecosystem

can affect both the frequency andcatastrophic potential of naturaldisasters.) A series of recentdisasters in Central America havebrought that topic “home” to USpolicymakers, while concernsabout nuclear power plant safetyin the western parts of the formerSoviet Union is (or should be) ofintense interest to Europe.

These three types of situations are notthe only forces that analysts andpolicymakers must mind on anongoing basis. A number of additionaltrends also affect the size, direction,and type of international migration, ifat smaller scales. Among them onefinds the following.

The first, and perhaps most troubling,trend is the refusal to adjust immigrationpolicies to better reflect market realities.By so doing, governments surrenderever-larger proportions of theirimmigration decisions to smugglingsyndicates and their human cargo.

The second major trend has twodimensions and focuses on theemerging “competition” forimmigrants of many different typesand skill levels. Competition forskilled immigrants is by now a well-established fact and includesstudents, engineers, persons withoften advanced technical andcommunications skills, as well asmedical professionals of all types.Such competition stems in large partfrom the widespread recognition thatindividual initiative, education, and

xxviii

talent are now among the mostvaluable resources a society (and aneconomy) can “possess.” Guaranteeingthose who have these attributes nearlyunimpeded immigration access hasbecome a priority across much of thedeveloped world — hence creating thepalpable sense of competition oneobserves among the would-be hosts fortalented and well-qualified foreigners.7

Less appreciated (and more politicallycontroversial) is a trend that is onlyslowly coming to the surface and stillstruggles with political acceptance.This trend focuses on the entry ofimmigrants who are willing to play bythe rules and work hard in jobs thatmany of the citizens of the developedworld find increasingly unappealing.This is the one form of migration thatis expected to grow most robustly inthe next two decades; it is also likelyto be the most contested.

The third trend presents the worldcommunity with a governance andethical challenge of the first order: the growth in “false promises” and“indentured servitude” migration.These two often-related phenomena go far beyond the sex trade that hasbecome such a “fashionable” topic ofconversation in some advancedindustrial countries to incorporate thelarge segments of total immigrationthat are now systematically “trafficked”by increasingly sophisticated (and well-financed) smugglers and profiteers.

This chapter will return to these threethemes repeatedly as they are critical

pieces in the analytical jigsaw puzzlethat the (more) successful managementof international migration requires.

Why Governments

(and Societies) Find


So Difficult to Tackle

Effectively

Four sets of mutually reinforcing factorsseem to be at the root of the difficultygovernments and, more generally,societies, have in dealing well withlarge-scale immigration’s effects. The first is found in immigration’srelationship to relatively sudden anddeep social and cultural change. Thesecond has to do with the fact thatimmigration requires the making oftough policy (and politically painful)trade-offs. The third stems from theissue’s deeply uneven distributionaleffects. The fourth and final set offactors can be found in immigration’sdeepening relationship with economicinterdependence and globalization. Allfour sets of factors require governmentsto engage in delicate balancing acts inwhich the cost of failure is oftenmeasured both in severe social (and attimes even economic) consequencesbut also in political ruin.

A. Managing change

Living organisms evolve at leisurely,almost glacial, rates. Societies, whichare first and foremost living organisms,are no exception. Large-scale


7 D. Papademetriou and S. Yale-Loehr, Balancing Interests: Rethinking the U.S. Selection of SkilledImmigrants(Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1996).

Introduction xxix

immigration accelerates that pace and deepens its effect while itsethnic/racial/cultural “visibility” makesit more difficult to ignore — makingchange, rather than constancy, the rule.While social and cultural change areoften identified as undergirding much ofthe public’s concern with immigration,one form of change may beunderestimated in analyses about thereaction to immigration. Large-scaleimmigration compels societies tocontinually re-negotiate the formulasaccording to which their social,economic, and political power areallocated — formulas over which mostsocieties have often invested enormousenergy, passion, and even blood.

Put differently, most modern societiesare built around the notion of nearimmutability. Nation-building symbolsand myths typically reinforce thatsense by emphasizing commonness andoften invent “facts” that support it —and reinterpret and otherwise dismissnonconforming facts. Deep andprofound change, by challenging thevery foundations of that commonness,carries within it the seeds of instability.

Certain “facts on the ground” aboutinternational migration furtherreinforce many otherwiseunderstandable popular and governanceconcerns about it. Migration to theadvanced industrial North has grownsince the mid-1990s at a measurablyhigher rate than before and has spreadthroughout the advanced industrialworld. At the same time, its national,ethnic, racial, and cultural composition

has also widened enormously, while themanner in which it has grown (often inways that are unexpected and seem todefy attempts at regulation) fuelsdiscomfort and anxiety — andcontributes further to the issue’sprominence as a governance “problem”of the first order.

The manner through which a pluralityof immigrants reach their destinationshas given rise to a new industry —that of the organized smuggling ofpeople. Two challenges appear to beparticularly daunting about thisdevelopment. The first is that thesesyndicates use constantly shiftingorganizational frameworks to protectthemselves from being penetrated anddissolved by the authorities. Thesecond is much more consequential.Illegal immigration controls havespawned lucrative black markets for alltypes of products and services that candefeat regulation, in part by corruptingofficials along the entire route to adestination. This challenge points tothe need for smarter enforcement. Italso identifies a basic weakness inregulatory practices that stubbornlydeny labor market realities and thepower of human nature and seek toalter behavior by focusing almostexclusively on policing responses.

This is a theme to which this chapterwill return again in the pages ahead.

B. Negotiating difficult trade-offs

If sudden and deep change is toughto manage, an additional set offorces makes managing immigration

xxx

even more difficult by forcinggovernments to make choices thatrequire tough policy trade-offs. Manytrade-offs have political consequencesthat can be best described as classic“Hobson’s choices.” Two examples ofsuch trade-offs — one from aneconomic/labor market and socialpolicy perspective, the secondthrough a broader internationalcooperation lens — offer a sense ofthat complexity.

1. Trade liberalization, training and education adjustments, and social protections Openness to migration can juxtapose a“just-in-time” philosophy of economiccompetitiveness, which seeks forevergreater access to the global labor pool,with a social democracy’s morefundamental interests in training itsown workers and maintaining generoussocial and labor protections. In such abinary framework, the economicinterests that support immigration areseemingly put on a collision course withthe interests of the broader society.Obviously, as posited, a large part ofthis tension is intentionally artificial,even simplistic. Yet, it is important tomake the larger point as clear aspossible. Policymakers are asked tomake virtually instant calculationsabout complex cost-benefit ratios acrossa maddening array of policy domainswith grossly inadequate informationand crude policy tools.

An example from international trademight make this point clearer. Tradeliberalization is a policy priority thathas been pursued relentlessly by the

advanced industrial states. The globalcompetitive forces that trade openingsunleash can make waiting for a society’seducation and training regimes toadjust to changing demands ineducation and skill-sets akin toeconomic suicide. Waiting for theattitudes of one’s workers about workand associated social protections toadapt to the realities of internationalcompetition is an even larger challengeand will likely take even longer. In fact,even under the best of circumstances,such adjustments require atypicalamounts of astuteness, good judgment,and political courage — attributes thatalways seem to be in short supply.

As noted earlier, the reasons go beyondthe fact that products produced moreefficiently and cheaply elsewhere arenow imported with few or no duties,quotas, or licenses, thus forcinguncompetitive industries and socialpolicies that are out of line with aneconomy’s ability to afford them, into acorner. Two additional factors are that(a) the developed North has alsopursued vigorously (and very effectively)the liberalization of capital markets andthe stabilization of foreign investmentenvironments, and (b) many middle-income and even less-developedcountries have increasingly well-prepared, competent (and pliant)workforces. Hence, unless access toimmigrant workers is also liberalized,and social policy regimes become morealigned with the economic facts on theground (especially productivity), someof a country’s most competitive firmsmay well decide to “outsource” some oftheir activities and expand their


Introduction xxxi

operations mostly abroad, or evenrelocate entirely. This is not a theoreti-cal proposition as the (re)emergingdebates about these reemerging issues inthe United States, Germany, andelsewhere make clear. This is indeedone of the largest policy dilemmas tradeliberalization and global interdepend-ence pose for advanced social democra-cies and demonstrates the need foruncharacteristic wisdom in making theright trade-offs across policy domains.

2. International cooperation incontrolling irregular migrationA second example of difficult trade-offs comes from the area ofinternational cooperation. Theexample focuses on the challenge ofengaging key sending countries insharing in the management ofinternational migration deeply enoughto, in effect, assume co-responsibility forachieving mutually agreed-upon policyoutcomes. Accomplishing such a“joint management” objective willrequire both parties to make toughchoices during negotiations.

In order for advanced industrialdemocracies to engage key immigrant-sending and transit states in seriousnegotiations about a common frontagainst organized forms of illegalmigration, the former must place onthe table items of high value to thelatter in exchange for their “organic”cooperation. Among the itemsreceiving countries must put on offerare liberalizing trade in such lowvalued-added areas as agriculture,textiles, and garments (sectors highlyprotected by all rich countries),

as well as some physical and socialinfrastructure assistance. One moreelement, however, is also essential: far greater access to the advancedworld’s labor markets. While thepolicy objective sought in this tradeoff is an important one, the cost ofsuch a “deal” is measured not only injobs and at least some economic painfor some of the advanced economies’societal segments, but also in adversepopular reaction and electoralretribution. The pain will in fact be felt twice: first, when affecteddomestic constituencies organize inopposition to such a bargain, andsecond, when they retaliate againstthe government at the polls.

3. Migration’s distributional effects The third part of the issue’scomplexity can be traced to itsdistributional effects. Migration’seconomic and social effects aredistributed unevenly across otherwisediscrete policy domains (such asvarious components of humanresources policies, trade policies, taxpolicies, etc.) and among a society’sconstituent segments (such asinvestors, producers, consumers,workers, etc.) These effects, as well asthose of a government’s responses tomigration, unless managed well,create distinct categories of “winners”and “losers” and sow the seeds fornegative political reactions tomigration. Failure to address thesereactions quickly and decisively can and does lead to politicalcontentiousness about immigrationone is observing in many parts of theadvanced industrial world.

xxxii

4. Migration and economicinterdependenceThe near-free movement of capital,production, and markets has meantthat well-capitalized and highlycompetitive global firms have beenable to exploit global opportunitieswith greater ease and fewer risks. This minimization of obstacles and risk has been enshrined in trade andinvestment liberalization regimespursued through the World TradeOrganization’s ongoing negotiations, as well as in bilateral and regional trade and investment accords. In verylimited instances, some regional“integration” negotiations are alsomoving forward, if slowly (e.g., theSouthern African DevelopmentCommunity — SADC). Theseinstruments clearly advance theobjectives of the business sectors that promote them, and, as a result,most producers and consumers benefit from them.

At the same time, and as noted brieflyearlier in this chapter, such agreementsalso blur the lines between opportunitiesand risks for some segments of thesocieties that are parties to them.Opening foreign markets, for instance,creates clear opportunities for Westernbusinesses to exploit their advantagesin endeavors that “contain” highervalue-added and greater technologicalcontent. Hence, both those directlyemployed in these businesses andthose employed up and down theeconomic stream in those and relatedsectors also benefit through the so-called ripple effects.

The opening of foreign markets,however, requires roughlycommensurate concessions byadvanced industrial societies — a reality that is naturally nothighlighted until an agreement isreached and the text becomes public.(Few public processes are lesstransparent than trade negotiations.)The opening up of protected sectorsin advanced industrial countriestypically has substantial adverseconsequences for businesses in these sectors and their associatedworkforces — just as the opening ofthe less advanced countries’ marketsdoes for them. Thus, for nearly everyopportunity that trade accords create, some social and economicsectors “win” while others are askedto absorb a significant amount of riskand pain.

The adverse effects of increasingeconomic interdependence andglobalization-dictated restructuringimpact most directly noncompetitiveindustries and the holders ofuncompetitive skill sets — whereverthese are found. More important for this analysis, however, may be the social consequences of thisrestructuring. These consequences areat the root of the popular uncertaintyand fear that globalization forces havecreated. Refocusing on the advancedindustrial societies once more, these same social consequences arealso the root causes of much of thereaction to immigration.


Introduction xxxiii

Managing a Global Social

and Economic Process

Economic and other forms ofinterdependence noted earlier placecountries and entire geographic regionsin the grasp of an increasingly globalmigration system in which economicand sociopolitical events have directmigration consequences. Recall, forexample, US fears in the mid-1990sthat the failure to “rescue” the Mexicanpeso would greatly increase immigrationpressures from that country, orEuropeans’ concerns that the latest EUenlargement would have substantialmigration consequences for the EU 15.8

At the root of the immigrationmanagement quandary, whichvirtually all advanced industrialsocieties now find themselves in,lies the myriad of economic, political,social, and other calculations andactions (or, more notably, inactions)these societies have made on this issueover the years. These decisions and“non-decisions” have invited or subtlyencouraged various types of migrantsto enter the international migrationstream. This process, in turn, hasgiven rise to a governance challengeof the first order — a challenge thatsince September 11, 2001, hasacquired a very distinctive public-security component. The issue hasthus become how to (a) regain the

public’s confidence that governmentcan and will manage immigrationcompetently (and protect thehomeland), (b) address the array of public grievances relating toimmigration and its consequences,and, in doing so, (c) defuse growingxenophobia and reduce thestigmatization of various ethnic,religious, and immigrant communities.

These concerns make clear the depthof the migration managementchallenge and point to one of thischapter’s major lines of argument: thatinternational migration has reached amanagement “tipping point” wheresingle-country solutions are no longercapable of addressing it effectively and tomutual advantage.9 Managingimmigration more effectively in theyears ahead, whether unilaterally,bilaterally, regionally, or multilaterally(even globally), thus requires thatpolicymakers understand much betterthe following issues: � The differences between factors

that cause or at least substantiallyaffect migration and those thatmerely mediate it — and the policylevers policymakers can pull andthe sequence in which to pull themto bring about a desired outcome.

� The reasons some people react to certain events by emigratingwhile so many others facingsimilar or worse circumstances

8 The EU 15 countries made different interim provisions about such migration. They placed no restrictions on themovement of Cypriots and Maltese. Some of the EU 15 offered liberal entry and work privileges to the nationals ofthe new Member States, but a subset restricted access to the social benefits for such immigrants. The rest havecontinued to restrict movement for part or all of the seven-year transition period the accession treaty provides.

9 This line of reasoning, however, does not absolve countries involved in the migration process from making their owntough but smart governance and management choices.

xxxiv

stay put — and how governmentscan intervene in each instance tosteer the outcomes towards thepreferred direction.

� The role of organized people-smuggling syndicates in thegrowth of unwanted migration(they are now a critical factor)and the need to reallocateresources and shift detection andenforcement paradigms in order totackle them systematically andaggressively.

� The relationship (“fundamentaldifference” may be a moreappropriate construction) betweenimmigration decisions andopportunities for terrorists — andparticularly the role that a country’sforeign political and economicdecisions, and its ability tointegrate its immigrants effectively,play in the growth of this era’sclash with nihilistic violence.

� The limits of unilateralism (or ofde facto unilateralism10) inresponding to unwanted migration.

The reality is clear: Migration tiessending, transit, and receivingcountries — as well as immigrants,their families, and their employers —into often reinforcing intricate systemsof complex interdependence. It takesthe cooperation of virtually all theseactors — plus smart policy decisions,thoughtful regulation, and sustainedenforcement — to make real progress

in limiting the effects of migration’schallenges enough so as to draw outeven more of its benefits.

Failure to understand the types ofissues outlined above much better andto work with key societal actors indrawing out migration’s benefits willplace governments further behind inthe migration management effort.This is especially the case whentaking into account the ongoingadaptations unwanted migrants maketo their entry and labor-marketassimilation strategies. Making thingsworse are the public’s impatience withexperimentation and its intolerancefor anything but almost-immediateresults. The obsession withcontrolling international migrationthrough unilateral law-and-ordermeasures and the distorting effect ofthis approach on the public debatesimply complicates matters further.All these factors allow governmentsprecious little leeway to demonstratethe following key points: � First, that immigration is not at

the root of the North’s majorproblems (although it exposesthose problems and subjects thento public scrutiny).

� Second, that problems to whichmigration contributes can in factbe managed.

� Third, that immigration, properlymanaged, can provide importantanswers to some of the North’s


10 The term “de facto unilateralism” refers to individual or groupings of advanced industrial societies “negotiating” withsending or transit countries with very little to offer them beyond lectures and stern warnings, technical assistancedesigned to advance the destination countries’ purposes of immigration control and trade “concessions” that aretypically both less meaningful than they may appear and have a double-edged sword character in their requirements.

Introduction xxxv

most intractable longer-termeconomic, social protection, and demographic dilemmas.

Migration Management

Fundamentals

Single-purpose policies, just as single-cause explanations, are poor guides indeveloping successful responses tointricate and politically sensitiveissues. Decisions that relate toimmigration cut across policy domainsand administrative responsibilities andthus require extraordinary amountsand forms of coordination in bothplanning and execution. (A partial listmust include border management,public order, social welfare, educationand training, and foreign, trade, and development policies.) Yet,government competencies are almostalways single-issue focused, andbureaucracies are typically organizedvertically in order to deliver thenecessary function.

This need not be always the case. For instance, the creation of DHS had the opportunity to begin to chipaway at this public-sector agencymanagement paradigm. So far, it isfailing badly. (The July 2005 attacks onLondon led some to call for a similarconsolidation of key functions under asingle new agency.) Furthermore, thesubsequent reorganizations of bothCanadian, and, to a lesser degree,Mexican federal agencies to “match”some DHS functions may create anopening for thinking and acting“horizontally” on the increasing number

of issues that cut across issue portfolios(the jargon one hears more regularlynow is about “policy coherence” and“mainstreaming”). In another example,the EU Commission seems to belearning how to cooperate more across“competencies” although it seems to bedoing so slowly and painfully. If some ofthese experiments succeed, managingimmigration’s benefits and consequencescould become an archetype of howpolicy decisions can be made jointlywith and implemented across severalline agencies.

Another matter also detracts from theopportunity to manage migrationissues more effectively: the extremetendency to compound and conflate.In fact, the tendency to conflate bothconcepts about and responses tomigration has become endemic.Conflation denies public servants andpoliticians alike space for identifyingwhat works well (and should beencouraged) from what may bebroken about migration — and thusplays into the hands of those intenton “tarring and feathering” the entiresystem. For instance, to use justelementary examples, not allimmigration is boon (or bane), not alltemporary worker programs are bad(or good), not all immigrants are aburden to social welfare systems(although many are), not allimmigrants refuse to commit tointegrating into the communities inwhich they live (although many do),and not all asylum claims are bogus(but far too many are). In the publicdiscourse about these and similarissues, opponents behave as if

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everything about immigration isnegative while proponents in turnargue that all is well. The overallpoint remains simple but compelling:conflation ultimately deniesgovernments the space they need to identify, experiment with,and promote responsible management practices.

A. Four Elements of Better

Migration Management

The approach to better managing allmigration — and not just its illegalvariant — has four organicallyinterdependent parts that must bepursued in concert if the managementobjective is to succeed.

First, legal immigration channels ofvarious forms must be widened anddeepened. Greater legal access byimmigrants does not translate, ipsofacto, into the silver-bullet solution tomigration’s challenges that someimmigration advocates may argue.Without it, however, governments willalways find themselves in untenablepositions both in regard to their controlefforts and public perceptions abouttheir overall governance skills.Perversely, such criticism will likelycome both from those who feel they arenot doing enough to produce resultsand those who argue that they aredoing too much of the wrong things.

Second, internal controls must besystematically and regularly reviewedwith an eye to reducing opportunitiesfor unauthorized immigrants to gainfootholds in the destination country.There are at least two tracks to

internal controls. One must focus onthe labor market while the other mustbe mindful of the increasinglycomplicated array of law-and-orderissues, particularly terrorism. In thefirst track, regulators will find theirtask easier if they work with themarket and civil society. The secondtrack demands a reorientation of lawenforcement priorities, thedevelopment of additional lawenforcement methodologies, andgreater resources. Both tracks alsorequire something else that fewanalyses emphasize and hardly anygovernment has tried consistently:sparing no effort to convert keysocietal stakeholders into partners inwhat should be conceived of andcarried out as “national projects.”Such partnerships will requireexquisite listening skills and thewillingness of both parties to makecompromises — attributes that neitherside has demonstrated that it has inadequate supply.

Third, the state’s border control stancemust be reviewed frequently with aneye to continuing to make onlyinvestments that both make sense andbear fruit. Agreements between majorcountries of origin and destinationthat focus on sharing responsibility forthe management of migration flowsshould be pursued simultaneously withrobust border policing. Suchagreements must be truly bilateral andbalanced in terms of what each partygives and receives. A good rule ofthumb upon entering suchnegotiations is that the benefits toeach party must be substantial enough


Introduction xxxvii

to alter behavior while the costs donot undermine either party’sfundamental legitimacy to the pointwhere delivering policy outcomes inaccordance with agreed-upon termsbecomes impossible.

Fourth, the task of solving theimmigration and intergroup relationspuzzle must be engaged withuncharacteristic imagination andvigor. Nothing a country does onimmigration will be moreconsequential in the long term thancreating level playing fields for theeconomic, social, and politicalincorporation of immigrants — newand old. The new security imperativeamplifies that point a hundredfold.But the effort should go much further.As relationships between hostsocieties and immigrants evolve, an emphasis on mutuality and oncreating common space anddeveloping an inclusive communityidentity can help a society moveforward. Collaborative integrationefforts that engage government, theprivate sector, civil society, and thephilanthropic community can leveragescarce resources and establish agendasthat recognize immigrants not only aslong-term contributors to thecommunity but also as futureconstituents. Ultimately, integrationefforts succeed best when theyreconcile the immigrants’ needs andinterests with those of the broadercommunity in a dynamic process thatweaves a new social fabric.

Marginalization and stigmatization ofimmigrants and their ethno-culturalcommunities, whether willful,inadvertent, or the consequence ofinattentiveness, will likely fuelvarious forms of anomie and prove to be the source of hard-to-repairdamage to long-term social cohesion.Nor is there a shortage of division-promoting issues. The domestic phaseof the United States’, and, increasingly,the Western world’s emerging “war onterrorism” is likely to become thelatest and arguably most potentinstrument through which suchstigmatization is occurring. Unless itis handled wisely, this “war,” whileperhaps making us safer in some ways,can also set the cause of immigrantintegration and social cohesion backfor a generation or longer — and thusundermine domestic security in thelonger run.

B. Thinking Beyond the Advanced

Industrial Countries’ Perspective

These four observations are obviouslymade from the rather narrow perspectiveof developed countries. The overallobjective must remain, however, toenhance migration’s role as a criticalresource for greater human progress.This is a goal that is made easierthrough migrant remittances of variousforms, the gaining and dissemination of new ideas, and the transfer ofeconomic and noneconomic skills.11

The dilemma is sharper than usual atthis point in time because interest in

11 The role and value of “social” and “political” remittances are often underestimated as they occur in the longshadow of the far more commonly referenced financial remittances.

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and reliance on migration by the lessdeveloped world is intensifying. Thisintensification, however, is takingplace simultaneously with the struggleof many industrial societies to find abalance among reflexive restriction,enlightened self-interest, and anadmittedly weak but nonethelessexisting sense of solidarity with theless developed countries from whichmost immigrants come. Nowhere arethese dilemmas playing themselves outmore powerfully than in the EU/EEA.

Not all immigrants are following “south-to-north” trajectories. Verysubstantial intradeveloped worldmigration also occurs but there isvirtually no discussion about it. This isonly in some part because themovement is treaty-based or otherwisereciprocal. The largest part of therelative equanimity wealthy nationsshow towards such migration is that, byand large, such migration is socially,culturally, and ethno-racially acceptable.

Finally, there are also significantnorth-to-south movements, primarilyof business persons, aid anddevelopment experts, and,increasingly, retirees. Thesemovements also occur beyond theradar screens of most analysts andcertainly those of the “worried” classesthat often turn issues into problems.

These realities point not only to thecomplications associated withsenseless restriction but also to thepossibility that such restriction, ifcarried to the extreme, can affectpersons and processes whose

movement is mostly beneficial andmay in fact be desirable. A decidedturn to mindless restriction will thusthreaten international migration’shistoric role as an instrument forindividual freedom and personalgrowth, as a force for the developmentof source countries, and as a strategicfactor in the continuing growth ofdestination countries.

C. The Elements of Better

Management Practices

Considering this wider analytical lens,what might the advanced industrialworld be doing differently onmigration that is more “development-friendly” and captures and maximizesits many benefits? Mindful that policyprescriptions are always easier to offerthe further one sits from the “real”world of policy and, even more so,politics, the following ideas are offeredwith the necessary amount of care.The discussion is organized along twobroad categories: (1) setting the stage,and (2) basic management rules. Theoverall management objective soundssimple but is extremely difficult whenmanaging complex social processes: toregulate international migration inways that avoid the vicious circle offailed unilateral and single-purposecontrols and move state actors towardscooperative policies that promote thevirtuous cycles of disciplinedpragmatism and good governance.

1. Setting the stagea. Recapturing control of the portrayal of the migration process Two mutually reinforcing trends posethe most imminent and clearest threat


Introduction xxxix

to continuing to draw benefits from theglobal migration system: demagogueryand illegality. Demagogues, irrespectiveof party affiliation and regardless of whether they are in or out ofgovernment, ride the issue for politicaladvantage with abandon. As a result,they often define the parameters of thepublic debate. In the typical scenario,governments do not address whyimmigration is important, what isvaluable about it, and how to maximizeits gains and minimize its costs until a crisis erupts. By that time, however,they are on the defensive and theiractions typically reinforce the case ofthe demagogues. The result is thatpublic perceptions about migrationbecome further distorted, and thediscourse moves even further awayfrom responsible ideas.

The second obstacle is illegality,particularly the perception that mostmigration is unauthorized. The apparentubiquity and brazenness of theinternational trafficking syndicates andthe publicity of their “exploits” reinforcethat impression and undermine theprospects for deliberate action. Inaddition to frequently mistreating themigrants they traffic, these syndicatesalso harm the social order and rule-of-law interests of the societies in whichtheir “cargos” end up. Recapturing theprocess from both demagogues andsyndicates — in the first instance,symbolically, in the second one, literally— is a good governance imperative ofthe highest order.

b. Practicing far greater transparency Migration is full of myths, missing and

unreliable data, biased analyses, and(almost purposefully) obtuseadministrative terms of art. Forinstance, what is a “working holidaymaker” when a visa can last for a yearor more, and what is “temporary” aboutmultiyear foreign-worker visas thatallow their holder to readily adjuststatus to a permanent one? Furthermore,migration suffers from too much passionon both sides of the issue. Practicing fargreater truth-in-immigration might thusbe supported as a policy objective thatcan stand comfortably on its own merits.

Two areas shout the loudest for greater transparency and politicalintrospection, as well as for morethoughtful discussion: (1) exploringfurther the reasons for the increasingdemand for the work that immigrantsdo in industrial countries, at all skilllevels and across all economic sectors;and (2) the relationship betweenmigration and social democracy/thewelfare state (see the chapter byBrochmann and Dolvic in thisvolume). The policy complexity ofboth issues (and the intensity of theassociated politics) requires treatisesfor each. This chapter will simply raisesome of the issues.

With regard to the first issue, theUnited States and all advancedindustrial societies have to think harderabout whether and how shortcomingsin systemic education and trainingfailures are linked to greaterimmigration. Additional effort shouldbe invested in exploring systematicallythe relationship of immigration to thepersistent unwillingness of first-world

xl

workers to move to where the jobs are and their shunning of what theJapanese call “3-D” jobs — demanding,dirty, and dangerous. And as if thoseissues are not incendiary enough in a political sense, a real discoursemust also delve deeply and honestlyinto the relationship amongimmigration (legal and unauthorized),unemployment rates, and theavailability of relatively generousunemployment and welfare benefits.

In addition, and related to this last setof issues, the question must also beasked whether it is still feasible to pay“high” wages for low-skilled, low-value-added jobs in the face ofinternational competition that dictatesthat wage and nonwage costs fortradable goods and services betterreflect a worker’s productivity. Finally,and putting it even more directly, thequestion is whether 3-D jobs cancontinue to be rewarded at the levelthey used to be when protectionismensured domestic products were able tocount on several forms of subsidies andincentives relative to foreign products.The latter could either be keptvirtually out of a country outrightthrough quotas or otherwise be mademuch more expensive through aByzantine system of high duties andtaxes, restrictive licensing, and otherforms of “regulation.”

The second issue may be even morepolitically explosive and thus requireseven greater care and honesty. On the

one hand, post-World War II baby boomers now have a set ofexpectations from social democracythat makes even modest changes inlabor market and social protectionpolicies extremely contentious.Former German Chancellor GerhardSchroeder’s experience in making anumber of rather modest labor marketand social protection reforms late in2003 attests to that difficulty, as canthe experiences of a succession ofFrench political leaders.12 On theother hand, advanced industrialcountries’ failure to adjust theireducation and training systems tocompete globally prior to, or at leastsimultaneously with, their deep andsharp opening to trade liberalization,has contributed to high levels ofstructural unemployment in manysectors. The reason is simple. Withglobalization forces galloping on,those without the requisite bundles of skills, those who are unwilling toadapt to the rules of globalcompetition, and those with readyaccess to more or less substantialgovernment incentives not to do so(in the form of social protections),find themselves among globalization’s“losers.” Decisions by many of theadvanced world’s firms to moveinvestments and, increasingly, jobsabroad — for many of the same kindsof reasons and under a similarimperative to compete successfullyand draw out additional profits —contribute to the unemploymentconundrum further.


12 Although the examples are European to emphasize the political difficulties of changing deeply rooted practices,they are no less valid for the United States or Canada.

Introduction xli

These and associated issues seem tohave some policymakers and mostpoliticians stymied and evenintimidated, while they present others with the ancient Greektheater’s deux ex machina opportunityfor opposing immigration. A possibleroadmap out of this quagmire mightstart not by denying or dismissing thepresent (admittedly complicated)relationship between immigration andsocial democracy, but by thinkingharder and investing more of all formsof capital in turning immigration intoan ally of and contributor both tocompetitiveness and socialdemocracy.13 Some experiments inthat regard have been suggested in thesection on “controls plus” below.

In sum, all governments use facts andtruth much more sparingly than theyshould on politically sensitive issues.On immigration matters, however,willful distortions and outright liesplay directly into the hands ofimmigration’s detractors and interferewith the more successful managementof the issue.

c. The imperative of public education A sustained public education effort isessential to making real progresstowards recapturing the initiative onmigration. Specifically, governmentswill likely find their public educationtask both easier and more amenable ifthey move gradually but firmly awayfrom the rhetoric of just keepingimmigrants out and towards a stance

that points to the benefits of pursuingimmigration policies that address keypolicy priorities directly. It is then farmore productive, and in some wayseasier, to encourage all relevant societalactors to participate in a public debatethat deals with the facts and to conductsuch a debate from a stronger position.In doing so, the debate and subsequentenforcement actions stand a chance tomove from the enforcing of typicallyarbitrary rules to sharing responsibilityfor implementing mutually agreed upon bargains across a variety of policydomains.

A simple rule of thumb may be themost basic point here. If the politicalleadership cannot or is not willing toarticulate clearly to its electors whythe country is or should be in theimmigration “game” in the first place,that country should not be in it.Everything else is a potentiallyexplosive mix of high-handedness andpolitical cowardice. It is not uncommonfor leaders to be punished in the pollswhen they are perceived to engage insuch behavior — whether onimmigration or other divisive butunavoidable issues. Electorates inseveral European countries in recent years, as well as in Canada in the early 1990s, have handedsitting governments stinging defeats in significant part because of such perceptions.

An alternative model exists when itcomes to immigration. The Canadian

13 D. Papademetriou and K. O’Neil, “Reflections on Immigration and the Welfare State” (Washington, DC:Migration Policy Institute, 2004).

xlii

government “speaks” with Canadiansabout its immigration policiesregularly and has found this avoids the“feast-or-famine” cycles with publicopinion on immigration that the USexperiences, the deep skepticism andreaction to immigration with whichvirtually all European governmentshave to contend.

2. Basic management rulesa. The importance of clear rulesClear rules are an essential part of any sound management system. In fact, the greater the complexity of the management challenge, thegreater the need for clear andconsistent rules.

Consistent rules, however, are notenough. Complex managementsystems also require that rules beapplied steadily and reliably across theboard. Put differently, a managementsystem that is rules-based should alsodeliver consistent — and hencepredictable — outcomes. It ispredictability in outcomes, in turn,that is the essential precondition tobuilding public confidence on complexand often divisive policy issues.

Predictability in outcomes is veryelusive in all countries that engage theimmigration system — although somestates seem to do better in that regardthan others. Differential outcomes are most pronounced, and perhapsmost troubling from a governanceperspective, in two areas: enforcementand naturalization. And both of theseseem to be more troublesome infederal, rather than unitary, states.

b. Building and maintaining management capacity Building robust management systemsand funding them properly areessential preconditions to a soundimmigration regime. Instead, “frail”management systems and insufficientresources for the immigration functionhave become endemic across mostadvanced industrial countries. But therequirements do not stop there.Implementation methodologies andstrategies must be reviewed regularlyand adjusted frequently so that theyare always aligned with policyobjectives, and the delivery of thefunction must be evaluated constantly.The reason is compelling: it is inimplementation that even the mostwell thought-out systems stumble.

Building and maintaining effectivecapacity in the management ofmigration should thus become andremain a policy priority of the firstorder for all immigrant destinationcountries. Yet, among countries thatengage in migration in substantialways, only Australia, New Zealand,and Canada come somewhat close to the management robustness called for here.

c. Working with the market and civil societyFinally, if most who engage themigration system are to get greatervalue out of their “investments” inmigration, two of the most powerfuland determined critics of migrationpolicy and systems — the market andmost of organized civil society — mustbe converted into partners if the effort


Introduction xliii

to create and take advantage of win-win situations is to stand a chance tosucceed. Working against, rather thanwith, the market is often an exercise infutility; working without the benefit ofclose cooperation with civil society —a system’s main stakeholders — makesthe task of governance on complexissues tougher than necessary. There isanother, extremely important, benefitto working with one’s critics ondifficult issues that is often discountedor even ignored: the two sides canshare responsibility for what succeedsrather than always blaming each otherfor the many things that willinevitably fail.

The “Wars” Against Illegal

Immigration and Terrorism

Even if governments are diligent in observing the managementfundamentals outlined above, perfectioncannot become the policy goal whendealing with the complex social andeconomic issues associated witheconomic immigration. The standardsperfection demands are too high, andany policy designed to meet them willultimately be judged a failure.

In no policy field has the rhetoricalpursuit of perfection led to moregovernance (and political) dead ends,than in “defeating” illegal immigrationexclusively through law-and-orderresponses. This premise remains valid

even if such responses are coordinatedto include much tougher bordercontrols, ever greater labor marketregulation, the enhanced intrusivenessassociated with high-energy interiorpolicing, and persistent efforts toreduce the demand for asylum bymaking it more difficult both tolaunch applications and succeed in theadjudication process. The facts in theUnited States and throughout much ofEurope speak for themselves.

Four reasons make the point obvious. � First, the enforcement of

exclusion, that is, law-and-ordermeasures without concomitantrules that also admit people alonga variety of criteria14 and engagethem in common projectstowards building up thecommunities in which they live,cannot be effective — that is,not unless (some analysts will say“even if”) a society is willing tomilitarize its response toimmigration and invest alwayslarger resources in it. The UnitedStates has been moving in thesedirections, initially in its bordercontrol efforts. Yet, net illegalimmigration has been rising byan average of more than 500,000persons per year15 for nearly adecade now despite massive totalexpenditures on controlmeasures. The effort’s perverseeffects do not stop there. Severalhundred would-be immigrants die

14 The criteria will include employment needs, humanitarian responsibilities, and legal obligations.15 J. Passell, Unauthorized Migrants: Numbers and Characteristics (Washington, DC: Pew Hispanic Center, 2005),

http://www.pewhispanic.org/files/reports/46.pdf.

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each year as they attempt to crossinto the United States illegallyfrom Mexico. Furthermore, manyMexicans who used to follow amigration rhythm of back-and-forth movement (what manyanalysts call “circularity”), nowfind themselves locked in oncethey make the much higherinvestments (in smuggler feesand personal risk) necessary todefeat US border controls.

� Second, immigration systemscreate their own self-feedingdynamics that encourage evenmore migration. These dynamicsinclude both “push” and “pull”forces (see also immediatelybelow.) Flexibility, then, andsmart and clear rules that a statecan enforce firmly, are betterpolicy goals than mere denial.

� Third, unless a state buries itselfin isolation, a proposition that isabsurd on its face, alltransnational contacts (economic,political, social, and cultural)have at least some migrationconsequences. Globalization,however one defines it, is thusalso a major migration lubricant.If a state believes it can drawimportant benefits from theopenness globalizationinstitutionalizes and regulates,working with it also on migrationis smarter than working against it.

� Fourth, people fleeingcircumstances they considerintolerable will enter the illegalmigration stream and test variousreceiving states’ defenses againand again. They will do so

regardless of whether they mustrisk their own lives, payexorbitant fees, or subvert theasylum system or any otheravailable means of entry. Thenthey will insert themselves deeplyinto the underground economy.

This is not to propose “going soft” onillegal immigration. In addition toundermining a society’s legal order,illegal immigration can also hidepersons who wish the targeted societyill and confound or pervert a variety ofthat society’s domestic and foreignpolicy priorities. Terrorist issuestemporarily aside, one of the mostsignificant consequences of illegalimmigration may in fact stem from thereality that the traffickers’ “cargo” —most illegal immigration is increasinglywell organized — consists of desperatepeople. Such people are willing towork long hours under virtually anyconditions to pay passage fees thatrange from the low thousands ofdollars for crossing a single border tomany tens of thousands of dollars for“full-service” contracts that includedelivery to specific destinations.

Smuggling networks increasingly getonly part of their fees up front — afunction of the reality that fewprospective immigrants (and theirhouseholds) can amass the fundsneeded to prepay for passage orotherwise pay in full upon successfulcompletion of the journey. As aresult, increasing numbers ofunauthorized immigrants mortgagetheir very lives and futures to theirsmugglers — turning themselves into


Introduction xlv

peons at the mercy of unscrupuloussyndicates and their clients. This class of modern-day indenturedservants weakens the receivingsociety’s system of wage and workingconditions, its social contributions’schemes, its legal and social order,the well-being of communities inwhich such immigrants settle, and,conceivably, its security interests —while diluting and underminingsupport for all immigration.

Nonetheless, as with many otherlucrative illegal activities, the global“war” on trafficking in people is notwinnable under the current rules ofengagement. One of the key reasonsfocuses on the differences in thefundamental organizational dynamicsof the contestants. These dynamicsfavor the agile, transnational, andrelatively small trafficking networksover of the much larger, slower, andmore bureaucratized governmentagencies based in a single state.

Relative to the fluidity that charac-terizes illegal syndicates, governmentagencies are also hampered by threeadditional forces. The first is impliedimmediately above and focuses on thefact that governments are at their worstwhen they must act across borders. The second is that, relative to theiropponents, government agencies tendto be grossly underresourced (at least interms of being resourced in a timelyfashion) both in terms of funds andaccess to technology. Finally, govern-ments typically have to observe rulesand conduct that hamper their abilityto respond “in kind” — rules that are

meaningless to the transnationalcriminal syndicates that run thetrafficking networks.

What may be the governments’greatest disadvantage, however, is that,as they line up against market forces,they must fight a war in which theirefforts are resisted from within theirown state. These resisters includeeconomic interests, archaic andoverburdened labor market and socialprotection rules, humanitarians whofeel that protecting those who flee isthe highest order of responsibility (anear “calling”) of a wealthy liberal-democratic society, and many of asociety’s other public and privatesector forces that are more committedto openness than the politics of theday may allow.

The lesson? Instead of engaging inbattles the government cannot win, asmarter way is to let the market findits own equilibrium but within rulesset by society and enforced jointly bygovernment and key stakeholders fromthe civil society.

In no field of endeavor is the controleffort more complicated than infighting terrorism. Many opponents ofimmigration have latched on to theterrorism challenge opportunisticallyin an effort to promote their anti-immigration agendas. Yet, some of theconcerns they articulate are legitimate.The attacks on the United States,Spain, and the United Kingdom makeclear that some foreigners were able totake advantage of these countries’entry management systems and, to a

xlvi

much lesser extent, their immigrationsystems proper, and launch theirattacks from within. Furthermore,there is now little doubt that theterrorists’ cause has active sympathizersin the immigrant and ethniccommunities of which the terroristswere nominal members — and thatsuch sympathies have aided andabetted terrorist acts.

The policy question then becomeshow to protect oneself and one’scountry from the threat terrorismpresents. This is not an easy thing.Intelligence and police work will haveto be the frontlines of protection, aswill much deeper internationalcooperation than is either the casetoday or appears likely in theimmediate future. The effort must alsoinclude a thorough review of thedeveloped North’s foreign politicaland economic relations with an eyetowards identifying policies that fuelhatred towards it.

A parallel track must also befashioned, however, and followed withequal diligence. This track mustinvolve developing and implementinga plan for winning the hearts andminds of ethnic and immigrantcommunities. In doing so, and bysystematically promoting inclusion,participation, and engagement, suchcommunities can be turned into keyallies in the fight against terrorism,rather than incubators and protectorsof the next wave of terrorists.

The calculus is as clear as it iscompelling. In many ways, terrorist

sympathizers and terrorists are evenmore of a threat to the well-being ofthe communities of their coethnics inadvanced democracies than they are tothe society targeted for a terror attack.This reality must serve as a wake-upcall to these communities or they willfind themselves further marginalizedand stigmatized. Similarly, the broadersociety’s self-interest dictates thatinclusive policies be devised andimplemented with vigor so as not tomarginalize the immigrants in its midst.But the effort must not stop there.Positive steps must also be taken sothat such immigrants are made intoessential parts in solving theantiterrorism puzzle.

Controls “Plus” and the

Importance of Moving

Beyond Unilateralism

Regulation is a critical part of anyrobust management system. In fact,regulation is the ultimate guarantor ofa system’s integrity. On complex andconstantly evolving regulatory systems,such as migration management, settingthe right goals is absolutely essential.In that regard, instead of seekingperfection with its predictabledisappointments, immigration policiesmight proceed from the premise thatuncertainty and imperfection will be away of life. They should also becompatible with a people’s sense ofthemselves and with a country’s social,economic, labor market, anddemographic realities. Immigrationpolicy will nonetheless be alwayspartly an exercise in the inexact.


Introduction xlvii

Channeling it is thus a better andmore realistic course than eitherdenying its existence or articulatingpolicy goals that seek total control orexclusion — goals that tend to createunrealistic public expectations and fuelfurther climates of intolerance.

The international environment alsoshapes what is and what is not possible.Consequently, countries (or regionalstate groupings) should invest in somemodest experiments in smart regulation— a learning-by-doing approach —that are continuously evaluated. These experiments might test a varietyof market-based responses andintroduce ideas that go beyond simply building better mousetraps.The following is a sampling.16

1. Requiring bonds from migrants andtheir employers (anyactivity/behavior can be bonded atno cost to, and with little effort on,the part of the public sector).Austria, Australia, and NewZealand, among others, use suchbonds as incentives to shapecertain forms of behavior in anumber of immigration-relatedissues, and several other countriesare also considering them.Language training and ensuring thereturn of temporary workers are thepolicy areas most frequentlytargeted by such bonding schemes.

2. Charging employers an initial feethat goes beyond recovering thecost of the typical administrative

service and dedicating such fees totraining and similar policyinitiatives focused on the domesticworkforce. The United Statesemploys such a fee in one of itsentry categories for foreign-bornprofessionals and uses it forprecisely such purposes — as doSingapore and some othercountries. Fees that might bededicated to building a modestsocial safety net for immigrants andtheir immediate families (in healthand transitional educationalservices, for instance) might alsoprove to be important investmentstowards the better acceptance andintegration of immigrants.

3. Experimenting with allowingemployers to offer marginally lowerminimum wages for entry-level, low-skilled jobs to permanently residentnewcomers for a short period of time— say, six months. This mightencourage firms to hire and invest in training legally permanentimmigrants with few or no skills,and to do so in the formal, ratherthan the underground, economy.

4. Reducing the social contributionsof temporary workers to inducethem to invest in tax-protectedpersonal savings accounts thatthey would access only uponreturn to their home countries.Such an approach would providean additional incentive for suchworkers to return home and gainaccess to their nest egg that theythen might invest in an economic

16 These responses can be tested individually or in pairs and groupings. The important thing is to test and evaluatenovel ideas that, if successful, may allow governments to move beyond the tried-and-failed routine of simply doingmore of the same.

xlviii

activity there. Together withbonds and with sending countries’efforts to help their workersabroad remain engaged with theirfamilies and communities backhome (for instance, by providingemigrants’ families with modestsocial protections during the breadwinner’s absence), such schemesmay offer a real test to theproposition that circular migrationthat treats all concerned properlycan be successfully implemented.

5. Requiring family sponsors to absorbsome of the protection costs — andrisks — associated with the(re)unification of their families bypooling insurance-like premiumsinto special funds that canunderwrite a number of unforeseenchanges in the newcomers’circumstances. Considering thatseveral countries now hold sponsorsfinancially accountable for thosewhom they sponsor, and theincreasingly widespread concernabout the social insurance costs ofmany forms of immigration,experimentation in this area holdsthe promise of beginning toattenuate one of immigration’smajor “image” problems.

6. Mandating the establishment ofmigrant-funded trust funds thatcould provide part of thetransitional educational costsimmigrants and their families mayneed in the early years ofmigration. These funds might beindependent of, alternatives to, orin addition to the conceptsdiscussed in items 2 and 5 above.

7. Experimenting with granting a

sample of asylum seekers and asample of family immigrants workpermits immediately upon entry,then observing and measuringlabor-market attachment andrelated outcomes over time. Suchan experiment would allow themaking of informed judgmentsabout the implications ofalternative policy decisions. Thiswould be particularly relevant forEuropean countries that practice apoorly thought-out policy wherebymost newcomers are not allowed towork — and thus instill in them aculture of dependence on the statethat often spills over into thenewcomers’ lives after they areallowed to work.

By thus systematically setting up andassessing the performance of newpolicies, testing the durability of newregulatory frameworks, and laying outmenus of policy alternatives,initiatives on migration managementstand a better chance of bearing thedesired policy fruit than they do now. Nor can the importance ofdemonstrating success in migrationmanagement be emphasized enough.So far, dealing with migration hastaught most advanced industrialdemocracies how to deal with failure.It is now time to look to the futureand consider how to achieve betteroutcomes for the greatest number ofactors on international migration andhow to measure success.

The more important point here,however, may be neither to dwell,Cassandra-like, on doom-and-gloom


Introduction xlix

scenarios nor to be unrealistic abouthow much success to expect. Rather, itis to recognize that policy coherence isa process, not an event; to understandwhat policymakers are up against whenthey talk about “reining-in” illegalimmigration and managing legalimmigration more effectively; and to setrealistic benchmarks against which tomeasure progress, rather than “success.”

Many countries have had considerablesuccess with different types of legal,organized immigration. Furthermore,the past decade has shown that goodmanagement practices can preventimmigration from becoming a runawaypolicy and political “problem” thatrequires extreme measures to contain.For instance, US actions in the mid-1990s in support of Mexico’s currencyshowed a particularly sophisticatedunderstanding of the complex linkagesbetween economic and politicalstability and unwanted migration,while pointing to the mutualobligations and liabilities thatNAFTA-like relationships impose onall the parties involved. Similarly, theBush administration’s negotiationswith Mexico on sharing responsibilityfor managing the bilateral migrationrelationship has shown promisetowards developing a new bilateralregulatory paradigm with implicationswell beyond North America. (Thesenegotiations started in February 2001,less than a month into the Bushpresidency, but stalled after theSeptember 11, 2001 terrorist attack onthe United States.) The willingness of the United Kingdom (in the pastdecade or so), Australia, and Canada

to adjust their policies regularly and toinvest systematically in policy researchand evaluation has allowed them toderive substantial benefits fromimmigration while controllingits downsides.

Mr. Bush’s intermittent commitmentto work through the issues of illegalimmigration and a spate of billsintroduced in the US Congress in2005 point to the increasinglysophisticated understanding amongsome US governmental circles of therelationship between larger numbers ofpermanent and temporary legal visasand the curtailment of illegalimmigration. Although perhaps lessambitious, Italian and Greek bilateralefforts to stem, in the largest partthrough regulation of work visas,illegal migration from Albania andother Balkan states is also thought tohave borne very substantial public-order and labor-market gains. Similaragreements and less formalunderstandings with Turkey and certainother Mediterranean countries are alsothought to have been beneficial, if to alesser extent. Finally, the most recentagreement between Spain andMorocco, as well as sustained but notyet fruitful negotiations between theEU Commission and a variety ofmigrant-sending and transit countries,are important to note and observe asthey unfold although it is too early toassess their effectiveness.

These and similar responses, whileprobably the exceptions in a sea ofrhetoric and action that emphasizesunilateral controls, do represent an

l

important ray of hope that advancedindustrial democracies can begin toacknowledge publicly what theiractions have hinted at (“advertised”may be a more appropriate word) forseveral decades now: namely, thatmost types of migrants, includingmany unauthorized ones, have beenessential to their prosperity. It doesnot behoove them now to forget thatmigrants have basic human, social,economic, and legal rights, and that these rights should not beviolated or withdrawn unilaterally. More importantly, it verges onirresponsibility for advanced nationsto deny themselves the benefits ofsmartly regulated internationalmobility (in which their ownnationals are also major players) or toignore migration’s very positive, iflong-term, developmental effects forsending societies and for the worldcommunity as a whole.

Managing Flows Better

The overall thrust of this chaptersuggests that in terms of effectivenessif not in fact, the “age of unilateralism”of migration management is in sharp retreat, if not already over. This proposition implies that, in themigration-flow management area,

bilateral negotiations and, much moregradually, regional and global regimeswill play increasingly prominent roles.Of course, the precise roles and thepace of their evolution will bedifferent in various geographic andgeopolitical settings.

A good rule of thumb at the dawn ofthe 21st century may be that the closera state is to, and the more influence itcan exert over, a supranational processand its institutions, the more likely it isto show significant deference to it onmigration management issues.According to this logic, bilateral effortsare likely to be preferred over regionalones, and both will be thought of as farsuperior (in terms of a nation state’swillingness to negotiate and abide by a set of rules) to global ones. 17

Of course, such a broad statement hides substantial degrees of variationwithin it. The advantages ofbilateralism are obvious. For instance,if the United States wishes to addressits Mexican immigration problem(nearly three-fifths of its undocumentedpopulation is estimated to be Mexicanand an additional one-fifth entersthrough Mexico), working togetherwith Mexico makes eminent sense.And the United States is doing so, ifslowly. Similarly, in the early 1990s,


17 The content of the rules in question is very important in this respect. “Norm-setting” exercises may be useful firstefforts at developing and nurturing the sense that a “code of conduct” on migration with which most nations canidentify is indeed possible. The Global Commission on International Migration, led by Jan Karlsson, the formerSwedish Minister of International Development and Migration, and World Bank former Managing DirectorMamphela Ramphele, has just completed such an exercise. The Commission, which presented its report to theUN Secretary General in the fall of 2005, had an opportunity to be the catalyst for starting a multilateralconversation on migration in subsequent years. The rather cool reaction to the report by Mr. Annan, and thedisinterest in it by most advanced immigrant receiving governments, point to the political ground that must becovered before the conversation that the Commission had hoped to initiate can be engaged.

Introduction li

Germany created a special visarelationship with Poland as a first steptowards managing its migrationrelationship from and through thatcountry better and, some will argue, asa down payment to Poland’s entry intothe EU in May 2004. (Of course,Germany’s strategic policy aims had even stronger geopolitical andeconomic rationales, as do those of the United States vis à vis bothMexico and Canada.) Finally, and asnoted, Italy’s and Greece’s migration“deals” with Albania, or Spain’s with Morocco, fit under similarexplanatory frameworks.

To recap, the advantages of bilateralnegotiations lie principally in theability to agree on and implementreciprocal obligations whoseobservance can be measured (and forwhich adjustments can be madeaccordingly) and enforced. Regionalprocesses may offer the prospect ofeven greater opportunities forcooperation, but adjustments will be,by definition, more difficult to make.Furthermore, it is infinitely morecomplicated to act efficiently andeffectively in regional settings whennoncompliance occurs. And in anyevent, at this time at least, all but oneregional process — that of the EU —are little more than “talk-shop”exercises without the institutionalmechanisms to reach bindingagreements and, more importantly,the power levers to enforcecompliance in meaningful ways.

The EU fulfills most — but by nomeans all — of the requirements thatmake bilateral conversations theinstrument of choice for migration-flowmanagement. For the Union to movecloser to meeting more of theserequirements, and especially that ofenforcing compliance, it will have to“communitarize” migration well beyondwhere it is today or is envisioned underthe proposed EU Constitution. Putdifferently, the greater the reliance onintergovernmental mechanisms for thepurposes of managing migration flows,the less likely it is that meaningful18

agreements with countries ofunauthorized migrant origin and transit can be negotiated and observed.Specifically, unless the Commission isgiven authority to negotiate migrationaccords with third countries thatinclude work visas, and unless it and/orthe Member States are willing tocommit to honor and enforce the termsof such agreements, Brussels may be inonly a slightly more advantageousposition relative to the Babel ofregional dialogues in negotiating truemigration management agreements.

One may be tempted to argue that thisis too severe a judgment, particularlygiven the EU’s common visa regimeand the Commission’s ability tonegotiate these and similar matters onbehalf of the Member States. Thejudgment becomes less harsh, however,and more accurate, if the analyticalobservations regarding the nature ofinternational migration contained

18 The term is used here to underline the importance of engaging in negotiations where both parties give upsomething of value in order to achieve a result of higher significance for each.

lii

herein are endorsed. If they are, itfollows that more fruitful negotiationson migration flows require a broaderapproach. This approach must includeputting work visas of various kinds onthe negotiating table. Simultaneously,the ability to strengthen compliancewith the terms of any resultingagreement through the withholding ofother “public” goods (such as certainforms of development aid) must alsobe enhanced.

Notwithstanding a spate of activismin the last months of 2005, theCommission does not have theseauthorities now. Furthermore, a last-minute German reservation on theproposed (but now moribund?) EUConstitution would deny theCommission any authority withregard to such visas. Finally, thesensitivities of several Member States(especially with regard to tyingforeign and development aid to aparty’s obligations under a migrationagreement) withhold from theCommission the basic governancepower of safeguarding the integrity ofsuch agreements by enforcing fullcompliance with their terms.

Immigrant Integration and

Social Cohesion

If flow-management issues becomemore complicated the further onemoves from bilateral negotiations, theintegration issue is in many ways morecomplex yet. Here, subnational andlocal levels of government, as well asthe “soft” but crucial power of thenongovernmental (civil society)sector, must and do play the most

critical roles. As noted earlier, “code of conduct” exercises mayindeed develop important dos anddon’ts on international migration. And these codes might includecompelling ideas on how to moresuccessfully integrate immigrants andbuild more cohesive multiculturalsocieties in the 21st century.

By its very nature, however,integration/cohesion will always befirst and foremost a local affair. Thisis because it is at the local level thatcritical interactions betweennewcomers and the larger communityoccur and where successes and failures— and hence the possibility of policyinnovation and gains — happen mostnaturally. Localities, in other words,are the terrain where governmentaldecisions and nondecisions withregard to all aspects of internationalmigration play themselves out. To besure, national governments and, inthe case of federal and confederalstates, state and provincial ones willtypically provide both the resourcesand the enabling legal environmentswithin which experiments will bepossible, and where performance willbe measured.

This reality does not devalue the integration role of EU-likeregional levels of governance. These roles are essential and are likely to grow in importance. Theireffectiveness, however, will fluctuatewith the maturity and robustness ofthe supranational mechanism and thethoughtfulness and quality of itsintervention.


Introduction liii

Both conditions, in turn, will beinfluenced greatly by four interrelated factors. First, thesensitivity supranational institutionsdisplay towards the issue, especiallywith regard to what is expected bothof Member State publics and ofnewcomers. Second, the authoritythese institutions have to initiatepolicy interventions in this area andthe courage they display by speakingclearly when Member States fail to make progress on integration (this refers to the eternal issues ofcompetence and deference to MemberState sensitivities). Third, how deeplycivil society will be engaged andintervene at the supranational leveland the quality of its intervention.Fourth, the resources that will beavailable to this level of governanceso that it might seed new ideas andinitiatives, as well as fund “corrective”region-wide policies. (Most of thesepolicies will naturally fall in the socialaffairs and employment policy areas.)

Looking Ahead to 2020

Projecting how international migrationis likely to evolve in the next 15 yearsis both easier and more difficult than itmay appear at first. It is easier becausewe understand the phenomenon’sbehavior well enough now, both fromwhat might be called the supply sidebut, increasingly, also from the demandside. We now also understand betterthe triggers, drivers, and facilitators ofmigration. It is more difficult becauseof two factors whose effect is akin tothat of wild cards in a game of chance:

security (terrorism) and the socio-cultural reaction to migration. Both of these factors have beendiscussed already.

For the next 15 years, the supply —the so-called migration pipeline —will remain robust. There is nothingwithin this rather short horizon thatwill change dramatically for the betterto affect the major developing-countrysuppliers of immigrants in ways thatwill lead to a pronounced drop in theinterest to emigrate. If anything, anumber of still relatively smallmigration “players” are likely to growin importance, while China and theIndian Subcontinent could wellbecome massive players in theinternational migration system withrelatively little notice.

While the supply is thus expected toremain near infinite, the demand forimmigrants will also grow substantially,though arithmetically. Three factorswill account for the lion’s share ofthat growth. First, demography,especially the one-two punch of thebirth dearth and the growth in thepopulation share of the old and thevery old in the North and China —with these groups’ health, pensionsand personal services’ needs toppingthe list of priorities (introduced in thischapter’s next section and analyzedextensively by Lutz and Scherbov inthis volume). Second, increases inskill and more general labor shortages(including skill and geographicdemand and supply mismatches) thatwill be fueled in large part by thebirth dearth. Third, the sheer

liv

momentum of the process itself,whereby pro-immigration coalitionsform in support of immigration whileformulaic, legal, and “rights-based”openings to migration — such asfamily (re)unification, refugeeresettlement, and asylum grants —continue to build ever strongerimmigration streams.

Of course, terrorist attacks may yetplay a bigger role than they have todate on reshaping the environment in which international migration hasthrived in recent decades. In thatregard, terrorism and the “war”against it have introduced a degree ofuncertainty into the calculus thatunderlies this chapter. Thatuncertainty raises the possibility, ifnot yet the likelihood, of extremestate reactions to most migration. If, however, we are on the brink of anew era of nihilistic conflict rooted inresurgent nationalism (centered notonly in the developing world),politically expressed religiousfundamentalism, and various othernearly forgotten “isms,” and if thecasualties on both sides grow at ratescommensurate with the capabilities ofour era’s instruments of destruction,the scenario outlined herein mayindeed be nullified. And if such aconflict and chaos scenario comes topass, the only reasonable projection is that national security will trump all other policy priorities with regard to migration for anindeterminate period — and thatmost forms of international migrationto the developed world will be cutdramatically.

Otherwise, migration’s reach duringthe next 15 years will expand and gobeyond the advanced industrial West — to Japan and the “AsianTigers” — as well as to emergingmarket societies everywhere. Initially,the government-led or government-assisted part of this expansion willmost likely take the form of regulatedtemporary entry by needed high- andlow-skilled foreign workers. But it willnot stop there. “Front-gate”provisions for converting valued“temporary” legal immigrants intopermanent ones will also proliferate,turning temporary admission streamsinto transition and filtration systemsfor selecting permanent immigrants.In addition, opportunities foradmitting better-skilled foreignersoutright as permanent immigrantswill also increase, particularly whenthe world economy rebounds andglobal competition for talentedforeigners intensifies.

At the same time, pressure fromunauthorized migration is also likely to remain robust, and managing it willcontinue to be a major preoccupationof governments. Changing the statusquo, however, will require movingbeyond the “tried and failed”paradigms of simply applying alwaysgreater resources to border and interior controls. It will also requireinterventions that are as nimble andmultifaceted as the phenomenon itself,as well as unaccustomed discipline,unusual degrees of coordination acrosspolicy competencies, and new modelsof cooperation between countries oforigin and destination.


Introduction lv

Demographics, Labor Markets

and Migration to 2020

Low rates of native-populationgrowth across the advanced industrialworld have meant migration isalready a large demographic forcethere. For instance, between 1985and 1990, international migrantsaccounted for about one-quarter ofthe developed world’s populationgrowth; that figure grew to about 45percent during the 1990-1995 period— a function of both increasedimmigration and relentlessly lowfertility — and likely stands at abouttwo-thirds of growth today. Ofcourse, averages typically hideenormous regional, subregional, andnational variations. For instance,international migration nowprobably accounts for all of the EU’soverall population growth. But whatwill the future bring?

The demographic facts are not indispute. Most of the advancedindustrial world has failed toreproduce itself for a generation now.As the post-World War II babyboomers (there was a baby-boom echoin the late 1960s and early 1970s)pass from the economic scene overthe next decade or so, most Westerndemocracies will experience sub-stantial indigenous working-agepopulation gaps. It is the bulge in theretirement age population, however,that is of special interest to thisanalysis. The number of retirees willreach absolute and relative sizesunlike anything we have witnessed.With people living much longer thanever before, the taxes of fewer and

fewer workers will have to supportever larger numbers of retirees — aratio known as the old-age support(or dependency) ratio.

The evidence is nothing less thancompelling. By the year 2020, theOrganization for EconomicCooperation and Development(OECD) estimates that most of itsMember States will have old-agesupport ratios that range from a lowof about 30 percent for some of thetraditional countries of immigrationto about 42 percent for Japan. (More recent reports from theEuropean Commission, as well as a2000 and a 2003 report by the UN’sPopulation Division, validate thesefindings completely.) This meansthat for states with tax-supported,pay-as-you-go retirement systems,the taxes of between 3.3 and 2.4workers, respectively, will have tosupport a retired person’s costs to thepublic purse. For the relatively fewcountries where tax-financedpensions are supplemented by privatepensions, mandatory occupationalretirement schemes, and/or so-called(and much rarer) capitalized schemes(where each population cohort savesfor its own retirement), the pictureis slightly improved because itbalances risks better. However, andas the OECD pointed out in 2001,although a fully capitalized system may be less vulnerable todemographic forces, it is morevulnerable to risks associated withinvestment rates of return. Therecent performance of stock marketsmakes that point extremely relevant.

lvi

The data become more troubling whentotal support ratios are examined, thatis, the ratio of the number of personsin the workforce relative to the sum ofthose who are already retired and thosewho are too young to be working. Nordoes the bad news for the next twodecades stop here. Most estimationmodels assume that young people enterthe workforce in their mid-teenageyears and that retirement occurs at age65. Both of these conventions are atgross variance with actual behavior inadvanced industrial countries and biasthe estimates systematically in favor ofgreater optimism — and complacency.The gravity of the situation increasesfurther when considering that, unlikelong-term projections about fertility,which come closer to educated guessesin their “out” years, the aging numbersare pretty well known for the next twodecades. More to the point, even iffertility were to increase dramaticallyand immediately, it would have littleeffect on old-age support ratios duringthe next two decades because of thetime it takes most young persons inthe advanced world to enter the laborforce full-time.

How, then, does migration fit into allthis? No reasonable analyst believesthat immigration can somehow“solve” the demographic policyconundrum. One example of theimmigration numbers that might berequired to maintain reasonable old-age support ratios might suffice tomake this point. Maintaining 2010-level old-age support ratios in 2020through immigration would requireintakes that are several times the size

of most states’ actual immigrationintakes for the 1985-1995 period.Such intakes are clearly neithersocially nor politically viable. More tothe point, perhaps, the analyticalevidence suggests that the permanentimmigration “solution” is complicatedin another key respect: unless a stateadmits primarily very youngimmigrants, it would need alwayslarger foreign-born populations tomaintain reasonable old-age supportratios. An alternative “immigration”option, admitting larger numbers oftemporary workers, is thus likely tobecome more popular for manyadvanced industrial societies and gainin significance relative to permanentimmigration. Introducing age biasesin permanent-immigration formulas— as do some of the countries thathave point selection systems — mayalso become more common.

Responding to the Challenge of

the Graying of the Advanced

Industrial World

The aging of the baby boomers andhigher life expectancies are leading toan unprecedented growth in thedeveloped world’s elderly populations.But this is only half the “problem.” Atthe same time, improved birth controltechnologies and numerous powerfuland, by now, deeply embedded social,cultural, and economic forcesseemingly conspire to keep thenumber of its youth at historically lowlevels. Together, these twin realitieswill cause immense economic, social,and political dilemmas that willgradually come to dominate the West’spolitical and policy agendas.


Introduction lvii

While the timing and severity of thechallenge will vary among developedstates, the trend is unmistakable and,for the next 20 years, the outcomepractically predetermined. Thepowerful forces that drive it includeoften stunning improvements inmedical science, almost limitlessaccess to state-supported or subsidizedmedical care, affluence (whichimproves access to more advancedmedical services and depressesfertility), and ever higher rates offemale participation in the labor force.

These realities pose three policychallenges of the first order; they alsosuggest three key areas for policyintervention. The first regards thetiming of retirement and targets initiallythe slowing down and gradually thereversal of the growing imbalancebetween the time a demographiccohort spends in the labor marketrelative to the time it spends inretirement. The second addresses thequality of retirement and targets thesustaining of retirement income andhealth maintenance systems whiletending to the needs and (most of the)expectations of the elderly andsimilarly situated populations (theinfirm, the disabled, the needy, etc.).The third challenge focuses on the mixof retirement-income forms and onhow to expand such a mix — an areabeing explored systematically by theOECD but one that is well beyond thescope of this chapter.

By 2020, with longer life expectanciesand the post-World War II babyboomers in their 70s, one will witness

an explosion in the size of that agecohort. Even with total fertility rates(TFR, that is, the number of livebirths per woman during her lifetime)increasing modestly, the first twopolicy dilemmas above will onlybecome more pronounced. (Thepopulation replacement level is a TFRof about 2.1.) Nor is the TFR for theadvanced world likely to increasesubstantially, especially consideringthat the total fertility for Europe’ssouthern and eastern flanks willcontinue to decline. And althoughsome project Europe’s TFR to increasefrom the present 1.4 to about 1.55, thisis an unlikely feat given that thecontinent’s demographic momentumcontinues to point downward.

The challenges this scenario poses areas follows. The greatest may besecuring adequate living standards forpensioners without putting crushingtax burdens on workers — a challengethat will worsen every decade. In1998, the OECD projected that by2020, its members would experiencesubstantial but wide-ranging increasesfor pension expenditures as apercentage of GDP — from 2.9percent for Australia to more than 12percent for Germany and Japan. Moresignificantly, estimates of thedeveloped world’s size of unfundedpension liabilities stand at tens oftrillions of dollars while paying forelderly medical care adds an equallyimmense amount to the total. Bothexpenditures will increase at firstgeometrically and later exponentiallyas the aged cohort bulges and medicalconsumption patterns explode. (Those

lviii

over 65 are estimated to consumeseveral times as much medical care asthe rest of the population.)

These are not the only implications.The median age of the population willalso rise while the relative size of thenative-born population in most of thedeveloped world will decline. Changesin the ethnic composition and agedistribution of European populations,as well as actual population declines(even with reasonable amounts ofimmigration), will give rise toadditional policy challenges rangingfrom the threat of deflationary pricing(as goods chase fewer domesticconsumers and competition for foreigncustomers intensifies) to numerouslabor-market distortions. The latterincludes increasingly severe laborshortages that will go beyond themismatches between needed andavailable skills that define many labormarkets today. At a minimum, theseanomalies will redefine the world ofwork in most advanced industrialsocieties — although not during thischapter’s time frame.

The labor market implications of thisdemographic conundrum will be feltmost directly in economic sectors ofparticular interest to the aged. Amongthe most vulnerable sectors are thosein which, while demand is alreadystrong and will continue to growrobustly, the nature, social standing,and wage structure of the jobs makethem unappealing to native workers.These jobs include caregiving to theelderly and tending to the personalservices needs of affluent first-worlders.

This will not be the only set of workershortages. More workers will also beneeded to help keep retirement andpublic health systems afloat throughtheir taxes, and, in many cases, to keepboth production and consumptionsystems humming.

This analysis suggests that societiesthat address these demographicallycentered challenges sooner and moredefinitively will enhance theirprospects for economic stability andgrowth. Those that do not can expectgreater economic instability and,under certain extreme scenarios,economic decline. Both scenarios alsoimagine a spillover into socialinstability; accordingly, responsesmust factor in the requirement ofsocial cohesion.

Among the most critical issuesgovernments will have to addresseffectively is the effect of thewidespread phenomenon of two-earnerhouseholds on fertility behavior(including the fertility-reducing butincreasingly popular and necessarydelays in childbearing). But the policyquest cannot stop there. Child- andelder-care issues (especially increasingdemands for elder care), and thepublic policy issues associated withintergenerational responsibilities bothwith regard to elder care and income-transfer programs, must also beaddressed. In short, what may berequired may be nothing short of anew social governance paradigm.

Is such a paradigmatic shift likely? Oneway to begin to address this question is


Introduction lix

by breaking the current paradigm intoits major components and assessingeach part’s amenability (or resistance)to change. If one looks at pensions andhealth benefits, for instance, it is clearthe public purse cannot maintain itscurrent responsibilities over the longterm, let alone enhance coverage,under present tax and productivitymodels. However, increasing taxburdens on individuals, smallbusinesses, or corporations will beresisted strongly. European taxpayersalready feel over-taxed, and politiciansmust tread softly if they are interestedin being reelected. Similarly, businessowners cannot be realistically expected to accept higher taxes whenthe twin forces of globalization andtrade liberalization demand they keeptheir costs down and their productivityup to remain competitive — andhence in business.

These difficulties, however, should notbe understood as a judgment that thedeveloped world has no ammunitionwith which to combat them. It does.However, every policy response entailssignificant pain for important societalsegments — suggesting that govern-ments will likely attempt first toprolong the status quo and postponemore aggressive initiatives. This tacticwill prove both inadequate and harmfulin the longer run.

Among the stop-gap measures that are certain to be relied upon will bethe following: � Mandating longer work lives

(Japan, the United States, and several other countries

are already moving in thisdirection).

� Reducing retirement benefits.� Experimenting with greater

efficiencies in state-supported,health-care delivery systems(including the introduction ofcompetition from private sectorcare providers in publicly fundedhealth systems).

� Encouraging the development of additional forms of retirementsystems (“pay-as-you-go” systemswill become unsustainable in theabsence of a set of coordinatedpolicies that include moreimmigration and extraordinaryand sustained growth inproductivity).

� Engaging in a new and vastlymore severe round of fundamentaleconomic restructuring — thisone mandated by the politicalrealities of the new demographics.

Most states are already experimentingwith several of these approaches, anda list of “best practices” is beginningto emerge. However, the politicalpush-back for the most obviousroutes is already strong and willintensify as the service cuts that mostinitiatives also include begin to befelt by ever larger population cohorts.It is the judgment of this chapter thatonly three long-term solutions aretruly salient: (a) gradual changes inretirement age, (b) significant andlong-term changes in fertility, and (c) far larger immigration.

The first will pit the governmentagainst retirees and those nearing

lx

retirement, two groups that hold adisproportionate share of a country’swealth and political power. Thegovernment may not be able to winthat battle except at the margins —and even that may take much longerthan the crisis can allow.

The second one, changes in fertility,implies a reversal in long-term trendsand will require nothing less than arevolution in prevailing social normsand economic logic. Nonetheless, some governments (such as Japan and France) already offer enormousincentives for having more children,and more governments are expectedto follow that route.

The final one, far larger immigrationintakes, will require even sharperattitudinal changes to overcome the age-old resistance to large-scaleimmigration and the social andcultural changes it implies. Cansocieties that appear to valuetradition and continuity virtuallyabove all else, as Europeans andancient Asian societies do, make theleap that larger immigration levelsrequire? Will traditional immigrationcountries start preparing the politicalground for the larger temporaryimmigration intakes they will need inthe future — as they must also do?Will both types of societies be able tomanage the social and politicalreactions this solution will generate?These are difficult adjustmentsindeed. Yet these societies cannotremain meaningful internationalplayers if they fail to address thedemographic issues outlined here

or if theyattempt to address themwithout the required wisdom.

Conclusion

Categories of social analysis do not develop sui generis; they aredeveloped by analysts trying to get a handle on “a problem.” Onceestablished, however, such categoriesare very difficult to change. The complex, shifting terrain ofinternational migration; the growingcomplexity of its causes, processes,and consequences; and the radicallynew global context in which it takesplace all demand that we reviewconstantly both the usefulness of our conceptual and analytical tools and the resulting administrativecategories and managementstructures in this area.

Even the most cursory review of theadvanced industrial world’s dominantadministrative-management modelsand accompanying data and policiesreveals that the current internationalmigration system is organized aroundideal constructs that are both datedand disturbingly binary. Regrettably,much of the analytical literaturereinforces these tendencies. Forinstance, states are designated as eithersending or receiving; people who moveare classified as either permanentsettlers or temporary residents; andreasons for flight are catalogued eitheras the improvement of one’s economiccondition or protection from variousforms of disaster and persecution. Such gross dichotomies and the


Introduction lxi

administrative structures and datasystems that have been built aroundthem shed little light on the reality of today’s migration patterns. Today,people move for a variety of reasonssimultaneously. Furthermore, most states both send and receivesubstantial numbers of migrants and may also act as areas of migranttransit. Increasing proportions of“permanent” immigrants leave ormove beyond their adopted country of residence. And temporary residents,such as students and professionals,often settle in their host countries.

Failing to understand these behaviors better and adapt flow-management models and data systems accordingly adds to theoverall migration managementchallenges that have been the focusof this chapter. Clearly, since statesand individuals participatesimultaneously in multiple “systems”of movement, managing whatamounts to complex transnationalprocesses through archaic andunresponsive policies will be ofdiminishing value in the years ahead.

Preparing better for the future isessential given the significantmigration that economic, political,human rights, and demographic needsand differentials imply. The fact thatmigration is an increasingly essentialingredient to the developed North’seconomic success, means that policiesand administrative structures designedwithin such naïve frameworks aredestined to fall short of even relativelong-term success.

A more insightful set of policies would take into account the variety of experiences across advancedindustrial societies and theirdifferent levels of success whileappreciating that “success” isoverwhelmingly a function of effort,resources, commitment, flexibility,and adaptability in responses, as wellas consonance with a state’s culture and history. This is true both for thecontrol of illegal flows and for thebroader management of legal flows.Greater success in solving theimmigration puzzle also requiresconfidence, sure-footedness,leadership, and vision in the publicarena. Although surely preciouscommodities, they are well withinthe realm of realistic possibility inthe advanced democratic world.

There is clear agreement that reformall along the migration-managementcomplex is long overdue. What is farless clear is whether such reform willbe the product of a judicious effort toaddress all of a nation’s interests, aswell as balance those interests withinternational obligations, or be littlemore than the typical knee-jerk yankon the control levers.

This chapter is partly based on a much brieferand narrower text that appeared under theheading “Managing Rapid and Deep Change inthe New Era of Migration,” In The Politics ofMigration: Managing Opportunity, Conflictand Change, edited by Sarah Spencer, 39-58.Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003.

lxii

Suggested Readings

Aleinikoff, A. and D. Klusmeyer. CitizenshipPolicies for an Age of Migration. Washington,DC: Carnegie Endowment for InternationalPeace, 2002.

Athens Migration Policy Initiative. Proceedings,July 2002 – May 2003. Washington, DC:Migration Policy Institute, 2003.

Bilsborrow, R. E., G. Hugo, A. S. Oberai, and H.Zlotnik. International Migration Statistics:Guidelines for Improving Data Collection Systems.Geneva: International Labor Office, 1997.

Chishti, M., D. Meissner, D. Papademetriou, J.Peterzell, M. Wishnie, and S. Yale-Loehr.America’s Challenge: Domestic Security, Civil Liberties, and National Unity AfterSeptember 11. Washington, DC: MigrationPolicy Institute, 2003.

Cohen, R., ed. The Cambridge Survey of WorldMigration. Cambridge: Cambridge UniversityPress, 1995.

Commission of the European Communities.Communication from the Commission to the Council, the European Parliament, theEuropean Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions on Immigration,Integration, and Employment. Brussels, June 2003.

European Commission. Communication onImmigration, Integration, and Employment. COM(2003) 336 final, 2003.

European Commission. An EU Approach toManaging Economic Migration. COM (2004)811 final, 2004.

European Commission. Confronting DemographicChange: A New Solidarity Between theGenerations. COM (2005) 94 final, 2005.

Global Commission on International Migration(GCIM). Migration in an Interconnected World:New Directions for Action. Report of the GlobalCommission on International Migration,October 2005.

International Organization for Migration. WorldMigration 2003: Managing Migration: Challengesand Responses for People on the Move.Vol. 2 – IOM World Migration Series. Geneva: International Organization forMigration, 2003.

Migration Information Source. Special Issue:Integration and Immigrants. Washington, DC:Migration Policy Institute, October 2003,http://www.migrationinformation.org/special_integration.cfm.

Migration Information Source. Special Issue: US-Mexico Migration. Washington, DC: MigrationPolicy Institute, March 2004,http://www.migrationinformation.org/special_mexico.cfm.

Niessen, J. and Y. Schibel. EU and US Approachesto the Management of Immigration: ComparativePerspectives. Brussels: Migration Policy Group,2003.

OECD Continuous Reporting System onMigration (SOPEMI). Trends in InternationalMigration. Paris: Organisation for EconomicCooperation and Development. Annual.

Papademetriou, D. “Alles eine Frage derAusgewogenheit: Zur Verbesserung derWettbewerbsfähigkeit durch eine besonneneSteuerung der Zuwanderung – eine grundsät-zliche Betrachtung aus amerikansicherPerspektive.” In Arbeitsmarktsteuerung derZuwanderung – neuere deutsche Ansätze undinternationale Erfahrungen, Ullrich Heilemannand Hans Dietrich von Loeffelholz, Eds. Essen:Rheinisch – Westfälisches Institut fürWirtschaftsforschung, 2003.

Papademetriou, D. “The Global Struggle withIllegal Migration: No End in Sight.” MigrationInformation Source. Washington, DC:Migration Policy Institute, September 1, 2005,http://www.migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?ID=336.

Papademetriou, D. “International Migration andUS Security Interests: An Overview andAssessment.” Prepared for the US NationalIntelligence Council, 1999.


Introduction lxiii

Papademetriou, D. “Migration Trends in Russiaand the CIS and their Potential Consequencesfor Europe (Migrationstendenzen in Russlandund den GUS – Staaten und ihre potenziellenFolgen fuer Europa).” in Illegal Migration(Illegale Migration). Bonn: Varus Verlag, 2000.

Papademetriou, D. “Reflections on RestoringIntegrity to the United States ImmigrationSystem: A Personal Vision.” Insight V.Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute,September 2005.

Papademetriou, D. “’The Regularization’ Option inManaging Illegal Migration More Effectively:A Comparative Perspective.” Policy Brief IV.Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute,September 2005.

Papademetriou, D., ed. Managing Migration: A Policy Agenda for Economic Progress and Social Cohesion. Migration Policy Institute,forthcoming.

Papademetriou, D., J. Audley, S. Polaski, and S.Vaughan. NAFTA’s Promise and Reality: Lessonsfrom Mexico for the Hemisphere. Washington,DC: Carnegie Endowment for InternationalPeace, 2004.

Papademetriou, D. and K. Hamilton. “Lainmigración entre México y Estados Unidos: loque está en juego.” Economia Exterior 28(Spring 2004): 59-66.

Papademetriou, D. and K. O’Neil. “EfficientPractices for the Selection of EconomicMigrants.” Report prepared for the EuropeanCommission (DG Employment and SocialAffairs), May 2004.

Papademetriou, D. and K. O’Neil. “Reflections onImmigration and the WelfareState.”Washington, DC: Migration PolicyInstitute, 2004.

Papademetriou, D. and S. Yale-Loehr. BalancingInterests: Rethinking the U.S. Selection of SkilledImmigrants. Washington, DC: CarnegieEndowment for International Peace, 1996.

Pedersen, P., M. Pytlikova, and N. Smith.“Selection or Network Effects? Migration Flows into 27 OECD Countries, 1990-2000.”Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA),Discussion Paper No. 1104. Bonn: IZA, 2004.

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Spencer, S., ed. The Politics of Migration: ManagingOpportunity, Conflict and Change. Oxford:Blackwell Publishing, 2003.

Tribalat, M., J. P. Garson, Y. Moulier-Boutang, andRoxane Silberman. Cent Ans D’Immigration,Ètrangers d’Hier Français d’Aujourd’Hui. Paris:Presses Universitaires de France, InstitutNational d’Etudes Dèmographiques, 1991.

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US-Mexico Migration Panel. Mexico-US Migration:A Shared Responsibility. Convened by theCarnegie Endowment for International Peaceand the Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo deMéxico. Washington, DC: CarnegieEndowment for International Peace, 2001.

lxiv Europe and Its Immigrants in the 21st Century

The Challenge of

Integration in Europe

Sarah Spencer

2

Integration is now central to theEuropean Union’s agenda. It is recognized that migration — at

different levels and in differing forms— is here to stay and that the successfulintegration of immigrants cannot betaken for granted.

Migration can bring significant benefits.For generations, migrants from acrossthe world have settled and prosperedin Europe, making a significant economic and cultural contribution.Migration contributes to the prosperityof European societies and to that ofmigrants themselves.

Migration, however, also brings chal-lenges. Integration requires investment.There are many migrants who overcomethe barriers to integration without assistance. Some, like Indians in theUnited Kingdom (UK), perform betterthan other residents in education and inthe labor market. Nevertheless, on eachpathway to inclusion, economic andsocial, migrants face barriers. And bywhichever indices we choose to measureit — language acquisition, educationoutcomes, labor market performance,social segregation, health, living condi-tions, civic participation — there iscause for concern across the EuropeanUnion (EU) states.

Moreover, the presence of migrants,the most visible evidence of globaliza-tion and the rapid social change itengenders, has also become the focusof tension in some local communitiesand of mobilization by the far right,

spreading the politics of exclusionwhere communities need trust, cooper-ation, and mutual respect. Tensions arecompounded by the involvement of asmall minority of migrants in politicalviolence and European leaders fear agrowing radicalization of migrantyouth. Concern focuses most acutely,though not exclusively, on Muslims.The alleged perpetrators of some high-profile acts of terrorism, includingthe September 11 attacks in 2001, theMadrid bombings of March 2004, andthe killing of film director Theo VanGogh in the Netherlands in November2004, were Muslims.1 There is a per-ception that certain beliefs associatedwith Islam are not compatible with“Western values.”

The fear of radicalization dominatespublic and political debate on thisissue. The possible accession to the EU of a predominantly Muslim country,Turkey, has raised the political stakes.While fear of radicalization sets a narrow and negative context for thedebate, overshadowing the parallelagenda on economic inclusion, it hasextended the political space for policy development across a broaderintegration canvas.

The European Union recognized theimperative to change gears on thisagenda at the conclusion of the GreekEU presidency in Thessaloniki inJune 2003. The foundations of a new approach had been set out in aEuropean Commission Communicationon Immigration, Integration, and


1 This text of this chapter was completed in April of 2005.

The Challenge of Integration in Europe 3

Employment earlier that month.Primary responsibility for action onintegration would remain at thenational and local level. Yet the Dutch Presidency, in the winter of2004, was able to secure agreement onCommon Basic Principles on integra-tion across the 25 Member States, and Justice, Freedom, and SecurityCommissioner Franco Frattini statedhis intention to develop a broaderEuropean policy framework. The ques-tion is what form the EU’s developingstrategy should take, and how assertivethe Commission can afford to be insetting the direction for Member Statesto follow.

Many Member States, particularly theoriginal EU 15, have already shiftedtheir domestic attention to the inte-gration agenda. The focus andapproach each has taken differs,reflecting contrasting views on themeaning and objectives of integrationand the strategies that should beadopted to achieve it. In some states inNorthern Europe (e.g., Denmark, theNetherlands) there has been anincreasing emphasis on programs oflanguage instruction and social orien-tation for new migrants, often with anelement of compulsion, in targetedprograms. Others (e.g., Spain, Ireland)have looked to mainstream servicesand/or civil society to provide support,or focused less on migrants’ needs thanon the barriers they face, including dis-crimination (e.g., the UK).

There is, however, some convergencein approach. In particular, there isrecognition that integration is a two-

way process, requiring adaptation bythe migrant but also by the institutionsand public of the host country, andthat to be successful it must take placein four spheres of life: economic,social, cultural, and political.

Differing views on the goals of integra-tion and appropriate strategies toachieve it, coupled with MemberStates’ insistence that decisions should,wherever possible, be taken at thenational level, not in Brussels, have inthe past inhibited the EU using theunique levers at its disposal to make aneffective contribution. The fact thatintegration is necessarily a cross-cuttingpolicy agenda, in particular engagingthe Commission directorates on Justice,Freedom, and Security and onEmployment and Social Affairs (withcommensurate committees in theEuropean Parliament) has not beenconducive to progress. The imperativeto address integration issues more effec-tively could now provide the politicalmomentum to challenge those barriers.

The aim of this chapter is, first, to iden-tify the barriers to integration and thetarget groups of any integration strategy.It considers the responsibility of thestate, migrants, and civil society in theintegration process before reviewingrecent EU developments and setting outa forward policy agenda. It looks first,however, at the nature of the challenge.

The Challenge

Net migration into Europe is increasing,and is now the largest component of

4

population change. Internal mobilitywithin the EU was also enhanced byenlargement in May 2004, includingmobility to work in those states (UK,Ireland, and Sweden) that did notimpose a transition period. SomeEuropean states have long experiencewith immigration but others, likeIreland and Spain, have become countries of immigration only withinthe last ten years. Eastern Europeanstates in particular have little experi-ence with the social and economicimpact of immigration and the needfor strategies to manage it effectively.

Migrants now come to EU MemberStates from a far wider range of coun-tries, and bring a greater diversity oflanguages and cultures than in thepast. School children in London speakmore than 200 different first languages;in a Swedish city, Malmo, Mohammedis now the most popular name for anewborn son.

Migrants also bear differing immigrationstatuses. They may enter as business orlabor migrants, on short- or long-termpermits. Alternatively, they may comeas asylum seekers and subsequentlysecure, or fail to secure, refugee status.They may enter as family members, asstudents, or within a vast array of cate-gories from minister of religion to aupair. The significance of each of theselegal categories differs across MemberStates: In one state family reunificationmay be the largest category, in anotherentry for work. Migrants’ status may,alternatively, be irregular. They mayarrive legally but work without permis-sion or overstay their visa, or their

entry itself may be illegal. Migrants’immigration status, crucially, willdetermine their right of access to work,public services, and welfare benefits.

Migrants’ legal status also determines,in part, whether they remain in the EUpermanently or reside for only a fewmonths or years. If free to travel, theymay retain strong transnational linkswith their country of origin and remitsome of their earnings to dependantswho remain there. Nevertheless, theymay not return but move on to anotherpart of Europe or elsewhere. WhereasMember States once made the mistakeof assuming that all migrants wouldeventually leave, it would now beequally mistaken to assume that all willstay. Yet those who reside temporarilyneed a level of integration, both eco-nomically and socially. An integrationstrategy needs to accommodate thesedifferent migration trajectories.

Fourteen million third-country nationals lived in the EU 15 in 2001:less than 4 percent of the population.But their concentration in particularregions and cities, their vulnerability toexclusion even after they and the sec-ond generation have become nationals,and the fact that EU nationals them-selves can face barriers to integration,make the issue more significant thanthat statistic would suggest.

While many are successful in the labormarket and enjoy positive relationswith other residents, there is substantialevidence of disadvantage and exclusion.In education, there is disproportionateunder-achievement at school, in which



poor language skills are one factor, asthey are in the disproportionate unem-ployment and underemployment inthe labor market. The employmentrate for non-EU nationals in the EU15, at 52.7 percent, is much lowerthan that of 64.4 percent for EUnationals (2001). The gap is particularlysignificant for women. In housing,migrants experience homelessness,excessive segregation in poor neigh-borhoods, and unacceptable housingconditions. Evidence suggests somemigrants’ health declines after arrival;and in local communities they canface hostility and victimization byother residents.

Patterns of disadvantage and exclusionare complex: There are substantial dif-ferences in levels of economic, social,and cultural integration between andwithin migrant communities.Integration, as Portes and Zhou amongothers have shown, can be “segment-ed.” Migrants, and the second genera-tion, can become integrated not intothe middle class but into an under-class, sharing its economic prospectsand modes of behavior. Class and geo-graphic location can thus be more sig-nificant as determinants of life chancesthan ethnicity or length of residence.Moreover, migrants and the secondgeneration can be well integrated onone index (e.g., high rates of inter-marriage) but not on others (e.g., lowrates of employment). Others canachieve success in the labor marketwhile remaining culturally distinct,maintaining the values of and solidaritywithin their ethnic group, demonstrat-ing that cultural assimilation is not

necessary for economic integration.Alternatively, migrants can become“acculturated” while no other forms ofintegration take place.

This situation translates into economicand political pressures for more effec-tive integration strategies. Europeneeds an educated, trained workforceto fill skill shortages in an evolvinglabor market. Member States cannotafford to neglect the talents ofmigrants already in the workforce and,if states are to compete for the “brightestand the best,” potential migrants mustbe confident that they will not facediscrimination and exclusion. Despitehigh levels of unemployment in partsof Europe, there are also shortages ofworkers for some low-wage jobs forwhich it is evident that migrants willcome with or without permission.Political leaders cannot allow theirpresence to lead to resentment amonglong-term residents unable to findwork. Most salient are the needs toavoid the eruption of community ten-sions into violence or increased supportfor far right parties, and the EU-wideneed to re-engage migrants whosealienation may lead to their supportfor religious and political extremism.

Integration: the Goal

All Member States would nowacknowledge that integration is a two-way process: that there is a needto address the barriers that migrantsface as well as adaptation by migrantsthemselves. This approach reflects academic analysis that has established

6

that the outcome of the integrationprocess depends on the interactionbetween factors in the host society and the characteristics of migrants. Yet states have differed markedly inthe emphasis they have placed on thetwo poles of this process. Germany, forinstance, has traditionally focused onincreasing the employability of migrantworkers by ensuring that they have theskills needed to get a job and prosper. In the UK, in contrast, while settledmigrants have had access to mainstreamemployability programs, the emphasishas been on addressing the race discrim-ination barriers faced by ethnic minorityimmigrants and subsequent generationsin employment, housing, and services.Despite continuing differences inapproach across the EU, there is never-theless some evidence of convergenceon which an EU strategy can build.

It is also significant that integration isseen as a process, not an end state.Although states are increasingly iden-tifying indices to measure progress onintegration — e.g., migrant employmentrates — with the implication thatintegration is achieved when there isparity with long-term residents, this isa reversible process. In an economicdownturn, former migrants are morelikely to be unemployed. And there isevidence that the second generation,despite having necessary languageskills and nationality status, can be lessintegrated socially than their parents’generation.

States have also differed in the empha-sis they have placed on integrationinto the labor market, or on social

integration and cultural assimilation.To avoid segmented integration, how-ever, the strategy needs to be multi-tiered to achieve:� Integration into the labor market

— and at a level matching themigrants’ qualifications and expe-rience;

� Social inclusion within the main-stream institutions and activitiesthat meet individual and societalneeds — education, health andsocial care, housing;

� Inclusion in civic life — activeparticipation in the institutionsand obligations of civic society,particularly for those remaining inthe long term; and

� “Bridging capital,” trust and goodrelations with neighbors and thewider community.

Is the concept of “inclusion” actuallymore helpful than that of integration?Many resist “integration” because ofassociations not with a two-wayprocess of mutual adaptation, but withassimilation. Inclusion, in contrast,emphasizes the responsibility of societyto open up to the excluded, and is thegoal identified for long-term residents.The EU has national action plans onsocial inclusion for the population as awhole — why not use the same termfor migrants?

Barriers to Integration

Barriers in law

A distinction in terminology mayneed to be maintained for migrants(though not the second generation)



for a significant reason: because thelevel of economic and social inclusionpermitted by law to non-nationals isless than that for nationals. Dependingon their immigration status, non-nationals can be subject to restrictionson access to jobs (or be restricted tocertain kinds of employment); onwhether family reunion is permitted;on access to public services and welfare benefits; and on the length ofresidence itself.

These legal restrictions on integration,whether in the conditions attached toimmigration status or in the rules governing access to public services andbenefits, are rarely the focus of policydebate, and their impact is under-researched. Their purpose is to protectthe public purse and jobs for the resi-dent labor force. It is arguable that themigrant who arrives in Copenhagen orDublin, who steps on to the tarmac atHeathrow or Charles de Gaulle,should not immediately be able toaccess the full range of social benefitsand public services to which long-termresidents have contributed. But statesneed to recognize that these restric-tions can be a barrier to integration,and the balance may need to bereweighed between exclusion ofmigrants from public services (to limitpublic expenditure, deter welfaretourists, and perhaps appease publicopinion) and allowing access to servic-es that promote inclusion. For aneffective integration strategy, it is thusnecessary to consider which servicesand benefits migrants should, overtime, have access to, because it is inthe interests of society — promoting

self-sufficiency and social inclusion —as well as in the interests of the migrant.

Discrimination

Second, there is the barrier of discrimi-nation — discrimination on grounds ofrace and, increasingly it appears, ofreligion. Discrimination can be overt,but is more often unintended and systemic in the way staff are recruitedand services are organized to meet theneeds of the majority. When not tunedto the differing needs of new commu-nities, lacking interpreters or materialsin minority languages, even servicesintended for migrants can fail to meettheir needs or exclude them entirely.

Discrimination is a barrier to inclusionnot just because it excludes migrantsfrom the jobs they are eager to do andthe services they need, but because ofthe resentment it fosters. Why go ontrying if you keep getting knockedback? As Trevor Phillips, Chairman ofthe Commission for Racial Equality inthe UK, said in 2004:

Feelings of resentment based ondiscrimination, or the sense ofrejection, can drive migrants intothe arms of the minority whowould like to retreat to the villageinstead of joining the world —into the arms of the people whosupport forced marriages, the folkwho will not allow their wives towork or speak English, and thepeople who will back any kind ofconduct on the ground that it isjustified by cultural difference.

Action to address discrimination canbe seen, therefore, not simply as a

8

matter of individual rights, as a sepa-rate project in a separate departmentfrom work on integration — but asone central, essential component ofthe integration agenda.

Public attitudes

The third and related barrier is publicattitudes. In some local communities,migrants are warmly received, reflecting Europe’s best traditions ofhospitality; but in others they aremet with suspicion and hostility.Such attitudes can breed discrimina-tion. But they can also lead to abreakdown in trust, tension, andeven disorder. For the migrant, nolessons in citizenship or encourage-ment to identify with the collective“we” will override a negative message from the neighbors that “you do not belong.” An integrationstrategy that focuses only on migrants and not on their neighborswill not address this powerful forcefor exclusion.

Integration: the Target

It is often assumed that an integrationstrategy need target only sections ofEurope’s migrant communities: onlythose who are from outside theEuropean Union; only those whointend to stay in the long term; or onlyrefugees. EU documents consistentlyrefer, narrowly, to “legally residentthird-country nationals” as the target,assuming that it is this legal status,rather than the experience of transna-tional mobility, that is the basis oftheir need for support.

States themselves require migrants toenter through a particular channel andacquire a label — “seasonal worker,”“refugee,” “highly skilled permit holder,”or “dependant.” They can then assumethat their needs differ, or that it is onlyworth investing in those who willremain in the long term, or thatEuropean citizens, as holders of equalrights, are by definition integratedfrom day one.

Yet we know that, even within the EU15, EU citizens exercising their freemovement rights can face languagebarriers, non-recognition of qualifica-tions, or resentment from the public.We call their arrival “mobility,” not “immigration,” but they are new-comers, facing barriers to integration,nevertheless. Their need for access tolanguage courses, social orientation,advice, and even protection fromexploitation by employers is often noless because they enjoy the status ofEU citizen. Will the EU’s integrationstrategy recognize their needs, or willthey be expected to fend for themselves?

Among third-country nationals, thosewhose residence is temporary may bethe least likely to have families towhom they can turn for support. Theymay have the fewest incentives to learnthe language or to build good relation-ships with their neighbors, while havinggreater susceptibility to exploitation.They may thus need assistance toensure that they have a level of inclu-sion matching their own, and society’s,best interests. The question ariseswhether the EU integration strategyidentifies these temporary residents as



a priority, or whether their temporarystatus, or simple budget constraints,will leave them out in the cold?

Moreover, within each category ofmigrants, women may have differentneeds from men, and the young fromthose who have greater experience inlife. This suggests that, in practice, thestrategy needs to be based on:� An understanding of the barriers

experienced by different groups ofmigrants;

� Clarity of objectives for eachgroup; and

� A portfolio of interventions, rec-ognizing that one-size-fits-all willnot deliver for this disparate groupof people any more than it wouldfor the population as a whole.

Irregular migrants

Last on the list is the most difficultgroup to mention in the context ofintegration — irregular migrants, suchas those who came legally but over-stayed their visas. It is certain that asignificant number of people are inthis position, and undoubtedly manyare doing jobs that legal residents areunwilling to do. Privately, some offi-cials acknowledge that it is unrealisticfor the authorities to detect andremove them all, and that it wouldhave damaging economic and socialconsequences if they did. Moreover,while these migrants remain, it is insociety’s interests that they have accessto essential services such as medicalcare and education for children.

There will be concern in someMember States about general

amnesties for irregular migrants. Couldthe European Commission neverthelessinitiate a dialogue among Member Stateson devising a pathway for some irregularmigrants to legal status? It could perhapsbe the kind of “earned legalization”scheme that Papademetriou advocatesas part of a broader package of meas-ures, which could bring this group ofmigrants out of exclusion withoutattracting future migrants to stay whentheir visas have expired.

Integration: Whose

Responsibility?

Whose responsibility is it to promotethe integration of migrants, other thanmigrants themselves? Increasingly, par-ticularly in Northern Europe, nationalgovernments are taking responsibilityfor devising programs, often deliveredby municipalities. Many large munici-palities, like Frankfurt and Rotterdam,already have their own programs,developed in response to evident needat the local level. Others support ini-tiatives developed outside of the publicsector.

There is a plethora of initiatives at thelocal level in operation or development,among employers, unions, communitygroups, and the public, to provide language support, mentoring, advice,access to jobs, and means of participa-tion in civic society. This suggests thatwe should see integration not as a stateresponsibility, but as a shared responsi-bility among a series of actors, includ-ing but not exclusively the migrantand the state.

10 Europe and Its Immigrants in the 21st Century

Integration Nexus: shared responsibility for

the Inclusion of new migrants© Sarah Spencer 2004

PublicFriendshipMentoringFoster senseof belonging

MigrantsLearn language

Contribute economy& community

Obey lawPay taxes

MediaBalanced reporting

Inform attitudes

UnionsAdvice &

representationProtection from

exploitationFoster relationshipswith other workers

RelativesInformation

SupportAccommodation

Language

StateLeadership / vision

Inform debateDefuse tensions

Mobilise partnersConsult

Evidence based policy Agency coordination

MainstreamMonitor

Legal rights & obligationsAccess citizenship

EmployersAccess jobs

Skills trainingLanguageInductionHousing

Inform public debate

NGOsFlexible services

AdviceOpportunity to

contributeContact with public


There is scope for debate on theresponsibilities of each player, asreflected in the diagram at left.

Migrants

The most contentious issue is perhapsthe extent to which the migrant has aresponsibility to adapt, and conse-quently the degree of adaptation it islegitimate for the host society toexpect. Few would question migrants’obligation to obey the law and to paytaxes along with other residents. Nor isit unreasonable to expect migrants,like other residents, to make everyeffort to be self-sufficient and avoidreliance on the state (and hencereliance on other taxpayers).

Beyond those requirements, it isknown that language acquisition con-siderably enhances the migrant’s prob-ability of getting a job. The questionhas thus arisen whether it is legitimateto require migrants to take languagecourses. Where there is no evidencethat migrants are unwilling to takesuch courses, this would seem premature. In some regions there arelong waiting lists for courses or theyare offered at a cost or on schedulesthat are not feasible for migrants. Itwould seem appropriate for states toensure, first, that migrants have theopportunity to study. Should there bereluctance, incentives could be consid-ered before considering sanctions fornon-attendance.

Core values

Should migrants be required to adoptthe values and norms of the host society,to assimilate rather than integrate?

Should Member States, at oneextreme, allow migrants to maintainany religious or cultural practice, or atthe other ban any practice that arousesdisapproval in any section of the public?Where should states draw the line?

Before addressing this question, it isimportant to remember that the vastmajority of migrants do not engage inextreme practices or hold valuesinconsistent with those of Europeancitizens. It has also been shown that thesecurity provided by inclusion withinan ethnic culture is a form of socialcapital that can be of both psychologicaland economic importance in enablingindividuals to overcome the isolationof the migration experience.

It is also necessary to acknowledgethat the nationals of each MemberState are themselves diverse, not onlywith regard to ethnicity and mothertongue, but also in terms of class, gender, age, religion, and other charac-teristics. Values and social norms notonly differ between groups, but haveevolved significantly in recent decadesand will continue to do so, influencedin some respects by those of migrantsthemselves.

Moreover, while the majority ofEuropeans would identify themselveswith human rights and democratic values, commitment in practice (e.g.,levels of voting) and standards of socialresponsibility (e.g., levels of criminalityand other forms of anti-social behavior)suggest that we can not hold upEuropeans per se as models to whichthird-country nationals should aspire.

12

Rather, the common principles onintegration adopted under the DutchPresidency framed the aspiration moreappropriately in affirming that everyperson resident in the EU must adhereto the basic values of the EuropeanUnion. It cites the European Treatiesand the Charter of FundamentalRights as the source of those valuesand respect for human rights and therule of law in particular.

In the UK, ministers have highlightedthe importance of human rights ascore values that can unite a diversesociety. Speaking to civil servants in1999 on the Act of Parliament thatwould bring the EuropeanConvention on Human Rights intoUK law, the then Home SecretaryJack Straw MP said:

Consider the nature of modernBritish society. It’s a societyenriched by different culturesand different faiths. It needs aformal shared understanding ofwhat is fundamentally right andfundamentally wrong if it is towork together in unity and confidence … The HumanRights Act provides that formalshared understanding.

Human rights are, in most cases, notabsolute standards. With exceptionssuch as freedom from torture, an indi-vidual’s human rights may be limitedto protect the rights of others and ofthe community as a whole, forinstance from crime. Internationalhuman rights standards set down theterms in which these restrictions areallowed and provide the most valuable

tool for determining whether, in particular circumstances, restrictionsare acceptable: the test of proportion-ality. When considering whether it islegitimate for the law to ban a particu-lar cultural or religious practice, itrequires us to consider: Is this ban toachieve a legitimate aim, and is it proportional to the harm it is designedto prevent? Human rights standards donot necessarily provide direct answersto the questions raised by culturalpractices — they do not always tell uswhether the practice is right or wrong— but they do provide a framework toresolve the conflicting rights whichthe practice has posed.

Government and municipalities

The state and its agencies at thenational and local levels are responsible,first and foremost, for leadership.They must deliver clarity of vision on the kind of society that the integration strategy is designed toachieve, while explaining to the public the rationale of the strategyand promoting an informed, balancedpublic debate. The state, particularlyat the local level, must take responsi-bility for promoting good relationsamong communities, including preparing residents for new arrivals.And it should exercise leadership inmobilizing the partners it needs incivil society to make the strategy work.

An effective strategy needs a soundevidence base. The state can conductor sponsor research, consult others, andevaluate “what works.” It can prioritizeeffective interagency coordination.And it can ensure that integration



objectives are built into its mainstreamemployment, housing, education,health, and urban renewal programs.

National governments can ensurethat post-entry immigration controlsdo not pose an unnecessary barrier tointegration, and that there is clarity(for migrants, employers, and serviceproviders) on the rights and responsi-bilities of migrants. All MemberStates have a responsibility to ensurethat there is effective anti-discrimina-tion legislation. They may also takedirect responsibility for delivery ofservices to migrants: introductory pro-grams, language and skills training,and so forth. Finally, national statesdetermine the conditions underwhich migrants may become nationalsand entitled to the rights and obliga-tions, and equality of opportunity,which citizenship status confers.

Civil society

The state’s responsibility is extensive,but the integration process happens in daily life, and here the agencies ofcivil society — employers, tradeunions, community and voluntaryorganizations, and faith groups — havekey roles to play.

Employers, for instance, do not onlyprovide employment. Some are alsoproviding language courses for newmigrants or allowing time off fromwork to attend courses off-site. Tradeunions have taken responsibility forensuring that migrants have access toinformation on health and safety andemployment rights. Their role inaddressing exploitation of low-wage

migrants by rogue employers is vital.Membership in a union is also animportant way for migrants to engagewith non-migrants in circumstanceswhere they have a common interest.

Voluntary organizations play a signifi-cant role in many countries by provid-ing services to migrants that meet theirparticular needs, from health, educa-tion, and housing to specialist adviceon immigration rules. Governmentsacknowledge that they do not them-selves always have the detailed knowl-edge of migrants’ diverse needs and thatthose needs are better met by organiza-tions and groups in this sector.

Beyond services, community and faithgroups play another key role in buildingbridges between migrants, with othermembers of their ethnic or faith group,and with the wider community. Theyprovide a means of access for govern-ments to consult migrants, and canprovide migrants with ways not only toaccess mainstream jobs and services, butalso to contribute to the community ina voluntary capacity.

Individuals in the local

community

Members of the public can offer a vitalingredient in the integration processthat no government can provide: thewelcome and understanding that canfoster a sense of belonging and security.Their openness to new people andideas, their willingness to engage inconversation and invite newcomersinto their homes, can be the mostimportant source of information andadvice to migrants on local services

14

and social norms, as it is to anyonewho moves into a new neighborhoodwithin their own country. Through afriendly neighbor, migrants can meetother members of the community, hearabout vacant jobs and accommoda-tion, learn how to register with a localdoctor, and where to leave rubbish forcollection. Neighbors, in turn, learnabout migrants and can contribute intheir conversations with others to amore informed public debate.

Media

The media has a responsibility toensure that coverage of incidentsinvolving migrants is balanced andthat information on numbers ofmigrants or data on use of services, forinstance, is accurate. In some statesthere are voluntary codes of conductproviding guidance to journalists.Governments can ensure access toaccurate information and that miscon-ceptions are actively redressed.

State of play at the EU level

The EU has long recognized that integration is a necessary part of a com-prehensive immigration and refugeestrategy; but only recently accorded itany priority. The European Commissionsought to push integration farther upthe agenda in its Communication onImmigration in 1994, and the integra-tion of third-country nationals formallyreached the agenda at the EuropeanCouncil in Tampere in 1999 as one offour themes of a new, comprehensivemigration strategy.

Primary responsibility for integrationremains at the national and local levels.

But it is now recognized that EU goals in relation to immigration, economic growth, and social cohesionall necessitate a focus on integration.The EU has no specific legal competence in relation to the inte-gration of migrants. It does, however,have competence to address manyissues central to it, including the reg-ulation of migrants’ rights post-entry(e.g., the Directive on FamilyReunification); targeted programs for ethnic minorities like Equal; andmainstream strategies on employment,social inclusion, and health.

Since the Amsterdam Treaty (1999),the EU has in particular had a mandateto require antidiscrimination legisla-tion. Directives (2000/43/EC and2000/78/EC) now require MemberStates to legislate against discriminationon grounds of race (in employment,goods, and services); to establish astatutory race body to provide assis-tance to individual victims; and to bandiscrimination in employment ongrounds of religion or belief (sinceDecember 2003).

Thessaloniki

The Justice and Home Affairs (JHA)Council in October 2002 asked theCommission to come forward withproposals for a more comprehensiveintegration strategy, and the conclu-sions of the Greek Presidency inThessaloniki in June 2003 confirmedthat, “The European Council deems itnecessary to elaborate a comprehen-sive and multidimensional policy onthe integration of legally residingthird-country nationals who should be



granted rights and obligations compa-rable to those of EU citizens.”

It was agreed at Thessaloniki that thepolicy should cover employment, eco-nomic participation, education andlanguage training, health and socialservices, housing and urban issues, aswell as culture and participation insocial life, and should take intoaccount the particularities of differentmigrants, e.g., children and refugees. Itnoted approvingly that agreement hadnow been reached on the directives onfamily reunification and long-term res-ident status, which it recognized asessential instruments for integration.

The Thessaloniki conclusions sawintegration as a “continuous, two-wayprocess based on mutual rights andcorresponding obligations of legallyresiding third-country nationals andthe host societies.” While primaryresponsibility remained that ofMember States, it argued that policiesto achieve integration should be devel-oped within a coherent Europeanframework, taking into account thelegal, political, economic, social, andcultural diversity of Member States.The development of such a frameworkwould be assisted by defining somecommon basic principles. It would alsobe necessary to share knowledge andexperiences, and to that end, therecently established group of officialsas “national contact points” on inte-gration would facilitate coordination.The Commission was invited to pres-ent an Annual Report on Migrationand Integration in Europe, mappingdata, policies, and practice, as an aid

to developing “policy initiatives formore effective management of migra-tion in Europe.” Integration was thusclearly seen as one part of a broadermigration management agenda.Finally, it was acknowledged that thesuccess of an integration policy relieson the involvement of a wide range ofactors including not only state agencies,but also trade unions, employers,NGOs, migrant organizations, andorganizations engaged in cultural,social, and sporting activities.

Commission

Communication 2003

The communication from theCommission on Immigration,Integration, and Employment hadbeen published earlier, on June 3. It set out the approach to integration,endorsed at Thessaloniki, which isnow being developed and is thereforeworth mentioning in some detail.

The communication set integrationwithin the context of both theTampere (migration) and Lisbon (economic prosperity) agendas, seeingsuccessful integration of new and settled migrants as a matter of socialcohesion and economic efficiency. Itemphasized participation: the need forstates to create the conditions inwhich it is possible for the immigrantto participate in economic, social, cul-tural, and civil life; while “immigrantsrespect the fundamental norms andvalues of the host society and partici-pate actively in the integration process,without having to relinquish their ownidentity.” The Commission foresawmigrants acquiring more rights and

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obligations depending on their lengthof residence, with integration measuresavailable to them soon after arrival. It recognized that asylum seekersmight also need integration measuresbut noted that, as migrants without theright to remain, they were outside ofthe scope of the communication. In relation to irregular migrants, whileendorsing the need for an effective policy of return, the communicationwent so far as to acknowledge that“integration policies cannot be fullysuccessful unless the issues arising fromthe presence of this group of people areadequately and reasonably addressed.”

The communication established anumber of important principles: thatthe approach should be holistic(embracing economic and social inte-gration, addressing cultural and reli-gious diversity, citizenship, and politicalrights); should reflect the varyingneeds of different categories ofmigrants; should engage a wide rangeof non-state stakeholders; and shouldrequire investment of resources. Itargued that immigrants should them-selves participate in the design andevaluation of the programs and policiesthat affect them. Significantly, itargued that while special programswere necessary in the initial phase ofintegration, in the long term it wasimportant that migrants access main-stream services, which must takeaccount of their specific needs.

In relation to integration into thelabor market, the communicationcited the need to recognize migrants’existing qualifications, to remove

unnecessary barriers such as dispropor-tional language requirements, toaddress discrimination, and to upgrademigrants’ occupational and languageskills. The goal should be to reduce byhalf the unemployment gap betweennon-nationals and nationals by 2010.Social partners needed to ensure thatmigrants receive equal pay and workingconditions, and employers that diversityin the workplace is well managed.

The communication also covered theimportance of education for languageacquisition, social orientation, andbridge-building across communities. It suggested that diversity should bereflected in the curriculum, thatschools should work closely with parents, and that problems — which itidentifies only in relation to largenumbers of immigrants concentratedin one school — should be addressed.It noted the factors that lead to housingsegregation, the lack of affordablehousing, and the barriers posed tomigrants’ sense of belonging and par-ticipation by racism and xenophobia.Regional planning strategies to addresssegregation were cited as one area forpolicy development. Access to healthand social services was a further areawhere it was suggested that existingpolicies could be adapted to addressmigrants’ particular needs. Informationfor migrants and training for serviceproviders, with migrant participationin planning services, was recommended.

Migrant participation was emphasizednot only to ensure the cultural sensitivity of services, but also as abroader path towards social mixing



and development of mutual respectacross communities. The Commissionstressed the need to ensure that thepublic has accurate information about the contributions migrants make in order to challenge negativeattitudes. Politicians and the mediashould, it suggested, set an example for civil society.

The Tampere conclusions (1999) had already endorsed the value of nat-uralization for third-country nationalsin fostering a sense of belonging andaccording important legal rights. TheCommission had itself proposed a con-cept of “civic citizenship” under whichnon-nationals would acquire a certainlevel of rights over a period of years,including some rights of participationin elections. It now saw the Charteron Fundamental Rights as central tomaking these rights a reality.

Turning to policy levers, the commu-nication proposed faster progress onpending directives, for instance onrecognition of qualifications, and fullimplementation of the directives onrace and religious discrimination. Itrecommended that Member States gobeyond the minimum and give publicbodies a duty to promote equal treat-ment. A major publicity campaign wasanticipated, focusing on employers andemployees, and an annual report published on equality and discrimina-tion in the EU.

The national contact points, mostlyofficials from Member State govern-ments, would be a means of sharinginformation and strengthening

coordination of policies at the nationallevel, while ensuring synergy withrelated EU policies on employment,social inclusion, and antidiscrimina-tion. The first priorities identified bythe Commission for the contact groupwere to identify optimal models forintroduction programs for newarrivals; extend access to languagetraining; and increase participation in civil, cultural, and political life.

In relation to the European EmploymentStrategy, the Communication urgedMember States to:� Increase migrants’ access to train-

ing and employment services toreduce unemployment;

� Develop a mix of sanctions andpreventative measures to tackleundeclared labor;

� Monitor the needs of the labormarket and the role of immigra-tion within it;

� Share information on good practice; and

� Implement a series of other meas-ures including fast-track languagetraining for professionals.

Member States have also been requiredsince 2001 to report on NationalAction Plans for Social Inclusion, andthe Commission asked that subsequentreports on measures to promote thesocial integration of individuals at particular risk of exclusion should paygreater attention to immigrants.

In addition to the existing EuropeanRefugee Fund, 12 million Euros overthree years would fund pilot projects(“INTI” projects) on sharing information

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and good practice in order to developgreater consistency of practice acrossthe EU. Separately, the Commission isexploring the potential for developinga series of indicators for measuringintegration, for comparative purposes,as part of an action plan for the collec-tion and analysis of community statis-tics in the migration field.

Progress in 2004

The Commission’s first, brief annualreport on migration and integration waspublished in July 2004. Summarizingmigration trends and evidence on fiscaland labor market impacts, the report onintegration was drawn from the nationalcontact points and from the NationalAction Plans on Employment and onSocial Inclusion. In those plans, theCommission found greater prioritybeing accorded to integration issues.However, at EU and national levels, in some major policy fields the main-streaming of integration issues remainedslow. At the national level, in relationto employment, it found limited partici-pation by social partners, and scantevaluation of the effectiveness of policieson the ground. Many occupationsremain restricted to nationals. Provisionof language tuition for new arrivals wasincreasing, as had provision of civiceducation (or “social orientation”).

The report found that many MemberStates had little analysis of the reasonswhy immigrants are particularly at riskof poverty and exclusion, and wereexperiencing difficulties addressing res-idential segregation and poor housing.Action on discrimination and racismwas often not connected to strategies

on integration, and it had been mademore difficult by negative stereotypingof migrants in the media and the risein support for the far right.

The Commission found it “difficult toassess whether there has been progressin developing comprehensive integra-tion strategies at a national level,”while acknowledging the increase inspecific measures and at least awarenessof the importance of including immigra-tion objectives in mainstream policiesand programs. Gender considerationshad not yet been taken on board, inpolicy or data. Nor had the directiveson discrimination been transposed intonational legislation in some MemberStates, a situation on which theCommission intended to act.

The national contact points wereengaged in developing a handbook forpractitioners and policymakers andthis was duly published later in theyear. It covers good practice on intro-duction programs, civic participation,and indicators for measuring progress.

The report stressed the importance ofdeveloping networks for dialogue withmigrant organizations, and emphasizedthat it would monitor the legal frame-work of rights accorded to migrantswithin Member States. It would alsotake forward the proposals to establisha set of common principles on integra-tion as the basis for subsequently iden-tifying common objectives across thepolicy fields. It foresaw the nationalcontact points playing a significant rolein these subsequent developments. Butthe Commission would also consider



the need for a more formal basis for theexchange of information on integrationalongside the existing EU mechanismson employment and inclusion.

Finally, the annual report stated thatthe Commission’s budget for 2007-2013would provide specific support for acommon policy on immigration, includ-ing incentives to Member States to promote integration, but without furtherclarity on what form this provisionmight take. (In practice, it may proveappropriate to bring the Refugee Fundinto a broader integration fund in orderto help overcome the institutional barriers between provision for refugeesand that for other immigrants whoseneeds are, in many respects, the same).

There are also mainstream fundingstreams such as the European SocialFund which in 2000-2006, for instance,will spend one-fifth of its budget pro-moting equal opportunities in thelabor market, with some funds directedspecifically at migrants. This is alsotrue of the Socrates education program,the program supporting vocationaltraining, and the EntrepreneurshipAction Plan. This demonstrates theimportance of mainstreaming relativeto targeted initiatives that cannotattract equivalent funding.

Common Basic Principles

The Dutch Presidency (July-December2004) subsequently gave considerablepriority to progress on the integrationagenda, arguing that, “The long termwell-being of many of our societies is

probably more contingent upon solvingthe immigration and inter-group rela-tions puzzle than some of us mayacknowledge publicly.”

Its goal was not to harmonize policiesacross the EU, but to reach agreementon the key elements of the commonEU framework that Thessaloniki hadendorsed. Its achievement was agreement by all 25 Member Stateson Common Basic Principles forimmigrant integration policy at theEU Justice and Home Affairs Councilin November 2004.2 The preamble tothe Common Basic Principles estab-lishes the rationale for action at theEU level by stating that, “The failureof an individual Member State todevelop and implement a successfulintegration policy can have in differ-ent ways adverse implications forother Member States and theEuropean Union.”

It cites the potential impact of this failure on the economy, on fulfillmentof international human rights obliga-tions, and on tensions within society.The preamble suggests, on this basis,that it is in the common interest of allMember States that each is encouragedto pursue effective integration strategies.

The Common Basic Principles arenon-binding but intended to provideguidance on developing goals and priorities and on measuring progress,both for states with experience withimmigration as well as for those whichhave only recently become migrant

2 Council of the European Union Document 14615/04, 19 November 2004.

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destinations. They are also intended“to assist the Council to reflect uponand, over time, agree on EU-levelmechanisms and policies needed tosupport national and local-level integration policy efforts, particularlythrough EU-wide learning and knowledge-sharing.”

This is clearly seen as a first steptowards greater EU intervention inensuring that adequate steps are takenin each Member State to promoteintegration, in the interests of the EU as a whole.

The eleven principles adopted aftermuch debate largely reflect the holisticapproach the Commission had takenin its earlier communication: thatintegration is a two-way, multi-dimen-sional process of mutual accommoda-tion, with recognition of the need forhost societies to remove the barriers tointegration, including discrimination;and a process that must respect therights of migrants as well as their obligations. The Common BasicPrinciples emphasize the importance ofemployment, language acquisition,education, living environment, oppor-tunities for social mixing, and migrantparticipation in decision-making. Theyassert that everybody in the EU must“adhere closely to the basic values ofthe EU,” not only migrants, and thatthe practice of diverse cultures andreligions are guaranteed by the Charterof Fundamental Rights and must besafeguarded unless particular practicesconflict with other inviolable Europeanrights or with national law. Referenceis made, in that context, to the freedom

of women to choose whether to practicea particular religion. The CommonBasic Principles emphasize the impor-tance of mainstreaming integrationmeasures into all relevant policy portfo-lios. They stress the value of engagingnon-state actors and of coordinatingtheir contributions. Looking ahead,they talk of developing clear goals and indicators at the EU level andevaluation mechanisms to learn fromexperience and from each other.

The Common Basic Principles are less comprehensive than the earlierCommission communication and theirunderstanding of integration lessnuanced: They imply, for instance, thatintegration is a uni-directional processthat will reach completion. Temporaryand irregular migrants are not includedwithin the target group. An inclusive,positive vision gives way, in places, to amore negative tone (references to “law-abiding” immigrants and “migrantyouth delinquency”), with somewhatgreater emphasis on migrants’ responsi-bility to integrate than on the responsi-bility of the receiving society to provideopportunities for them to do so. Thegoal is to overcome a deficit of migrantintegration rather than to build a morecohesive, inclusive society. The strengthof the Common Basic Principles, how-ever, is in adding the endorsement ofall Member States to a holistic integra-tion strategy that focuses not only onmigrants, but also on dismantling thebarriers to integration that they face.

The Dutch Presidency brought thegovernment ministers responsible forintegration together for the first time.



At a conference in Groningen, focusing on introductory programs and on measures relating to youth, itwas evident that Member States wouldvalue greater coordination and infor-mation-sharing but did not agree onthe extent to which the EU shouldtake the lead or have significant financial responsibility. While somesupported the creation of a EuropeanFund for Integration, others thought allfunding for integration should remainwithin the competence of MemberStates. They did ask that the EuropeanCommission, with the national contactpoints, create a dedicated website onintegration to provide access to infor-mation on good practices in and beyondMember States.

The European Council in earlyNovember 2004 approved theCommon Basic Principles in its forward agenda for the EU, “TheHague Program.” Adopted at a time of heightened awareness of securityissues, the Hague Program situatesintegration within the security and justice issues on the EU agenda.Throughout the program there is asense of urgency about implementa-tion, outcomes, and evaluation. Onintegration, it reiterates the need forgreater coordination of national poli-cies and EU initiatives and states that“a framework, based on these commonbasic principles, will form the founda-tion for future initiatives in the EU,relying on clear goals and means ofevaluation.” The establishment of thededicated integration website that theministers had proposed would supportthe exchange of information.

After his appointment as Commissionerfor Justice and Home Affairs, FrancoFrattini announced that he wouldlaunch a communication on a coherentframework for integration during 2005to implement the integration dimensionof the Hague Program; this communi-cation was released in September 2005.

Conclusion and Way

Forward

The alienation of a small minority ofimmigrants, and evidence of broadereconomic and social exclusion, hasforced the issue of integration on tothe EU’s agenda. On each index ofintegration — employment, education,health, living standards, civic partici-pation, and community relations —migrants are often disproportionatelydisadvantaged even in the second andthird generations. The strong focus onintegration could now provide themomentum for addressing the barriersfaced by migrants. But public concern,some open hostility, and support forthe far right, have set up a politicalCatch-22: Integration measures areneeded yet the allocation of resourcesto services that migrants need can becontentious when resources for thepopulation as a whole are limited.

Member States recognize that migrationwill be a continuing and evolving feature of Europe’s future and that theintegration of migrants requires policyintervention. The need to ensuresocial cohesion is matched by the needto ensure the integration of migrantsinto Europe’s labor markets, in which

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their skills and labor will continue tobe essential to its prosperity. Even inthose states with long experience withimmigration, integration measures arelimited and have not been based on acomprehensive understanding of thebarriers to integration. States have differed in the extent to which theyhave focused on foreigners or ethnicminorities, on newcomers or secondgeneration, on economic integrationor cultural assimilation. In addition, inthe northern, southern, and easternregions of Europe, states have differedin the extent to which there is anexpectation that the state or civil society will take responsibility for inte-gration initiatives. There are signs ofsome convergence, but huge differencesremain in emphasis and approach.

The Greek and Dutch presidencies ofthe EU in 2003-2004 oversaw progresstowards acceptance by Member Statesthat the EU has a role to play inadvancing the integration agenda,even while primary responsibilityremains at the national and local levels. It is accepted that there should be a common framework forintegration policies and the first step,a document on Common BasicPrinciples, has been agreed upon.

Despite a heavy emphasis within some states on the perceived failure of migrants to adapt, and elements of compulsion in language and social orientation programs, Member Stateshave signed up to a more balanced,multi-dimensional analysis. There is, moreover, agreement on someconcrete steps:

� Implementation of anti-discrimina-tion legislation (albeit contentiousin practice in some states);

� Mainstreaming of integration intothe EU employment and socialinclusion strategies;

� Sharing of good practice throughnational contact points, with fur-ther editions of the handbook anda dedicated website; and

� A small budget for pilot initiativeswith potentially a more significantbudget from 2007, and

� An annual report on integrationto monitor progress.

The next step is thus to take the existing agenda forward, and for theCommission to act in those areaswhere it has a clear mandate, forinstance in enforcing the discrimina-tion directives.

Cross-cutting governance

arrangements

The Commission will need to devel-op a stronger basis for cooperationacross directorates for this quintes-sential cross-cutting agenda. This isparticularly important betweenJustice, Freedom and Security(known as “JLS,” formerly Justice andHome Affairs) which leads on migra-tion, integration, and fundamentalrights, and Employment and SocialAffairs, which leads on employment,social inclusion, and discrimination.It is no secret that differences ofemphasis exist between these twodirectorates, and that each insiststhat it should lead on integration.This has made agreement on a common agenda a difficult process.



It remains unclear how the Commissioncan develop a consistent integrationstrategy mainstreamed across policyfields unless this division is overcome.At the national level there is equally achallenge for ministers responsible forintegration, wherever located, to ensurethat this issue is given some prioritywithin the departments that lead onemployment, education, health, inter-national development (for cooperationwith source countries), and other crucialpolicy areas. Mechanisms are thusneeded for dialogue with stakeholderswithin and across governments, andwithin the Commission, not only tosecure cooperation in mainstreamingintegration objectives across policyportfolios, but also to develop a common understanding of the strategy’smultiple objectives.

Mainstreaming

Integration objectives need to be builtinto all of the Commission’s relevantmainstream programs and budgets, ashas already begun in employment andsocial inclusion. There is more capacityin those programs to achieve change,not least those requiring regularreporting on national action plans,than in any additional projects targetedonly at the migrant community.Targets and performance indicatorsrequired in the guidelines of theaction plans should specifically requirereporting on indices that measure theinclusion of immigrants alongsidethose of the rest of the population.Where relevant, data reported shouldreflect gender, and not mask differencesbetween and within the main immi-grant communities.

The Commission could carry out areview to identify which Communitypolicies, programs, budgets, and policylevers are most relevant to integration,to inform its mainstreaming approach.It could also lead by example, reviewingits own staffing procedures to increasethe number of ethnic minority staff atall levels — both to ensure equalopportunities and to guarantee thatpolicymaking benefits from their expe-rience. It could reconsider the bar onemployment of resident third-countrynationals, while encouraging a reviewwithin Member States of the impact ofoccupational barriers to non-nationals.

Research, monitoring,

and evaluation

There is a role for the Commission indeveloping a broader evidence base forintegration policies, through research,monitoring, and evaluation. The factthat we know that language proficiencyhas a significant, measurable impact onlabor-market performance, for instance,is a powerful reason for providingaccess to language classes. But we donot have an equal understanding of theimpact of other integration policylevers. An approach that “works” inone Member State may not be entirelysuitable for another, but it may offerinsights from which others can learn. The Commission is committed to dis-seminating information on good prac-tice through its proposed dedicatedwebsite. What constitutes “good prac-tice,” however, depends on criteria formeasuring outcomes, and the evaluationitself should be conducted with inde-pendence and rigor. The work beingcarried out to identify indicators to

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measure national progress is valuable,but the Commission could also ensurethat resources and guidance are avail-able to monitor and evaluate individualprograms according to agreed-upon cri-teria that would make comparisonwith programs in other Member Statesmore meaningful.

Research is also needed on the barriersto integration within and beyond thelabor market. Results should be dis-seminated in a form accessible to poli-cymakers to address assumptions andmisconceptions on which policy initia-tives can otherwise be based.

Review legal controls

It is recognized that admission policieshave an impact on the capacity to inte-grate, but little attention has been paidto the impact of post-entry controls onmigrants’ access to jobs, services, andparticipation. At the EU and nationallevels, there is a need to review theimpact of immigration controls toensure that those restrictions thatremain are no more than necessary toachieve competing objectives. Therights and responsibilities accorded tomigrants should reflect their temporaryor permanent status, with maximumpossible access to the rights that pro-mote integration — including work,family reunification, public services,and participation in the democraticsystem. Understanding the impact ofthese controls — for instance on thelifestyle of male migrant workers notpermitted family reunification, or theimplications of permits that tie themigrant to a named employer — couldbe a further topic of research.

The Commission could also endeavorto give substance to the notion of civiccitizenship by developing a frameworkof minimum civil, political, social, andeconomic rights and responsibilitiesthat apply to all migrants within theEU, some on arrival and others afteran agreed-upon residence period. Itcan, and has given, substance to someof these rights through directives suchas that on family reunification and therights of third-country nationalmigrant workers.

In developing a framework of minimumrights, the Commission should at leastinitiate a debate on the position ofirregular migrants who, regardless oflegal status, have some civil rights.Moreover, excluding irregular migrantsfrom basic health care, or their childrenfrom education, has social conse-quences which should be taken intoaccount. Some Member States (e.g.,Italy) protect the access of irregularmigrants at least to emergency healthcare. The Commission could initiateresearch on the impact of this approachin order to inform policy development.

Tackle discrimination

On discrimination, the Commission hasthe authority to monitor implementa-tion of the directives and to takeaction against any of the 25 MemberStates that fail to give them force indomestic law, including the establish-ment of a specialized “race” body to promote compliance. The Commissionmay need to be tough on MemberStates that drag their feet. Migrantswho are treated unfairly on grounds ofrace or religion, denied the opportunity



to prosper and participate, will neverfeel the sense of belonging and commit-ment to their new country which inte-gration programs, however well designed,cannot deliver. In practice, discrimina-tion legislation is itself only the firststep: Subsequent action is needed toensure that employers (and in the caseof race, service providers) have theknowledge and incentive to comply.

The Commission suggested in its communication that Member Statescould go beyond minimal complianceand put a statutory duty on publicbodies to promote equality. TheCouncil of Europe has recommendedthis to its broader European membershipsince 2003.3 The UK is currentlyimplementing this for race, and thisnew approach has shifted the debatefrom an emphasis on victims and litigation to a focus on outcomes.Are ethnic minorities securing accessto jobs and services, and achievingeducation, employment, and healthoutcomes, in the same way as the restof the population? By requiring publicbodies, from health and educationproviders to the police and housingauthorities, to identify barriers toequality in their services and takesteps to deliver change, the new law is taking equality from the marginstowards the mainstream of each organization’s service planning. TheCommission could play a role in ensur-ing that this and broader experiencein implementing discrimination legis-lation is shared among policymakers,

social partners, specialized bodies,NGOs, and migrant organizations.

EU law currently requires protectionfrom racial discrimination in employ-ment and services, but only in employ-ment if discrimination is on grounds ofreligion or belief. Given current levelsof hostility towards Muslims, we mayexpect to find evidence of discrimina-tion in services on grounds of religion,for instance by landlords or educationproviders. In parts of Europe, e.g.,Northern Ireland, discrimination ongrounds of religion has been wellproven. The Commission could ensurethat research evidence on currentexperiences with religious discrimina-tion is collated and, if necessary, newresearch undertaken, with a view toextending the Directive on religiousdiscrimination in employment to covergoods and services. If the desired out-come is for religious minorities to feeland be included, an effective integra-tion strategy should ensure that theyare not treated less favorably whenseeking access to housing, health, oreducation services.

Information and advice

to migrants

Member States are increasingly seeingthe need to provide migrants withinformation on their rights andresponsibilities, on the practicalities oflife such as finding a local doctor andopening a bank account, and on socialexpectations for behavior. The manualfor new members of Danish society, for

3 ECRI General Policy Recommendation No 7 on National Legislation to Combat Racism and RacialDiscrimination adopted on 13 December 2002. CRI (2003) 8.

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instance, in addition to practical information, advises migrants not totake offense if a colleague’s use of ironyin humor seems rude.

Migrants may fail to take up essentialservices if they do not know that theyare entitled to use them, e.g., to registerwith a local doctor. Equally, tensionscan be caused by inflated expectationsof a service or by lack of knowledge ofsocial expectations.

Recognizing the need for this informa-tion does not, however, necessarilytranslate into a political priority to allocate resources to provide it. Thiscan be exacerbated where integration isthe responsibility of a department thatcurrently has significant competingclaims on resources, e.g., for dealingwith crime and national security. TheEU could help to overcome this with itsdedicated integration budget, for whichone category of expenditure could beinformation and advice provision fornew arrivals.

Migrants need access to independentadvice so that they can access the oppor-tunities that are open to them and avoidexploitation, for example, by unscrupu-lous employers or landlords. Evidencesuggests that many do not join tradeunions in the early period after arrival,and rely for advice on migrant commu-nity organizations that may not be wellequipped to provide the information andadvice needed. Language barriers mayinhibit migrants seeking advice else-where, so that increasing the capacity ofmigrant organizations as a first port ofcall may be one way forward.

Mobilization of civil society

It is agreed that there is a need for dialogue to inform, engage, and mobi-lize civil society partners in the inte-gration process. While for governmentsthe agencies in civil society are anunder-utilized resource, they are alsoan important counterweight to a state-driven agenda tending to focustoo narrowly on language and employa-bility. Integration happens at the locallevel and it is local employers, tradeunions, and voluntary and communityorganizations that, along with familiesand neighbors, will be central to theintegration process, whether govern-ments engage them within a formalstrategy or not.

The social partners are, however, onlyvaguely aware of the key role they playand the responsibility they share for itssuccess or failure. They are, with otherplayers in civil society such as faithgroups and community organizations,scarcely recognized as partners in theintegration process. Discussions couldbe initiated at an early stage to establishwhat would be the most effectivemeans to develop and disseminateideas on the roles that these partnerscould play and to monitor their impact.

The question arises whether theEuropean Commission itself can contribute directly to this exercise, orshould provide a framework of ideas,guidance, and funding to enable it tohappen. This could be a topic thenational contact points include intheir agenda for policy developmentand guidance in 2006. If local partnersare to play a significant role, they will



also need to have a voice in policydevelopment. Eurocities, a network oflarge cities in Europe, recently calledfor an explicit partnership on integra-tion and a role in policy design.

Build bridges across communities

There are many examples of local initiatives to build bridges betweenmigrants and their neighbors, bringingpeople together in circumstances inwhich they develop shared interests,common understanding, and positiverelations. Neighborhood welcomingcommittees, mentoring, and engagingmigrants as volunteers in communityprojects are some of the schemes thathave delivered results. Yet there is littlecoordination within or across MemberStates and scant evaluation or sharedlearning. Nor are there ample resourcesto enable such initiatives to be devel-oped in all of the areas where they aremost needed.

Public hostility can reflect racism orxenophobia. It can also reflect fearsabout competition for jobs or publicservices, or personal security, and suchfears need to be addressed. Wheregood practice exists, it has often beeninitiated by community organizationsor municipalities in response to animmediate local need. The Commissioncould encourage such initiatives bymaking available matching funds, bydisseminating information on successfulinitiatives on the proposed integrationwebsite, and by suggesting that theseinitiatives have some priority withinthe work program of the national contact points. Major questions, suchas ways in which faith groups can play

a significant role in building bridgesacross communities, need to be the focusof research, to put more information and analysis into the public domain.

Understanding and acceptance

of human rights standards

The Common Basic Principles assertthat all those in Europe need to adhereto some unifying common values. EachMember State is a signatory to theEuropean Convention on HumanRights (ECHR), which not only setsdown minimum standards on how thestate treats people within its borders butalso provides an ethical code for howwe treat each other. The conventionteaches respect for privacy, equality,and family life, while challengingintolerance and degrading treatment.The Charter of Fundamental Rightsbuilds on those standards. The EUpublic does not, in its diversity, needto agree on everything. There washuge diversity of values in Europebefore post-war migration added tothat cultural mix. But Europe needs acommon code that overrides unaccept-able extremes. The ECHR and broaderinternational human rights standardsprovide that, and the EU needs toconsider what steps should be taken to promote understanding andacceptance of those standards amongpeople and institutions.

Where states have established HumanRights Commissions or equality com-missions with a broader human rightsmandate, those institutions can play asignificant role in raising awareness (aprocess in which the Council ofEurope should continue to play an

28

important part). At the EU level, the European Monitoring Center onRacism and Xenophobia is to be developed into a broader human rightsagency that could be given a role inbuilding awareness and understandingof human rights, as well as of monitor-ing abuse. There is a place here, too,for interfaith dialogue to clarify thebroad areas of agreement on funda-mental values and those areas wherediffering interpretations among themajority or a minority within a faithgroup, need to be resolved.

Public debate

Bridge-building initiatives, and human-rights awareness, could be part of awider attempt to foster a more positive,balanced public debate. There is anurgent need for leadership of thatdebate at the EU, national, and locallevels by politicians who could help toensure that the public has accurateinformation, presented in a way thatbuilds confidence in migration management and addresses misinforma-tion and misconceptions. The publichas had little explanation of therationale for migration policies and hasnot accepted that migration is a neces-sary part of Europe’s future and that itcan bring benefits. There is little recog-nition by Member States of their immi-gration history and the lessons that canbe learned from it, for instance throughsupport for immigration museums. TheCommission framework could addressthe terms in which national and localgovernments could help bring the factsabout migration into the public domain,explain the rationale for policies, andavoid contributing to negative media

coverage. The Commission could itselfmake public EU-wide data.

If the Commission were to embraceand implement this broad integrationagenda, its role would develop fromthat of legislator, regulator, and monitor, to one of leader and mobilizer,under the watchful eye of MemberStates and the European Parliament.The urgency of this agenda, and thevalue in developing a common framework that encompasses labormarket, social, cultural, and politicalengagement, suggests that the EuropeanCommission should be encouragedand given the resources to do so.

The danger inherent in an EU-ledapproach is that it develops as a top-down strategy. Integration happensat the local level. Moreover, it is notsomething that is done to migrants,but a process in which they are butone significant player. The EU canprovide a framework, legal minimumstandards, and resources. It can help to mobilize the stakeholders. But theCommission and Member States mustensure that the voices of migrants andof agencies at the local level are heardwhen the goals and policy levers of the integration process are chosen.Migrants will be a permanent part ofEurope’s future and, in the final analysis, new residents and old willneed to negotiate their future together.



References

Cabinet Office. Ethnic Minorities in the LabourMarket. Final Report, Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit, 2003.

European Commission. Communication onImmigration, Integration, and Employment, COM (2003) 336 final, 2003.

European Commission. Handbook on Integration for Policy-Makers and Practitioners. 2004,http://europa.eu.int/comm/justice_home/.

European Commission. First Annual Report onMigration and Integration, COM (2004) 508 final, 2004.

European Policy Centre/King BaudouinFoundation. Beyond the Common Basic Principles on Integration: The Next Steps,Issue Paper 27, April 6, 2005.

EU Presidency Conclusions Thessaloniki EuropeanCouncil June 2003. Council of the EU, Brussels, October 1, 2003. 11638/03.Polgen 55, 2003.

Frazer, H. “The National Action Plans on Povertyand Social Exclusion and Provision for Migrants.” Presentation at the IrishPresidency Conference “Reconciling Mobility and Social Inclusion: The Role ofEmployment and Social Policy.” Bundoran, April 1, 2004.

Parekh, B. Rethinking Multiculturalism, CulturalDiversity and Political Theory. London: MacMillan, 2000.

Portes, A. and M. Zhou. “The New SecondGeneration: Segmented Assimilation and its Variants.” ANNALS, AAPSS, 530,November 1993.

Rudiger, A. and S. Spencer. “Social Integration ofImmigrants and Ethnic Minorities.” Presentation and paper to the OECD/EuropeanCommission conference on The Economic and Social Aspects of Migration,Brussels, January 21-22, 2003, http://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/about/publica-tions/Sarah/OECDpaper03.pdf.

Spencer, S. and A. di Mattia. “Introductory Programmes and Initiatives forNew Migrants,” Paper for the MinisterialConference on Integration, Groningen, November 2004,http://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/publications/Integration%20report%20summary.html.

Weil, P. and J. Crowley. “Integration in Theoryand Practice: A comparison of France and Britain.” In Migration and Social Cohesion,edited by S. Vertovec. United Kingdom/United States: Edward Elgar, 1999.

Integration Processes of

Migrants : Research

Findings and Policy Lessons

Rinus Penninx

32

Immigrant integration is now ahotly debated topic across Europe,but the history and nature of these

discussions differ from country tocountry. In some states, the debatestarted as a reaction to the perceivedfailure of integration policies. InSweden and the Netherlands, forexample, longstanding integrationpolicies have come under fire in apolitically polarized climate. In othernorthwestern European countries,however, the topic of immigrantsbecame politicized much earlier, preventing even the establishment of integration policies. Germany, forexample, only recently reached a political compromise on a new law on immigration and integration.

This ambiguous stance of mostEuropean countries on integration policies is reflected at the EuropeanUnion (EU) level, where attempts toestablish such policies are quite recent.This relative newness comes despite alonger history of trying to frame a common immigration policy thatreaches back to the Amsterdam Treatyof 1997, which laid the legal founda-tion for a harmonization of asylum andcommunitarian immigration policies inthe EU. Later, the Tampere Summit in1999 developed a political program and work plan to gradually build a harmonized, common immigration policy. The Communication on aCommunity Immigration Policy(November 22, 2000) set the frameworkfor such policies, and in the first four

years since the enactment of theAmsterdam Treaty, twenty-three binding regulations have been accepted.Eleven of these relate to borders andvisas, six to illegal immigration andexpulsion, five to asylum, and one tolegal migration.1 The topics reflect the still-dominant preoccupation withrestrictive and control-oriented migration regulation at the EU level.

It is exactly this ambivalent attitude of European countries towards immigration that makes integrationpolicies problematic. In contrast withclassical immigration countries likeCanada, Australia, and the UnitedStates, European states do not regardthemselves as immigrant receivers,despite the large numbers crossingtheir borders. That is why integrationhas appeared as a topic on the EUagenda only since the Communicationon Immigration, Integration andEmployment was published on June 3,2003. Under the EU’s Greek Presidencyat the Thessaloniki Summit of June2003, this document was accepted as abasis for developing an EU-wide inte-gration policy. It was not, however,conceived as a communitarian policy.Instead it was a “Third Pillar” policy,meaning that any common initiativecan only be implemented by the unanimous decision of the Council ofMinisters. A further step towards sucha consensus-driven policy was recentlytaken at the Ministerial Conferenceresponsible for integration under theDutch Presidency, where eleven


1 C.A. Groenendijk and P.E. Minderhoud, “De Nederlandse invloed op nieuwe Europese regels betreffende migratieen asyl,” in Immigratie en asiel in Europa. Een lange web naar gemeenschappelijkheid, ed. W.A. Brusse, D. Broeders,and R. Griffith (Utrecht: Lemma BV, 2004), 137-162; J. Niessen, Five years of EU migration and asylum policymaking under the Amsterdam and Tampere mandates (Brussels: MPG, 2004).

Integration Processes of Migrants: Research Findings and Policy Lessons 33

common basic principles for integrationpolicies were discussed and accepted.

The topic of integration processes and policies has thus been neglectedin the past, but it is now on its way tothe top of the political agenda at thelocal, national, and EU levels. Thischapter will develop a conceptualframework and draw lessons from pastexperiences. The groundwork will belaid by making basic observations onthe logic of integration processesthen on the often distinct logic ofpolicymaking and implementation.This will be followed by exploringanswers to these questions: if we havea sound knowledge of integrationprocesses, and if we have managed to formulate adequate policies to steer these processes, who must implement policies and at what level? Furthermore, how do policies at the local, national, and EU levelsrelate to one another?

Finally, this chapter will examine what strategies can or should befollowed in implementing policies tobe successful and draw conclusionsabout the kinds of fundamentalsinvolved in integration policies andwhich dilemmas should be solved.

The Logic of Integration

The moment immigrants settle in a country, they have to acquire aplace in that new society. This is truenot only for physical needs such ashousing, but also in the social and cultural sense.

Integration is the process by whichimmigrants become accepted into society, both as individuals and asgroups. This definition of integrationis deliberately left open, because theparticular requirements for acceptanceby a receiving society vary greatly fromcountry to country. The openness ofthis definition also reflects the factthat the responsibility for integrationrests not with one particular group, butrather with many actors — immigrantsthemselves, the host government,institutions, and communities, toname a few.

There are two parties involved in integration processes: the immigrants,with their characteristics, efforts andadaptation, and the receiving society,with its interactions with these newcomers and their institutions. It isthe interaction between the two thatdetermines the direction and the ultimate outcome of the integrationprocess. These two, however, areunequal partners. The receiving society, in terms of its institutionalstructure and the way it reacts to newcomers, has much more say in theoutcome of the process.

The process of integration of immigrants is thus not — as is oftensupposed — only taking place at thelevel of the individual immigrant, whoseintegration is then measured in termsof housing, employment, education,and social and cultural adaptation tothe new society. It also takes place atthe collective level of the immigrantgroup. Organizations of immigrants arethe expression of mobilized resources

34

and ambitions and also at this level, mechanisms of the integrationprocess apply.

In addition, there is the level of institu-tions, which come in two broad types.The first are general public institutionsof receiving societies or cities, such asthe education system or institutionalarrangements in the labor market.Laws, regulations, and executiveorganizations, along with unwrittenrules and practices, are part of suchinstitutions. These, however, may hinder access or equal outcome fornewcomers, or even completelyexclude them. The functioning ofthese general public institutions (andthe possible adjustment of them inview of growing diversity) is thus ofparamount importance. It is on thislevel that integration and exclusionare mirrored concepts.

The second kind of institutionbelongs to specific types of immigrantgroups themselves, such as religious orcultural institutions. These specificinstitutions and their possible integration can be viewed in the sameway as immigrant organizations: theymay become an accepted part of societyon the same level as comparable institutions of native groups, or theymay isolate themselves or remainunrecognized and excluded.

The mechanisms working at the individual, group, and institutional lev-els are different, but the results on eachof these levels are clearly interrelated.Institutional arrangements determinethe opportunities and scope for action

of organizations. Institutions andorganizations together create the struc-ture of opportunities and/or limitationsfor individuals. Conversely, individualsmay mobilize and change the landscapeof organizations and ultimately evencontribute to significant changes ininstitutional arrangements.

The interconnectedness of integrationprocesses on different levels can beillustrated by comparing TurkishMuslims in the Netherlands to those inGermany. These immigrants came inthe same period, for the same reasons,and with roughly the same characteris-tics, but policy reactions to Islam andthe Turkish group differed markedly inthe two countries. The Netherlandsintroduced an “ethnic minorities policy”in the early 1980s, which impliedamong other things an official recogni-tion of Islam on the same footing asother religions. This opened opportuni-ties for its public manifestation. It alsoentailed recognition of organizations aspotential partners in integration policies, including religious ones. Inturn, this implied ongoing relationsand negotiations between these organi-zations and authorities both for thepublic regulation of specific Muslimactivities in the Netherlands (mosquebuilding, the public call to prayer,Islamic public broadcasting, state-fundedIslamic schools, etc.) and for integra-tion activities by Islamic organizationsfor their rank and file. In contrast,Germany, with some local-level excep-tions, has been much less engaging.

The result of these diverging policiesrelating to specific institutional



arrangements for Islam and to Islamicorganizations is that on the individuallevel, attitudes towards the receivingcountry and towards integration, particularly as measured among youngand second-generation Turks, seem todiffer markedly in the two countries.Some research in Germany foundinward-oriented and even fundamen-talist attitudes among Turkish youngsters on a large scale. In theNetherlands, in contrast, researchersfound a much more positive attitudetowards integration, involvement,and participation, particularly in localsociety. This goes together with morecritical and independent views ofyoungsters on established Islamicumbrella organizations.2

One final, critically importantelement of the logic of integrationprocesses is the time factor. Integrationof newcomers is a long-term process.At the individual level, an adult immigrant may adapt, learning howthings are done, by whom, etc., for the pragmatic purpose of earning immediate rewards. However, individualfeelings and likings, as well as theirevaluations of right and wrong, arepersistent within an individual’s lifetime. This is a general rule for

mankind, but it becomes more evidentin those who change environmentsthrough migration.

Generally speaking, the descendants of this “first generation” of migrantsdiffer from their elders in this respect.Through primary relations within theirfamily and other immigrants, they arefamiliarized with the immigrant community, and possibly with its rootselsewhere. At the same time, however,they become thoroughly acquaintedwith the culture and language of thereceiving society through informalcontacts. These occur in the neighborhood starting in early childhood, and further contacts takeplace through participation in generalinstitutions, primarily the school system. If such a double process ofsocialization takes place under favorableconditions (in which policies play amajor role), this second generationdevelops a way of life in which theycombine the roles, identities, and loyalties of these different worlds andsituations. They accomplish this balancing act in many different ways,which makes for more and more differentiation within the originalimmigrant group. At the group level,this means that the litmus test for

2 K. Canatan et al., De maatschappelijke rol van de Rotterdamse moskeeën (Rotterdam: COS, 2003); J. Doomernik,Turkse moskeeën en maatschappelijke participatie: De institutionalisering van de Turkse islam in Nederland en de DuitseBondsrepubliek, (Amsterdam: Instituut voor Sociale Geografie, 1991); W.J. Heitmeyer et al., VerlockenderFundamentalismus. Türkische Jugendliche in Deutschland, (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1997); Y. Karakasolu andS. Koray, Islam and Islamic organizations in the Federal Republic of Germany. A short summary of study of theZentrum für Türkeistudien on Islamic organizations in Germany, (Birmingham: Centre for the Study of Islam andChristian-Muslim relations, 1996); N. Landman, Van mat tot minaret. De instiutionalisering van de islam inNederland, (Amsterdam: VU-uitgeverij, 1992); Y. Özbek and S. Koray, Muslim voices. A stranger within? Section onGermany, Part I and II, (Essen: Zentrum für Türkeistudien, 1998); N. Ögelman, “Documenting and Explaining thePersistance of Homeland Politics Among Germany’s Turks,” International Migration Review 37 (2003): 163-193; Th.Sunier, Islam in beweging. Turkse jongeren en islamitische organisaties, (Amsterdam: Het Spinhuis, 1996); Th. Sunier,“Niederländisch-Islamische Staatsbürgerschaft? Anischten über Islam, Bürgerschaft und Bürgerrechte untertürkische Jugendlichen in den Niederlanden,” in Der Fundamentalismus-verdacht. Plädoyer für eine Neuorientierungder Forschung im Umgang mit allochtonen Jugenlichen, ed. W.D. Bukow and M. Ottersbach (Opladen: Laske undBudrich, 1999).

36

integration, and for the success orfailure of policies in this field, is the

position of the second generation.3

If the integration process results fromthe interaction of two parties thattakes place at different levels, whatcan be expected in terms of outcomes,taking into account the differentiatingeffect of time and generations?Comparative studies indicate that aplurality of outcomes is the rule.

A first category of studies comparesthe integration process of differentimmigrant groups in the same institutional and policy context of anation or a city. Two major messagestranspire from such studies. First,long-term studies in the UnitedKingdom (UK), Germany, France, theNetherlands, and Belgium reveal thatas a general rule, immigrant groupsdisappear after one or two generationsas specific groups because they havebecome an accepted part of society.Policies are by definition selective, inthat only those immigrants aredefined as relevant groups who arenot (yet) an accepted part of society.In the Netherlands, for example, thismeans that the large group ofEurasians that “repatriated” from theDutch East Indies since 1945 werenot included as target groups in theethnic minorities policies of the early1980s. This indicates that such immigrants had, by then, acquired anaccepted place in society.

Second, other studies reveal thatimmigrant groups follow different patterns of integration or incorpora-tion. For the Dutch case, for example,research has shown that Moluccan,Surinamese, Antillean, SouthernEuropean, Turkish, and Moroccanimmigrants — all target groups of theethnic minorities policies — differ inthe speed of their integration and inthe tracks of social mobility they tendto follow.4 For reasons that flow fromthe design of the studies themselves— namely, that these immigrants areliving in the same national or citycontexts — such differences are primarily ascribed to characteristics of particular immigrant groups.

A second category of cross-nationalcomparative studies looks at the integration of the same immigrant group in different nationalcontexts. Such studies have exactlythe opposite explanatory scheme:they also find differences in outcome,but these are primarily ascribed to the differential functioning of the context in which the group isintegrated. Differences also turn outto be significant in this arena, asnoted above in the example ofTurkish Muslims in Germany and the Netherlands. Other studies have found markedly different outcomes as a consequence of varyinginstitutional arrangements and traditions of public acceptance of religions in Belgium, the Netherlands,


3 M. Crul and H. Vermeulen, “The second generation in Europe, Introduction” International Migration Review 379(2003): 965-986.

4 H. Vermeulen and R. Penninx, Het democratisch ongeduld. De emancipatie en integratie van zes doelgroepen van hetminderhedenbeleid (Amsterdam: Het Spinhuis, 1994); H. Vermeulen and R. Penninx, Immigrant integration. TheDutch case (Amsterdam: Het Spinhuis, 2000).


and the UK.5 Research on the attitudes and actions of trade unionsin relation to immigration and theposition of immigrants in society inseven European countries also indicatessuch differences. For example, thehigh degree of union membership of Turkish immigrants in Sweden(above 90 percent) and the lowdegree of this same group in France(around 15 percent) appears to be aconsequence of how trade unions are organized, as well as whether ornot they are incorporated into socio-economic decision-making at the national level.6

A recent empirical research projecton multicultural policies and modesof citizenship in seventeen Europeancities shows the heterogeneity of bothimmigrants and the receiving localsocieties.7 The study looked at immigrants first, showing that thebackground of their migration is verydiverse, both in time and space. Some migration movements towardsEurope’s cities reflect colonial relations with the country of destination, a fact clearly visible incities like Amsterdam, Birmingham,Lisbon, and Marseille. Another driverof this migration goes back to (veryselective) demand-driven migration,mainly of low-skilled workers, some of it with a long history as inSwiss, Belgian, and French cities,

some of a more recent origin in thepost-war decades.

The study also indicates that over thelast three decades, European countriesand cities received a varying share of mixed immigrant flows, i.e., significant supply-driven movementsof refugees, asylum seekers, and unauthorized immigrants, often alongwith high-skilled cosmopolitan professionals and company-linkedmigrants. The overall picture emergingfrom this project is one of significantgrowth in diversity of immigrant origins, from mainly European to moreand more global. In addition, there aremarked differences in the social andcultural capital that immigrants bring with them and/or have developedduring their stay.

Variability is also strong among theother partners, the receiving cities.The seventeen urban areas show greatvariety in their institutional settingsand policies, as well as reactions toimmigrants. Some of this variance canbe explained by differences in thenational institutional systems in which cities are embedded, but thereare a great many local factors and cir-cumstances that add to the variabilityof local reactions and policies. Theseinclude an area’s political constellationsand coalitions, which may work forinclusion or exclusion; the physical

5 J. Rath, et al., Western Europe and its Islam (Leiden/Boston/Köln: Brill, 2001).

6 R. Penninx and J. Roosblad (eds.), Trade Unions, Immigration, and Immigrants in Europe, 1960-1993. A ComparativeStudy of the Attitudes and Actions of Trade Unions in Seven West European Countries (New York/Oxford: BerghahnBooks, 2000).

7 A. Rogers and J. Tillie, Multicultural Policies and Modes of Citizenship in European Cities (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2001);R. Penninx et al., Citizenship in European Cities: Immigrants, Local Politics and Integration Policies (Aldershot:Ashgate, 2004).

38

layout of the city and its relation toneighboring areas; historical experienceswith earlier immigration and diversity;and the concrete instruments andresources available to local policymakersto steer processes in the vital domainsof housing and urban renewal, labor market and entrepreneurship,education and health, and so on.

The Logic of

Policymaking

Formulating and implementing effectiveintegration policies requires more thanjust insight into the logic of integra-tion processes. It also demands anunderstanding of how to secure politicalapproval and popular support. Thelogic of politics and policymaking,however, is often problematic in relation to immigrants.

As noted, a key condition for effectivepolicies is that long-term residenceshould be expressed in an adequatelegal status for immigrants and inopportunities for them to participatein politics and policymaking. However,existing political systems often do notprovide such conditions.

The conundrum here is that decisionson the content and orientation of integration policies are taken in apolitical system decided by the majorityvote. In such a system, majority-minor-ity relations and the actual or perceivedclash of interests connected to themare played out. This happens on boththe national level and in cities, and it

may lead to outright exclusion of someimmigrants (e.g., aliens) from the formal political system. Even if they areincluded, it may also marginalize theirvoices. The way immigrants are per-ceived by the receiving society turnsout to be important in such a process,often more so than facts. This tendencyincreases if immigration and the statusof immigrants become politicized questions. This mechanism can leadeither to an absence of integrationpolicies and an avoidance of issuesrelated to immigrants or to lopsidedand patronizing policies reflectingmainly majority interests and disregard-ing immigrant needs and voices.

Although this has been the rule inEurope, exceptions exist at both thelocal and national levels. CertainBritish cities may serve as local exam-ples. Since most of their immigrantsare of ex-colonial origin and have UKcitizenship, the political system is basically open to them from beginning.This does not prevent significantpolarization of majority-minority rela-tions, as a wealth of literature testifies.But over time, the significant concen-tration of immigrants in certain districts,combined with political coalitionswith powerful parties, may lead to substantial immigrant political participation in cities. Crises in suchcities have reinforced this process.Thus, cities may play a prominent rolein establishing new practices of politicalparticipation and integration.

A different trajectory appears inSweden and the Netherlands, where



society and cities show more politicalparticipation and inclusive integrationpolicies. In both of these countries,fairly comprehensive integration policieswere introduced at the national levelin a period in which immigration andimmigrant integration was much lesspoliticized. In Sweden in the mid-1970sand the Netherlands at the beginningof the 1980s, there also existed anactive and fruitful relationshipbetween research and policy in thisfield. These conditions promoted theearly establishment of liberal andinclusive measures and policies inthese countries, leading, among otherthings, to the early introduction oflocal voting rights for aliens (Swedenin 1976, the Netherlands in 1985) and easier access to naturalization.These measures, all novelties at thetime, were introduced with the conviction that forces within migrantgroups must be mobilized to secure theacceptance and implementation ofpolicies and to foster social cohesion.Naturalization and local voting rightswere seen as means to promote inte-gration, rather than as final testimonyof acquired integration.

The trajectories and achievementsdescribed above for cities in the UK,Sweden, and the Netherlands, however,do seem to be exceptions to the standard pattern. In most other casesof the seventeen-city project discussedabove, the stimulating factors mentioned above have been absent.The question of what kinds of policiesare developed in these cities, andwhen, seems closely related to the

urgency of the situation. In practice,crisis situations often lead to actionsand policies that strongly and lopsid-edly reflect perceptions and interests of locally dominant groups.

An additional aspect of the logic ofpolicymaking emerges when policieswin the approval of politicians. Incontrast with the long-term nature of the integration processes discussedabove, political mechanisms in democratic societies require policiesto bear fruit within much shorterterms: between elections. Unrealisticpromises and demands derived fromthis “democratic impatience” — thatis, the political desire to have quicksolutions for problems and processesof a long-term character — often leadto backlashes. The recent vigorousdebate on the (supposed) failure of integration policies in theNetherlands is a shining example.

More difficult than democratic impatience, however, is the situationin which the political climate of anti-immigration and anti-immigrantsentiments, when translated intopolitical movements and the politicization of immigration and integration matters, prevent well-argued policy proposals frombeing accepted. This means thatmuch more attention should be givento the question of how to frame immigration and integration policiesin such a way that these are politicallyacceptable and embraced by the ruling political system, political parties, and their rank and file.

40

All of the foregoing observations relateto the political process that may facili-tate — or block — the establishmentof explicit integration policies. Animportant next step is to examine theform and content of such policies,once established.

First of all, integration policies are bynecessity context-bound. Systematicattention has been paid to the differentideologies and practical models throughwhich countries incorporate immigrants.

This context-bound nature is illustratedby Hans Vermeulen, whose 1997 studycompares immigrant policies in fiveEuropean countries since the 1960s.8

The research looks specifically atintegration and labor market policies,policies relating to immigrant languages,and policies in relation to religious systems introduced by immigrants.Vermeulen’s study shows that the actualcontent of integration policies is to agreat extent dependent on, or inspiredby, the pre-existing institutionalarrangements in these areas within the different countries. For a countrythat traditionally has had different recognized languages within its territory(or religions, for that matter), it is inprinciple easier to make additional provisions for newcomers. In the samevein, a 2003 analysis by Vermeulen andBoris Slijper examines multiculturalpolicies in Canada, Australia, and theUnited States.9 The “multiculturalism”of these countries differs not only in

terms of its historical development; in addition, the practice of it turns out to be clearly context-bound. Both of these examples pertain at thenational level of states, but studies indicate that the same rule holds truefor the level of cities.

Local variations in institutionalarrangements, as well as opportunitiesfor integration policies and participationof immigrants, may to an extent beexplained by diverging national policies,institutional settings, and their underlying conceptions. Embedded ascities are in their national contexts,they necessarily reflect national policies and conceptions. This can bedemonstrated by comparing political“problem definitions” of immigrantsand their integration on the nationallevel and the ensuing strategies to beapplied in these policies.

A first prototypical definition is the one that defines the immigrantprincipally as an alien and outsider. Asociety that employs such a definitionis emphatically not defining itself as animmigration country and migrants aretherefore temporary “guests.” At best,measures may be taken to make thattemporary stay comfortable and profitable for both parties and to facilitate migrants’ anticipated return;there are no logical grounds for inclusivepolicies that would incorporate theseimmigrants as full citizens or politicalactors. Such an exclusionary definition


8 H. Vermeulen (ed.), Immigrant policy for a multicultural society. A comparative study of integration, language andreligious policy in five Western European countries (Brussels/Amsterdam: MPG/IMES, 1997).

9 H. Vermeulen and B. Slijper, Multiculturalisme in Canada, Australië en de Verenigde Staten. Ideologie en Beleid, 1950-2000 (Amsterdam: Aksant, 2003).


leads to the kind of policies thatMichael Alexander in his typologycalls either “non-policy” or “guestworkerpolicy.”10 Forms and instruments of such policies are variable and haphazard, being mostly ad hoc reactions to concrete problems.

In contrast with such exclusionarypolicies, there are definitions that inprinciple include immigrants over thecourse of time. The way this inclusionis envisaged, however, two distinctpolitical definitions of immigrants andtheir integration can be discerned. Thefirst one is prototypically formulated inthe French-republican vision. As aconsequence of this vision of the state,its relation to citizens, the resultingpolitical system, and institutionalarrangements in the public sphere, thedistinction between citizens and aliensis crucial. Alien immigrants shouldpreferably become citizens and thusbecome recognized as individual politi-cal actors. Immigrant collectivities arenot recognized as such. French republi-can terminology avoids notions likeethnicity, ethnic minorities, and multi-culturalism that suggest collectivenessand institutionalized difference of anysort, be it origin, culture, religion, orclass. The overriding political principleis (formal) equality on the individuallevel. In this sense, this definition prin-cipally depoliticizes the issue of immi-grants and their integration (which inreality does not prevent immigrationfrom becoming an overriding issue forestablished parties).

The second prototypical inclusivevision is the Anglo-American one, inwhich immigrants are supposed to takeup citizenship individually. Once theyhave done so, the political systemleaves them ample room for collectivemanifestation and action. Ethnicity and ethnic minorities are perceived asrelevant notions, even to the extentthat the total population, e.g., in censuses, is officially registered as such.Although equality is also an importantprinciple in this political vision, there isthe additional notion that substantiveequality may in practice be related tomembership in cultural, ethnic, immigrant, or disadvantaged groups.Political struggle between groups onissues of multiculturalism is thus anexplicit part of politics (irrespective ofthe outcomes of such political struggles).

The internal logic of these prototypicalinclusive visions leads to differentstrategies employed in integration policies. The French-republican systemleads principally to strategies thatselect for the following general policies:equality within the given system aspriority; avoidance of designating fixedtarget groups; and non-recognition ofcollective manifestations and organiza-tions as important actors. The inherentproblem of such a definition is that ofmobilizing and engaging forces fromwithin immigrant groups (who arefeared to counteract integration) inthe implementation of policies. Thesecond vision tends to designate targetgroups and formulate group-specific

10 M. Alexander, Comparing local policies toward migrants as an expression of Host-Stranger relations, PhD-thesis (Universiteit van Amsterdam, 2003).

42

policies, even to the extent that positive discrimination or affirmativeaction may be part of such policies. It is more prone to recognize, if notstimulate, forms of representation ofsuch groups, for example by extendingsubsidies directly to immigrant organizations, or indirectly by subsidizing certain activities of suchgroups. This vision is also moreinclined to combine equality with cultural difference, implying recognitionof cultural and religious aspects ofintegration processes.

This chapter has deliberately outlinedthese two models of inclusion as prototypical and contrasting, in orderto illustrate their internal logic. Inpractice, there are many variations andeclectic assemblages that incorporateelements of both visions in the definitions and instruments of policies.This is the case on both the nationaland the city level. The elements of thisassemblage, moreover, may also changeover the course of time.

Divergence versus convergence

The argument presented in the preceding section is that differences in (national and local) contexts leadto divergence of integration policies.But the picture is different when evidence and arguments for convergence are compiled.

Several cross-national studies indicateforms of convergence, albeit hesitantand partial ones. Vermeulen has listeda number of issues that show at leastsome convergence.11 First, in immigration policy (particularly thepart of the residential status regulationsfor immigrants of non EU-countries)the European Union has in recentyears issued a number of directives thatpartially harmonize Member Statepolicies. Second, some convergencehas also occurred in naturalizationpolicies. For example, the wide disparities between French andGerman legislation and practice in thisfield have narrowed: the jus sanguiniselement in German legislation is thusbeing relaxed and the jus soli principlehas been introduced to enable childrenof immigrants to gain citizenship moreeasily. In France, meanwhile, the jussoli principle has lost ground in recentyears. Recent studies on methods ofadjudicating nationality to aliens confirm the convergence tendency ona wider scale in Europe.12 Third,Vermeulen also sees some convergencein the use of a common terminologythat is particularly encouraged bysupranational organizations. He warns,however, that such common vocabularyof “integration” and “multiculturalism”may not necessarily mean that peopleagree in their ideas, potentially evenleading to illusory agreements.


11 Vermeulen, Immigrant policy. (see n. 8.)

12 R. Bauböck (ed.), From Aliens to Citizens: Redefining the Status of Immigrants in Europe (Aldershot: Avebury, 1994);V. Guiraudon, “Citizenship Rights for Non-Citizens: France, Germany and the Netherlands,” in Challenge to theNation-State: Immigration in Western Europe and the United States, ed. C. Joppke (Oxford: Oxford University Press,1998); R. Hansen and P. Weil, Towards a European Nationality. Citizenship, Immigration and Nationality Law in theEU (Houndmills/New York: Palgrave, 2001); P. Weil, “Access to Citizenship: A Comparison of Twenty-FiveNationality Laws,” in: From Migrants to Citizens: Membership in a Changing World, ed. A. Aleinikoff and D.Klusmeyer (Washington, DC: Carnegie Foundation, 2000).


Apart from these convergence tenden-cies that stem from national or evensupra-national levels of policy action,there are specific forces at work at thelocal level that lead to convergence. Itseems that the strong local character ofthe settlement process of immigrantsitself acts as a major force towards convergence of policies. Whatever theinstitutional arrangement is, localauthorities have to find answers to thesame questions, such as how to provideimmigrants with adequate housing andjobs, how to make educational andhealth facilities available to them, andhow to react to their demands to fulfillreligious obligations and teach theirmother tongues. Furthermore, theyhave to deal with the native population’svery similar reactions to immigrants, aswell as processes of discrimination and social exclusion. Neglecting andavoiding these questions is easier at themore distant level of national policies,but in cities these questions makethemselves even more concretely felt,particularly if the number of immigrantsand their concentration in certainparts of the city increase. If city authorities do not address such questions on their own initiative, they may be forced to do so by emergingcrises. “Inner city riots,” as they areoften called in the UK, or the banlieu-problematique (problem neigh-borhoods in the suburbs) in France areillustrations of triggers to may lead to(new) policies for and of cities. In thissense, such crises may be seen as “bottom-up” forces for convergence.

A logical consequence of such area-specific manifestations as triggersfor policies is that these policies areoften framed as space-specific policiesin which housing, concentration, andsegregation are central issues. The“Inner City Policies” in the UK since1968 and the “Politique de la Ville” inFrance since the 1990s illustrates this.

These forces do not simply stimulatethe emergence of policies and influencetheir content; they also tend toencourage, in the end, similar strategies in their implementation. In some cases, consultation of immi-grants and engagement of individualsand organizations in the implementa-tion is part of policies from the beginning. If this is not the case, however, it often soon becomes clearthat it is impossible to effectivelyimplement immigrant policies withoutlinking up with immigrant groupsthemselves and engaging them in policy formulation and implementa-tion.13 Many studies suggest that con-ditions for effective implementationlead to a certain convergence in the strategy used, although the formsmay differ.

Levels of Integration:

Policies and Actors

Integration processes, from the pointof view of immigrants themselves, take place primarily at a local level.Because circumstances there may vary

13 D. Moore, Ethnicité et Politique de la Ville en France et en Grande-Bretagne (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2001).

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significantly, local policies for integra-tion should have the highest priority.Also, from the perspective of the city,there is an argument for prioritization.The city receives newcomers of all different origins who bring with themdifferent cultures, religions, andlifestyles. Their integration into thesocial fabric of the city is not a naturalprocess: social segregation, socialexclusion, and marginalization of (certain of these) immigrant groupsmay threaten the social cohesion inthese cities. Cities and their neighbor-hoods are the places where importantevents happen that affect the daily livesof all residents, including immigrants.It is also the level where the loyalty ofnewcomers and old residents can begained, or for that matter, lost.

Proceeding from this evidence-basedstarting point, it also follows that such local policymakers should begiven tools and room to act in locallyadequate ways. National policies, andby implication also European integrationpolicies, should primarily facilitate thework of local actors, from both thegovernment and civil society, by creating general frameworks, rules, and instruments.

National and local policies

In practice, however, relationsbetween national and local levels ofpolicy are not always so smooth andcomplementary. In the European context, tensions between the nationaland local levels have developed

according to two different patterns.The first pattern is visible in countriessuch as Switzerland, Germany, andAustria, where national integrationpolicies have been piecemeal orabsent, and where pressures to formulate adequate policies and claimsfor competence and resources havecome from large cities. The cities ofZurich, Bern, and Basel in Switzerland,for example, took — in the completeabsence of such policies at the nationallevel — the initiative of developinglocal policies in the late 1990s.14

Berlin, Frankfurt, and Vienna developedsuch policies even earlier under thesame conditions: an absence of national policies and resources.

In countries where integration policieswere started rather early on thenational level, such as the Netherlandsand Sweden, such tension has taken adifferent form. The major cities inthese countries have been confrontedwith immigration on a scale quite different from the country’s average.This has been expressed in high pressure on essential institutions likethe housing system (segregation anddegeneration of neighborhoods), thelabor market (disproportionate unemployment, high levels of socialbenefit costs), the educational system(concentration of pupils of immigrantorigin in certain sectors and spaces)and public order (racial harassment,crime, and tensions between groups).To cope with such developments,these big cities have joined forces to


14 J. D’Amato and B. Gerber (eds.), Herausforderung Integration. Städtische Migrationspolitik in der Schweiz und inEuropa (Zurich: Seismo Verlag, 2005).


claim more executive power andresources from the national government. In the Netherlands andSweden, general policies for urbanareas and integration policies forimmigrants have in recent years beenbrought together — at least in the formal sense — in one framework, in principle creating new and morecomprehensive possibilities.

Common to all these cases is that such tensions often lead to a criticaldialogue between large cities andnational governments on topics wherenational and local policies work outcontradictorily. Cities will not alwayswin these battles on principle. At thesame time, however, city authoritiesmay use their discretionary power togain more room to maneuver in favorof (certain) immigrants. What suchexamples make clear, broadly speaking,is that the interests at stake in integration policies and their execution at the local level of citiesmay be substantially different, or perceived differently at the local andnational levels. At the city level, theconfrontation with the day-to-dayconsequences of immigration is muchmore direct. Any serious attempt tocope with related problems, or — in apositive formulation — to get the bestgains out of the presence of newcomers,will put pressure on the higher andmore abstract national level.

EU integration policies

In view of the ideal division of tasksoutlined above, and taking intoaccount the political will of the EC inthe field of EU integration policies as

expressed in the Communication of2003, the consent of the ThessalonikiSummit (June 2003) and the recentMinisterial Conference in Groningen(November 2004), what can beexpected from EU policies? What special tasks could the EU/EC take onin favor of policies at the national andlocal levels? These can be listed brieflyas follows.

A first task of the EU is “framesetting.”The EC could frame both (im)migra-tion and integration and the nexusbetween the two differently than it isnow commonly done at the nationallevel in most EU countries. The shiftwould be from a defensive and mainlycontrol-centered policy to: 1) a proac-tive, future-oriented, comprehensiveapproach; 2) a balance between (realistic) problem-orientation andpossible present and future gains ofimmigration, thus furthering acceptanceof immigration; and 3) emphasis onthe necessity of common action inboth the immigration and integrationdomains. In principle, the EU is in a position to bend negative competition and “burden shifting”practices among EU Member Statestowards an approach that focuses oncommon interests.

The framesetting task has to be donewithin the political and bureaucraticsetting of the EU/EC and between“Brussels” and the national authoritiesand policymakers, which implies longand tough negotiations. But, as SarahSpencer expressed it, the EC/EUshould also take “active responsibilityfor leading a balanced, informed,

46

public debate about the reasonsmigrants are in Europe by putting intothe public domain information aboutthe contribution they make and barriersthey experience, acknowledging publicfears, and correcting misinformation.”15

This wider task is of great importance,because it prepares the ground for policymaking in civil society and amongthe population at large and mobilizes acounterforce against populist anti-immi-grant political exploitation. The twocommunications from the EC in 2000and 2003 mentioned earlier can beregarded as important first steps in theefforts of the EC to establish a soundframework for policy action.

A second function or task that followsfrom framesetting is “normsetting.”The abovementioned general frameshould be worked out in a number ofnormsetting regulations, directives, oreven laws that pinpoint basic startingpoints for integration policies. Suchnorms pertain to:

1) The definition of the target group of integration policies. Importantnormsetting regulations could be developed, including those related tothe following questions:� Which immigrants are regarded,

and at what particular point intime, as a residents for whom comprehensive integration policies are applicable?(Immigration/admission policiesand integration policies shouldclearly be coordinated.)

� How should admission policiesdistinguish between temporarymigrants and long-terms residents,and if migrants are initially admitted temporarily, when does“temporariness” end?

� What status should be accorded to family members and marriagepartners of established immigrants?

2) The scope of integration policies. If the ultimate aim is in principle fullaccess of long-term residents to all publicinstitutions and facilities of the society ofsettlement, then in the course of time, a system of norms could be developedsystematically (through political nego-tiation) for the three basic dimensionsof citizenship: socio-economic, legal-political, and cultural/religious.

3) Antidiscrimination policies. In fact,this is the negative corollary of positivenormsetting. It is a necessary elementin policies, but it also has severe limitations. Any anti-discriminationnorm assumes positive normsetting inthe first place, which in turn is beingtrampled upon by discrimination.Since, and as long as, positive norm-setting differs in national contexts, thepractical use of anti-discriminationnorms also differs between countries.

Third, apart from framesetting andnormsetting, the EC has practicalinstruments to promote activities related to the development of integration policies. Specific budgetlines of General Directorates in charge


15 S. Spencer, “The Challenges of Integration for the EU,” Migration Information Source. (Washington, DC: MigrationPolicy Institute, October 1, 2003), http://www.migrationinformation.org.


of certain policy domains (Justice andHome Affairs for immigration, asylum,and reception of asylum seekers andrefugees; Social Affairs and Employmentfor integration and anti-discrimination)can be used to mobilize forces. These mobilizations could include, for example, setting up systems for systematically collecting information(both internally and externally), having certain policy questionsresearched externally, etc. Also, theEuropean Refugee Fund has been created to involve nongovernmentalagencies in reception of asylum seekersand refugees. In 2003, an effort to promote integration projects and thedissemination of their good practiceswas started under the so-called INTIprogram.This program is expected toexpand significantly in the coming years.

The significance of such EC-financedactivity for the development of inte-gration policies can be high, if suchactivities enable local actors to develop and implement strategic projects, if successful pilot projects areanalyzed and reported systematically,and if these results are disseminated asexamples of good practices.

Strategies and Instruments

for Local Policies

Evaluations of local policies point at a number of important strategic

and tactical aspects of such policies. In the first place, in order to becomeeffective, such policies have to engagepartners in the integration process atdifferent levels. First of all, that meansengaging immigrants at the individual,organizational, and institutional levels.Too much policy conception is “top-down,” addressing individualimmigrants, while much of the policyimplementation has to rely on mobilizing forces within immigrantgroups to be successful. A number ofgood examples of using the potentialwithin groups have been developedand are developing. One example ismentoring projects in which immigrantstudents monitor younger co-ethnicsduring their secondary education.16

Other examples include immigrantorganizations mobilizing their rank andfile for training and language coursesor for labor market projects.17

But local policies should involveimportant institutional actors in thereceiving society as well, such aschurches, trade unions, employerorganizations, political parties, and themedia. In brief, the whole of civil society should be involved. Such nongovernmental partners are importantin two ways. First, they play a key roleas direct partners in the implementa-tion of policies. But they may be evenmore important as political actors,influencing the political climate andcontributing to the framing of policy

16 M. Crul, “Turkish and Moroccan Sibling Support and School Achievement Levels: An Optimistic View”Netherlands Journal of Social Sciences 35 (1999): 110-128; M. Crul, “Success Breeds Success. Moroccan and TurkishStudent Mentors in the Netherlands,” International Journal for the Advancement of Counselling 24 (2002): 275-287.

17 A. Zolberg and A. J. Clarkin, Sharing Integration Experiences: Innovative Community Practices on Two Continents(New York: International Center for Migration, Ethnicity and Citizenship, New School University, 2003).

48

questions in such a way that adequatepolicies are accepted. They may beimportant agents in combating exclusion, discrimination, and xenophobia. In the Swiss case, forexample, institutional agents likechurches, trade unions, and employerorganizations have often helped toavert the danger of anti-immigrant referenda. In the German case, tradeunions and churches have been — inthe absence of government integrationpolicies — the most important actorsand promotors in the integrationprocess of foreign workers.

Second, local integration policiesshould define clear priorities for actionin a number of domains. For long-termimmigrants, priority should be given todomains in which local authoritieshave effective and generally acceptedinstruments with which to promoteintegration (and prevent exclusion):the economic domain of work and thesocial domain, particularly education,health, and housing. In the long term,policies in the political and culturaldomain (including religion) are crucialfor integrating immigrants. The initialforms of policies in the latter domainsmay depend, to a great extent, onexisting institutional arrangements inreceiving societies and cities. In thelong run, however, gradual changestowards more inclusive policies areindispensable.

On the more concrete level of strate-gic instruments, evaluations suggestthat an important strategy is that ofmonitoring outcomes of both generalpublic institutions and specific

integration policies. Monitoring is adevice for developing awareness andestablishing an empirically based diagnosis and thereby creating aninstrument for steering policies. Thebasic assumption here is that the position of newcomers in a society isdetermined to a great extent by the(mostly unintended) differentialimpact of general public institutions.Because of the socio-economic status,their immigration-related characteristics,and sometimes their cultural/religiouscharacteristics, the outcomes for immigrants may be unequal. Suchunintended outcomes may includehigher unemployment and thus (ifaccess is permitted) overrepresentationon social welfare benefit regulations.Other outcomes may include lowereducational attainment of immigrantchildren or concentration/segregationthrough housing policies and regulations.

Turning this reasoning around meansthat monitoring outcomes can lead toawareness of how general public insti-tutions function for immigrants. Whenthe procedures through which theunequal outcomes come into being arescrutinized, a clear diagnosis shouldresult. At the EU level, the AnnualReport of States — a regular reportestablished by the ThessalonikiSummit in June 2003 — is intended to have this same function as aninstrument for progressive policymaking.

A second important element for localpolicies is to provide newcomers withthe basic tools they need to acquire aplace in society independently:



a toolkit for training in the language of the society of settlement, basic knowledge of that society, civic training, etc. The basic idea here (andthe lesson from earlier policies relatedto temporary migrants and guest workers) is that immigrants should begiven the necessary tools to preparethem for full participation in society.Several countries and cities are developing policies in this field. It isimportant, however, to look at suchefforts as primarily facilitating thebeginning of an integration process(and thus avoid normative claims ofadaptation or assimilation). Preferablysuch activities should take place inconnection with trajectories for labormarket integration or further education.

Policy Fundamentals and

Dilemmas

There are many lessons to be drawn from the foregoing generalobservations on integration processesand related policies. Three fundamentals(which may sometimes present themselves for policymakers as dilemmas) can be derived from thelogic of integration processes.

The first is that a key condition for effective integration policies istransparency of admission of immigrantsand their residential and legal status(the immigration-integration nexus).Expectations of long-term residence,and how such expectations are handled in reality, should be expressedin an adequate legal position andopportunities to participate in

politics and policymaking, especiallyin policies that affect immigrants’ positions. Local policies in this legal-political domain are, to a great extent,dependent on immigration, integra-tion, and naturalization policies at thenational level. But this dependencehas its limits. First of all, local policymakers have discretionary power in the implementation ofnational regulations. Furthermore,they may develop effective alternativechannels for participation, thereby creating a city-related form of inclusion and citizenship.

Second, integration policies should be comprehensive in the dimensionsand domains covered, thereby signifying that they represent not only the concerns of the native majority, but are also built on needs asdefined by immigrants. The economicand social domains should take priority, with the understanding thatin the long term, policies in the politicaland cultural domains are indispensablefor integration. The forms that suchpolicies may take depend in practiceon the existing institutional arrange-ments in receiving societies and cities,and on the political willingness tochange these to become graduallymore inclusive.

Third, local integration policies should follow strategies and tacticsthat engage different partners in theintegration process at various levels.They should combine “top down” activation elements with “bottom up”mobilization. They should define theprocess of integration as “open,”

50

within the rules of liberal-democraticsocieties, leaving room for a morediverse, but cohesive, society as a result.

The preceding observations on thelogic of policymaking give rise to someadditional fundamentals or dilemmas.The first is that establishing policiesrequires not only solid scientificknowledge of the logic of integrationprocesses, but also an adequate politicaldefinition that makes such policiespolitically acceptable and endorsed.What is needed is a balanced frameworkthat does not hide problems to besolved, but primarily stresses the common interests of all. There ismuch to be gained here: not only theavoidance of crises that would becomeinevitable if problems were consistentlyneglected, but also the restoration andpromotion of cohesiveness in citiesand states that makes it possible toreap the potential fruits of immigration.Acceptance of immigrants and theiractive participation is an essential condition in such a framework. Newforms of negotiated diversity will resultfrom it. On this front there is stillmuch work to do for all actors, but primarily for politicians.

A second lesson is that the viability of integration policies in the long termdepends heavily on realistic targets tobe attained, as well as on adequateanalysis of the institutional setting and the options it can support. Such apractical (and less ideology-driven)approach, when combined with theactive participation of immigrants and their organizations, could head off potential backlashes among the

majority population. It could alsoresult in an inclusive process in which immigrants feel recognized.



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Groenendijk, C.A. and P.E. Minderhoud. “DeNederlandse invloed op nieuwe Europese regels betreffende migratie en asyl.” InImmigratie en asiel in Europa. Een lange weg naar gemeenschappelijkheid, edited by W.A.Brusse, D. Broeders, and R. Griffith, 137-162.Utrecht: Lemma BV, 1991.

Guiraudon, V. “Citizenship Rights for Non-Citizens: France, Germany and theNetherlands.” In Challenge to the Nation-State:Immigration in Western Europe and the UnitedStates, edited by C. Joppke. Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press, 1998.

Hansen, R. and P. Weil. Towards a EuropeanNationality. Citizenship, Immigration and Nationality Law in the EU. Houndmills/NewYork: Palgrave, 2001.

Heitmeyer, W., J. Müller, and H. Schröder.Verlockender Fundamentalismus. Türkische Jugendliche in Deutschland. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1997.

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:

Citizenship

T. Alexander Aleinikoff and

Patrick Weil


Recent decades have witnessed aremarkable resurgence of inter-est in issues of citizenship

among policy-makers, academics, andthe public. An important aspect of thepublic debate has been the challengeposed by large-scale immigration. Forany state, the arrival and settlement oflarge numbers of newcomers raisesimportant citizenship questions.

For modern liberal-democratic states,citizenship is fundamentally a legal sta-tus that designates full membership inthat state. As a legal status, citizenshipcarries significant rights and dutiesthat establish nowadays a formal basisof equality for all of its bearers in aparticular state. Large-scale immigra-tion presents a challenge for states tothe extent it produces a settled popula-tion of less-than-full members withless-than-full rights and duties.

Migration makes host societies moreculturally and socially diverse. It canbring new talent and energy, expandthe creative horizons of all members,and enhance the domestic labor pool.But migration can also be a source oftension and anxiety. Citizenship policycan be an effective tool for promotingthe smooth inclusion of new members.Any sound citizenship policy mustweigh a variety of complex factors, and it must consider deep questions of belonging, commitment, and socialand political integration. In liberal-democratic states, citizenship policymust also be closely guided by thenorms of fairness and justice thatare fundamental to modern liberal-democratic ideals.

This chapter considers four “baskets”of citizenship issues: access to citizen-ship, dual nationality, political integra-tion, and social and economic rights.Each section presents policy recom-mendations.

Access to Citizenship

Birthright Citizenship

The traditional approach to classifyinghow states endow citizenship has beento contrast regimes based on jus soli(making birth on the state’s territorythe crucial determinant) with thosebased on jus sanguinis (making descentfrom a parent with nationality the keydeterminant). It has been common tocharacterize jus soli regimes as inclusive— more “immigrant-friendly” —because they endow full membershipon the children of immigrants at birth;jus sanguinis regimes, in contrast, havebeen portrayed as exclusive, ethnicity-based policies, sometimes leaving second- and third-generation personswithout the citizenship of the state inwhich they are born. These characteri-zations are not accurate as an historicalmatter and the modern practice ofstates is dramatically undercutting theworkability of the categorization.

In 18th century Europe, jus soli was the dominant criterion of nationalitylaw. The practice derived from feudalconcepts in which human beings werelinked to the lord who held the landwhere they were born. The FrenchRevolution broke from this feudal tradi-tion and allegiance. The Civil Code of1804 granted French nationality at

Citizenship 55

birth only to a child born to a Frenchfather, either in France or abroad. Thispolicy of jus sanguinis, representing amodern innovation, was not ethnicallymotivated; it simply meant that indi-vidual rights and family had becomemore important than subjecthood andstate power. This innovation was exten-sively borrowed and became the law ofAustria (1811), Belgium (1831), Spain(1837), Prussia (1842), Italy (1865),Russia (1864), the Netherlands (1888),Norway (1892), and Sweden (1894).

The British tradition of jus soli wastransplanted unaltered to its coloniesin Europe (Ireland), Africa (SouthAfrica), North America (the US andCanada), and Australia. Most of thesestates were countries of immigration,and the legal tradition fulfilled stateinterest in terms of the integration ofimmigrants’ children.

For most continental European coun-tries that were countries of emigration,jus sanguinis allowed the maintenanceof links with citizens abroad. Recentdecades have brought large-scale immi-gration to these states, and most haveadopted jus soli provisions that permitsecond or third-generation immigrantsto access citizenship at birth or lateron. At the same time, some traditionaljus soli countries (such as the UK,Portugal, and South Africa) haveadopted restrictive rules, such as limiting birthright citizenship to children born to lawfully admitted and settled immigrants.

Strict adherence to either system failsto generate fully appropriate citizenship

policies. Jus soli rules appear overinclu-sive to the extent they recognize thecitizenship of children born to immi-grants with but slight ties to their country of residence — such as short-term visitors or immigrants in an irregu-lar status who have been in the countrya short period of time. Jus soli principlesalso appear underinclusive as regardschildren born to citizens traveling orresiding outside their state. It is not surprising that virtually all jus soli statesrecognize the citizenship of some classesof children born to citizens beyondstate borders. Jus sanguinis rules fre-quently appear underinclusive, denyingcitizenship to children and grandchil-dren of immigrants who are fully social-ized in their country of birth and maynot have citizenship in their parents’ or grandparents’ country of origin.

These developments lead to questionsabout the viability of the jus soli/jussanguinis analysis. A more penetratingand useful analysis of citizenship policieswould — considering immigration —adopt generations as the category forexamination. This approach moreaccurately reflects the social realities of the immigration process by linkingacquisition rules to differences in thestages of settlement. It would alsoreflect legal changes in states thathave blurred the traditional linesbetween jus soli and jus sanguinis.

This analysis is premised on the ideathat it is desirable that immigrants andtheir descendants become citizens andhave the right to become citizens. Thispremise may be defended as a matterof morality (i.e., the importance to the

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individual of state membership in aworld of nation-states), as a necessaryimplication of a state’s commitment todemocratic norms (i.e., that personshave a right to participate in politicalsystems that rule them), and as asocially advantageous public policy (to the extent that citizenship aids inthe process of integration). It mayeven be justified in terms of protectingthe sovereignty of the state, which can be perceived as challenged by thedevelopment of large foreign popula-tions born in the country but dependentlegally on a foreign state.

The first generation consists of people born and raised in anothercountry who immigrate to a newcountry as adults. The second genera-tion consists of the children of thefirst generation who are born in thehost society. In a deviation from traditional categorization, this chapteralso includes in the second generationthose who were born in a foreigncountry but immigrated at an earlyage and were primarily socialized in the host society. The third generation comprises the grandchil-dren of the first generation, who arepresumed to have been born andraised in the host society.

A “generations approach” yieldsimportant results for citizenship policy.

As a first recommendation:� Third-generation immigrants

should automatically acquire thecitizenship of their parent’s hostsociety at birth.

As a sociological matter, the vastmajority of the third generation willmake their lives in their country ofbirth, and their ties to their grandpar-ents’ country of origin may well beslight. Because their parents have beensocialized in the country of immigra-tion, there is no justification forrequiring them to wait until majorityto naturalize. A number of jus sanguinisstates have rules that confer citizen-ship on third-generation children atbirth, such as France (since 1889), theNetherlands (since 1953), Spain (since1990), and Belgium (since 1992).

Another implication of a “generationsapproach” pertains to the second generation. Specifically: � In jus sanguinis states, a child born

to immigrants on national territoryshould be entitled to citizenship ifthe child or one of the child’s par-ents has lawfully resided there fora period of years.

For the second generation, socializationwill take place in their country of birth. They are, for all practical purposes,members of the society in which theyreside. In jus soli states, of course, suchchildren will be citizens at birth. But the authors recognize that the traditions and values of jus sanguinisstates may vary from state to state.Accordingly, a range of policies may beacceptable so long as this underlyingprinciple is honored: citizenship for thesecond generation should follow as amatter of course if either they or a parent has attained and maintainedlawful status in the host country forsome period of years. France, Belgium,


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Finland, Sweden, Denmark, theNetherlands, and Italy attribute citi-zenship to children born in their coun-try to foreign parents after a number ofyears of the child’s residence (e.g., aperiod of time linked to primary educa-tion). In Germany, citizenship is attrib-uted at birth to children of foreign parents who are permanent residents. Ifthese children possess another citizen-ship they have to choose between their different citizenships at the age of 23.

Neither an automatic jus soli rule nor abirth-plus-lawful-residence approachprovides citizenship to the foreign-bornchildren of immigrants who arrive in a host country at an early age.Traditionally, these children have beencompelled to go through the naturaliza-tion process (whether they have settledin a jus soli or jus sanguinis state) despitethe fact that they are largely indistin-guishable from second-generation children or children of citizens. Theauthors believe that the strong likeli-hood of socialization in the state of resi-dence combined with a goal of effectiveintegration of immigrants supports poli-cies recognizing citizenship for thesechildren, provided that they havereceived significant social or educationalformation in their country of settlement.Such socialization could be establishedby long-term residence (perhaps 10years) or a significant period of school-ing (perhaps six years). Accord-ingly, afurther recommendation is that:� Foreign-born children who

immigrate at an early age and who meet specified residency oreducational requirements shouldbe entitled to citizenship.

Naturalization

Naturalization is the process by whichmembers of the first generation attaincitizenship in a host country. Consistentwith an approach that focuses on thegrowing ties of immigrants to theircountries of settlement, the requirementsfor naturalization should decrease withlengthy residence. Standards may requirethat an immigrant provide some proofof integration, but the criteria for naturalization should be clear, limited,precise, and objective. Conditions that are not consistent with liberal-democratic citizenship norms shouldbe reconsidered. Specifically:� States may reasonably require a

period of residence and knowledgeof the language; and they mayalso take into account a criminalrecord.

A required period of residence shouldnot exceed five years. Languagerequirements should be related to thecircumstances of the applicant. Acriminal record should not be a permanent barrier to citizenship whereit is not a ground of deportation. Ifknowledge of history and/or culture isrequired, the standards should be relatedto the circumstances of the applicant.� Overly broad or vague conditions

for citizenship, such as require-ments of “good moral character”or “evidence of integration withsociety,” should be avoided.

In this regard, official discretion shouldbe limited and subject to judicial review.� Naturalization fees should be

reasonable and not deter access to citizenship.

Individuals lacking adequate resources should be exempted from

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a naturalization fee. States shouldensure that adequate resources aredevoted to naturalization.

Managing Dual

Nationality

In today’s world, dual citizenship isincreasingly common, despite interna-tional legal norms formally opposed tosuch a status. Because this oppositionis increasingly at odds with modernneeds and realities, actual state policiesagainst dual nationality have beenwidely but unevenly eroded. The oldstance of some states (Germany, Japan,United States) against dual nationalityappears increasingly inappropriate and,in fact, has been undermined by legalchanges in many sending and receivingstates. More appropriate for today’sworld would be policies that seek tomanage, rather than prevent, the incidence of dual nationality.

The principal reason for the prolifera-tion of dual (and multiple) nationalityis now treated as commonplace: Theworld has become progressively moreinterconnected through technologiesthat greatly facilitate communications,travel, and commerce, and throughpolitical changes that are increasinglyreceptive to cross-border trade andinvestment. More people, at all levelsof the economic and social ladder, liveoutside their countries of origin. Cross-national marriages have proliferated,and the children in these families typically obtain both parents’ national-ities. Even among couples of the samenationality, residence outside their

countries of origin may produce dualnationality via naturalization orthrough jus soli citizenship rules.

Despite common assertions that dualnationality weakens commitments tostates or causes irreconcilable conflictsfor individuals, there is no convincingempirical evidence to support theseclaims. Opponents of dual nationalityoften treat national allegiance asinherently exclusive and indivisible.But whatever force this argument mayhave had in the 19th or 20th centuriesin the US or Germany, it carries farless weight today. Modern nations inoverwhelming proportions tolerate orencourage a wide range of competingloyalties and affirmations in civil society— to family, business, local community,religious denominations, non-govern-mental organizations promoting politicaland nonpolitical causes — and do nottreat such allegiances (even when theyhave an international dimension) asincompatible with a healthy level ofloyalty to the nation-state. Dualnationals also may feel strong ties totwo nation-states without ordinarilysensing that the commitment to onecompromises or clashes with their loyalty to the other. This is not to saythat allegiance to the nation-state is notimportant. The contrary is true: It callsforth the engagement in politics thatdemocracies need. But such commit-ment to a democratic polity is certainlypossible in the modern world even ifone holds two or more nationalities.

The weakened case for mono-nationality is complemented byincreasingly persuasive reasons for


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modern liberal-democratic states toaccept dual nationality. Accepting the legitimacy of dual nationality isjustified as a matter of respect for amigrant’s connections and affiliationswith the country of origin. In wishingto deepen ties with the country of settlement, immigrants frequently neither wish, nor see the need, to castoff completely their links to anothercountry. And many immigrants whoare otherwise eligible for citizenshipmay not apply if attaining citizenshiprequires them to sever their legal tiesto their original country.

The central premise, then, is this: Inthe conditions of the modern world,dual nationality often reflects the real-ity of complex loyalties and allegiancesin an increasingly interconnectedworld. The status of dual nationalityshould no longer be suppressed, butrather it should be expressly acceptedand managed more thoughtfully. The following specific guiding principles are relevant:� States should accept the

legitimacy of dual or multiplenationality when it reflects anindividual’s genuine link to thecountries concerned.

States should repeal legal provisionsthat require renunciation of formernationalities upon naturalization orthat impose the loss of nationality oncitizens who naturalize elsewhere.States should sustain gender-neutralrules that allow children to inherit thenationality of both parents, and theyshould not require dual-national chil-dren to choose among nationalitiesupon attaining majority.

� States should readily permit the renunciation of a nationalityby dual nationals as long as the decision would not leavethem stateless.

The procedures followed by statesshould assure a citizen’s full deliberationand free choice.� Where laws, obligations, or

entitlements conflict, primacyshould be given to the country ofprincipal residence.

In the private-law realm, conflict-of-law issues once resolved by referenceto the law of the country of nationalityshould come to be governed by the lawof the country of principal or habitualresidence. Similarly, military obligationsshould be primarily to the country ofprincipal residence. A corollary tothese conclusions is that a dual nationalshould look first to the country ofprincipal residence for rights and entitlements. � To ensure a genuine link between

a state and a citizen, citizenshipshould not be perpetuated to distant generations after the family has lost all real contactwith the state involved.

The authors’ analysis is based on theview that a person can maintain effec-tive and affective ties to two states,and that conflicts between obligationsto two states can be managed. But dualnationality should not follow as a matterof course or right when a person has noreal stake in a country whose citizen-ship was held by a distant relative.Rather, states should require some lifetime link by a parent with the countryof nationality before that parent maytransmit citizenship jure sanguinis.

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Furthermore, states may condition the continuation of the citizenship of a child born abroad on some later reasonable period of actual residenceor to some concrete link to the country of origin.� Upon taking an elected position

in a national government, a dual national should generally be expected to surrender the other nationality.

Dual status, however, should not beconsidered a bar to civil-service jobs.

Citizenship Policies and

Political Integration

Citizenship has forever been closelylinked to political participation. Inmodern democratic states, many socialand economic rights previously enjoyedonly by citizens are now granted tononcitizens on the basis of legal residence and employment or as universal human rights. But nationalitystill remains a significant dividing linewhen it comes to political participation.For immigrants, then, acquiring thenationality of the host society has there-fore always been the most important steptowards political integration. But formalcitizenship is not a sufficient conditionfor political integration, nor need it bea necessary condition for enjoying certain political rights.

Promoting political participation ofsettled immigrants recognizes that theyare, in the main, fully functioningmembers of the social and economiclife of a society, that they have aninterest in their communities, and that

they frequently have perspectives onissues that enhance the considerationof public policies. Participation isimportant training for the kind ofengaged citizenship that most liberaldemocracies seek to foster. It can famil-iarize noncitizens s with the politicalculture and imbue them with a senseof belonging that can make the decisionto naturalize more attractive. From thisperspective, state policies that restrictpolitical liberties of noncitizens resi-dents seem counterproductive, and apersuasive case can be made for granti-ng settled immigrants a local franchise.

Political Liberties and Citizenship

Liberal democracies guarantee all theircitizens’ basic liberties such as freedomof opinion, expression, peaceful assem-bly, and association. Citizens participatein political life not only by casting theirvotes but also by debating politics inprivate and public arenas, by joiningpolitical parties, and by demonstratingin the streets. Today these liberties areno longer the rights of citizens only;they have been recognized as universalhuman rights.

Many democratic states have in the pastgenerally prohibited political activity bynoncitizens s. A number of countriesstill have special constraints on the lib-erties of expression, assembly, and asso-ciation for noncitizens s. Even wherethe political liberties of noncitizens s arenot formally restricted, they may be cur-tailed in practice by wide-ranging anddiscretionary powers of deportation.States have legitimate interests inremoving persons who pose imminentthreats to national security or public


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safety. But to permit deportations for theexercise of political liberties has anobvious chilling effect on political par-ticipation. Accordingly, in the absenceof a clear and present danger for nation-al security, only those political activitiesthat are punishable under criminal lawshould lead to deportations.

Institutions of receiving states canencourage and promote forms of politi-cal activity that are conducive to inte-gration. By forming their own associa-tions and making their voices heard inpolitical debates, immigrants becomefamiliar with the political culture ofthe country and insert themselves intoits political institutions. The freedomto engage in political activities hasseveral integrative effects. It permitsimmigrants to organize themselves, toarticulate their interests, and to settheir demands on the political agenda;it also helps to avoid or counterbalancepaternalistic representation by organi-zations that promote the interests ofimmigrants but are run exclusively bynative citizens. Furthermore, it allowsfor a free articulation of differences ofideology, interests, and identitiesamong migrants and undermines theperception that they are a homogenousgroup of outsiders. The experience andpractice of democratic freedoms mayalso have an educational effect forthose immigrants who come from lessdemocratic countries. It shapes theiroutlook towards their country of originand often turns emigrants into a forcesupporting democratic reform there.

Based on these considerations, it issuggested that:

� The basic liberties of freedom ofthought and expression, associa-tion, and assembly are universalhuman rights, whose exerciseshould not be dependent onnationality tests.

Citizenship and the Franchise

Although voting rights for noncitizenss are rather uncommon, there are several significant examples of sucharrangements. In New Zealand, all permanent legal residents haveenjoyed general suffrage in all electionssince 1975 (although not the right tobe elected). In Britain, citizens fromCommonwealth countries and Irelandcan not only vote but also run as can-didates in elections at all levels. Irelandresponded in 1985 by granting thenational franchise to British citizens. Ithas also had local suffrage rights for allforeign residents since 1963 and eligibility for office since 1974. In1975, Sweden introduced the vote inlocal and regional elections and in referenda for all noncitizens s withthree years of legal residence.Denmark, Norway, and Finland havesimilarly extended local voting rightsthat were originally only granted tocitizens of Nordic countries. In 1985,the Netherlands adopted a local franchise independent of nationalityafter five years of residence. Thus, afranchise for noncitizens s is not autopian goal; it has become a democraticnorm in several countries. There is noevidence that it undermines theintegrity of the democratic process,and none of the countries that haveintroduced it since World War II haveseriously considered abolishing it.

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Any discussion of the franchise forimmigrants must consider the basicdemocratic premise that what concernsall should be decided by all. Morespecifically, persons who are subject tothe laws of the state, who are currentlyinformed about the issues at stake, andwho will be affected by future legislationshould not be excluded from electingrepresentatives or running as candi-dates. Together, these considerationsdisqualify short-term visitors but notlong-term residents. Most laws of democratic states apply not only totheir citizens, but to all who live in theterritory. noncitizens immigrants paytaxes, but if they are disenfranchisedthey have no say over how the moneyis spent. Voters should also be wellinformed about candidates and issues onthe political agenda. Permanent resi-dents are generally just as much exposedto mass media and party campaigns ascitizens are. Finally, most permanentresidents will also have to bear thefuture consequences of political deci-sions in which they participate and aretherefore likely to vote responsibly.

Opponents of an immigrant franchiseraise a number of other objections thatrefer to potential abuse, conflicts ofloyalty, or a lack of corresponding obligations. The first concern is thatnewcomers, who are unfamiliar withthe political system and democraticnorms, can be easily mobilized to casttheir votes collectively and withoutproper consideration. This argumentdoes not hold if a sufficient time ofresidence is required before the fran-chise can be exercised. The secondobjection is that foreign nationals may

use their vote to promote the interestsof their state of origin or to import itspolitical conflicts. However, thisapplies just as well to dual nationalsand even to those who have renouncedtheir previous nationality. A thirdobjection is raised in those countrieswhere foreign nationals are exemptedfrom citizenship obligations such asmilitary or jury service. While con-scription has indeed been an importanthistoric element of citizenship, this isno longer the case. The general dutyto obey the laws and the duty to paytaxes is the same for citizens and noncitizens s. Other legal obligationssuch as military conscription or juryservice are not imposed on all citizensbut only on specific groups or allow fornumerous exemptions. If many citizenscan vote while being exempted fromthese obligations, the argument frominequality of duties provides only weak support for rules that excludenoncitizens s from the franchise.

There are two routes towards equalpolitical rights for immigrants and thenative population. One is to extendthe franchise, the other is to facilitateand promote access to citizenship. The question is then: Should foreignnationals be represented in politicaldecisions even if they themselveschoose not to become formal membersof the political community? In stateswhere naturalization is encouraged and offered on fair terms and wheresecond and third generations areincluded through jus soli rules, the casefor a noncitizens franchise loses muchof its urgency. Facilitating access tocitizenship and granting noncitizens


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immigrants secure residence, full liber-ties, and welfare benefits are equallyimportant tasks. If both are carriedout, an extension of the general fran-chise is not an essential requirement.

A general franchise for noncitizens s,then, should not be seen as an impera-tive but rather as a legitimate politicaloption. Different constitutional traditions and historic conceptions of citizenship may justify, as well asexplain, policy differences in this area. The authors therefore conclude that:� In those states with open access to

citizenship through naturalizationand automatic acquisition, corepolitical rights, such as access tohigh public office or the right tovote in national elections, may bereserved for their nationals.

The discussion so far has concernedvoting in national elections.Significantly different considerationsare relevant at the local level.Immigrants have specific interests inlocal politics and develop local identi-ties. Most contemporary migrants areattracted to big cities and the economicand cultural opportunities they offer. Inreceiving countries, immigrants tend todevelop an urban identity that can be easily combined with an ongoingnational affiliation to their countries oforigin. Even those who are not ready tojoin the wider political community oftheir host country feel that they have astake in the city. This sense of belong-ing to the city can be expressed by participating in local elections. Asmembers of low-income groups, immi-grants are also particularly affected by

policy areas, such as public housing,health services, and education, wheremunicipal authorities tend to havestrong competencies. Granting themthe franchise at a local level may thusprovide political representation in decisions that affect their most immediate interests.

Second, some reasons for excludingnoncitizens s from the national elec-tions do not apply at the local level. In contrast with a national polity, localpolitical communities have no immigra-tion controls that distinguish between citizens and noncitizens s. The right offree movement within the territory of ademocratic state is not tied to national-ity. Membership in a municipality orfederal province shifts automaticallywith a change of residence. Furthermore,the argument that foreign nationals areexempted from some obligations of citizenship does not apply at the municipal level. In the main, local citizenship has no specific legal dutiesthat are exclusively imposed on citizens.

Therefore:� In contrast to elections for

national offices, citizenship shouldnot be used as a relevant criterionfor democratic representation inlocal political communities.Settled immigrants should begranted a local franchise aftersome years of legal residence.

Promoting Political

Participation Among Groups

of Immigrant Origin

Communities of immigrant origininclude citizens as well as noncitizens

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residents. The political integration ofthese ethnic minorities depends notonly on their individual rights (whichare formally equal for those amongtheir members who are citizens) butalso on opportunities and incentivesfor their participation in political life.

It is neither necessary nor reasonableto expect communities of immigrantorigin to participate or to be elected inproportion to their population numbers,given the distinctive characteristicsand priorities of immigrants settling ina new country. Where these groupshave high percentages of recent arrivals,or of people who plan to return totheir country of origin, or of peoplewho come from countries with no tradition of democratic participation,it is highly likely that they will havelower rates of participation, evenwhere the host society enables andencourages their participation.

Nonetheless, the persistent under-representation of immigrant-origincommunities is a concern. Suchunder-representation may indicatestructural barriers to participation and social marginalization of ethnicminorities, particularly where it existsfor long-settled populations. The goal,therefore, should not be to guaranteeproportional representation of groupsof immigrant origin, but rather toidentify and remove structural andsocial barriers to effective participation.Political participation depends notonly on the socioeconomic position of individuals within the group, butalso on the internal structure ofminority communities and their

interaction with the native popula-tion. Participation in civil society prepares immigrants for political participation and provides them withinfluence in the policymaking process.Integration into civil society is not aone-way street of assimilation into theinstitutions of mainstream society, butalso offers opportunities for groups ofimmigrant origin to organize aroundtheir specific interests and identities as ethnic minorities. Both forms ofparticipation will generally contributeto political integration. Empiricalresearch confirms that rates of votingrise significantly with the membershipof groups of immigrant origin in associations of mainstream societysuch as churches, sports and leisureclubs, trade unions, and neighborhoodcommittees.

The lesson for public policy is thatmunicipal and national administra-tions should support the formation of associational networks and consultthem regularly on immigration andintegration policies, as well as on general issues affecting all citizens.Formal or informal consultationmechanisms can be important instruments for political integration,creating relations of trust betweenpublic administrations and spokesper-sons of immigrant communities. They also serve as two-way transmis-sion belts for integration policies:Immigrant groups can voice grievancesand suggest policy reforms in a low-confrontation setting; publicadministrators can obtain informationand foster cooperation in the implementation of their programs.


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Many European cities have establishedconsultative bodies on immigrant poli-cies. The members of these committeesare appointed by municipal authorities,designated by immigrant associations,or elected by the immigrant communi-ties themselves. While democraticelections for consultative committeesobviously strengthen the mandate ofrepresentatives, they should not beaccepted as a surrogate for the localfranchise. Such consultative bodies are special arrangements for making a public administration more responsiveto a particular group, whereas a localfranchise for noncitizens s establishes a common local citizenship shared byall residents.

These arguments suggest:� Equal formal rights are not enough

to achieve effective political par-ticipation of groups of immigrantorigin.

Electoral systems should be scrutinizedfor overt and hidden barriers thatdiminish opportunities for members ofsuch groups to vote, run for office, orbe elected. Public policies shouldencourage the participation of groupsof immigrant origin in civil society.Political authorities should establishmechanisms of cooperation and con-sultation that involve associations ofthese groups in processes of policy for-mation and implementation.

Furthermore:� Democratic political parties

should list candidates of immigrantorigins on local and regional pri-mary ballots and should refrain

from campaigns that stigmatize eth-nic minorities and from allianceswith other parties that incite eth-nic prejudice and racial hatred.

Social and Economic

Rights and Citizenship

Benefit Programs

A number of arguments may be offeredin support of limiting noncitizens s’access to public benefits. First, incomedisparities between developed anddeveloping countries are so wide thatbenefits offered by the host countrycan exceed income opportunities inthe sending countries. As a result,nations that offer immigrants generousbenefits may serve as a magnet forpoor immigrants who would qualify forsubsidies and may repel higher-earningimmigrants who would contribute taxesto pay for benefits. Thus, welfare’savailability changes the composition ofthe immigration flow and enablessome unintegrated immigrants to staywho would have otherwise returned.

Second, immigrants are said to repre-sent a disproportionately large share ofwelfare users, imposing high costs ontaxpayers. This drain on state resourcesmay jeopardize the social contract thatmaintains the welfare state and turnpublic opinion against more inclusiveimmigration policies. It might also beargued that an immigrant’s supportshould fall to his or her sponsor, whobenefits from being able to unite witha family member or by obtaining a newemployee (or both, in some instances).

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Finally, it is suggested that restrictingbenefits to citizens provides an incen-tive to naturalize. The naturalizationprocess, in turn, has an independentintegrating effect produced by require-ments to learn the language and todevelop at least a rudimentary historical,political, and cultural understanding of the host country.

But the rationing of benefits by citizenship raises substantial concernsas well. In the first instance, suchschemes discriminate against settledresidents by putting them in the position of having to contribute to thestate without receiving the reciprocalbenefits that flow to other members.

Second, restrictions on rights may givecitizenship an increasingly instrumentalvalue as immigrants naturalize to obtainsafety-net or work-support services or torelieve their sponsors of a binding sup-port contract. The resulting conceptionof citizenship may be viewed as being atodds with the nation-building goal ofpromoting durable and wholeheartedcivic engagement.

Third, restrictions on noncitizens s’access to non-contributory benefitsimposed by Austria, the US, andBritain raise integration concerns. Inthe US, the families that have beencut off from social benefits by new citizenship restrictions are among theneediest. Immigrant children in theUS are more likely to be poor, to livein overcrowded housing, and to reportbeing in poor health than children ofnatives. Not surprisingly, they are farless likely to be insured or to have a

usual source of care than their coun-terparts in families headed by a citizen.Similar results, presumably, wouldobtain in the other industrializedcountries that have introduced benefitrestrictions. Restricted access to publichealth insurance, coupled with thediminished medical care that results,therefore, can lead to poor and declin-ing health outcomes for children. It isalso likely that limiting access to publicly subsidized work supports suchas childcare, transportation assistance,and job and language training willslow immigrants’ labor-force mobility.Furthermore, policies that bar immi-grants from cash transfers also generallybar them from a range of work supportssuch as job and language training,transportation assistance, childcare sub-sidies, and health insurance. Denyingnoncitizens s these basic work supportscan only slow economic integration.

Fourth, restricting legal noncitizens s’access to public benefits — especiallyin jus soli nations — has unintendedand arguably discriminatory spillovereffects on citizen children. In the US,three-quarters of all children in immi-grant families (i.e., with one or moreforeign-born parents) are citizens.Since enactment of the 1996 welfarelegislation in the US, there has been areduction in benefits use not justamong the noncitizens adults whowere the policies’ targets, but alsoamong the citizen children who live intheir families and within the same,typically constrained, family budget.

Fifth, federal benefit restrictions decouple the national government’s role


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as gatekeeper from its responsibility forpaying the costs of newcomers’ settle-ment. These costs, then, fall dispropor-tionately on the receiving community.To the extent that state and local governments follow the national government’s lead in erecting eligibilityrestrictions, noncitizens s are likely tosuffer more limited freedom of move-ment than their citizen counterparts. As the decision to grant or deny healthand other benefits falls increasingly to subnational units of government, levelsof food insecurity, health-care access,and outcomes among immigrants mayvary more widely than among citizens.

Finally, the symbolic message that suchexclusions send to established immi-grant populations can be alienating,effectively discouraging the sentimentsof membership that would promotecitizenship.

These concerns substantially outweighthe arguments offered in support ofexclusion of presumptively permanentimmigrants from social benefits. Thus,citizenship status should not be thegatekeeper to access to social benefitsand the labor market. Rather, immi-grants who have a status that authoriz-es or presumes settlement in the stateshould be guaranteed eligibility onterms similar to those established forcitizens. Adopting this broader under-standing of membership complementsand supports the institution of citizen-ship in liberal democracies.

Specifically:� Citizenship should not be used to

ration access to welfare and other

social benefits. Settled immigrantstatus rather than citizenshipshould suffice for access to mostbenefits made available under thewelfare state.

At the same time, however, immi-grants’ sponsors should carry a time-limited support obligation for at leastsome cash and other benefit programs.But such obligations should notimpose an open-ended fiscal liabilityon immigrants’ sponsors, and theyshould not lead to gross disparitiesbetween the obligations imposed onthe families of legal immigrants andthose imposed on citizens. Thus: � Sponsor support obligations

should not impose an open-endedfiscal liability on immigrants’sponsors.

Labor Market Access and

Citizenship

Citizenship matters in the rationing ofpublic-sector jobs across most states.While blanket exclusions of nonciti-zens s from civil-service jobs have beeninvalidated by the courts in the US,specific restrictions regarding positionsdeemed to be related to the exercise ofstate power have been upheld. Alongsimilar lines, France restricts all rail-way, postal, and hospital jobs to EUcitizens. Germany bars third-countrynationals from all jobs in governmentservice, including employment in pub-lic transportation and kindergarten. Incountries where major economic sec-tors are administered by the govern-ment, the implications of reservingpublic-sector jobs for citizens are morefar reaching.

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Two widely accepted rationales forrestricting public sector employmentare commonly advanced. Such policiesare said to promote national securityand to limit public-policy decision-making to full members of the state.There are, however, other rationalesfor limiting noncitizens s’ access topublic employment that sweep farmore broadly. These include givingnoncitizens s an incentive to naturalizeor simply reserving a valuable publicgood for the citizenry.

There are strong reasons to adopt more inclusionary policies regardingnoncitizens s’ access to public-sectorjobs. From an instrumental perspective,it could be argued that immigrantsrepresent an expanding share of thetotal labor force and that their exclusion from the public sectorrestricts governments’ access to apotentially rich labor pool. In an eraof demographic change, it makes senseto include members of language andother minorities in the public serviceto promote better communicationbetween communities of immigrantorigin and police forces, public-schoolfaculties, licensing offices, and thelike. Further, an inclusionary approachto public employment can promote a shared identity of immigrants with the state and the nation, rather thantheir withdrawal or exclusion from it. In some cases, this may require notonly liberal hiring policies, but also special accommodations by mainstream institutions.

From an equity perspective, an argu-ment made in support of immigrant

eligibility for public benefits applies to public-sector employment as well:Because noncitizens s assume most ofthe societal obligations required of cit-izens, they should be eligible for mostof the social and economic opportuni-ties afforded by states to their citizens.

On balance, therefore, states that haveblanket exclusions of noncitizens sfrom public-service jobs should rethinksuch policies. While it is reasonable tomake exceptions for positions thatimplicate national-security or high-level policymaking positions — just asit may be reasonable to ask high-levelgovernment officials to relinquish citizenship in another state — suchexceptions should be closely circum-scribed. Scant justification, for example, exists for limiting teachingpositions in public schools to citizens.

Settled immigrants frequently enjoythe same access to the private labormarket as citizens. Furthermore,national policies generally do notencourage private employers to discriminate in favor of citizens, andsome states have express prohibitionson such discrimination.

Australia, Britain, Canada, and theUS offer striking examples of openaccess from the time of admission toboth the labor market and self-employ-ment. This access exceeds some of themost progressive, inclusionary proposalscontemplated for the EU. As in thearea of social welfare, these progressivepolicies in English-speaking states maybe largely a function of immigrationrules, which admit immigrants as


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permanent residents on track for citizenship rather than as temporarylabor migrants.

There are, however, important excep-tions to this overall pattern of compar-atively inclusionary labor-market poli-cies. While citizens from EU countriesenjoy free movement and open accessto the labor markets in other EUcountries, third-country nationals donot benefit from such rights; theirrights to residence and employmentare generally defined by and limited tothe EU state that authorized theiradmission. In Germany, for example,family members of third-countrynationals who do not hold unrestrictedresidence or work permits can berefused a labor permit if a German orEU citizen is available for the job. Insome German regions these familymembers — who will likely becomelong-term, if not permanent, residents— can be excluded from all employ-ment. Moreover, access to the perma-nent-residence status needed for freelabor movement within Germany islimited by requirements that the appli-cant pass language tests and have along employment record.

Extensive restrictions on establishednoncitizens s’ access to employmentalso exist in Austria. Family membersof third-country nationals can beexcluded from the labor market for aperiod of four to eight years. And theemployment rights of many establishedthird-country nationals remain insecure, as they must periodicallyrenew their work permits and can beturned down depending on patterns of

labor-market demand. Access to moresecure jobs in the large, semi-publicsector is heavily influenced by political patronage, strong trade-unioncontrol, and citizenship requirements, which, taken together, virtuallyexclude immigrant workers.

Plainly, policies that facilitate theacquisition of nationality would openaccess to employment for third-countrynationals within the EU. But otherpolicies may also hold promise. Inspring 2001, the European Commissionissued a directive proposing that afterfive years, third-country nationals beallowed to work in EU states otherthan their country of residence.

These considerations suggest:� Employment policies, like welfare

rules, should be constructed topromote integration of settledimmigrants. Citizenship shouldnot be erected as a barrier to thelabor market.

� Citizenship should not be a condition for the granting of professional licenses, for apprenticeships, or for entry into the civil service or the greatmajority of public-sector jobs.

� States should implement anti-discrimination policies,which, when coupled with anenforcement system that is carefullydesigned and adequately funded,can be an important tool in ensuring that immigrant rights to access to private employmentare protected.

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This chapter is adapted from Citizenship Policies for an Age ofMigration (2001), T. A. Aleinikoff &D. Klusmeyer, eds., a volume which represents the capstone of a multi-yearstudy conducted by the InternationalMigration Policy Program of the CarnegieEndowment for International Peace.

References

Aleinikoff, A. and D. Klusmeyer, eds. FromMigrants to Citizens: Membership in a ChangingWorld. Washington, DC: CarnegieEndowment for International Peace, 2000.

Aleinikoff, A. and D. Klusmeyer, eds. CitizenshipToday: Global Perspectives and Practices.Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment forInternational Peace, 2001.

Castles, S. and A. Davidson. Citizenship andMigration: Globalization and the Politics ofBelonging. New York: Routledge, 2000.

Hansen, R. and P. Weil. Towards a EuropeanNationality: Citizenship, Immigration andNationality Law in the EU. Hampshire:Palgrave, 2001.

Hansen, R. and P. Weil. Dual Nationality, SocialRights and Federal Citizenship in the U.S. andEurope, The Reinvention of Citizenship. NewYork/Oxford: Berghan Press, 2002.

Rubio-Marin, R. Immigration as a DemocraticChallenge: Citizenship and Inclusion in Germanyand the United States. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press, 2000.

Weil, P. Qu’est ce qu’un français ? Histoire de lanationalité française depuis la Révolution. Paris: Grasset, 2002.


Building Successful

Urban Policy in the

New Era of Migration

Jorge Gaspar and Maria Lucinda Fonseca

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The world has entered a new age of migration, with unprecedented numbers of

migrants embarking on internationaljourneys. As such, migration is affecting many sending and receivingcountries to such an extent that someanalysts have defined the passage into the millennium as the “era of migration.”

Today, these migrants’ most frequentdestination is a city: a complex struc-ture characterized by diversity, wherevaried economic, social, and culturalforces create synergies and increasethe sense of identity, belonging, andinclusion. As cities become home togreater numbers of immigrants, theinterface between urban policy and the politics of immigration isbecoming ever more critical.

While international migrationincreases the presence of immigrantsin the world’s largest cities, their dis-persal to mid-sized, “peripheral” citiesis also accelerating. This has alreadybeen observed in the United States,and in the European Union the jointforces of EU enlargement and politicalchange in Eastern Europe will makethis change even more pronounced. Aring of new migrant destinations willstretch from Glasgow and Helsinki inthe north, through Copenhagen andthe Baltic states, to Warsaw, Prague,Bratislava, and Budapest in the east,to Nicosia in the south. In manycases, these cities will receive largenumbers of migrants from a particularsending region, creating importanttransnational ties.

Understanding what is at stake for bothcities and immigrants at this pivotalmoment requires examining, first, thehistoric role of cities in relation tomigration, and second, the recent erasof international migration. This will setthe stage for a more detailed analysis ofhow urbanization and immigration nowinteract, followed by an examinationof the implications for European citiesin general and the abovementionedcities in particular. This chapter willconclude with a range of recommenda-tions for urban policymakers strugglingto optimize the gains offered by well-managed immigration, while minimizing the potential tensions.

Background : Urbanization,

Immigrants, and Cycles

of Renewal

For centuries, cities have been placesof interaction and exchange for peopleof different geographical, social, professional, and cultural backgrounds.Cities have served as bastions of ideals,symbols of identity, and refuges fromoppression and enemies. But the raisond’être of cities has been their residents’quest to make the best use of theirskills, most importantly by connectingwith one another.

Beyond the individual level, on thescale of societies, cities have long beenplaces of contact, juxtaposition, coop-eration, and conflict between differentcultures. This has sometimes, but notalways, led to ethnic diversity. Citieshave often hosted coexisting, culturallydiverse communities, each with specific


Building Successful Urban Policy in the New Era of Migration 73

functions and sometimes enjoyingadministrative or judicial autonomy.This phenomenon is well illustrated bythe diversity of some medievalChristian and Islamic cities but canalso be observed across continentsfrom Africa to America. Cities canthus aptly be described as communitiesof communities.

At the dawn of the 21st century, citiesand migration have become even moretightly intertwined. The city hasemerged as a privileged actor in theeconomic, social, political, and culturalorganization of countries, macro-regions, and the entire planet. Certaincities have replaced regions and evencountries as cultural, socio-political,and economic points of reference bothfor immigrants and natives. The litera-ture of various diasporas, whose writinghas been a major influence on cities’transnational heritage in recent years,accurately portrays cities as both deci-sive actors and arenas. Cities are theplaces where immigrants can mostquickly find points of reference aroundwhich to build new ways of life.Identification can be made with thestrongest and most typical local reference points — the soccer team,the river, the neighborhood.

At the same time, the reality withwhich an immigrant comes into con-tact does not always correspond tohis/her hopes and expectations. Inlarge cities in particular, immigrantsare often at risk, confronted with hos-tile spaces that have oftentimesalready been abandoned by others. Yetthese spaces can re-instill faith in and

the will to create the “promised” cityimagined before emigrating, providedthat there is work, food, and shelteravailable. The will to construct thepromised city is strong, facilitating therecycling of urban space and turningthe city once only dreamed of into adesired reality.

In different eras, and clearly in the 21stcentury, the obsolescence of certainurban functions and of their respectivespaces and infrastructures has createdconditions for people to return to thecity, producing new patterns of work,housing, and leisure. Overall, thisprocess has provided opportunities atdifferent levels and for various func-tions among immigrant communities.As a result, these communities havebecome increasingly complex andfunctional, both socially and culturally.This evolution has also translated intonew urban forms when partnered withnative-born populations’ tendenciestowards particular ways of organizingspace and society. The frequent contri-bution of immigrant communities hasbeen to renew life in obsolete spaces,such as declining residential areas,allowing for the reinvigoration of thecity as a whole.

Large metropolises and national capitalscomprise privileged spaces of interac-tion, putting different parts of theworld in contact with one another andemerging as leading places in theworld economy. Despite the growingmobility of capital and the labor force,urban centers have held tenaciously totheir place and prestige. Even in timesof crisis, permanent capital invested in

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property and infrastructure networks(i.e. highways, railways, ports, airports,water and electricity supply networks,sewage networks, telecommunications)have assured cities’ connections toother places, solidifying their grip onlandscapes and power. These factorsensure that urbanization, in its diversi-fied forms and contents, is both shap-ing and being shaped by globalization.

Above all, as in other historicalmoments for humanity, the contributionof immigration has been largely to pro-vide continuity to urban life and itsdiversity, filling in gaps left by new andspread-out forms of urbanization andcreating conditions for cities — reno-vated and modernized — to escapecycles of decay and return to theirworldly ways.

Eras of Migration

Over spans of decades, cities havebeen the site of continuity and discon-tinuity between successive waves ofimmigration and the communities theyhave helped to build. Different periodshave seen global migration ebb andflow from one region and country tothe next, with far-reaching implica-tions for urban policy.

The 1960s marked a turning point forinternational migration, and it is thewatershed at which it is most useful tobegin a discussion of modern immigra-tion and urban policy. Before 1925, 85percent of international migrationcame from Europe. By the 1960s, theweight of European emigrants in world

immigrant flows had declined drastically(Massey et al. 1998: 2) and emigrationout of Africa, Asia, and Latin Americahad risen along with an increase in thevariety of countries receiving immi-grants. In general, this diversificationof sending countries came aboutbecause of a variety of factors, includingpost-colonial migration, increasingneed for laborers in the so-called 3D’sjobs (dirty, dangerous, and difficult),multinational and bilateral agreements,recruitment of foreign labor by oil-richcountries, the transition of SouthernEuropean countries from countries ofemigration to countries of immigration,new migratory movements connectedwith economic and social change inthe “newly industrializing countries,”development of mass movements ofrefugees and asylum seekers, and theincreasing international mobility ofhigh-skilled personnel in both tempo-rary and permanent flows (Castles andMiller 2003).

By the 1990s, global migration flows todeveloped countries were dominatedby people from a wide variety of com-munities of origin that were quite different from those observable up tothe early 1970s. The restructuring ofthe global economy, the diffusion ofcompetitive mechanisms throughoutthe world, and the worsening asymme-try in regional development increasedmigration from developing countries inAfrica, Asia, and Latin America.

Immigrants from these two periodsthus differed in their ethnic, social,and professional composition, patternsof urban and economic integration,



and attitudes toward their host soci-eties and their societies of origin. Inthe period before 1973, links betweencommunities of the same cultural and geographical origins were maintainedin a more or less organized manner,both in the country of destination andwith their homeland. Urban spaceswere restored by a succession of immi-grant communities with cultural andgeographic similarities or simply bythose casually connected by their emigration experiences. The underly-ing links, transmitted experiences, andcontinuities that existed throughoutthis period have important implicationsfor successful integration and thestrengthening of links between countries of destination and origin.

The immigrants of the 1990s differedfrom their counterparts in previousdecades not only in terms of their eth-nic and social composition, but alsowith regard to the dynamics of theirintegration into urban spaces. Forexample, some researchers noted howincreasing racial and ethnic diversityrendered some traditional conceptionsof residential segregation obsolete,such as the assumption that livingwith whites was the main or only basisfor cultural integration and assimila-tion. Some researchers proposed thatintegration should be considered amulti-ethnic process, shunning the useof white populations as the only legiti-mate reference points (Reardon andFirebaugh 2002; Wong 1998).

Other notable aspects of urban immi-gration in the 1990s were economic,ranging from ethnic business districts

to particular ways of entering theurban labor market. In this period,cities saw the development of very ethnically and racially diverse situationsamong communities, cities, and sectorsof economic activity. For example,businesses like banks often becameassociated with residential areas domi-nated by particular ethnic communities,based on linguistic accessibility, trust-worthiness, and relationships back inthe country of origin. For differenteconomic reasons, groceries andrestaurants came to be dispersedthroughout areas in which an immi-grant owner’s community was hardlyrepresented.

The transformation of global migrationbetween the early 1970s and the1990s, particularly with regard tocities, did not come about in a simpleway. Underlying recent changes tomigration patterns, in everything fromsettlement patterns to workforce inte-gration, have been interactionsbetween migration and urbanization.

Three Driving Forces:Globalization,

Urbanization, and

Migration

Over the last 30 years, the daily life ofmost people — not least immigrantsthemselves — has increasingly beenshaped by economic, political, and cultural activities on a global scale.Connected to this globalization areurbanization and the expanding influ-ence of global cities — poles of popula-tion and centers of economic, political,

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and cultural power. These cities form ahierarchical network connecting coun-tries, regions, companies, organizations,communities, and individuals world-wide. It is to these poles that migrantsare increasingly drawn.

In the context of the various types ofinterplay that occur among globaliza-tion, urbanization, and migration, themost important for the purposes of thisanalysis is the relationship betweenurbanization and migration. Only byunderstanding this relationship can poli-cymakers hope to maximize the gainsfrom immigration, while minimizingfrictions. The following are some keyaspects of the interplay between urban-ization and international migration.

Continuity. The growth of cities hasalways been fed by migration, whetherdirectly from rural areas, or in succes-sive stages of migration from one largeurban center to another more distantone. This phenomenon is not uniquelyEuropean, having also taken place inthe Americas, Africa, and Oceania,creating various strands of historicalcontinuity with the phenomenon ofurbanization today. According to theUnited Nations Population Division,the world’s urban population reached2.9 billion in 2000 and is predicted togrow to five billion by 2030. In termsof percentages, the urban populationgrew from 30 percent in 1950 to 47percent in 2000, with 60 percent projected to live in cities by 2030.

Concentrations of Diversity. Becauseof the growth and increasing complex-ity of international migratory systems

that began to emerge in the last quarterof the 20th century, large cities areincreasingly more multi-ethnic andmulti-racial. All indications point tothese differences increasing in thefuture. Although patterns vary, thegeographic distributions of the foreign-born population in industrializedreceiving countries uniformly show thelargest concentrations in urban areas.

In European cities, whether those ofNorthwestern Europe with a longerhistory of immigration (such as Paris,Brussels, Frankfurt, Munich, Geneva,Rotterdam, and Stockholm) or thoseof Southern Europe (such as Athens,Naples, Rome, Barcelona, Madrid, andLisbon), the percentage of foreigners isalways much higher than their respec-tive national percentages. This trendcan also be observed in the UnitedStates, Canada, Australia, and in cer-tain major Asian cities. Furthermore,globalization’s facilitation of commerce— with lowering trade barriers, reduc-tion in transportation costs, and newproduct-preservation techniques —allows for the “cross-breeding” of cultural practices, thereby contributingto greater cultural diversity in cities.

Varying Urbanization Patterns. It isimportant to note that urbanizationmanifests itself differently in developedand developing countries. In the former,the number of urban dwellers doubledand their proportion of the total popu-lation grew from 54.9 percent to 75.4percent during the second half of the20th century. At the same time, indeveloping countries, the urban population grew without precedent,



multiplying by more than six times,and leading to a change from 17 per-cent in 1950 to 40.4 percent in 2000.However, even this is still not any-where near the 75.4 percent figure inthe developed world.

Moreover, levels of urbanization andurban growth vary greatly amongdeveloping countries. In LatinAmerica and the Caribbean, the partof the population that resides in urbanareas (75 percent) is twice that ofAfrica and Asia and slightly greaterthan that of Europe (73 percent).Despite all of these differences, the sta-tistics correctly reflect the speed atwhich a once predominantly ruralworld is becoming much more urban.

Transnationalism. Progress in trans-portation and communications hasbrought sending and receiving countries closer together and forgedconnections between different placesof settlement for populations belong-ing to the same national or ethniccommunity. As such, today’s interna-tional migrations increasingly encompass more “nodes of circulation,”defined by a complex network of information, people, goods, and capitalthat connect communities of migrantsthroughout the world.

Researchers have noted the strongsocial networks, institutions, and bondsbetween first-generation immigrantsand their countries of origin. Theseimmigrants often travel to their home-land, send remittances to relatives,keep up on their country’s politics andcrises, and generally cultivate cultural

ties. This type of transnational identityis a feature of many cities in the developed world, where the means ofexchange — of goods, of culturaldevelopments, of information about thehomeland — is accessible. In the 1990s,as noted earlier, this access was increasedby the rise of niche economic businessesrun by and targeting immigrants.

Chain Migration. On the internationallevel, urban areas are most recognizedfor their role in facilitating contactbetween immigrants and their countryof origin, while offering greateremployment opportunities and socialmobility. Furthermore, following thesettlement of “pioneering” immigrants,networking mechanisms tend to developthat attract their compatriots, thusreinforcing immigrant concentrationsin the receiving countries. In this way,contact networks play a decisive rolein the migratory process and serve toexplain both the strong urbanization of international migration and the formation of migratory links betweenparticular sending and receiving areas.

Revitalization of Public Space. Incities and other urban centers inreceiving countries, the middle classesare abandoning traditional urban pub-lic spaces (i.e. squares, public parks,and sidewalks), with the exception ofpublic consumption and class-orientedspaces such as theaters, cinemas, museums, stadiums, and gyms.

At the same time, many lower-incomeimmigrants are living in overcrowdedand poor-quality houses or apartments,and are feeling cultural isolation

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brought on by residing in anonymousbuildings with people who speak otherlanguages and have unfamiliar behaviorsand habits. As a consequence, manyimmigrants are seeking out publicspaces and traditional gathering places(i.e., cafés) to gather and to comple-ment their living space. Thus, the newinhabitants gain the status of belongingto a city and replicate the uses of timeand city space once typical of other eras.

In Northern Europe, revitalization of this type is observable in Berlin,particularly in Kreuzberg, where theTurkish community has regeneratedthe urban environment’s vibrancy and richness. Another example isSödertalje, an average-sized Swedishcity once gripped by post-industrialcrisis, where citizens well-versed inurban history have rebuilt with theparticipation of immigrants such asAssyrian Christians.

In Southern Europe, though immigra-tion is a recent phenomenon, immi-grants have left numerous marks onthe urban landscape. In the case ofLisbon, the Martim Moniz area is animportant multi-ethnic commercialenclave that has greatly contributedto turning around the economicdecline, urban decay, and social marginality of this area located on thefringe of Lisbon’s traditional downtown.Besides animating this area during theday, the progressive appropriation ofthis area by immigrants and ethnicminorities has proved to be key to itsrehabilitation and collective re-appro-priation, thus making it a symbolicspace that displays the multi-ethnic

character of the Lisbon MetropolitanArea (Fonseca 2002).

In Barcelona, non-EU immigrants whobegan to arrive in the 1970s are alsochanging the look of the Old City.Ethnic businesses fill this older quarterwith life and color along the Corders-Carders-Portal Nou axis and Carrer dela Princesa. The neighborhood is broken up into a series of subunits thathave been appropriated by diverseimmigrant and ethnic minority groups.Carrer Corders, next to Plaça de laLana, recreates an African atmosphere;Carrer Carders has a Dominican feel;and, from Plaça S. Agustí Vell toPortal Nou, North African influencesemerge (Monet 2000).

In Marseille, the Belsunce neighbor-hood, located in the city centerbetween the Vieux Port andCanebière, has long been a point ofarrival for immigrants and a focalpoint for specialized services. It hashosted successive waves of immigrantsfrom the Mediterranean (Italians,Spanish, Lebanese, Turks, and Egyptians,as well as Armenians and the first waveof Algerians starting in World War I).During World War II, it attracted anumber of Jews and, starting in the1950s, it became a host for people intransit, port workers, and a new wave ofNorth African laborers, many of whomwere undocumented. Before the touristvisa was set up for entry into France in1986, Marseille was a marketplacepatronized by many North Africans.The urban economy benefited a greatdeal from this shopping tourism fromthe other side of the Mediterranean.



The Belsunce neighborhood had ele-ments of an Arab city that were locallyknown as the “Casbah” or “LittleAlgiers.” In the 1980s, the neighbor-hood began to undergo major urbanrenewal efforts that, associated with thedecline in North African tourism, maythreaten the local economy and displacethe immigrants. The success or failure ofthis city-center renewal project willdepend on Marseille’s ability to preserveand attach value to the area’s culturaluniqueness and history, finding solu-tions adapted to the diverse populationthat lives there and frequents it.

The Role of Urban Policies. Theseexamples typify different effects ofimmigration on the changing use ofurban space and in the dynamics ofsocio-spatial integration of immigrantsin cities. Urban policies and spatialplanning have an essential role to playin both the economic and socialregeneration of cities and in the socio-spatial integration of immigrants andpoor ethnic minorities, because effortsto improve living conditions indeprived neighborhoods and better usepublic space must be anchored in abroader urban context that includeslong-term planning.

The process may differ from place toplace. These differences reflect theimportance of local contexts: history,urban form, the mixing and specificconcentrations of housing, the qualityof the environment and the publicspace, the number and diversity ofimmigrants and ethnic minorities, and the economic, social, and politicalstructure. That is why place is impor-

tant and why urban government andgovernance can make a difference.

Depending on local contexts, threedifferent situations can come about.First, there is the possibility of totalobsolescence of public space. This caninduce rejuvenation or reconstruction,with its content totally reconstructedbut for the same purpose as before (i.e.,social housing projects, traditionalbusinesses, cottage industry, etc.) andits new users’ identities recognized,creating significant ethno-culturalpolarization. Second, total reconstruc-tion for new uses is possible — in thepast, in fact, solutions that ended uppushing out both immigrant users andnearby native-born residents werecommon. Third, there is the possibilityof the promotion of a gradual large-scale or even privatized regeneration,in which stratification and gentrifica-tion can be managed and inspire a newtype of urban integration/mix.

This same process may only winddown when improved socio-economicconditions lead immigrants to abandontheir use of public space and insteadseek out better housing and greatercomforts, which naturally contributeto more individualistic behavior.

Europe’s Experience with

Urbanization and

Migration

During Europe’s reconstruction follow-ing World War II, economic expansionand the end of the demographic transi-tion (which involved a decline of the

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natural population growth rate) led to the mass immigration of laborers, primarily to France, Germany, theUnited Kingdom, the Netherlands,and Switzerland. To a certain extent,there was also mass immigration of thistype to the industrialized Nordic coun-tries: First from Finland and certainBaltic countries and then, starting inthe 1960s, from Yugoslavia andGreece, particularly to Sweden.

At first, these workers came from thepoorest and geographically closestcountries, including Italy, Ireland, andFinland. They also arrived from thecollapsing British, French, and Belgiancolonial empires. Later, especially duringthe 1960s, this flow expanded toinclude migrants from countries alongthe Mediterranean, including Spain,Portugal, Greece, Yugoslavia, andTurkey. Of those arriving from the for-mer colonies, many were seeking safetyand economic betterment for theirchildren and hoped to return home oneday. Others were refugees: Initially, themost fervent supporters of the colonizersof their respective countries, and later,those threatened by power struggles innewly de-colonized countries.

Southern Europe’s Profile. SouthernEurope’s experience with migration hasbeen quite different from that ofNorthwestern Europe, because thetransition for Greece, Italy, Portugal,and Spain from countries of mass emi-gration to countries of mass immigra-tion only began in the late 1970s.

There have been three major immigra-tion flows into Southern European

countries. First, Southern Europe hasbecome, since the 1980s, a new portalfor entry to the European Union formany Africans, Asians, and SouthAmericans. Most of this immigrationhas been clandestine. Second, therehas been an increase in the number offoreigners from developed countries,chiefly Western Europe. These migrantsfill highly qualified positions, mainly inmultinational enterprises. Third, thecoastal regions of Southern Portugaland Spain have attracted many retiredforeigners, particularly British andGermans. In the Portuguese case, it isalso important to note that, between1975 and 1976, more than a half a mil-lion Portuguese returnees, mostly fromAngola and Mozambique, came toPortugal following the independence ofthe African colonies.

East-West migration increased in the1990s following the fall of communismin Eastern Europe and the formerUSSR. This new wave of migrationfirst affected neighboring countries,such as Germany and Austria, butquickly spread to Southern Europeancountries. The current numerical sig-nificance of Eastern European migrantsin Southern Europe is based on bothformal and informal networks active atboth ends of the migration path. Thishas given rise to some quite unbal-anced flows (e.g., Ukrainian malesmigrate mainly to Portugal, whileUkrainian women largely go to Italy).This new flow of Eastern Europeans toSouthern Europe differs from that oflaborers coming from the Southernand Eastern Mediterranean, Sub-Saharan Africa, Asia, and Latin



American, as it is comprised of a largenumber of skilled migrants. Despitetheir skills, however, they are mainlyincorporated into low-paying andsocially undervalued jobs, such as construction (men) and professionalcleaning and domestic work (women)(Baganha and Fonseca 2004).

Migration and Urban Growth ofEuropean Metropolises. Even in theperiod when Southern European citieswere still growing mainly as a result ofan exodus from rural areas (starting inthe 1950s and 1960s, though earlier orlater in different areas), large urban-industrial centers in NorthwesternEurope began to grow as a result ofinternational migration. The percentageof foreigners in the total population ofthe most important cities tended to behigher than that of the country inwhich they were situated.

The cumulative results of these devel-opments are increasingly clear, at leastin terms of settlement patterns.Immigrants and ethnic minorities tendto be concentrated in the most impor-tant urban areas in each receivingcountry. For example, in 1999, while5.6 percent of the population in Francewas foreign, foreigners represented 14.5percent of the population in Paris and12.9 percent of the population inMarseille. In Germany, foreignersmade up 8.9 percent of the total popu-lation in 2000, though the same statis-tics in Munich and Frankfurt weremuch higher (22.8 and 27.8 percent,respectively). The concentration ofimmigrants in cities can also be seenin Belgium. In 2004, 26.3 percent of

people living in the Brussels regionwere foreign, while the correspondingnational rate was only 8.3 percent.

Though immigration is rather recent,the same phenomenon can still beobserved in Southern Europe.According to the 2001 PopulationCensus, 55.5 percent of foreignerslived in the Lisbon Metropolitan Area,representing 4.7 percent of the totalLMA population, while immigrantsrepresented only 2.2 percent of thetotal population in Portugal. In Italy,Spain, and Greece, the largest concen-trations of immigrants can be found inthe main cities. In Italy, more thanone-half of all immigrants live in thenorthern part of the country.According to an estimate by theRegional Observatory of Lombardy, 6.1percent of the population living in theMilan Metropolitan Area in 2002 wasimmigrants from developing countriesand Eastern Europe, equivalent to 50.7percent of immigrants living in theLombardy region (Blangiarlo et al.2003). In Spain, foreigners made up3.8 percent of the country’s populationin 2001, while 38.4 percent of all for-eigners lived around Madrid andBarcelona. Consequently, the percent-age of foreigners in these two citieswas higher than the national average,with 4.8 percent living in Barcelonaand 6.8 percent in Madrid. In Greece,the concentration of immigrants in theAthens Metropolitan Area (AMA)can be seen by examining the resultsof the regularization campaigns forundocumented foreigners in 1998 and2000. Around 40 percent of regulariza-tion requests made in 1998 and renewal

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requests for permanence permits madein 2000 corresponded to individualsliving and working in the AMA(Sintès 2002).

Housing and Segregation in EuropeanMetropolises. The emergence of resi-dential segregation based on ethnicityis another new feature of the contem-porary development cycle of SouthernEuropean cities. However, authorssuch as J.M. Leontidou (1993) andJorge Malheiros (2002) describeSouthern European cities as havingfewer levels of socio-spatial segregationthan their Northern European coun-terparts. Delayed industrialization, theinexistence of a culture of formalurban planning, the nature of the wel-fare system (particularly in the domainof housing), a dualistic housing regime,the recent character of internationalmigration, and the great geographic,ethnic, and social diversity of immi-grants and ethnic minorities of immi-grant origin are the main factors thathelp explain the differences observedin Southern European countries(Arbaci 2002). However, in morerecent years, the increase in thegrowth of immigrant populations andtheir descendants in SouthernEuropean metropolises has been associ-ated with the trend towards greaterstandardization of urban and socialpolicies in the European Union, atten-uating the differences observedbetween Northern and SouthernEuropean cities.

In fact, as large-scale urban problemsinvolving basic infrastructure, housing,and accessibility have been resolved in

Southern Europe and as the middleclass expands, there has been a progressive urban “harmonization”throughout Europe. Differencesbetween Southern European cities areincreasingly based upon their land-scapes, heritage, and traditions, anddecreasingly based upon their func-tional and social structure. For thisreason, it is important to note the rejuvenation of historical city centers, suburban renewal, de-population ofthe city center, and the emergence ofnew urban centralities, as well asprocesses of gentrification.

From the 1950s to the 1980s, there waslittle awareness among policymakersthat the clustering of the most disad-vantaged social classes (which includethe vast majority of immigrants) inneighborhoods in and around largeEuropean cities would lead to so manysocial problems in the future. Prominentamong these problems were immigrants’frustrations with climbing the economicladder, as well as the clash of cultures,growing difficulties with findingemployment, and the dissatisfactionand revolt of the generation born inEurope.

The oil crisis at the end of 1973 markeda turning point — a chronological andsymbolic wake-up call at the end of aperiod of economic euphoria. It corre-sponded to a crisis for cities manifestedin rising unemployment, economicrecession, demographic decline, andanti-urbanization movements.Overcoming the shock of the 1970seconomic crisis, European cities andthe European urban system underwent



a profound social and economic transformation. The development of aheavily internationalized service econo-my, structured by a network of citiespositioned in different parts of the glob-al urban hierarchy, reflected the socialpolarization of labor markets, with thesimultaneous demand for highly skilledprofessionals and low-skilled service-sector workers (cleaning and domesticwork, caring for the elderly, security,commerce, hotels, and catering).

In this way, the reconstruction of cities and the restructuring of Europe’seconomic base generated much morefragmented urban spaces from a socio-economic point of view. These spacesare associated with the rise in socialinequality and increasing unemploy-ment, as can be seen in the emergenceof new situations of exclusion in whichimmigrants and their descendants arepotentially overrepresented (Musterdand Ostendorf 1998).

During the 1970s, many emigrantsfrom Southern European countrieswho had contributed decisively toNorthern Europe’s reconstructionreturned to their countries of origin.Some returned simply to retire andlive off of their pensions; others builtimportant support structures for thedevelopment of the poorest areas ofSouthern Europe, from Greece toPortugal. The integration of Greece,Spain, and Portugal into the EuropeanUnion contributed to the recognitionnot only of the knowledge of themigrants that returned home, but alsoof the webs of relationships they haddeveloped throughout Europe.

In addition, the European integrationprocess, associated with greater ease intransport and communication, has ledto the development of a come-and-gotype of migration for many former emi-grants who have already retired. Thesemigrants travel between their countriesof origin and their former receivingcountries in order to visit children andgrandchildren who stayed on in thereceiving country, to benefit fromsocial services to which they may nothave access or that are better thanthose in their countries of origin, or toprovide informal temporary assistanceto a family member (e.g., to care for an ailing person or a child, etc.).Similarly, movements in the oppositedirection have increased during vaca-tion periods, with second- and third-generation descendents living in thereceiving country going to visit familymembers in the country of origin.

Conclusions and

Recommendations

The rebirth and restructuring of theEuropean urban system under theinfluence of globalization, urbaniza-tion, and a new era of internationalmigration is shaping the structure ofthe Europe of the future. The dynamicsof urban growth are closely related tothe dynamics of migration. Immigrantsand ethnic minorities in the urbanspace of Southern European cities aredispersed to a far greater extent thanthose in Northern Europe. The tworegions also differ in terms of the typesof spatial segregation that generallyemerge at the micro-level.

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These differences are the products ofthe more recent nature of immigrationto Southern Europe, the continent’sdemographic transition, the later onsetof the processes of industrializationand suburbanization in SouthernEurope, and the weak public-housingsector in the region’s metropolises.These factors come in association withrudimentary welfare-state systems andan urban planning system developedvery late and without a consistent all-encompassing urban policy.

Political and policy measures directedtowards the necessary marriagebetween migratory flows and urbandevelopment are badly needed.Without them, social and economiccohesion, the complementary relation-ships of the European Union andcities, and social and spatial equalitywill all suffer.

The rapid economic growth of variousEuropean countries, dating back fordecades but in the South only inrecent years, has only been possiblebecause of successive flows of immigra-tion. Immigrants have filled primarilylow-wage, low-skill jobs, particularly inconstruction, agriculture, tourism, andlow-skill services, where the local laborsupply has been limited.

Despite this largely positive role,immigrants have faced negative reactions from sectors of the politicalleadership and the public in both theNorth and the South. The emergenceof immigration as a political issue inSouthern Europe happened much later and under substantially different

conditions from those between WorldWar II and the 1970s in NorthwesternEuropean countries. The politicizationof immigration in the NorthernMediterranean is closely associatedwith the European integration processand, unlike other more-developedEuropean countries with deeper-rootedimmigration traditions, ultra-nationalistmovements with xenophobic or racistfeatures are still quite marginal inSouthern Europe. However, there aresome signs of increasing racial tension,which is cause for growing concernamong politicians and citizens alike(Fonseca, Caldeira and Esteves, 2002).

It is also clear that the EU faces migratory pressures from North Africa,the Middle East, and the Balkans, allreinforced by the political instability of these regions. Coping with thesesimultaneous pressures will requiregreater coordination and harmonizationof EU migration policies. It will alsodemand increased cooperation betweensending and receiving countries in orderto promote the development of theformer and to curb illegal migration.

As with similar growth in the past, theenlargements of the European Unionin 2004 and beyond will have conse-quences both for urban systems in general and migration flows in particu-lar. These changes will greatly facilitatemovement among economicallyunequal countries and develop newforms of interaction (economic, social,and cultural) between the cities whereimmigrants live and their regions oforigin. These flows will becomeincreasingly complex, both in terms



of the levels of qualifications of themigrants and in terms of migratorypatterns, which will in turn create newurban forms, and potentially acceleratethe polarization of the urban systemsin the new member states. This, inturn, will translate into increasing spa-tial disparities between the dominantcapital cities in countries such as thosein the Baltic area, Hungary, and theCzech Republic.

More specifically, the 2004 enlarge-ment can be expected to maintainmigratory pressure on the cities of thewestern core or heartland of theEuropean Union, which will continueto attract immigrants. Several factorssupport this potential trend. Firstgrowth rates in the new MemberStates are above the EU-15 average,but there is only limited real economicconvergence. Second, the service sector there is growing, but the unem-ployment rate remains very high.

However, coupled with politicalchange in Eastern Europe, the enlarge-ment will also give dynamism to a vastring of peripheral European cities.These will become increasingly attrac-tive destinations for migrants. Onereason for this attraction is that anti-immigration movements tend to besmaller in traditional cities of immigra-tion. Consequently, control over theentry of new immigrants tends to betighter, potentially sending migrantstowards less restricted urban areas.These alternative destinations, thoughless attractive from an economic pointof view, constitute less hostile atmos-pheres for their integration. The ring

of new “peripheral” destinationsstretches from Glasgow and Helsinkiin the north, through Copenhagenand the Baltic states, to Warsaw,Prague, Bratislava, and Budapest in the east, to Nicosia in the south.

For the same reason, major cities thatwere formerly on the eastern border ofthe European Union, such as Berlinand Vienna, may become relativelyless attractive in comparison with thenew peripheral ring of cities. Finally,Romania and Bulgaria will likely continue to lose population andremain economically depressed. Assuch, it is likely that migration flowsfrom this region to SouthwesternEurope (Italy, Spain, and Portugal),which began in the 1990s, will continue.

The development of long-distancesocial relations due to the develop-ments in communication and informa-tion technologies, combined with theincreasingly greater socio-cultural differences of the population of theEuropean cities, will accelerate thetrend of the decline in neighborhoodrelations and solidarity. That is whydiversity and increasing populationturnover in urban centers has thepotential to create new tensions inareas previously characterized by a certain homogeneity.

At the same time, new economicopportunities are likely to arise becauseof the progressive development oftransnational communities anchoredin the circulation strategies of immi-grants with multiple spatial belongings.These communities represent great

86

potential innovations for both placesof origin and of destination, due to theirhigh density of social capital, theinterchanges they promote, and thechallenges they pose to traditional reg-ulation systems. In this context, immi-grants have an important role to playin the process of economic restructuringand secondary internationalization ofthe metropolises. This stands in contrastwith the hegemonic internationalizationprocess associated with transnationalcorporations and their strategies(Fonseca and Malheiros 2004).

In light of the need for the EuropeanUnion to develop a comprehensivestrategy to address the dual issues ofurbanization and immigration, the fol-lowing set of recommendations can bemade. They are addressed to resolvingproblems on the ground and are initiallydirected at Southern European cities.

1. Each city or metropolitan areashould develop, as a component ofstrategic planning, a strategy toaddress the insertion of immigra-tion into urban economic, social,and cultural policies. The way inwhich the welfare state adopts andadapts to the new migration flowsis of central importance.

2. Housing must be given absolutepriority and must be treated as abroad concept, including not onlyshelter and accommodation, butalso community services and theirconnection with the workplace.

3. At the metropolitan and intra-metropolitan scale, planningshould aim, where feasible, toensure that critical demographicdimensions are reached for

immigrant communities that have the same cultural identity or a common set of values, traditions, and behaviors. This creates better conditions for theprovision of services, both publicand private, and is key to the successful implantation of immigrant groups. Otherwise, specific measures should be directed at the integration ofsmaller groups.

4. Policies should aim to create conditions to facilitate and stimulate the growth of immigrant businesses.

5. Social and physical infrastructurerelated to the use of immigrants’leisure time, directed at differentage groups, gender groups, andtime intervals (daily, weekly,monthly) should be developed.There are some examples of success in this area, such as sports(especially soccer), crafts, gardening,and the use of information andcommunications technology.

6. Immigrant communities must beallowed to participate in the designof urban policies on the same footing as national citizens. In thisrespect, local authorities should takeresidence, not nationality, as themain criteria of local citizenship.

Urban authorities have an essentialrole to play in this framework. A bot-tom-up approach, supported by theempowerment of civil society at thelocal level, is probably the key toavoiding social exclusion mechanisms.However, any local initiative must beanchored in a broader urban contextthat includes long-term planning.



References

Arbaci, S. “Patterns of Ethnic and Socio-spatialSegregation in European Cities: Are Welfare Regimes Making a Difference?” In Immigration and Place in MediterraneanMetropolises, edited by M.L. Fonseca, J.Malheiros, N. Ribas-Mateos, P. White, and A.Esteves, 83-115. Lisbon: Luso-AmericanFoundation, 2002.

Baganha, M.I. and M.L. Fonseca, eds. New Waves:Migration from Eastern to Southern Europe,Lisbon: Luso-American Foundation, 2004.

Blangiarlo, G.C. and V. Cesareo. “Foreign immi-gration in Lombardy: An overview.” In TheEighth Italian Report on Migrations, 181-210.Milan: Fondazione ISMU Iniziative e StudiSulla Multietnicità, 2003.

Castles, S. and M.J. Miller. The Age of Migration:International Population Movements in theModern World (Third Edition). Hampshire/NewYork: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003.

Fonseca, M.L. “Immigration and spatial change:The Lisbon experience.” Studi EmigrazioneXXXIX, 145, Marzo (2002): 49-76.

Fonseca, M.L., M.J. Caldeira, and A. Esteves.“New forms of migration into the EuropeanSouth: Challenges for citizenship and gover-nance: the Portuguese case.” InternationalJournal of Population Geography 8, no. 2 (2002): 135-152.

Fonseca, M.L. and J.M. Malheiros. “Immigrationand globalisation from below: The example ofethnic restaurants in Lisbon.” Finisterra. RevistaPortuguesa de Geografia XXXIX, 77 (2004):153-181.

Gaspar, J. “Developing cohesive cities: A perspective from the ground.” In Immigrationand Place in Mediterranean Metropolises, editedby M.L. Fonseca, J. Malheiros, N. Ribas-Mateos, P. White, and A. Esteves, 67-82.Lisbon: Luso-American Foundation, 2002.

Hohenberg, P.M. “The Historical Geography ofEuropean Cities: An interpretative essay.”Presentation at the Cities and GeographyWorkshop. Paris, Centre for Economic PolicyResearch, December 12-14, 2002,http://www.core.ucl.ac.be/staff/thisseHandbook/Hohenberg.pdf.

Leontidou, L. “Postmodernism and the City:Mediterranean versions.” Urban Studies 30, no.6 (1993): 949-965.

Malheiros, J.M. “Ethni-cities: residential patterns in Northern European andMediterranean Metropolis - implications inpolicy design.” International Journal ofPopulation Geography 8 (2002): 107-134.

Massey, D, J. Arango, G. Hugo, A. Kouaouci, A.Pellegrino and J.E. Taylor. Worlds in Motion:Understanding International Migration at the Endof the Millennium. Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress, 1998.

Monet, N. “El uso del espacio público por parte de los nuevos habitantes del Casc Antic deBarcelona: Continuidade e innovaciones.”Scripta Nova. Revista Electrónica de Geografía y Ciencias Sociales 69, no. 48 (2000).

Reardon, S.F. and G. Firebaugh. “Measures ofmultigroup segregation.” SociologicalMethodology 32, no. 1 (2002): 33–67.

Sintès, P. “Immigration, reseaux et espace metropolitain – le cas Athenien.” Cahiers de la Mediterranée 64 (2002).

Wong, D.W.S. “Measuring Multiethnic spatial segregation.” Urban Geography 19(1998): 77-87.

Practices and Policies for

Immigrant Integration in the

United States

Maia Jachimowicz and Kevin O’Neil

90

The United States has a historyof immigration and of integrat-ing immigrants that is as long

and successful as that of any country.Yet, the United States has no nationalimmigrant integration policy per se. Ofthe approximately one million immi-grants granted permanent residencyannually, only resettled refugees — agroup typically numbering fewer than100,000 people per year and thattotaled only 28,000 in 2003 — receiveintegration assistance from the federalgovernment. Otherwise, the UnitedStates has a largely uncoordinated setof policies and programs, stitchedtogether across policy domains, thatpromote the integration of “perma-nent” immigrants and in some waysmany of the assorted other “tempo-rary” and unauthorized immigrants.

The US immigrant admissions systemgrants foreigners residency rights primarily based on work or family ties.At some time after immigrants areadmitted to the US, a network of rightsguarantees them: the opportunity toobtain citizenship through a well-devel-oped naturalization process; access to aneducational system that makes includingand educating immigrant children a priority; and some (if modest) federalsupport for language and training pro-grams. Most significantly perhaps, theirchildren, when born in the US, areautomatically citizens. The remainingintegration services are carried out by arobust civil society sector that includesco-ethnic and conational organizations,a vigorous and flexible economy thathas proven capable of employing even low-skilled immigrants, and a fed-

eral-state governance structure thatputs much of the responsibility for therelevant social programs in the hands of local and state governments.

This chapter seeks to give a generalpicture of how these structures andprocesses work and, where possible, towhat extent they succeed. It also seeksto identify current trends, challenges,and controversies in integration.

Important trends include: the contin-ued migration of many immigrantswho have low skill levels relative tonatives (along with many who haveextensive skill sets); a change in thedistribution of where immigrants settleaway from the traditional cities andstates of settlement towards mid-sizedcities, suburbs, and new regions; andthe growth of a few regions and onecountry — Mexico — in the origin ofimmigrants to the US.

The associated importance of newcom-ers’ low English-language proficiency,especially in the context of labor-mar-ket integration and mobility, and thesuccess of immigrant children and children of immigrants in publicschools, highlights some of the chal-lenges of immigrant integration. At thesame time, the significance of Hispanicsin the evolving process through whichimmigrants and their descendantsemerge as important constituencies formarketers, unions, employers, andpolitical parties helps explain howrelated policies and politics emerge.

Controversies and policy developmentswithin the past 10 years include the


Practices and Policies for Immigrant Integration in the United States 91

elimination of some welfare benefitsfor many legal permanent residents, are-thinking of bilingual education forchildren, and the restructuring of thefederal administration responsible forimmigration and naturalization. Yet,the most important challenges lie inthe presence of an estimated 9.3 mil-lion unauthorized immigrants and inthe growing struggle of low-skilledworkers to earn a decent income andobtain health insurance.

Many of these forces will continue toexist in the immediate future, but afew other emerging trends and issuesare likely to shape immigrant integra-tion in America in years to come.Among the most interesting of these isthe role of sending countries in immi-grant integration; among the mostimportant are the uncertain impact ofsecurity concerns and the possibility ofimmigration reform. However, none ofthese trends seems likely to alter fun-damentally the generally “hands-off”approach of American integration policy. A long tradition of immigrationinsulates the United States neitherfrom anxieties about cultural identitynor problems of exclusion and povertyamong immigrants. Yet, the UnitedStates appears content to entrust inte-gration largely to migrants and their initiative and hard work, and to civilsociety, employment opportunities,and local actors.

This chapter explains the currentframework, including a generaldescription of practices and policies,for immigrant integration in theUnited States. An overview of the

institutional framework for integrationin the US and a brief demographicoverview of the size, composition, andgeneral characteristics of the foreign-born population set the stage for a dis-cussion detailing how integration isachieved through an open, undefinedstructure that combines broad nationalpractices with targeted state and localinitiatives. Administrative and admis-sions policies related to immigration,national anti-discrimination legislation,as well as how integration is framedwith regard to employment, housing,and education and children areaddressed. Taking into account currentimmigration trends, we highlight therole, or lack thereof, of the governmentin integrating foreign-born residents inthe US.

The chapter also seeks to examinesome of the recent trends affectingimmigrant integration and integrationpolicy in the United States. In somepolicy areas such as employment andthe immigrant admissions system therehas been little change, but growingpolitical pressure to reform the immi-gration system could radically alter theoutlook within the next five years. Inothers, such as education and welfare,there has been more action. Still othertrends — such as the changing settlement pattern of immigrants, thegrowing political power of immigrants,and the growing outreach of foreigncountries to their emigrants in theUnited States — are not completelywithin the control of public policy, but are shaped by it.

92

Institutional Overview of

Integration Initiatives

In the largest reorganization of its gov-ernment since 1947, the United Stateson January 24, 2003, formally createdthe Department of Homeland Security(DHS) to bring many of its security-related agencies under a single admin-istrative umbrella. The Immigrationand Naturalization Service, previouslyresponsible for the vast majority of USimmigration-related tasks, was movedfrom the Department of Justice intoDHS and simultaneously split intothree agencies. The admission ofimmigrants, naturalization, and citi-zenship now reside within one bureauof DHS — US Citizenship andImmigration Services (USCIS). Theother immigration-related apparatuseswithin DHS are the Bureau ofImmigration and Customs Enforcementand the Bureau of Customs and BorderProtection, responsible for enforcingimmigration law and protecting USborders, respectively.

Certain other functions related toimmigration, and whatever federalintegration functions do exist, are dis-tributed among several governmentdepartments. For example, theDepartment of State continues tomaintain authority over visa issuance(although visa policy resides withDHS), and judicial review under theBoard of Immigration Appeals remainsunder the Department of Justice, whilemost employment-based immigrationfunctions reside with the USDepartment of Labor. The Departmentof Health and Human Services is

responsible for unaccompanied minorswho enter the country, in addition tohousing the Office of RefugeeResettlement — the federal entitytasked with assisting refugees and successful asylum seekers.

In matters having to do with immigrantintegration, programmatic decisionsare made across levels and divisions of government while much of theimplementation is left to the non-governmental sector. Nongovernmentalorganizations (NGOs) develop theirown assistance schemes, some ofwhich end up being funded by govern-ment agencies. The resettlement andintegration of refugees is administeredlargely by State Refugee Coordinatorsand private organizations, called“Voluntary Agencies,” under contract with the Office of RefugeeResettlement. The departments ofLabor and Education also have impor-tant portfolios related to immigrantintegration efforts, respectively: assistingmigrant workers (especially agriculturalworkers), and offering immigrantsaccess to training programs and language-training initiatives. A brief overview of the governmentcomponents involved in immigrantintegration follows.

US Citizenship and ImmigrationServicesUSCIS deals primarily with adminis-tering immigration benefits and pro-viding immigration-related informa-tion. The agency has a network oflocal field offices throughout theUnited States to process immigration-benefit requests. USCIS, among other



things, maintains a 24-hour free callline in English and Spanish whereautomated service information can begathered and live representativesanswer immigrants’ questions duringregular business hours. USCIS hasrecently upgraded its efforts to provide, via the internet, informationand immigration forms, as well asappointment scheduling and individual case status information.Efforts to revise the citizenship oathand naturalization test to make themmore “relevant” are also under way.

Office of CitizenshipThe primary goal of the new Office of Citizenship, created as part of theDepartment of Homeland Security, is “to support [the] integration and participation [of immigrants] inAmerican civic culture.” The officeannounced in November 2003 plans toprovide new immigrants with informa-tion packets upon arrival through aweb of community groups and non-profit organizations devoted to thecause. In addition, the Office ofCitizenship has established CommunityLiaison Officers in seventeen cities tofacilitate its mandate where it mattersmost: at the local level.

State and Local GovernmentsImmigrant integration at the commu-nity level is most often delivered bystate and local governments, whichprovide their own programs, createlaws relevant to integration, and facili-tate partnerships between relevantpublic and private actors. From driver’slicense authorization and policingmethods, to in-state university tuition

determination, access to and participation in formal public-sectoractivities (such as those related toschool governance), and many welfarebenefits decisions, local and state governments play an influential role inimmigrant integration.

Office of Refugee ResettlementThe Office of Refugee Resettlementassists most individuals who enter theUnited States on humanitariangrounds. In doing so, ORR funds andfacilitates numerous programs such asemployment preparation, job and language training, social adjustmentand placement, and direct aid. ORRhas just completed a multi-year effort,the Building the New AmericanCommunity Initiative, designed to foster the successful integration ofrefugees and immigrants at the locallevel through community coalition-building exercises.

US Refugee Resettlement

People processed through the USRefugee Resettlement program are theonly newcomers eligible for the mostcomplete integration benefits the USgovernment offers. The resettlementprocedure includes integration servicesabroad, reception upon arrival, andpost-settlement short- and long-termintegration initiatives at the locallevel. Through a proactive resettlementprogram dedicated to serving thoserefugees identified abroad through aset of “refugee processing priorities,”the US government works with a net-work of governmental, international,and private organizations, at variousstages of the program, to provide

94

individuals and their families with support and services.

The President, in consultation withCongress, establishes annual refugeeadmission levels. In fiscal year 2004,the total refugee resettlement ceilingwas set at 70,000. These ceilings arefrequently not met, however, andshortfalls have ranged from a few thou-sand in most years to a shortfall ofmore than 50 percent of the limit foreach year since September 11, 2001.

Various government departments (e.g.,the Departments of State andHomeland Security), the UnitedNations High Commissioner forRefugees, and a network of NGOs helpidentify refugee groups eligible for resettlement according to pre-estab-lished priorities. Eligibility for refugeestatus is then decided on a case-by-casebasis, a process that includes individualinterviews, medical examinations, andsecurity background checks.

Upon positive determination of anapplication and prior to departure,refugees receive cultural orientationsessions administered by theInternational Organization forMigration and the Voluntary Agencies.Each refugee is then assigned to aVoluntary Agency responsible for initial resettlement services at the timeof arrival, including airport reception,initial accommodations, basic necessities, and targeted orientation.Individuals are also able to participatein longer-term integration programs,which include modest job and English-language training, and cash and medical

assistance. The latter form of assistanceis administered under regular US socialprotection schemes. After five years ofresidence, resettled refugees are eligiblefor naturalization. These programs areunder the general supervision andauthority of the Office of RefugeeResettlement.

Generally speaking, refugees are resettled throughout the UnitedStates, although distinct national and ethnic origin settlement patternsemerge. Resettlement agencies preferto place refugees in areas where theyare most likely to benefit from existingethnic communities and networks. For example, in fiscal year 2000Florida resettled more Cubans than all other states combined.

Demographic Overview of

the Foreign Born in the US

Immigration has been in an upwardclimb since the mid-1960s, althoughmeasured as a percentage of the totalpopulation, US immigrant stock andflow numbers are still below historicalhighs set in the 19th and early 20thcenturies. According to the CurrentPopulation Survey, in 2002 the foreign-born population totaled 32.5 million,representing over 11 percent of thetotal population. The foreign-bornpopulation is comprised primarily ofnaturalized citizens and lawful perma-nent residents (see Figure 1). However,unauthorized immigrants — mostthought to be residing on a long-termbasis — make up an estimated quarterof the foreign-born population.



Unauthorized immigrants do manageto become integrated over time despitetheir inability to access public servicesother than emergency medical andrelated benefits and de facto education.The lack of strong government partici-pation in integration initiatives, therelative openness of basic schoolingand employment to the unauthorized,and a jus solis tradition that grants citi-zenship to almost all children born inUS territory may help explain whyunauthorized status in the US amountsto less of a disadvantage in integrationthan might otherwise be expected.

Trends over the past four decades showa massive rise in immigrants born inLatin America, most significantly fromMexico, and Asia (see Figure 2). From

1960 to 2000, the foreign-born popula-tion from these two regions grew from1.4 million to 24.3 million, an increasefrom 14.3 percent to 78.1 percent ofthe total foreign-born population. Thesource country with the largest popula-tion living in the US is Mexico with9.2 million people, representing 29.5percent of the foreign-born population.Following Mexico, the other most sig-nificant source countries are thePhilippines (1.4 million people), India(1 million), China (988,857) andVietnam (988,174). And yet, immi-grants in the United States representan increasingly diverse set of countries.

As shown in recent Census data,immigrants are also more geographicallydispersed in their settlement in the US

Naturalized Citizens(10.3 million) 30%

Lawful Permanent Residents (LPRs)(10.5 million) 30%

Refugee Arrivals(2.7 million) 8%

Legal TemporaryResidents(1.6 million) 5%

UnauthorizedImmigrants(9.3 million) 26%

Figure 1. Legal Status of the Foreign -Born Population, 2002

Source: Graph reproduced from Jeffery S. Passel, Randolph Capps and Michael Fix. 2004. “UndocumentedImmigrants: Facts and Figures.” Washington, DC: Urban Institute.

96

than any time since World War II.Whereas in 1990 approximately 75percent of all immigrants were locatedin just six states (California, NewYork, Texas, Florida, Illinois, and NewJersey), over the past decade that figurehas decreased to 68 percent.Furthermore, the foreign-born popula-tion in many other states has morethan doubled — examples includeGeorgia, Arizona, North Carolina,Colorado, Nevada, Utah, and

Tennessee. Due to a lack of strong historical immigration flows, these“new growth” states often times do not have resources such as profession-ally organized ethnic associations or immigrant communities that assistnewcomers with language, housing,and educational needs. In addition to settling in new regions across thecountry, immigrants are also increas-ingly choosing to live in suburbanareas, where employment and


Fore

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born

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10

15

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25

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35

EuropeLatin America Asia

Northern America

Otherregions1

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20001990198019701960

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Figure 2. Foreign-born Population by Region of Birth, for

the United States: 1960 – 2000

Notes: 1. The “Other regions” category includes Africa and Oceania. 2. In 2000, in contrast to 1990, non-response on country or region of birth was allocated. For 2000, the “Not reported” category only includesthose born at sea. Source: Figure reproduced from “US Historical Trends: Region of Birth of the Foreign Born” Data Tools.Migration Information Source. http://www.migrationinformation.org.


educational opportunities are nowoften stronger than in central cities.

Generally speaking, the foreign bornare more likely than natives to beyoung, work, live in poverty, and be ofLatino origin. There are significantlymore immigrants who fall within theworking-age range than native US residents. For instance, immigrantsmade up 13.5 percent of the total population aged 15 to 64 in 2002,while composing 11.1 percent of thetotal resident population that sameyear. The foreign born comprise about14 percent of the US labor force, duein part to their disproportionate pres-ence among working-age residents andhigher proportion of men to women(relative to the total US population).In addition, as a result of their relativelylow educational and occupational statusand difficulties in credential and work-experience recognition, immigrantsmake up about 20 percent of low-wageworkers. Immigrant integration in theUnited States takes place within thisbroad context of a foreign-born popu-lation that is relatively large andincreasingly diverse in terms of legalstatus, country of origin, location ofdestination, and demographic andhuman-capital characteristics.

Admitting Immigrants

The United States does not selectimmigrants according to their “integra-tion prospects,” nor does it require evi-dence of language or other qualificationsprior to entry — qualifications thatmight ease the process of “integration.”

Yet the way immigrants are admitteddoes influence their prospects for inte-gration. The bulk — some 63 percentin fiscal year 2002 — of permanentimmigrants are admitted in order toreunite with family members (seeFigure 3). About three-quarters ofthese are the family members of UScitizens. Thus, the majority of incomingimmigrants have family ties to someonein the United States, and most ofthese have family ties to someone who is already well advanced in theintegration process, as indicated by citizenship.

Reuniting families enhances the integration prospects for US residentsas well as for their newly admittedfamily members. Social and civic participation in the host society canincrease significantly with the presenceof children and spouses, through, forexample, participation in school-relatedactivities. Residents are also more likelyto buy a home, a powerful indicator ofintegration, when living with theirfamily. Family reunification recipientsare granted work authorization uponentry to the US and are able thereforeto contribute to the household’sincome, and thus reduce the risk ofpoverty, and often develop additionalties to the community throughemployment.

The second-largest “stream” of USimmigrants is people who are admittedin order to fill specific jobs. With a fewexceptions, they must be “sponsored”by an employer. The vast majority ofsuch immigrants are required to behigh-skilled, with a college education

98

or the equivalent. Thus, these immigrants have personal characteris-tics that make them more likely tosucceed economically, and thus tobecome better integrated. Additionally,they are funneled directly into theworkplace, the most important arenafor integration in America.

The interaction between temporary andpermanent immigration statuses mayalso serve as a vehicle that facilitatesintegration. A significant number ofimmigrants admitted either as familyreunification migrants or as workershave spent time in the United Stateswith a temporary work permit (manyhave even adjusted directly from tempo-

rary to permanent status). In manyinstances, that time is as long as five orsix years. In some cases, the US formallyacknowledges certain types of temporarystatus as a system for admitting futurepermanent immigrants — many high-skilled temporary visa holders are notrequired to prove that they intend toreturn to their home country, as recipi-ents of other visas must prior to beingadmitted to the US for multi-year stays.In fiscal year 2002, approximately 64percent of all admitted immigrants wereadjusting from a temporary status, atrend that has been increasing over time(see Figure 4). These people have thushad extensive US labor-market experience, and, in cases of those who


0. 0

0. 2

0. 4

0. 6

0. 8

1. 0

1. 2

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(63.64% % % % % % %%

1996

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Num

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Family reunification (total) Other immigration (total)

Figure 3. Family Reunification as a Proportion of Total

Immigration, fiscal years 1995-2002

Source: Chart reproduced and updated from Ramah McKay. “Family Reunification.” Migration InformationSource (May 2003). http://www.migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?ID=122.


are later sponsored for permanent residence by employers, have apparentlydemonstrated their ability to succeedeconomically in the United States.

This admission structure means that, ofall immigrants formally admitted to theUnited States as permanent residents,only two small groups — those enter-ing for humanitarian reasons and thoseadmitted under the diversity lottery(numbering 126,084 and 42,829,respectively, in fiscal year 2002) —enter without some family or workconnection to the United States.

The United States’ unique experiencewith unauthorized migration — the

stock of unauthorized immigrants isestimated to have increased by500,000 individuals annually overmost of the past decade — is another,although informal, admission stream.Strong US labor demand, high unem-ployment, and continuing economicuncertainty in source countries (partic-ularly Mexico), as well as an immigra-tion enforcement system that focusesefforts on border control instead ofinterior enforcement, makes living andworking in the United States illegallya viable option. Most unauthorizedimmigrants come to the US usingstrong social, often family, networksthat facilitate employment, housing,and other “essentials.”

Num

ber o

f im

mig

rant

s ad

mit

ted

(mill

ions

)

Adjustments

Year (percent)

New Arrivals

1,200,000

1997(52.31%)

1998(45.44%)

1999(37.86%)

2000(52.10%)

2001(61.38%)

2002(63.86%)

1,000,000

800,000

600,000

400,000

200,000

0

Figure 4. Adjustments as a Proportion of Total

Immigration, fiscal years 1997-2002

Source: USCIS. Yearbook of Immigration Statistics, various years.

100

The unauthorized immigrant populationexhibits extremely strong labor-forceparticipation rates — for unauthorizedmale immigrants the rate is estimatedat 96 percent. Aside from employment,unauthorized immigrants and children(who are often US citizens) participatein society in many of the same ways astheir legal counterparts. Many of theunauthorized pay federal and statetaxes and file annual tax returns, theirchildren attend public schools and,increasingly, they have access to savingsaccounts and in some instances, credit.

In what can be seen as a bow to inte-gration, the United States has opted toenact opportunities for unauthorizedimmigrants to obtain legal permanentstatus. Of course, the principal reasonfor legalization was an attempt toreduce the size of the unauthorizedpopulation and allow all residents toenjoy basic protections and benefits.The legalization program of 1986under the Immigration Reform andControl Act (IRCA), under which 2.8 million foreigners were legalized,has been the only large-scale regularization program. (Other ways of legalizing immigrants, typically asindividuals, involve either administra-tive or judicial processes.) Successfulapplicants under IRCA were givenlanguage and civics courses to supporttheir integration.

A Legal Framework for

Integration

The second set of policies shapingimmigrant integration in America is

the various legal statuses granted toimmigrants and the process of naturalization. Immigrants are affordedvarying benefits depending on theirlegal status, which can facilitate theirintegration. Benefits are granted alonga continuum of presence in the US,ranging from unauthorized immigrantsto US citizens.

Lawful Permanent Residents

The status of “lawful permanent resident”(LPR) is the cornerstone of Americanimmigration. According to estimates,about 30 percent, or 10.5 million, of foreign-born residents in the US areLPRs. LPR status confers residence and work authorization. This status and the accompanying rights can onlybe withdrawn if 1) an individual hasbeen absent from the US for over a year;2) an individual is convicted of a felony;or 3) it is found that false informationwas provided during the applicationprocess. After five years of LPR statusimmigrants are eligible for citizenship.This waiting period is reduced to threeyears for immigrants who are marriedto US citizens.

In many important respects, LPR statusconfers rights approaching those of citizenship. Like US citizens, LPRs areable to serve in the US armed forcesand, if they do so, are granted expeditedcitizenship. In fact, as of 2002, therewas no waiting period required beforeapplying for citizenship for all active-duty and recently discharged non-citizens. LPRs may also obtain publicemployment and, in a few cities, certain limited local voting rights. The ability to receive family reunifica-



tion privileges under US immigrationlaw is also granted to LPRs, althoughthese benefits are less generous thanthose for US citizens. While a perma-nent resident can petition for theirspouse or unmarried children, only citizens can also petition for parentsand siblings. Furthermore, petitionsfrom LPRs are capped annually and arerestricted by country-specific limits,while immediate-relative petitionsfrom US citizens are not subject tonumerical limitations. In effect,although LPRs may seek family reuni-fication for immediate relatives, indi-viduals may need to wait years beforebeing granted a visa due to country-specific limits. Family reunification isespecially important for immigrantsfrom some countries — for Mexico,the Dominican Republic, and Jamaica,95 percent, 98 percent, and 94 per-cent, respectively, of those immigrantsadmitted in fiscal year 2001 did sounder family reunification categories.

As stated previously, LPR status conferswork authorization and all labor-marketrights as well as in-state tuition subsi-dies for higher education equal to thatof US citizens. In other aspects, howev-er, LPR status is inferior to citizenship.Most notably, LPRs are barred from voting in federal and most state andlocal elections and holding most publicoffices. They are also unable to makecontributions to political campaigns.

In most items related to internationalmovement and the possibility ofremoval, LPRs are also at a disadvan-tage. Legal permanent residents can-not travel or live abroad for more

than a year and they are not entitledto a US passport or US governmentprotection and assistance whileabroad. In some exceptional casesLPRs may be subject to removal(deportation). While removal of LPRsremains an exceptional practice, lawsimplemented in 1996 have expandedthe grounds for removal and the post-September 11 heightened security environment appears to haveplaced legal permanent residents inprecarious circumstances.

Furthermore, while permanent residentsare eligible for certain federal welfarebenefits (most notably housing assis-tance and subsidies to earned income)their access to many of the mostimportant social-support systems is now restricted. In 1996, welfare legislation broke with the tradition of treating LPRs nearly equally to citizens in terms of public benefits.That law instituted complex eligibilityrequirements that barred most LPRsfrom receiving most “means-tested”federally funded benefits for low-incomepeople for the first five years of theirstay in the United States. In addition,access by newly arriving immigrants to these benefits was made conditionalon having worked 40 calendar quartersin the US (refugees and asylees andthe families of military personnel wereimportant exceptions to this rule).The law also formalized a broad bar on unauthorized immigrants receivingfederally funded benefits. States were given the flexibility to providetheir own benefits to LPRs. Manychose to do so. These changes meanthat eligibility for benefits now

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varies more from state to state forimmigrants than it does for citizens.

A few of these public benefits havebeen reinstated since 1996 — particu-larly for children and the elderly —but the principle remains that LPRsgenerally have a greatly inferior claimto certain social protections and wel-fare benefits. The 1996 welfare reformsled civil society organizations to con-duct extensive naturalization drivesthat are thought to have contributedto a surge in naturalization applicationsin the 1990s.

Citizenship and Naturalization

Perhaps the United States’ greatest success is the rate at whichimmigrants acquire citizenship. In2003, about 49 percent of the legalforeign-born population in theUnited States were naturalized citizens — a figure that, in recentdecades, has ranged as high as 64 percent (in 1970) and as low as 39percent (in 1996). Further, theUnited States’ jus solis policy grantscitizenship to all children born in USterritory (with the exception of thechildren of some senior diplomaticstaff). Citizenship has many importantpractical effects, such as eligibility forall social programs, protection fromarbitrary government actions (espe-cially deportation), and preference infamily reunification. Naturalization,however, also has an important symbolic role, with naturalizationceremonies being festive, flag-wavingevents in which participants breakwith their previous allegiances andembrace the United States.

To become a naturalized citizen, legalpermanent residents must meet certaineligibility requirements and, throughthis process, accomplish a number oftasks. In addition to a series of physical-presence requirements, naturalization requires the applicant tobe at least 18 years of age, be of goodmoral character (i.e., have no criminalrecord), have an elementary level offacility in English, and have a basicknowledge of US civics and history.Upon a positive decision from immi-gration officials, immigrants must takethe Oath of Allegiance before beinggranted a certificate of naturalization.

Permanent residents must take theirown steps to become naturalized citizens, as the US government doesnot notify individuals when they are eligible to apply. Delays in grantingnaturalization caused by administrativebacklogs have frustrated many immi-grants and could deter future applicants,particularly because continuous presencewithin the US is required of all applicants from the date of petition tothe date of naturalization. In 2003,there were 702,152 naturalization applications pending a final determina-tion (including some applications from previous fiscal years).

Currently, an estimated 7.9 millionlegal residents are eligible to naturalize,and although naturalization rates arerising, certain groups tend to be lesslikely to become citizens than others.Asians, Europeans, and refugees areamong those immigrants most likely tonaturalize. Latin Americans, immigrantswith limited English skills, and those



with income under the federal povertylevel are less like to naturalize. In thecase of Latin Americans (the vastmajority of whom are of Mexican origin), naturalization rates have been steadily rising over the past years. Changes in 1998 to Mexicanlaw allowing for dual citizenship mayinvigorate this trend.

The United States’ jus solis policiescreate some interesting opportunitiesand challenges for integration. Forexample, 85 percent of immigrant families are of “mixed status,” whereone or more children are US citizenswhile the others, as well as the par-ents, may be non-citizens. In suchcases, the parent may be ineligible forsome or all public benefits, but one ormore of the children are eligible — yetthe parent may not realize this. Theparent of a minor child who is a citi-zen has no legal right to remain in theUnited States — although enforce-ment is inconsistent.

Another effect of the United States’strong tradition of naturalization andjus solis has been the growth in theproportion of immigrants and theirimmediate descendants in the USelectorate. Most significant is the perceived “Hispanic vote”— a “bloc”that is composed of naturalized immi-grants and native-born citizens ofLatino descent. In the 2000 nationalelections, about 5.9 million Hispanicsparticipated, accounting for about 5percent of the total voting public.Their ranks had been swelled by manyof the immigrants regularized underthe 1986 Immigration Reform and

Control Act. However, the true powerof the Hispanic vote is yet to come: 12million Hispanics are not yet of votingage and nine million more do not havecitizenship, but may yet receive it.

Temporary Migrants

The US also admits large numbers oftemporary immigrants. The bulk oftemporary entrants to the US are foreign visitors and those entering forbusiness purposes. Other temporaryimmigrants include students andexchange visitors and foreign workersof varying skill levels. Due to theirrestricted legal status, temporary immigrants enjoy more limited rightsthan all other legal foreign-born residents in the country. In fact, temporary immigrants are not eligiblefor any social benefits, except for housing assistance in certain extremelylimited cases (primarily for agriculturalworkers). Some temporary workersmay also earn credits that they can usein the pension system of their countryof origin. This is the result of bilateralagreements that allow workers to combine time spent working in bothcountries to meet minimum standardsfor retirement, disability, and survivor’sbenefits in their country of origin.

Unauthorized Immigrants

and Universal Rights

Unauthorized immigrants, who makeup nearly 30 percent of the foreign-bornpopulation, live in extremely precariouscircumstances in the United States. Ifapprehended, they may be deported(the process is not automatic) andthey enjoy almost no right to accessfederally funded public services. Yet

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there are many areas in which they doenjoy certain rights. Unauthorizedimmigrant children, for example, areentitled to basic education regardlessof their or their parents’ legal status,and emergency health care is providedwithout regard to legal status.

Unauthorized immigrants enjoy signifi-cant protections in employment. Laborstandards and minimum wages applywithout regard to legal status andunauthorized migrants may joinunions. Furthermore, employers arenot allowed to fire an unauthorizedworker or to report them to immigra-tion enforcement officials in retaliationfor a labor complaint, dispute, orunionization activities.

In certain other economic aspects,unauthorized immigrants find government regulations have unchar-acteristic flexibility. Investment andbusiness activities by foreigners have,thus far, survived increased concernsabout security, terrorism, and moneylaundering. For example, the USTreasury Department allows banks topermit foreign nationals to use identitycards issued by their consulates inorder to open accounts and conductother transactions. These cards aremost often used by unauthorized immi-grants who often have no other formof identification. The most notable ofthem is the Mexican matrículaconsular; over four million are thoughtto be carried in the United States. TheInternal Revenue Service, too, issues“Individual Taxpayer IdentificationNumbers” (ITINs) to foreigners whoare not authorized to work in the US

(and thus cannot obtain a SocialSecurity number). These identifiernumbers can be used to pay taxes,open bank accounts, and for mostother transactions not directly relatedto employment.

Much of the ability of unauthorizedimmigrants to integrate is due to thefact that governments below the federallevel typically ignore immigration status. US law places immigration policy and enforcement clearly withinthe competency of the federal government, giving state and local governments the option of ignoringimmigration status, and, in some cases,requiring them to do so. For instance,about eleven states issue driver’slicenses without regard to legal status— a number that has dropped sincethe terrorist attacks of September 11,2001, and continues to fluctuate asdebate over the issue continues.Furthermore, local and state policehave been reluctant to detain peoplesolely on immigration violations andare restricted by federal policy in thelength of time and circumstancesunder which they may do so. In general,local officials consider their neutralitytowards immigration status to be a critical aspect of building trust with,and policing, communities with immigrants and, in particular, largenumbers of unauthorized immigrants.In other situations, such as buying or renting a home or, in some cases,applying for a business license, people are not required to prove legal status.



Universal Protections

A number of basic rights, such as theright to a fair trial by jury and accessto legal representation, are guaranteedto immigrants regardless of legal status.Guarantees of freedom of expressionand freedom of religion, for example,protect the display of immigrants’ cul-tural and religious symbols in bothpublic and private forums, regardless oflegal status. Yet, the precise scope ofthese rights is evolving, sometimes inseemingly contradictory ways. Forexample, recent civil rights lawsuitshave resulted in outcomes that supportthe right of Muslim girls to wear thehijab in public schools, but that leavein place requirements for Muslimwomen to bare their faces for identifi-cation photos and in other security-related situations.

Of these “universal” protections, how-ever, the most relevant to immigrantintegration may be anti-discriminationprotections. The United States’ ratherwell-developed anti-discriminationlegislation, jurisprudence, and enforce-ment administration prohibit discrimi-nation based on “national origin.” Asapplied, however, these laws also prohibit discrimination based on nation-ality, so long as the immigrant hasproper legal status. Citizenship statusmay serve as a “tiebreaker” between acitizen applicant and an “authorizedalien” applicant in hiring, but this pro-vision is rarely used by employers. Ingeneral, anti-discrimination laws havea rather broad sweep: Requirementsthat an employee speak English mustbe justified by the requirements of

the job and English-only rules arebroadly prohibited.

In effect, the prohibition against discrimination on the basis of nationalorigin extends some protection to thosewithout proper legal authorization aswell. Although immigration lawrequires employers to request cursoryproof of employment authorization,anti-discrimination law prohibitsemployers from targeting the foreignborn with more extensive inquiriesabout their legal status. In other areasas well, such as in housing, inquiriesabout legal status are forbidden.

Employment and Income

Legal permanent residents in theUnited States enjoy unfettered accessto the job market. The continuing gapbetween immigrants’ skills and thosethat are well rewarded in the US jobmarket remains the most importantfactor limiting the labor-market successof immigrants. Low returns to and lackof recognition of foreign credentialsand work experience are significantsecondary factors. Permanent residentsand, in some limited cases, personswith work authorization may alsoaccess federal, state, and locally fundedjob-training programs. How well theseprograms serve their needs is anothermatter, however.

Immigrants to the United States areover-represented relative to natives at both ends of the skill spectrum.Generally speaking, high-skilled immigrants enter primarily through the

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employment stream and low-skilledimmigrants arrive principally throughfamily reunification and unauthorizedimmigration. There is great variationin skills, employment success, andincome according to country of origin.Mexican and Central American immi-grants, in particular, are disproportion-ately found in such low-skill sectors asconstruction, maintenance, production,transportation, and service occupations(see Figure 5). They have lower rates oflabor-force participation (see Figure 6),lower household incomes, and higherrates of unemployment relative to bothnative populations and other immigrantgroups. Immigrants from Europe,

Canada, Africa, and much of Asia, onthe other hand, are more likely to beemployed in professional, “white col-lar” sectors. European-born andCanadian-born immigrants also havehigher rates of labor-force participa-tion, lower unemployment rates, andhigher household incomes thannatives. Each of these indicators is, ofcourse, influenced by a host of factors— the labor-force-participation ratealone is determined by the age andfamily structure of the population concerned, skill levels and success inthe job market, and cultural factorssuch as attitudes towards women working, just to name a few.


0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

USA Caribbean Cen. Amer.

Mexico Europe Asia Africa

Perc

ent

Management

Professional

Services Sales & OfficeConstruction & Extraction Installation,

Maintenance & Repair

Production & Transport

Figure 5. Occupations of Foreign- and US-Born

Groups, 2000

Source: Brian Ray. 2004. “Practices to Promote the Integration of Migrants into Labour Markets.”Brussels: European Commision DG Labour and Social Affairs.


Looking at these indicators over time,one of the most important factors governing the labor-market integrationof immigrants is the overall state ofthe economy. The sustained economicgrowth of the late 1990s, for example,saw the unemployment rates of immi-grants fall faster than those of natives,with foreign-born Hispanic malesachieving particular gains. In 1996,the gap between the unemploymentrate of natives and the foreign bornwas 2 percent, that between all nativesand foreign-born Hispanic men was3.7 percent, and the gap between allnatives and foreign-born Hispanicfemales was 5 percent.

In 1999 these figures had dropped to 1.2 percent, 1.1 percent, and 3.6percent, respectively, as the economyboomed. However, wages rose moreslowly for immigrants than for nativesin the same period, with natives seeinga 7 percent rise in the hourly wage, but the foreign born only a 1.6 percent rise.

This snapshot may demonstrate a largertruth about the integration of immi-grants in the American workforce:Low-skilled workers can easily findwork in the US economy; their work,however, is not well rewarded. With30 percent of foreign-born workers

80%

60%

40%

20%

0%

Perc

ent

Unemployment Rate Labor Force Participation

USA Caribbean AfricaAsiaEuropeMexicoCen. Amer.

Figure 6. Labor Force Participation & Unemployment Rates,

Foreign- and US-Born Groups, 2000


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without a high-school diploma, and 46 percent having limited English proficiency, it is not surprising that theearnings of the foreign born trail thoseof natives, and that 17.9 percent of theUS foreign born live in poverty.

With little longitudinal evidenceavailable, it is difficult to determinethe effect of increased time in the USon progress immigrants make in theworkforce. This becomes particularlyproblematic when cohort effects areconsidered. There are signs of occupa-tional mobility. For example, in 2000,the proportion of Southeast Asian andCaribbean immigrants who arrivedduring the 1990s and were employedin professional occupations was 15.9and 9.1 percent, respectively. Those ofthe same two groups who arrived inthe 1980s recorded rates of 18.4 and11.9 percent in 2000. Likewise, theproportion of Mexicans and CentralAmericans employed in constructionand maintenance, services, and pro-duction and transportation occupationsalso decreased between cohorts overtime (Ray, 2004).

There are also signs of gains in earn-ings among immigrants over time —but for the least-skilled immigrantsmuch of the past two decades has beenan uphill battle in terms of earningsrelative to natives (see Figure 7 forhousehold-income distributions of foreign- and native-born groups in2000). The earnings of both groupswere affected by economy-widechanges in returns to education.College graduates earned 43 percentmore than high school graduates in

1979, but 84 percent more in 1995.Both immigrant and native workerswithout a high school degree (whichdescribes an especially large portion of unauthorized migrants) have falleneven further behind.

Yet, there are signs that while thehandicap of low skills matters stronglyat entry, immigrants do succeed inmaking gains once in the UnitedStates. Immigrants entering the US aslegal permanent residents after 1988had an average household income of$44,000 in 1997, while those enteringbefore 1988 had an average householdincome of $50,400. This latter figurewas slightly higher than that of nativehouseholds, although this is due to ahigher average number of earners perfamily. Unauthorized immigrants whoentered before 1988, on the otherhand, reported household incomesslightly lower than the unauthorizedwho entered later. These figures, however, like those immediatelyabove, ignore important cohort effects.

Longitudinal analysis offers a moreuseful picture. One study of historicaldata found that the wage gap betweenimmigrants and natives tended to narrow by about 10 percent (as meas-ured by mean earnings of immigrantsas a percentage of mean earnings ofnatives) over two decades. Anotherlongitudinal study found that whileimmigrants earn less than natives atentry, and this gap has widened overtime, immigrants continue to makestrong gains with time, particularlyafter 10 years in the United States.The earnings gap between immigrants



and natives closes by 21 percentagepoints for men and 13 points forwomen in the second decade of residence (Orcutt, 2004, Orcutt and Dowhan, 1999).

Federal employment policy has notfocused extensively on immigrants.Although employment assistance isavailable to permanent residents,advocates for immigrants charge that it does not meet the needs of thoseimmigrants facing the most seriousintegration obstacles. The “one-stopshop” assistance program set up under

the Workforce Investment Act of 1998was aimed primarily at people with a9th grade education or better and hadfew provisions for English-languagetraining. Provisions to increaseaccountability, and to tie assistanceprograms to employment, aggravatedthe situation, according to critics ofthe act, by encouraging educationproviders to set high entry requirementsand by discouraging immigrants fromseeking service in the first place. The reauthorization of the WorkforceInvestment Act, which is being con-sidered by Congress as of this writing,

80%

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0%

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Perc

ent

USA Caribbean AfricaAsiaEuropeMexicoCen. Amer.

0-$25K $25,000-50K $50,001-75K $75,001-100K Over $100,000

Figure 7. Household Income for Foreign- and US-Born

Groups, 2000


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will direct more attention to extremelylow-skilled and low-English-proficiencypopulations. The US Department ofLabor also runs an assistance programtargeted at migrant farmworkers,which includes English and job-skillstraining. In 2002, 36,222 workersreceived assistance through this program. Beyond these efforts, the burden of basic education and languagelearning for immigrant workers is stillborne largely by private organizationsand migrants themselves.

At the moment, there is little politicaldrive to change the status quo onemployment policy towards immigrants.The more significant change in inte-gration in the workforce — and itsfeedback into national politics andpolicy — may be the continuinggrowth of the importance of immigrantsto labor unions. From 1996 to 2003, aperiod in which overall union member-ship declined, the number of foreign-born members of labor unions increased24 percent, to 1.8 million people. Thisperiod also saw unions take up issues ofimportance to immigrants: The highestpriority of those involved is changes toimmigration policy, particularly theregularization of unauthorized workers,rather than issues of training, benefits,or discrimination.

However, immigrants are not onlywooed by organized labor, but also bybusiness. Services to immigrants —such as remittance-sending — thathad long been the province of nichecompanies now attract major bankinginstitutions. Citibank and Bank ofAmerica are among the largest of

many banks and credit unions thathave used remittance-sending servicesas a way to draw in customers fromone of the last untapped demographicsfor retail banking: the estimated 53percent of Mexican immigrant house-holds that do not use banking services.This both influences and is encouragedby public policy. In the case of thematrícula consular, the TreasuryDepartment’s decision to allow the useof consular identification cards foropening accounts helped banks reachthat market. The banks, in turn, addedan influential voice of support for theTreasury’s decision when it came underpolitical fire. This mutual reinforcementhas influenced other areas of policy:Banks now receive credit under theCommunity Reinvestment Act (whichgives banks an incentive to serveunderserved populations) for providingremittance services. Businesses are alsorecognizing the value of immigrants asworkers and have added many voicesto the call for regularization and immi-gration reform.

Education and Children

Although the training of immigrantadults receives little political attention,and has been characterized more bypolicy stasis than by change, the education of immigrant children hasreceived increasing attention and hasbeen subject to waves of change inrecent years. This is due, primarily, tothe rising presence of immigrants andchildren of immigrants in the publicschool system over the past fewdecades (see Figure 8). Of the 55



million children enrolled in kinder-garten through the 12th grade in 2000,10.5 million, or one out of five, areimmigrants or children of immigrants.

All children resident in the UnitedStates under the age of 18 are entitledto basic public education. The educa-tional system makes a genuine effort tomake good on this promise throughsuch programs as a $393 million federalprogram funding state-level programsfor the education of the children ofmigrant workers (who are primarilyimmigrants or temporary foreign work-ers). The program also supports jointefforts with the Mexican government,including a teacher-exchange program.

The education of immigrant children,particularly language learning, has alsooccupied a more mainstream positionin education policy debates. The “NoChild Left Behind Act,” a general,national education-reform bill signedin 2002, requires schools to teach andtest children in English within threeyears of their entry to the school. Italso compels the annual testing ofchildren with limited English profi-ciency for English, reading, science,and mathematics skills. Schools notachieving specific benchmarks can besanctioned and those students maythen be eligible to transfer schools andreceive special services, such as tutor-ing. In addition, the law removes a

Foreign-born Children US-born Children of Immigrants All Children of Immigrants

25%

20%

15%

10%

5%

0

Perc

ent

Year 1970 1980 1990 2000

6.4

20.1

15

5.2 4.8

1.6

Figure 8. Share of Immigrant Children Enrolled in grades

K-12, 1970-2000

Source: Jennifer Van Hook and Michael Fix. 2000. “A Profile of Immigrant Students in US Schools.” In J. R. DeVelasco, M. Fix and T. Clewell (Eds.), Overlooked and Underserved: Immigrant Children in U.S.Secondary Schools. Washington, DC: Urban Institute.

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requirement that a portion of the pro-gram’s $477 million (in fiscal year2003) in grants for programs targetinglimited English proficiency students gotowards bilingual education and givesparents the explicit right to move theirchild to “mainstream” courses. The acthas been hailed for focusing on theachievement of disadvantaged studentsin public education, yet criticized forimposing unrealistic and poorlydesigned standards and for providinginadequate general funding.

The No Child Left Behind Act fol-lowed a trend of re-examining the edu-cation of immigrant children whosebeginning was marked by the successof Proposition 227 in California in1998. That ballot initiative essentiallyended bilingual education — in whichchildren with limited English proficiencyreceived subject-area instruction intheir native language — in the state.Although it was opposed by manyimmigrant advocacy organizations asdamaging to the education of immigrantchildren, legitimate concerns aboutnot only the costs but also the educational effectiveness of bilingualeducation have brought the issue tostates where immigration is less of ahot-button issue, such as Massachusetts.

A second new debate on the nationalpolitical scene centers on the access ofunauthorized immigrants to publiclyfunded higher education. Legislationcurrently pending before Congress, forexample, would allow states to deter-mine whether to offer tuition subsidiesto unauthorized immigrants and wouldregularize certain young immigrants

who entered the United States beforethe age of 16.

The well-being of immigrant children,too, is greatly influenced by US welfarepolicies (most welfare programs in theUnited States are intended to benefitfamilies). A disproportionate numberof children living in poor families arethe children of immigrants. Although,as observed earlier, many of these chil-dren are US citizens, their parents maynot be citizens, or even legal residents.

Poverty among immigrant families hasslightly different causes than amongnative families. Immigrant families aremore likely to be poor because theheads of these households work inpoorly paid jobs; unemployment andsingle-parent households are the moresignificant factors in poverty amongnatives. Thus, the 1996 welfare-reformprovisions that cut benefits to LPRsimpacted citizen children as well asnon-citizen children. Between 1994and 1998, food-stamp (food subsidies)use fell by 53 percent among citizenchildren in immigrant families.However, this type of response was notobserved for all social programs: Use of health care coverage by citizen children remained relatively stable nomatter what the status of their parents.Such differing impacts might be partially explained by the varyingefforts that were put into outreach toraise awareness among immigrants thattheir children were eligible for certainprograms, given indications that welfare reform had a chilling effect on use of welfare by otherwise eligibleimmigrants.



Homeownership and

Settlement

The large majority of the foreign-bornpopulation in the United States is eligible for federal housing assistancebecause they are permanent residents or naturalized citizens (see Figure 1).Compared to most other indicators ofintegration, however, immigrants areslow to integrate into the homeowner-ship market. Currently, immigrantscomprise 8 percent of all homeownersin the United States — although theyrepresent over 11 percent of the totalresident population — and the averageimmigrant buys his first home afterresiding in the country for 11 years.Nevertheless, the foreign born are dis-proportionately represented (at 14 per-cent) among recent first-time home-buyers, indicating the potential ofimmigrants to play a key role in thefuture growth of the homeownershipmarket. In fact, the Joint Center forHousing Studies projects that minorities,of which immigrants make up 30 percent, will account for 64 percent ofhousehold growth from 2000 to 2010,creating a 39 percent increase in theshare of total homes owned by minori-ties over that time span.

There are many factors that influenceimmigrant homeownership and severalbroader trends, most notably immigrantdispersion throughout the United Statesin the past decade, are particularly rel-evant. Individuals in general are morelikely to own a home if they are white,highly educated, middle aged, married,have children, and have high incomesor intergenerational wealth assets.

These same factors also influence thepropensity for homeownership amongimmigrants, in addition to severalother immigrant-specific ones. Legalstatus, country of origin, English language proficiency, and length oftime in the country also affect immi-grants’ access to, views about, and likelihood of owning a home. As anindication that immigrants do inte-grate fully, although late, into thehomeownership market, the ResearchGroup of the National Association ofRealtors found nearly identical homeownership rates between thoseimmigrants who had resided in the US for 20 years or more and thenative-born population, 67.5 percentand 68 percent, respectively.

One of the most recent and tellingfindings about immigrants and home-ownership came as a result of new settlement patterns among the foreignborn. With more immigrants settlingwithin the last decade in states thathave not traditionally received largenumbers of immigrants, a relationshipbetween location and homeownershiprates has developed. An analysis of thetop 100 metropolitan areas in the USfrom 1990 to 2000 points to varyingrates of homeownership success forimmigrants, with the proportion ofimmigrants living in the area and therate of immigrant growth being important factors. As expected, homeownership rates are lowest forthose foreign born living in the traditional immigrant gateways due, primarily, to limited availability ofaffordable housing in these majorurban areas.

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Barriers to immigrant homeownershipare many, but recent efforts at the fed-eral, state, and local levels are workingto overcome them. Proven obstacles tohomeownership include a lack ofaffordable housing (especially in central cities where immigrants aremost heavily concentrated) and thelack of credit history among the foreignborn (a result of cultural norms and,for some, limited residence and participation in formal financial institutions). Perhaps one of thelargest barriers, however, is the paucityof housing information and educationdirected at immigrants — particularlysince some foreign born come fromregions where rental housing is thenorm and mortgages are not an option.

A promising example of increasingimmigrant homeownership through acommunity coalition has taken placein northwest Arkansas through alender-employer-immigrant partnership.In the early 1990s the North ArkansasPoultry company was experiencingongoing labor shortages. In an effort tocreate stable conditions, the companypartnered with First National Bankand Trust of Rogers to initiate Spanish-language financial-literacy workshops,including homebuyer education. Theemployer provided classroom space andpermitted workers to attend classes forfree during regular work hours. As aresult of the initiative, over 700 immi-grant families purchased homes between1994 and 2000, of which no loans havebeen in default. Furthermore, the banksucceeded in capturing a new market,and what was once a 200 percentworker-turnover rate at the poultry

company became a 15 to 20 percentturnover rate in 1995. This type of creative partnership is an example ofthe crucial role of the private sector in integration in America.

Conclusion : Trends and

Challenges

Several trends and debates seem likelyto continue to shape US integrationpolicy for some time to come. Ofcourse, it is not possible to discussimmigration policy in the UnitedStates today without mentioning thenew focus on security and terrorism.Post-September 11 detentions of peoplewith immigration violations, registrationprograms focused on foreign visitorsfrom predominantly Muslim countries,interviews of immigrants by lawenforcement authorities, and otheraspects of the “War on Terror” havedecreased the sense of comfort felt bymany immigrants and visitors (Chisti,et al, 2003). Yet, despite these tensions,the total entry of long-term permanentresidents has not been disrupted,although certain types of entries havebeen slowed. Most notably, administra-tive delays caused by security concernshave led to a massive slowdown inrefugee admissions and have played arole in decreasing student admissions.The ongoing political, social, andinstitutional responses to terrorism andsecurity preoccupations will undoubt-edly be important factors in immigrantintegration, but are among the mostdifficult to predict. Meanwhile, theseparation of the immigration bureau-cracy into two enforcement divisions



and one benefits division in responseto security concerns — although theyall remain within one, security-orienteddepartment — has created an opportu-nity to “rebrand” and re-energize theservices division. The establishment ofan Office of Citizenship is one positivedevelopment in the services division,but recent budget allocations and slowprogress in reducing the backlog ofapplications for immigration benefitsand naturalization indicate that radicalchange is unlikely to happen quickly.

As fits an integration framework thatis largely shaped by private actors and“organic” processes, many of the moreinteresting trends are not primarilyguided by the federal government.One such trend is the continued domi-nance of Mexico, South and CentralAmerica, and Asia in migration flows.The fact that such a large portion ofUS immigrants comes from Mexicoand that this national group trailsmany others in integration as meas-ured by many criteria (income levels,naturalization rates, language acquisi-tion in the first generation) has ledsome observers to conclude that thenational-origin mix of incoming immi-grants is itself an integration and economic challenge (Borjas, 1999,Huntington, 2004). However, thedominance of Mexican (and, morebroadly, Latin American) immigrantsalso creates a critical mass that generates opportunities. Communityagencies can cross the language barrierof the majority of recent immigrants byproviding Spanish language services(itself a controversial practice in somelocales); Hispanic immigrants are a

target market of great significance tomedia, business, and politicians alike;and Mexican and Hispanic cultureshave influenced American popularculture and politics arguably morethan any other “foreign” influence inrecent years. This growing influence isperhaps the most obvious evidencethat integration in the United States isa dynamic two-way process, in whichthe broader society also adapts toimmigrants.

Less obviously, national origin plays arole in another possible trend: thegrowing interest of sending countriesin playing an active role in the lives oftheir nationals in the United States. Inpart, this is motivated by the risingawareness of the economic importanceof migrant remittances to many sourcecountries, and reflects the desire ofsource countries to preserve theseflows. But it has also emerged frompolitical pressure to do more for com-patriots abroad. Arguably, the relativelyrecent willingness of Mexico, thesource of the United States’ greatestimmigration wave, to engage in opendialogue — even lobbying — on migra-tion issues reflects this new context.Most notably, the Mexican governmenthas engaged the US government on theissues of regularization and labor immi-gration, but it has also expanded theservices it provides to immigrants.

The matrícula consular, discussed above,is the most high profile of theseexpanded services provided by theMexican government to its nationalsabroad. The true significance of thematrícula lies arguably not in what the

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identification card can enable Mexicanimmigrants to do (which is nonethelessimportant), but in the way theMexican government recognized aneed of its citizens abroad, offered asolution, and then educated its citi-zens, US businesses, and local US gov-ernments about it through its networkof 45 consulates and nearly 700employees. In doing so, the MexicanGovernment demonstrated its capabil-ity to touch the lives of literally mil-lions of immigrants — a capabilitymatched only, on the US side, by thefederal and a few state governments.

The matrícula campaign was one ofseveral new initiatives designed toreach out to Mexicans in the US.Another such initiative was the cre-ation of an "Institute for MexicansAbroad" that established a committeeof Mexican expatriates to advise theMexican Government on issues ofconcern to them. In many jurisdictions,local businesses, police, and governmentofficials have welcomed the matrículaand the involvement of the consulates;in others, the effort was seen as anunwanted interference in local policy.At the national level, too, the issuehas provoked debate. The relationshipbetween consular officials and localand state governments is thus likely tobe a factor of growing importance inintegration. Although no other countryhas the sheer numbers of nationals inthe US, or such extensive consularresources, other countries seem to beinterested in following the Mexicanexample of increasing outreach toexpatriates and to actors in the com-munities where they live. The trend is

also raising the profile of migration inthe international development policyof the US, making remittances a par-ticularly hot issue.

Perhaps the most important current andfuture issue in integration, however, isthe critical importance of dealing withthe unauthorized immigrant populationand the possibility of immigrationreform. The unauthorized population ispossibly the greatest integration chal-lenge that the United States faces.Although the level of integration thatmany unauthorized immigrants achieveis remarkable considering their precari-ous legal status, their level of economicand social success lags far behind immi-grant groups with other legal statuses.The number of unauthorized immigrantsis simply too great to make removals arealistic option, creating pressure forsome sort of regularization program.

Unauthorized immigration may alsohave spillover effects on legal immi-grants: Although several arguments tothis effect can be made, one hypothesisholds that the lawlessness of illegalmigration leads the American publicto be more skeptical of immigrationand immigrants more generally, thusinhibiting integration of all immigrants.Immigration reform would likelyattempt to reduce the size of the unauthorized population through somesort of regularization program and tryto head off future unauthorized immi-gration by expanding legal-migrationinflows and improving enforcement.Both President Bush and Democraticleaders in Congress have called forreform that would include some type



of regularization and expanded migration pathways, but they differ ona number of specific points. The pres-sure for immigration reform comesfrom a broad spectrum of interests,including employers, labor unions,immigrant and ethnic organizations,and human rights advocacy groups,that agree strongly on the need forreform but differ as to what specificmeasures they would most like to seetaken. Notably, no mainstream reformproposal calls for a restriction of immigration. This broad politicalcoalition, however loose, and the factthat mainstream politicians of bothparties speak of immigration and immi-grants in overwhelmingly positiveterms, are welcome developments inthe political integration of immigrants.

Thus, the possibility of immigrationreform is itself a product of today’s integration successes and problems; if it came to pass, it would create an entirely new set of integration chal-lenges. Whether expanded immigrationpathways and regularizations are perma-nent or temporary and whether they arefocused on family reunification oremployment, they would have signifi-cant integration implications. Both reg-ularization and expanded admissions, atleast as currently being discussed, wouldlikely strengthen existing trends in thegeographical focus and skill mix of legal immigrants. Reform, depending onthe form it would take, would likelyexacerbate some problems (such asdemands on those who administerimmigration and naturalization bene-fits) while helping others (such as thedelay in reunifying families due to

annual caps or the fear that preventssome immigrants from seeking socialbenefits for citizen children).

Interestingly, there has been little discussion of integration policy in thedebate about immigration reform, norhave expanded integration efforts been a major component of any reform proposal. In part, this may beindicative of the infancy of the dialogue. It may also reflect, however,the confidence Americans have in thecapacity of employment and privateand local processes to integrate peoplewho already have roots in the UnitedStates and are largely perceived, in thewords of President Bush, as “willingworkers” in a country with a largenumber of “willing employers.”

Recommendations for

the US and Europe

� Unauthorized immigration presentsan integration problem of the firstdegree. In the United States, unauthorized immigration is thedominant issue in immigration, preventing political progress onother matters important to integration and straining socialacceptance of immigrants. Anyattempt to deal with unauthorizedimmigration, in the US or else-where, however, must acknowledgethe extent to which unauthorizedimmigrants are already integrated.This means recognizing the importance of their labor and thedegree to which they have social and family ties in the host country.

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Furthermore, this means thatremoval of the majority of the exist-ing unauthorized population is notan option for most countries.

� The United States’ blend of a minimal social safety net, relativelyhigh employment rates, and a feder-alized system creates an environmentfor immigrant integration that isquite different from that of manyEuropean countries. Yet aspects ofthis system — the importance ofschools and workplaces as venues forintegration and the importance ofintervention by local or municipalgovernments — could enhance integration in other environments.Schools, workplaces, and the localcivic sphere are the places whereintegration happens for most immigrants and should be the focus of most resources dedicated to integration.

� Not all good immigrant integrationpolicies are targeted at immigrants.Policy changes that are informed byintegration needs but affect largerpopulations (such as low-incomepeople) often have great beneficialeffects on immigrant integration.Conversely, policy changes that tar-get immigrants for cuts in supportmay have extreme adverse effectson both immigrant and non-immi-grant populations, particularly thenative-born children of immigrants.

� Naturalization and citizenship areimportant steps in immigrant inte-gration. The United States’ successwith immigrant naturalization as

both a symbolic and practical meas-ure is one of the best aspects of itsintegration policy. There are furtherways that naturalization can bestreamlined and encouraged in theUnited States, but other countrieswould do well to look to elementsof the US system that have assuredbroad access for immigrants to citi-zenship and have engendered confi-dence, and even affection, for theprocess among the native population.

� The recredentialing of immigrantsis an important facilitator of labor-market success though it is a processwith which no country succeedscompletely. Public-private partner-ships may be a particularly appropri-ate way to deal with this problem.

� Access to financial services, particu-larly checking and savings accountsand mortgages, is a crucial factor inenabling the upward mobility ofimmigrants. The government has arole to play in creating a regulatoryenvironment that encourages banksto seek out immigrants as customersand perhaps in promoting financialliteracy among immigrants.

� Delays in the unification of imme-diate family members and confusingimmigration regulations have inte-gration consequences and may fuelunauthorized immigration. Progresson cutting backlogs and in stream-lining the immigration processshould be a priority in any country.

� Immigration and security threatsshould be distinguished from each



other in the public mind and inbureaucratic priorities. Since 2001,the United States has experienced a sometimes painful evolution fromblanket security measures (thatimposed more requirements on, or targeted, large groups of immi-grants) towards intelligence-basedsecurity measures that are bothmore effective at identifying individuals who pose threats andless disruptive to immigrant integration. The separation of theimmigration services and immigra-tion enforcement bureaucracies inthe US is a possible positive devel-opment in this regard, but the lowpriority of the former in fundingallocation will hamper progress.

� The success of the second and “one-and-a half” generation (peoplewho immigrated as children) is animportant test of integration policy.The strength of the US school system so far in teaching immigrantchildren is the product of both anadequate allocation of resources anda healthy public debate as to theappropriate methods of teachingsuch children. Any effort to makeeducation policy part of immigrationenforcement efforts can have seriousnegative integration consequencesand must be avoided.

References

Aleinikoff, A. and D. Klusmeyer. Citizenship Policies for an Age of Migration. Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for InternationalPeace, 2002.

Borjas, G. Heaven’s door: Immigration policy and theAmerican economy. Princeton: PrincetonUniversity Press, 1999.

Capps, R., M. Fix, J. Ost, J. Passel, and D. Perez-Lopez. “A Profile of the Low-WageImmigrant Workforce.” Immigrant Families and Workers Brief, no. 4. Washington, DC:Urban Institute, 2003.

Chishti, M., D. Meissner, D. Papademetriou, J.Peterzell, M. Wishnie, and S. Yale-Loeher,America’s Challenge: Domestic Security, CivilLiberties and National Unity After September 11.Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute,2003.

Drew, R. B. “New Americans, new homeowners:The role and relevance of foreign-born first-time homebuyers in the US housing market.” Joint Center for Housing StudiesResearch Notes Series, no. 2-2. Cambridge:Harvard University, 2002.

Duleep, H. O. “Insights from longitudinal data onthe earnings growth of US foreign-born men.”Demography 39, no. 3 (2002): 485-506.

Duleep, H. O. and D. Dowhan. “Analyzing immigrant economic assimilation withmatched social security longitudinal data onindividuals.” Paper presented at the annualmeeting of the Population Association ofAmerica, 1999.

Fix, M., J. Passel, and K. Sucher. “Trends inNaturalization.” Immigrant Families andWorkers Brief, no. 3. Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2003.

Fix, M. and J. Passel. “The scope and impact ofwelfare reform’s immigrant provisions.”Assessing the New Federalism DiscussionPaper. Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2002.

Fix, M., J. Passel, and W. Zimmerman. “The Integration of Immigrant Families in theUS.” Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2001.

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Fix, M. and W. Zimmerman. “All Under OneRoof: Mixed-Status Families in an Era ofReform.” Washington, DC: Urban Institute,1999.

Grieco, E. “Immigrant Union Members: Numbers and Trends.” Fact Sheet Series, no. 7. Washington, DC: Migration PolicyInstitute, 2004.

Grieco, E. “Characteristics of the Foreign Born inthe US: Results from Census 2000.”MigrationInformation Source. Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute, December 1, 2002,http://www.migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?ID=71.

Huntington, S. Who Are We: The Challenges toAmerica’s National Identity. New York: Simon &Schuster, 2004.

Instituto de los Mexicanos en el Exterior. “Most frequently asked questions regarding the matricula consular.” Fact Sheet. Mexico City: IME, 2004,http://portal.sre.gob.mx/ime/pdf/mcas.pdf

Joint Center for Housing Studies. The State of theNation’s Housing. Cambridge: HarvardUniversity Joint Center for Housing Studies,2003.

Katz, L. and D. Autor. “Changes in the wage structure and earnings inequality.” In Handbook of Labor Economics, edited by O.Ashenfelter and D. Card. Amsterdam: North-Holland, 1999.

O’Neil, K. “Consular ID Cards: Mexico andBeyond.” Migration Information Source.Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute,April 1, 2003, http://www.migrationinforma-tion.com/Feature/display.cfm?ID=115.

Passel, J., R. Capps, and M. Fix. “Undocumentedimmigrants: Facts and figures.” Fact Sheet.Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2004.

Patrick, E. “The US Refugee ResettlementProgram.” Migration Information Source.Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute,June 1, 2004, http://www.migrationinforma-tion.org/Feature/display.cfm?ID=229.

Pew Hispanic Center. “The Latino Population and the Latino Electorate: The NumbersDiffer.” Fact Sheet. Washington, DC: PewHispanic Center, 2002.

Ray, B. “Practices to promote the integration ofmigrants into labour markets.” Brussels:European Commission DG Labour and SocialAffairs, 2004.

Ray, B., D. Papademetriou, and M. Jachimowicz.Immigrants and Homeownership in UrbanAmerica: An Examination of Nativity, Socio-economic Status and Place. Washington,DC: Migration Policy Institute, 2004.

Research Group of the National Association ofRealtors. “Housing Opportunities in theForeign-born Market.” Chicago: NationalAssociation of Realtors, 2002.

Schmidley, D. “The foreign born population in theUnited States: March 2002.” CurrentPopulation Reports, no. P20-539. Washington,DC: US Census Bureau, 2003.

Schoenholtz, A. and K. Stanton. Reaching theimmigrant market: Creating homeownership opportunities for new Americans. Washington,DC: Fannie Mae Foundation, 2001.

Singer, A. “Welfare reform and immigrants: A policy review.” In Immigrants, WelfareReform, and the Poverty of Policy, edited by P.Kretsedemans and A. Aparicio. Westport, CT:Praeger Publishers, 2004.

US Citizenship and Immigration Services. 2002Yearbook of Immigration Statistics.Washington,DC: Department of Homeland Security, USCitizenship and Immigration Services, Office of Immigration Statistics, 2003.


Migrants and the

European Labor Market

Rainer Münz and Thomas Straubhaar

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As Europe heads into the 21stcentury, it appears set torecruit considerable numbers

of third-country nationals as a mainway of meeting its foreseeable demandfor medium- and high-skilled labor.The reasons for this expected trend areboth demographic and economic.Europe’s aging native-born workforce— a pool already stagnating in manycountries due to low birth rates — hasfor the most part already been tappedof its skilled workers by Europeanemployers. For these reasons, all of thepresent 25 Member States of theEuropean Union (EU 25) as well asthe other members of the EuropeanEconomic Area (EEA; Iceland, Norway,Liechtenstein) and non-alignedSwitzerland will either remain or soonbecome countries of immigration.

As demographic aging will intensifyafter 2010, many European countrieswill have to develop proactive migra-tion policies to meet their burgeoningdemographic and economic needs. Fora relatively short period of time,European East-West migration, spurredby factors such as higher wages andwork opportunities in Western Europe,will continue to play a role. But in themedium and long term, potentialmigrants will inevitably be recruitedfrom other regions of the world.Because Europe will have to competewith traditional countries of immigra-tion — in particular Australia,Canada, and the US — for qualifiedmigrants to fill labor gaps, a discussionof labor migration and its effects onemployment structure is not only help-ful, but necessary. The same is true at

the national level, as in most MemberStates, certain sectors of the economy(e.g., agriculture, health care, foodprocessing, tourism) heavily rely onmigrant workers and employees.

Analysis based on the European LabourForce Survey reveals that migrants inEurope experience low employmentrates and higher unemployment thanthe native-born, and that there is aconcentration of immigrants and for-eign nationals from middle- and low-income countries in certain sectors ofthe economy and in low-paying jobs.Such an analysis comparing foreign-born and native-born populations hadnot been carried out before.

The analysis reveals that the employ-ment picture is somewhat better whenlooking at the foreign-born population(as opposed to the foreign-nationalpopulation), as it includes naturalizedcitizens of EU Member States, who onaverage are economically better inte-grated than those who remain thirdcountry nationals. In this chapter, theterm “immigrants” refers to the broader“foreign-born” population, not the“foreign national” population (see textbox). Immigrants from high-incomecountries residing in the EU (includingintra-EU migrants), in particular, expe-rience above-average employment ratesand, on average, are employed in betterpositions than legal foreign residents.

This suggests the following: Theprocess of integration of immigrantsdiffers to a lesser degree from that oftraditional countries of immigrationsuch as the US, Canada, and Australia


Migrants and the European Labor Market 123

than has been previously assumed,although labor market outcomesremain disappointing for migrants fromlow- and middle-income countries,and in particular those from NorthernAfrica and Turkey. This leads us toconclude that further sustained effortsto enhance the integration of immi-grants and their children and to pro-vide equal opportunities are necessary.

The main challenge for European poli-cymakers will be to position theircountries to recruit migrants matchingtheir labor needs, while still sustainingeconomic growth and supporting theirpublic pension systems. Given thosegoals, a common European approachto immigration can play a crucial rolein tackling shortages of labor andskills, provided the qualifications ofimmigrants are appropriate. This chap-ter concludes with recommendationsfor the best courses of action availableto policymakers.

Identifying Europe’s

Migrants

Understanding the interplay of migra-tion and Europe’s labor-market dynam-ics requires quantitative informationon the foreign-born population andtheir socio-economic position.However, collecting such informationis easier said than done. To begin with,one of the most important pieces ofdata — the size and composition ofEurope’s migrant population — isunknown. This is partly due to the factthat many European countries — incontrast to Canada and the US — use

nationality, but not place or country ofbirth, as a standard criterion in theirdemographic, economic, and socialstatistics. To date, European adminis-trative practice basically distinguishescitizens of the country in questionfrom legal (and irregular) foreign resi-dents, but does not distinguish native-born from foreign-born residents.Available statistics reflect this basicdistinction (see text box). Beyond this,differences in the ways migrants aredefined and data on immigration/emi-gration is collected remain despiteongoing efforts by the EuropeanCommission (EC) to bring about stan-dardization in this field.

Keeping in mind these variations, the best estimate of the number ofmigrants living in Western andCentral Europe (EU 25+), as of 2001-2,is 36 to 39 million people. Amongthem, as of 2002, some 33 to 36 millionwere living in the fifteen countries thatconstituted the European Union until2004 (EU 15). Another 1.7 millionimmigrants live in the other EEAstates and Switzerland, and some 1.5million immigrants live in the new EU Member States in Central Europe.

The overall estimate of 36 to 39 millioncovers both legal immigrants —whether foreign nationals or citizens— and irregular migrants. Availableofficial statistics underestimate bothforeign immigrants with a short dura-tion of stay and/or irregular status, aswell as naturalized immigrants with afairly long duration of stay. This is particularly true for immigrants whoreceive settlement privileges because

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they share ethnicity with the domi-nant majority of the receiving country(e.g., ethnic German Aussiedler,Pontian Greeks), those returning to thehistorical “homeland,” and peoplebeing repatriated from former overseascolonial possessions (e.g., French PiedsNoir from Algeria, British settlers fromZimbabwe).

In Italy, Greece, Portugal, and Spain,the number of irregular migrants wasapparently above 10 percent of thetotal foreign-born population prior torecent regularization programs. For theUnited Kingdom (UK), a good estimatemight be that 10 percent of the foreignborn are in an irregular status; figuresfor Denmark, Sweden, and Finlandcould be lower than 10 percent. It is

possible to estimate such differencesboth from recent regularization pro-grams and from discrepancies betweenlocal registers and general censusresults (see the case of Spain; Table 1).

Recent Flows

In 2003, the twenty-eight EEA coun-tries and Switzerland had an overallnet migration rate of +3.7 per 1,000inhabitants. The net gain from migration was 1.7 million people. This accounted for almost 90 percentof Europe’s total population growth of1.9 million people in that year.

In absolute numbers, gross immigra-tion was largest in Germany, the UK,and Italy. Relative to population size, Cyprus had the largest positive


How Europe Counts “Foreign Nationals” vs. “Foreign Born”

The “foreign nationals” who are traditionally counted in European statistics arelegal residents of EU Member States (or other countries of Europe) not holdingcitizenship of these countries. This includes both immigrants still holding foreigncitizenship (usually citizens of their country of origin) and children of immigrantswho were born in an EU Member State, but only received the foreign nationalityof their parents. The category “foreign nationals” does not include people whohave acquired the citizenship of their country of residence. The “foreign born,”on the other hand, are all people with place of birth outside of a particularEuropean country, regardless of their current citizenship. Thus, the definition“foreign born” includes immigrants who have acquired the nationality of thecounty where they reside. The number of foreign born in a given state can bemuch greater than the number of foreign nationals. This mainly has to do withthe fact that from 1992 to 2001, some 5.8 million people were naturalized in theEU 15.

In many documents of both the European Community (EC) and the EU MemberStates, the number of legal foreign residents or third-country nationals has beenused as “proxy” for the number of immigrants.


migration balance, followed by Ireland,Portugal, Switzerland, Liechtenstein,and Spain. Only Lithuania, Iceland,Poland, Latvia, and Estonia recorded anegative migration balance (Table 2).In the Baltics this is due to the outflowof ethnic Russians and other minori-ties, while in Poland emigration foreconomic reasons prevails.

Entry Channels in Relation

to Labor Migration

In many European countries for which data are available, recent regu-lar immigration is dominated by familyreunification and migration related tothe formation of new families, by theinflow of coethnic “return” migrants

Table 1. Total, Foreign Resident, and Immigrant

Population (EU 15), 2000 – 2002, Different

Data Sources Compared

EU 15 Total Foreign Foreign Foreign Immigrant Immigrant Immigrant Immigrant Popu- Resident Resident Resident / Foreign Popu- Popu- Popu-lation, Popu- Popu- Popu- Resident lation lation lation

Eurostat lation, lation, lation Popu- According with with(1) Eurostat, OECD/ with lation, to Country Duration

Chronos Sopemi Nationality UN for National of Birth of Stay DB for for Known, 2000 (3) Sources Known, Known,2000 2001 LFS (2) for 2001 LFS (5) LFS

(4)Belgium 10,356 853 847 784 879 n.a. 974 1,034Denmark 5,384 256 267 166 304 322 225 227Germany 82,537 7,344 7,319 5,444 7,349 9,700 n.a. 8,915Greece 11,018 161 762 362 534 n.a. 489 480Spain 40,683 801 1,109 450 1,259 2,664 858 664France (6) 59,629 3,263 3,263 2,724 6,277 5,868 4,605 1,327Ireland 3,964 127 151 118 310 n.a. 232 263Italy 57,321 1,271 1,363 n.a. 1,634 2,500 n.a. 511Luxembourg 448 148 167 161 162 145 127 119Netherlands 16,193 652 690 555 1,576 1,675 1,179 1,593Austria 8,067 754 764 695 756 893 899 798Portugal 10,408 191 224 106 233 n.a. 1,119 1,313Finland 5,206 88 99 50 134 145 81 86Sweden 8,941 487 476 295 993 1,028 681 933UK 59,329 2,298 2,587 2,026 4,029 n.a. 3,307 4,467Total (N) 379,484 18,692 20,088 13,936 26,429 24,940 14,776 22,730

(1) Eurostat, year-end population 2002; (2) European Labor Force Survey (LFS) 2002 (data for Italy not available); (3)UN Population Division, data for 2000 or latest available year (see UN 2002); (4) Data for Denmark, theNetherlands, Finland, and Sweden are from national population registers; data for Austria, France, Luxemburg, andthe Netherlands are from the most recent national censuses; data for Spain (2003) are from local municipalities' regis-ters; data for Germany are rough estimates based on foreigners' registers, naturalization statistics and an Allbus surveyestimate for ethnic German Aussiedler taking only immigration after 1950 into account (see Münz and Ulrich 2003);data for Italy are based on the number of residency permits (2003, various categories) and an estimate for foreign-bornchildren not required to hold residency permits (see Einaudi 2004); (5) European Labor Force Survey(LFS) 2002(data for Germany and Italy not available); (6) Chronos data, Sopemi data and Census data for France are from 1999.

Sources: Münz and Fassmann (2004), Eurostat Chronos DB and European Labor Force Survey, OECD/Sopemi (2004),UN Population Division (2002), various national sources.


Table 2: Indicators of Population Change in Europe, 2003

Country Population PopulationJanuary National January2003 Births Deaths Population Net Total 2004

in 1,000s Decrease/ Migration Population in 1,000sIncrease Change

EU-25Germany 82,537 8.6 10.4 -1.8 1.8 0.0 82,539France 59,635 12.7 9.2 3.5 0.9 4.4 59,901UK 59,329 11.6 10.2 1.4 1.7 3.1 59,516Italy 57,321 9.5 10.0 -0.5 8.9 8.4 57,804Spain 41,551 10.4 9.1 1.3 14.2 15.5 42,198Poland 38,219 9.2 9.5 -0.3 -0.4 -0.7 38,191Netherlands 16,193 12.4 8.7 3.7 0.2 3.8 16,255Greece 11,006 9.3 9.4 -0.1 3.2 3.1 11,255Portugal 10,408 10.9 10.5 0.4 6.1 6.5 10,475Belgium 10,356 10.7 10.2 0.5 3.4 3.9 10,396Czech Rep. 10,203 9.2 10.9 -1.7 2.5 0.8 10,212Hungary 10,142 9.4 13.5 -4.1 1.5 -2.5 10,117Sweden 8,941 11.0 10.4 0.6 3.2 3.8 8,976Austria 8,082 9.5 9.5 -0.0 4.0 4.0 8,114Denmark 5,384 12.0 10.7 1.3 1.3 2.6 5,398Slovakia 5,379 9.6 9.7 -0.1 0.3 0.2 5,380Finland 5,206 10.9 9.4 1.5 1.1 2.6 5,220Ireland 3,964 15.5 7.3 8.2 7.1 15.3 4,025Lithuania 3,463 8.8 11.8 -3.0 -1.8 -4.8 3,446Latvia 2,332 9.0 13.9 -4.9 -0.4 -5.3 2,319Slovenia 1,995 8.6 9.6 -1.0 1.7 0.7 1,996Estonia 1,356 9.6 13.3 -3.7 -0.2 -4.0 1,351Cyprus* 715 11.3 7.7 3.6 17.9 21.5 731Luxembourg 448 11.8 9.1 2.7 4.6 7.3 452Malta 397 10.1 8.0 2.2 4.3 6.5 400Total EU 25 454,560 10.4 10.0 0.4 3.7 4.1 456,449EEA, non EU 25Iceland 289 14.2 6.2 8.0 -0.8 7.2 291Liechtenstein 34 8.8 5.0 3.8 10.0 13.8 34Norway 4,552 12.0 9.4 3.1 2.4 5.5 4,578Total EEA 459,435 10.4 10.0 0.4 3.7 4.1 461,352Switzerland 7,318 9.7 8.5 1.2 5.6 6.8 7,368EU Accession CountriesCroatia 4,442 9.0 11.4 -2.4 2.0 -0.4 n.a.Bulgaria 7,846 8.4 14.3 -5.7 - -5.7 7,799Romania 21,773 9.6 12.2 -2.5 -0.3 -2.8 21,716Turkey 70,173 21.0 7.1 13.9 1.4 15.3 71,254

Source: Eurostat.

Change per 1,000 Population


such as the abovementioned Aussiedlerand their dependent family members,and by the arrival of asylum seekers(412,000 applications in the EU 25 in 2002).

In other EU Member States — namelyin Ireland and several countries ofSouthern Europe — regular and irregu-lar economic migration still plays adominant role.

The data show that family reunification/formation visas’ share of total visasgranted by a particular country variedfrom as much as 70 percent (e.g.,Sweden in 2001) to as little as 20 to30 percent in countries such asAustria, Finland, Greece, Italy, andSpain in 2000 to 2002.

In terms of migration for employment,admission for work accounted for 61percent of all entries into Italy in2000, while this number was as low as27 percent for the UK.

These differences reflect legal barriers(e.g., Denmark, UK) or quotas (e.g.,Austria) restricting family reunion orfamily formation of immigrants in thereceiving country. They also reflect thecountry’s history of immigration asfamily reunification usually is a productof past labor migration (which explainssmaller shares of family reunion inFinland and Southern Europe). Finallythey reflect current openness to labormigration (e.g., Ireland, Italy, Greece).

Looking at the EU 15 overall, nearly40 percent of all residence permits weregranted for the purpose of employment,

while 30 percent were granted for thepurpose of family reunification. Thesefigures, however, do not give the fullpicture, because in several EU coun-tries, economic migration on a largerscale takes place in the form of season-al and temporary labor migration(529,000 people admitted temporarilyto the EU 15 in 2001), as well as in theform of irregular labor migration of atleast the same magnitude. Statistically,the latter phenomenon only becomesvisible on the occasion of regularizationprograms. During the period 1995 to2005, some 4 million migrants wereregularized in the EU 15.

Labor Migration in the

New EU Member States

In most new EU Member States,migrant workers and employees (whohave come since the opening of theborders in 1990) represent a relativelysmall segment of the work force. Forexample, in the new EU states inCentral Europe (Estonia, the CzechRepublic, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania,Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia), cur-rent labor migration is still relativelysmall. Only in the Greek part ofCyprus has the share of foreign laborbeen above the EU average and con-tinuously growing.

Despite the fact that many new MemberStates have seen net emigration inrecent years, they, too, receive immi-grants. In Poland, the total number ofwork permits for labor migrants fluctu-ated between 15,000 and 18,000 peryear (1997 to 2002), and irregular labor


Table 3: Foreign Labor Force in Selected European

Countries in 2000 – 2001

Foreign Labor Force Foreign Labor Force, total(percent of total labor force)

Austria 10.5 398,622Belgium 8.9 378,243Czech Republic 2.0 115,431Denmark 3.4 100,076Finland (1) 1.5 39,109France 6.0 1,603,185Germany 8.8 3,599,877Hungary (3) 2.3 115.000Ireland 3.7 59,619Italy 3.6 926,271Luxembourg 57.3 107,091Netherlands (2) 3.4 248,452Norway 4.9 114,431Portugal 2.0 101,681Slovak Republic (3) 0.3 9,100Spain (1) 1.2 211,736Sweden 5.0 239,951Switzerland 18.3 707,294United Kingdom 4.4 1,293,649Total 6.5 10,368,817

(1) 1999 values; (2) 1998 values; (3) 2002 estimates.

Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators database.

Table 4: Education of the 15+ Years Old Immigrant

Population with Country of Birth Known, EU 15

EU 15 Mig. Mig. CEEC Turkey Africa, USA, Latin Asia Total EU 15EU EU (4) (others) Middle Canada, America, Foreign- average

West (2) South (3) East Austral. Carib. born

Low (5) 30.9 76.8 40.8 69.2 58.6 11.6 33.9 41.0 51.8 43.4Medium (6) 37.8 15.6 39.5 22.5 24.5 34.7 33.0 31.5 28.2 39.4High (7) 31.3 7.6 19.7 8.4 17.0 53.8 33.0 27.5 20.0 17.2Total (percent) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0Total (N) 2,774 2,801 1,628 766 3,084 346 224 966 12,589

(1) LFS 2002, data for Germany and Italy not available; (2) EU 15 (except Italy, Greece, Portugal, Spain) + Iceland,Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland; (3) Italy, Greece, Portugal, Spain; (4) New EU Member States, accession countries,other countries in Central/Eastern Europe and the Balkans, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Caucasus, Central Asia; (5) pri-mary/lower secondary school completed/not completed; (6) higher secondary school completed; (7) tertiary education.


migration has become visible (with anestimated size of 300,000 people, mostlyfrom Ukraine). In Slovenia, the number of work permits fluctuatedbetween 34,000 and 40,000. In 2001,the Czech Republic counted 104,000non-nationals legally working. Whenadding so-called trade licenses (i.e.,business visas for particular economicactivities), the number of economicmigrants could be estimated at around168,000 in 2001. In Slovakia, thisnumber was 9,000 in 2002. Relative to work force and population size,Hungary has had the largest number of legal foreign workers and employees:115,000 in 2002, or 2.3 percent of thework force (Table 3).

In the new EU Member States, thegreat majority of migrant workerscome from neighboring countries and regions. In Slovenia, more than 90 percent of the foreign workers and employees come from other suc-cessor states to the former Yugoslavia.Foreign workers from Ukraine, Belarus,and the Russian Federation representthe majority in Poland and some 30percent in the Czech Republic. InHungary, 43 percent of the legal foreign residents were Romanian citizens, followed by citizens of Serbia(11 percent) and Ukraine (8 percent).Many of them were ethnic Hungarians.Around 10 percent had come fromother EU Member States.

The Czech Republic and Poland also have a sizeable share of migrantworkers from Asian countries, notablyVietnam, whereas Hungary hosts thelargest Chinese diaspora community in

Central Europe, making up 6 percentof all foreign residents in Hungary(data for 2001-03).

Education and Skills

To understand the impact of migrationon Europe’s labor market, it is crucialto map out the relationship betweeneducation/skill levels and employmentpatterns. For the purposes of thisanalysis, “high-skilled” means comple-tion of tertiary education, “medium-skilled” indicates completion of loweror higher secondary education, and“low-skilled” indicates that no secondaryeducation has been completed.

In 2002, 32.6 percent of the EU population ages 25 to 64 had a “low”level of education, 46.7 percent had a“middle” level education, and 21.8percent had a “high” level (see Figure1). Within the EU, there are strongdifferences in the education levels. In most of the countries, the share ofthe population with a “low” educationlevel ranges from 12 to 40 percent.The less-educated half of the expandedEU is composed primarily of theSouthern European members of theEU 15 and several Eastern Europeannew Member States. These countrieshave the lowest proportion of highlyeducated people (10 percent in thecase of Italy and Portugal) and highestproportions of people of “low” educa-tion (reaching 80 percent in the caseof Portugal).

The skills profile of the foreign-bornpopulation is markedly different from

130

that of the total EU population. Bothpeople with low skills (immigrants: 52percent; EU 15 average: 48 percent)and with high skills (immigrants: 20percent; EU 15 average: 17 percent)are overrepresented among immi-grants. People with medium skills are underrepresented among migrants(immigrants: 28 percent; EU 15 average: 39 percent). This is mainly a result of labor markets primarily creating demand for high- and low-skilled migrants.

Migrants from Southern Europe livingin another EU country, as well as thosefrom Turkey, North Africa/MiddleEast, and sub-Saharan Africa residingin the EU, have relatively high pro-portions of people with low skills. Incontrast, immigrants from NorthwesternEurope living in another EU country,and in particular immigrants fromother industrialized world regions(North America, Australia, and NewZealand), have higher proportions ofhighly skilled people (Table 4).

Labor Market Dynamics

and Composition

In 2002, some 290 million people livingin the EU 15 were of working age (15to 65). Of these, 62.8 percent wereactually employed. Labor force partici-pation rates ranged from 51.5 percentin Poland to 75.9 percent in Denmark.Of the EU 15, Italy had the lowestparticipation rate (55.5 percent). Thesedifferences largely reflect variations infemale labor force participation and ageat retirement.

Most of the EU 25 countries achievedemployment gains in the period from1997 to 2002. However, some of thenew EU Member States, especiallyPoland and Lithuania, had to face enormous employment losses over thesame period (see Figure 2). Luxembourgand Ireland had employment growthrates of 25 percent, exhibiting the bestlabor market performance. Spain’s economic development during this period was also was favorable from theperspective of employment opportunities(+15.5 percent employment growth).On the other hand, employmentgrowth rates of several EU countriesclearly fell short of the EU average(e.g., in Greece, Austria, Germany, andDenmark). These countries performedeven worse than some new EU MemberStates (e.g., Hungary and Cyprus).

In 1997, the employment rates of EUnationals already had reached 79 percent for the medium-skilled and 88percent for the high-skilled. By 2002,they had further risen to 82 percentand 89 percent, respectively. A similardevelopment took place for legal foreignresidents in the EU 15. The number ofmedium-skilled increased by 50 percent,while the number of high-skilled doubled, amounting to more than 60percent of the total increase in theiremployment. This reflected cyclicalgrowth in employment and themigrants’ disproportionately large contribution to this increase duringthe period 1997 to 2002, which wascharacterized by economic and employ-ment growth. The situation for thelow-skilled was less favorable, with amuch more modest employment



0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Portugal

Italy

Slovakia

Czech Republic

Poland

Hungary

Slovenia

Austria

Greece

Luxembourg

Latvia

Bulgaria

Germany

France

Spain

Netherlands

Ireland

Sweden

Denmark

Belgium

Cyprus

UK

Estonia

Finland

Lithuania

EU25

EU 15

high middle low

Figure 1: Education Level of the 25–to–64 Age Group,

Percentages of Total Education, 2002

Source: European Commission (2004), authors' calculations.


Portugal

Italy

Slovakia

Czech Republic

Poland

Malta

Hungary

Slovenia

Austria

Greece

Luxembourg

Latvia

Germany

France

Spain

Netherlands

Ireland

Sweden

Denmark

Belgium

Cyprus

UK

Estonia

Finland

Lithuania -11,2%

-9,2%

-5,7%

-5,3%

-3,5%

-1,3%

0,0%

3,4%

3,6%

3,9%

4,0%

4,0%

5,1%

5,2%

6,4%

6,8%

6,9%

8,1%

8,4%

8,8%

9 ,6%

10,7%

15,5%

25,4%

25,9%

-20% -10% 0% 10% 20% 30%

Figure 2: Total Employment Growth Rate 1997 – 2002*

Source: Eurostat, http://europa.eu.int/comm/eurostat/newcronos.For Cyprus 1997-2001, Lithuania 2000-2002, Malta 1998-2002, Slovakia 2000-2002.


increase, but still stronger for third-country nationals than for EU nationals.

European Unemployment Rates. In2002, the average unemployment ratein the EU 25 was 8.9 percent.Currently, unemployment rates varysignificantly among EU states (seeTable 5). In 2002, Poland had anunemployment rate of 19.8 percent,while the unemployment rate in theNetherlands was 2.7 percent.However, in terms of unemployment,there is no clear pattern that woulddistinguish EU 15 states from newMember States. Some of the newMember States, such as Slovenia,Cyprus, Hungary, and the CzechRepublic, exhibit unemployment ratesbelow the EU average. Others, such asPoland and Slovakia, face unemploy-ment rates that are clearly above theEU average.

In terms of North-South differences,unemployment is relatively high insome Southern European countries(Greece and Spain), and distinctly lowin Portugal (5 percent). Most countriesin Northern Europe have relativelylow unemployment compared to theEU average, for example Denmark (4.6percent), Ireland (4.3 percent),Sweden (4.9 percent), and the UK(5.1 percent).

In all EU countries, the labor forceparticipation rate of men exceeds thatof women. The biggest differencebetween male and female participationrates can be found in SouthernEurope, namely in Greece, Italy,Malta, and Spain — the countries

(except Malta) with the highest unem-ployment rates for women. Labor forceparticipation of women is significantlyabove average in countries inNorthern Europe (i.e., Denmark,Finland, and Sweden).

In seventeen of the EU 25 countries,more women than men are unem-ployed, although in some of thesecountries, these unemployment ratesdiffer only slightly. This holds trueespecially for countries with relativelylow unemployment rates (Austria,Denmark, Hungary, Ireland, theNetherlands, Slovenia, and the UK).But in addition, in some of the coun-tries with high unemployment — suchas Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland —such gender-related disparities inunemployment are rare. In Finland,there is no difference between maleand female unemployment rates. Bycontrast, unemployment is distinctlyhigher for the female populations inGreece, Spain, and Italy.

Between 1997 and 2002, the numberof people employed in the EU 15increased by about 12 million (+8.1percent), out of which 9.5 million wereEU nationals and more than 2.5 millionwere third-country nationals. Whilethird-country nationals’ share of totalEU employment was 3.6 percent in2002, they accounted for 13 percent ofemployment growth during the period1997 to 2002. Taking into account for-eign-born naturalized EU citizens,immigrants contributed 20 percent ofemployment growth. (Table 7).

Immigrant Employment. The employ-

134

ment rate of the foreign-born popula-tion ages 15 to 65 is lower (61 per-cent) than the EU 15 average (64 per-cent; Table 8). This rate varies accord-ing to place of origin. Western andSouthern Europeans living in anotherEU 15 country and immigrants fromother industrialized countries havehigher employment rates than otherimmigrants and the EU average. Theyalso have lower unemployment rates

than the total EU population, whichhad an unemployment rate of 7.8 per-cent in 2002.

The opposite is true for immigrantsfrom other parts of the world.Employment is particularly low andunemployment correspondingly highamong immigrants from Turkey, whoserate of employment stands at 50 percent,and unemployment at 15.5 percent.


Table 5: Unemployment rates in EU 15, 2002, total, male,

and female, in percent (ordered by size)

Unemployment Ratetotal male female

Poland 19.8 19.0 20.7Slovakia 18.7 18.6 18.9Lithuania 13.6 13.7 13.4Latvia 12.6 13.6 11.4Spain 11.3 8.0 16.4Greece 10.0 6.6 15.0Estonia 9.5 10.1 8.9Finland 9.1 9.1 9.1Italy 9.0 7.0 12.2France 8.9 7.9 10.0Germany 8.7 8.8 8.4Malta 7.5 6.5 9.6Belgium 7.3 6.7 8.2Czech Republic 7.3 6.0 9.0Slovenia 6.1 5.8 6.5Hungary 5.6 6.0 5.1UK 5.1 5.6 4.5Portugal 5.0 4.2 6.0Sweden 4.9 5.3 4.6Denmark 4.6 4.4 4.7Ireland 4.3 4.6 4.0Austria 4.2 3.9 4.4Cyprus 3.9 3.0 4.9Luxembourg 2.8 2.1 3.9Netherlands 2.7 2.5 3.0EU 25 8.9 8.1 9.8

Source: http://europa.eu.int/comm/eurostat/newcronos.


Table 6: Employment Rate in EU 25, 2002, total, male,

and female, in percent (ordered by size)

Unemployment Ratetotal male female

Denmark 75.9 80.0 71.7Netherlands 74.4 82.4 66.2Sweden 73.6 74.9 72.2UK 71.7 78.0 65.3Austria 69.2 75.9 62.5Cyprus 68.6 78.9 59.1Portugal 68.2 75.9 60.8Finland 68.1 70.0 66.2Ireland 65.6 75.5 55.6Czech Republic 65.4 73.9 57.0Germany 65.4 71.8 59.0Luxembourg 63.4 75.1 51.6Slovenia 63.4 68.2 58.6France 63.0 69.5 56.7Estonia 62.0 66.5 57.9Latvia 60.4 64.3 56.8Belgium 59.9 68.3 51.4Lithuania 59.9 62.7 57.2Spain 58.4 72.6 44.1Slovakia 56.8 62.4 51.4Greece 56.7 71.4 42.5Hungary 56.2 62.9 49.8Italy 55.5 69.1 42.0Malta 54.4 74.7 33.9Poland 51.5 56.9 46.2EU 25 62.8 71.0 54.7

Source: http://europa.eu.int/comm/eurostat/newcronos.

Table 7: Distribution of employment growth (1997-2003)

EU 15

Male Male Female Female total totalNationality/Country foreign foreign foreign foreign foreign foreignof birth national born national born national born

Other EU 15 1.3 2.2 1.8 3.2 1.8 2.6CEE 3.9 2.7 5.6 4.1 3.3 4.8Other Europe 0.1 0.1 1.4 0.6 0.1 1.0North Africa 0.3 0.4 0.6 1.2 0.3 0.9North Am., Austral. 0.4 0.2 0.3 -0.2 0.3 0.0Other 7.3 5.5 13.4 10.1 6.3 11.6Nationals/Natives 85.9 88.4 78.1 81.8 87.3 80.1Unknown 0.7 0.5 -1.2 -0.7 0.6 -1.0Total (%) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0

(1) Data for Germany and Italy not available.

136

For those from the Middle East/Africa,the employment rate is 51 percent,while the rate of unemployment is 16percent. For immigrants from Asia, thecorresponding percentages are 58 and8.2 percent, respectively. Immigrantsfrom the new EU Member States, theBalkans, Eastern Europe, and LatinAmerica have almost the sameemployment rate as the EU 15 aver-age, 63 percent, respectively, but high-er unemployment (11 percent for theBalkans and Eastern Europe, and 11.7percent for Latin America; Table 8).

Foreign-born men only have a slightlylower employment rate (71 percent)and higher unemployment (9.3 per-cent) than the EU 15 average for themale population (employment: 73 percent; unemployment: 6.9 percent;Table 8). Employment is high amongmale immigrants from other EUMember States, the Americas, andAustralia. Only male immigrants fromTurkey, Africa, and the Middle Easthave significantly lower employmentrates and much higher unemployment(Table 8).

These differences are larger amongwomen. Foreign-born women have alower employment rate (52 percent)and higher unemployment rate (10.3percent) than the EU 15 average forthe female population (employment:56 percent; unemployment: 8.7 per-cent; Table 8). Female immigrantsfrom Turkey, Africa, and the MiddleEast have particularly low employmentand high unemployment, whilewomen from Asia have particularlylow employment but average unem-

ployment rates. Women from LatinAmerica have average employmentrates but particularly high unemploy-ment rates. The opposite is true forwomen from Western EU countriesand from other Western countries livingin the EU 15.

Because employment and unemploy-ment rates vary to a considerabledegree with acquired skill levels, loweremployment rates among certainimmigrant groups are partly the resultof differences in skills compositions.Employment rates of male migrantsmoving within EU 15 countries do notdiffer much from the EU average,while lower-skilled women from otherEU 15 countries have higher employ-ment rates. This is particularly true forwomen from Southern EU 15 countries.In contrast, immigrants from Turkeyand North Africa/Middle East at allskill levels have lower employmentand higher unemployment rates thanthe EU average. The employmentrates of immigrants from new EUMember States, Eastern Europe, andthe Balkans are below the EU 15 average for high-skilled men andwomen, but above the EU average for low-skilled women (Table 8).

The analysis presented here describesemployment rates of the foreign-bornpopulation in the EU 15, an analysisthat more accurately represents theeconomic status of “immigrants” thanthe so far dominant approach that hasonly looked at legal foreign residents(i.e., citizens of other EU MemberStates and third-country nationals; see the text box earlier in this chapter).



Table 8: Immigrant (Foreign-born) Population of Working

Age (15–64) and Known Origin by Labor Force Status,

Gender, and Country of Birth, EU 15, 20021

Labor Force Immigrant Population by Country of Birth EU 15 Status EU- EU- EU 8 + Turkey Africa, USA, Latin Asia Total Total

West2 South3 CEE4 Middle Canada, America, Immi- Popu-East Austral. Carib. grants lation

Employed 67.1 67.3 63.2 50.0 51.4 76.3 62.7 58.6 61.3 64.2Unemployed 4.7 4.2 7.8 9.2 9.8 3.5 8.3 5.2 6.6 5.4Inactive 28.1 28.4 29.0 40.8 38.7 20.2 29.0 36.2 32.1 30.4Total (%) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0Active (%) 71.8 71.5 71.0 59.2 61.2 79.8 71.0 63.8 67.9 69.6Unemployment Rate (%) 6.5 5.9 11.0 15.5 16.0 4.4 11.7 8.2 9.7 7.8Total (in 1,000s) 2,587 2,145 1,516 772 2,706 456 217 1,166 11,565 250,433

Employed 75.0 75.3 72.7 65.1 62.6 86.0 73.9 73.2 71.2 72.9Unemployed 5.2 4.1 7.6 11.6 11.4 3.2 5.4 6.0 7.3 5.4Inactive 19.9 20.5 19.7 23.4 25.9 10.9 20.7 20.8 21.5 21.7Total (%) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0Active (%) 80.2 79.4 80.3 76.7 74.0 89.2 79.3 79.2 78.5 78.3Unemployment Rate (%) 6.5 5.2 9.5 15.1 15.4 3.6 6.8 7.6 9.3 6.9Total (in 1,000s) 1,182 1,135 696 398 1,442 221 92 548 5,714 125,441

Employed 60.5 58.3 55.1 33.9 38.7 67.5 54.0 45.6 51.5 55.5Unemployed 4.3 4.4 7.9 6.9 8.0 3.4 11.1 4.7 5.9 5.3Inactive 35.2 37.3 37.0 59.2 53.3 29.1 34.9 49.8 42.5 39.2Total (%) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0Active (%) 64.8 62.7 63.0 40.8 46.7 70.9 65.1 50.3 57.4 60.8Unemployment Rate (%) 6.6 7.0 12.5 16.9 17.1 4.8 17.1 9.3 10.3 8.7Total (in 1,000s) 1,405 1,010 820 375 1,264 234 126 619 5,853 124,993

(1) LFS 2002, Data for Germany and Italy not available; (2) EU 15 residents born in another EU 15 country (exceptItaly, Greece, Portugal, or Spain) or born in Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, or Switzerland; (3) EU 15 residents bornin Italy, Greece, Portugal, or Spain but living in another EU 15 country; (4) EU 15 residents born in new EU MemberStates, accession countries, other countries (except Turkey), other countries in Central/Eastern Europe and theBalkans, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Caucasus, Central Asia.

Source: Labor Force Survey 2003.

Fem

ale

M

ale

Tot

al


Table 9: Legal Foreign Resident Population of Working Age

(15-64) by Labor Force Status, Gender, and Country of

Nationality, EU 15, 20021

Labor Force Legal Foreign Resident Population by Nationality EU 15 Status EU- EU- EU 8 + Turkey Africa, USA, Latin Asia Total Total

West2 South3 CEE4 Middle Canada, America, LFRs Popu-East Australia Carib. lation

Employed 67.5 66.9 60.7 47.5 41.5 76.8 62.6 56.6 58.6 64.2Unemployed 4.0 5.9 8.9 10.1 12.8 3.1 9.6 5.9 7.7 5.4Inactive 28.5 27.1 30.4 42.4 45.7 20.1 27.8 37.5 33.6 30.4Total (%) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0Active (%) 71.5 72.8 69.6 57.6 54.3 79.9 72.2 62.5 66.3 69.6Unemployment Rate (%) 5.6 8.1 12.8 17.5 23.6 3.9 13.3 9.4 11.6 7.8Total (in 1,000s) 2,027 2,310 1,861 2,121 1,373 383 115 525 10,715 250,433

Employed 75.5 73.9 70.3 61.3 55.3 85.9 77.1 74.1 68.9 72.9Unemployed 4.6 6.4 9.4 13.0 15.6 3.6 4.2 7.5 9.1 5.4Inactive 19.9 19.7 20.3 25.7 29.0 10.4 18.8 18.4 22.0 21.7Total (%) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0Active (%) 80.1 80.3 79.7 74.3 70.9 89.5 81.3 81.6 78.0 78.3Unemployment Rate (%) 5.7 8.0 11.8 17.5 22.0 4.0 5.2 9.2 11.7 6.9Total (in 1,000s) 975 1,293 842 1,131 748 192 48 239 5,468 125,441

Employed 60.1 58.1 52.8 31.6 24.8 67.5 52.2 42.0 47.9 55.5Unemployed 3.5 5.3 8.4 6.9 9.5 2.6 13.4 4.5 6.3 5.3Inactive 36.4 36.6 38.7 61.5 65.7 29.8 34.3 53.5 45.8 39.2Total (%) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0Active (%) 63.6 63.4 61.2 38.5 34.3 70.1 65.6 46.5 54.2 60.8Unemployment Rate (%) 5.5 8.4 13.7 17.9 27.7 3.7 20.4 9.7 11.6 8.7Total (in 1,000s) 1,052 1,016 1,018 989 624 191 67 286 5,243 124,993

(1) LFS 2002, Data for Italy not available; (2) EU 15 nationals (except Italy, Greece, Portugal, Spain) and nationals ofIceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, or Switzerland living in (another) EU 15 country; (3) Nationals of Italy, Greece,Portugal, or Spain living in another EU 15 country; (4) Nationals of new EU Member States, accession countries(except Turkey), other countries in Central/Eastern Europe and the Balkans, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Caucasus, orCentral Asia living in an EU 15 country.

Fem

ale

M

ale

Tot

al


A comparison between the foreign-born population and the legal foreignresident population reveals additionalinsights about the labor market situa-tion of migrants (Tables 8, 9, 10).

Discrepancies in employment andunemployment rates are clearly visiblewhen comparing high-skilled maleand female immigrants from new EUMember States, the Balkans, andEastern Europe, with foreign nationalsof these countries and areas residing inthe EU 15 (Table 11). Such discrep-ancies are visible at all skill levelswhen comparing female immigrantsfrom Turkey with female Turkishnationals, and male and female immi-grants from North Africa/Middle Eastwith nationals of these countries(both men and women) residing inthe EU 15. Such discrepancies do notappear when comparing high-skilledand unskilled male immigrants fromTurkey with male Turkish nationals of the same skill level.

Occupational Structure, IndustryStructure. On the whole, the occupa-tional structure of the foreign-bornpopulation in Europe is different fromthe EU 15 average (Tables 12, 13).Economically active immigrants areunderrepresented in medium-skillednon-manual positions and overrepre-sented in non-skilled manual positions.Immigrants from Northwestern Europeliving in another EU country as well asimmigrants from other industrializedcountries (North America, Australia/New Zealand) predominantly occupyhigh-skilled non-manual positions.Immigrants from Southern Europe liv-

ing in another EU country as well asimmigrants from the Balkans, Centraland Eastern Europe, and Turkey areover-proportionally active in skilledand unskilled occupations. Asians havean average representation in highlyskilled non-manual positions but areover-proportionally active in unskilledmanual positions.

Economic Inclusion and Exclusion ofMigrants. In Europe, over the lastdecade, third-country nationals’ unem-ployment has remained higher thanEU nationals’ unemployment (Table9). In a majority of Member States,the former is twice as high as the lat-ter. The difference is less marked whendomestic populations are compared tothe foreign-born population, ratherthan foreign nationals (Tables 8 and9). Third-country nationals also havemuch lower employment rates thanEU nationals (14 percent lower in2002), in particular in the prime work-ing age group (20 percent lower) andfor the high-skilled. The gap is onaverage wider for women than for menwithin all working-age groups.

In more than half of the EU 15, this gap has been shrinking over thelast decade. From 1994 to 2002, theemployment rates of non-EU nationalsimproved significantly in Portugal(+28 percentage points), Spain, (+22percentage points), Denmark (+18percentage points), the Netherlands(+16 percentage points), Ireland (+13 percentage points), and Finland(+12 percentage points). Smallerincreases were recorded in the UnitedKingdom, Sweden, and Greece.


Table 10: Activity Rate (age groups 15-65) of the

Immigrant Population from the Maghreb and Turkey

and the Foreign Resident Population (citizenship of

Maghreb countries and Turkey), selected EU countries1

Immigrants from Maghreb Immigrants from Turkish Maghreb Countries (2) nationals (2) Turkey nationals

Belgium 34.5 21.6 31.9 26.2Denmark 43.5 36.4 46.7 30.8Germany — 47.1 — 48.5Greece 63.2 75.0 57.1 57.1Spain 56.3 57.0 — 37.9France 50.8 39.1 42.2 50.6The Netherlands 53.2 41.9 55.9 57.0Austria 55.6 42.9 59.8 33.3Sweden 44.3 34.5 50.0 44.4UK 65.3 60.4 55.9 26.2

(1) LFS 2002; (2) Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia.

Table 11: Employment Rates of Working-Age Legal Foreign

Residents and Immigrants of Known Origin by

Nationality or Country of Birth, Gender, and

Educational Attainment, EU 15, 2002

Foreign Nationals (LFRs)1

Nationality Male FemaleLow Medium High Low Medium High

education2 education3 education4 education2 education3 education4

Turkey 55.5 73.3 _ 27.9 49.7 _North Africa 49.3 65.0 67.5 18.9 32.7 49.1North America _ 79.6 87.3 _ 60.6 76.9EU 8 + CEE 61.3 76.1 77.8 45.7 60.2 53.3EU-West5 59.5 78.5 87.8 35.0 61.3 78.0EU-South5 66.9 80.3 84.3 52.3 67.8 69.8EU 15 average 60.9 76.3 85.8 36.9 63.3 78.6

Foreign Born (Immigrants)6

Nationality Male FemaleLow Medium High Low Medium High

education2 education3 education4 education2 education3 education4

Turkey 58.4 75.3 _ 25.5 49.3 76.9North Africa 51.6 68.4 79.9 25.1 48.5 66.0North America _ 82.3 87.6 _ 58.9 78.5EU 8 + CEE 64.5 77.1 80.5 46.5 59.9 63.1EU-West7 59.7 74.4 86.1 41.7 61.6 76.8EU-South7 71.6 76.2 85.6 53.4 62.4 77.4EU 15 average 60.9 76.3 85.8 36.9 63.3 78.6

(1) LFS 2002, data on foreign nationals for Italy not available; (2) Primary education only; (3) Lower or upper second-ary education completed; (4) Tertiary education completed; (5) EU 15 nationals living in EU 15 but outside theircountry of citizenship; (6) LFS 2002, data on foreign born for Germany and Italy not available; (7) People born in EU15 but living in EU 15 outside their country of birth.


The employment rates for non-EUnationals remained below average inFrance and Belgium, and there was adecline in the employment rates ofnon-EU nationals in Austria (-3.5 percentage points), Luxembourg (-3.1 percentage points), and Germany(-2.0 percentage points).

Migrant workers and employees origi-nating from non-Western and non-EUcountries are concentrated in a fewsectors of the economy, and withinthem, in the lower-skilled segments. Agrowing number of them are employed

in the health and domestic caretakingsectors, as well as in education.Domestic services also play an impor-tant role, though this is not always visible in available statistics due to thehigh proportion of irregular migrantsworking in this sector. In contrast,young people of foreign origin increas-ingly tend to have an occupationalprofile closer to that of natives.

Whether or not these changes mean a better starting point for migrants’longer-term integration into the labormarket is debatable, as they still tend

Table 12: International Standard Classification of

Occupations (ISCO) of the Immigrant Population

with Country of Birth Known, EU 15 1

EU 15 EU EU CEEC Turkey Africa, USA, Latin Asia Total EU 15West South (4) (others) Middle Canada, America,(2) (3) East Austral. Carib.

Highly skilled non-man. 49.9 20.9 20.1 21.4 35.8 64.7 36.5 38.8 34.9 36.8Mediumskillednon-man. 11.7 6.9 5.4 6.6 11.1 12.6 12.4 9.4 9.3 12.9Lowskillednon-man. 13.0 13.1 16.0 14.2 12.5 7.5 20.4 17.5 13.7 14.0Skilledmanual 10.4 32.0 22.1 22.6 15.7 5.8 11.7 6.5 17.7 17.7Non-skilledmanual 14.5 27.0 36.4 34.7 24.2 7.5 19.0 27.6 24.0 17.9Armedforces 0.5 — — 0.5 0.7 2.0 — — 0.4 0.7Total(percent) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0Total (N) 1,758 1,527 959 380 1,391 348 137 691 7,191 161,906

(1) LFS 2002, data for Germany and Italy not available; (2) EU 15 (except Italy, Greece, Portugal, Spain) + Iceland,Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland; (3) Italy, Greece, Portugal, Spain; (4) New EU Member States, accession coun-tries, other countries in Central/Eastern Europe and the Balkans, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Caucasus, Central Asia.

142

to remain concentrated in low-qualityservice jobs offering little room interms of adaptability and mobility.

The picture, however, tends toimprove when comparing native-bornwith foreign-born workers and employ-ees, rather than contrasting third-country nationals with EU nationals.This is to be expected, as naturalized

citizens tend to be better integratedthan legal foreign residents. However,even in the first comparison, differencesbetween immigrants from non-industri-alized countries and Europe’s majoritypopulations remain strong. Third-country nationals who entered the EUin recent years tend on average tohave higher skill levels than thosealready established in the EU for a


Table 13: Economically Active Immigrant Population

with Country of Birth Known, by Sector/Industry, EU 15 1

EU 15 EU EU CEEC Turkey Africa, USA, Latin Asia Total EU 15West South (4) Middle Canada, Am.,(2) (3) East Austral. Caribb.

Agric, fish., mining 0.4 0.4 0.3 — 0.2 0.9 — — 0.3 0.3Manufact. 16.4 18.2 19.4 25.3 15.6 11.2 14.9 18.1 17.4 20.9Construct. 6.4 18.8 15.7 12.3 8.8 3.3 7.5 2.2 10.4 8.2Wholesale, retail trade 13.5 13.0 11.8 16.6 14.7 9.1 11.9 16.2 13.6 15.2Hotels, restaurants 5.9 7.8 10.1 10.4 5.9 3.6 15.7 13.5 7.9 4.4Transport, storage, communic. 6.2 5.1 5.0 5.7 7.1 3.9 6.0 9.4 6.2 6.5Financial intermed. 4.3 1.7 1.1 1.4 2.3 7.3 2.2 3.1 2.8 3.5Real est., renting, 14.4 9.8 12.1 10.4 13.2 22.7 14.2 10.9 12.8 9.7Public adm. 4.8 4.1 1.6 2.7 8.1 5.7 3.0 3.7 4.7 7.9Education 8.9 4.3 3.9 4.9 7.8 11.8 5.2 5.6 6.6 7.2Health, social work 12.8 6.5 9.2 6.0 10.7 10.6 8.2 12.7 10.1 10.2Personal services 5.6 3.7 4.0 3.5 4.2 9.7 8.2 3.5 4.6 5.0Private households 0.5 6.6 5.9 0.5 1.7 — 3.0 1.0 2.8 1.1Total (%) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0Total (N) 1,706 1,365 933 367 1,351 331 134 680 6,867 155,470

(1) LFS 2002, data for Germany and Italy not available; (2) EU 15 (without Italy, Greece, Portugal, Spain) + Iceland,Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland; (3) Italy, Greece, Portugal, Spain; (4) new EU Member States, accession coun-tries, other countries in Central/Eastern Europe and the Balkans, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Caucasus, Central Asia.


decade or longer. The activity rates ofthe newcomers are lower, however,and their unemployment rates higherthan those of longer-established immi-grants. In 2002, the 45 percentemployment rate of migrants fromnon-EU countries who arrived in 2001was nearly 20 points below that ofthose who had arrived 10 years earlier.

Differences in employment, economicperformances, and integration of third-country nationals are strongly correlatedwith the country of origin. Theemployment rate of legal foreign resi-dents from North Africa and Turkey isconsistently lower than for EU nationalsat every skill level. This gap is moremarked for women (Table 10). Again,the differences are somewhat less pro-nounced if native-born vs. foreign-bornpopulations are compared (instead ofEU citizens vs. legal foreign residents).In contrast, citizens of Balkan countrieshave employment rates at or above EUnationals’ levels both for men andwomen. The same is true for NorthAmericans and Australians residing inEurope, as well as for citizens ofNorthwestern Europe residing inanother EU member state (Table 9).

In the decade 1992 to 2001, some5,855,000 legal foreign residents werenaturalized in the EU 15, marking aconsiderable increase in comparisonwith previous decades. Sweden, theNetherlands, and Denmark had thehighest ratio of non-nationals acquiringcitizenship; Luxembourg and Greeceshowed the lowest relative numbers. Inthis period, the sub-segment of foreignnationals became much less represen-

tative of the migrant population. As aresult, the average economic positionof the foreign-born population in theEU 15 differs less from Europe’s popu-lation as a whole than it does from theeconomic position of the foreign resi-dent population. The latter are in aless favorable economic position.

Looking at foreign nationals only,instead of immigrants with or withoutcitizenship of the receiving country,paints an overly negative picture. Anincomplete examination of the avail-able data leaves the impression thatthe economic position of migrants isdeteriorating, particularly in EU coun-tries with a longer tradition of immi-gration and higher naturalization rates.

Analysis of European Labor ForceSurvey (LFS) data for 2002 shows thatimmigrants in Europe are more success-ful than surveys and data exclusivelyfocused on foreign nationals wouldsuggest. Thus, differences between tra-ditional countries of immigration —such as Australia, Canada, and theUnited States — and many Europeancountries are apparently smaller thanassumed. Nevertheless, for certainimmigrant groups — in particularthose coming from middle-and low-income countries — considerableemployment gaps remain.

Analysis of LFS data also makes clearthat immigrants who do not naturalizewithin their first 10 to 15 years in thereceiving country are more likely toremain in low-skilled and low-paidemployment. This sectoral concentra-tion of legal (and irregular) foreign res-

144

idents can partly be explained by laborshortages and lower requirements interms of specific skills. Such circum-stance may provide immigrants andtheir children with better opportunitiesto enter the labor market. At the sametime, relatively large numbers of non-EU nationals in some sectors with lim-ited rights or scope for mobility withinthe labor market will not be in astrong position regarding wages andjob quality.

In this context, the integration of third-country nationals newly arriving andresiding in Europe remains an importantissue for the EU, its Member States, andEuropean civil society. In fact, in recentyears, a growing number of EU MemberStates have introduced integrationprograms ranging from language-train-ing courses to civic education.

While Europe’s situation clearly showsthe importance of citizenship for theprocess of integration, there is, however,no simple causality. It is true that, onthe one hand, naturalization may helpreduce discrimination and boost immi-grants’ access to certain segments ofthe labor market, particularly in thepublic sector. On the other hand, it isevident that successful economic inte-gration of immigrants makes it morelikely that they will become citizens ofthe receiving country. Naturalizationmay therefore be both a cause and aconsequence of integration. In anycase, the results clearly show that sus-tained efforts toward the economic andcivic integration of immigrants andtheir native-born children (the so-called second generation) are necessary.

Demographic Imbalances

Low fertility and increasing lifeexpectancy in Europe reverse the agepyramid, leading to a shrinking num-ber of younger people, an aging workforce, and an increasing number andshare of older people. According toavailable data and projections, the sizeof Western and Central Europe’s totalpopulation will remain stable duringthe next 20 years and start to declineafter 2025 (see Figure 3; see also thechapter by Wolfgang Lutz and SergeiScherbov). More important than theoverall trend is the expected change inthe age group 15 to 65 defining theemployable part of the population. Inthe absence of massive recruitment ofeconomically active migrants, thenumber of people ages 15 to 65 willdecrease by 4 percent from 306 million(2005) to 295 million by 2025 and to245 million (-61 million = -20 per-cent) by 2050 (Figure 4).

During the same period, the old-agedependency ratio — the population ofpeople past retirement age expressed asa percentage of the population ofworking age people — is likely toincrease from 23 percent in 2000, to35 percent in 2025, and between 45and 50 percent in 2050.

We can assume that European societieswill respond to this demographic trendby raising retirement ages, by trying toincrease female labor force participa-tion rates (which is an option inSouthern Europe, Germany, Austria,and Poland in particular) and byrecruiting migrants.



Portugal

Italy

Slovakia

Czech Republic

Poland

Hungary

Slovenia

Austria

Greece

Luxembourg

Latvia

Malta

Germany

France

Spain

Netherlands

Ireland

Sweden

Denmark

Belgium

Cyprus

UK

Estonia

Finland

Lithuania

EU25

112,7

98 ,2

91 ,6

78 ,8

91 ,8

90 ,1

85 ,3

106,6

103 ,3

164 ,6

72,2

56 ,1

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75,8

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96 ,2

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95,4

48 ,1

99,1

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113 ,9

99,7

86,8

90 ,1

0 5 0

2025 2050

1 0 0 1 5 0 2 0 0

Figure 3: Population forecasts until 2025 and 2050,

2000=100, EU 25

Sources: UN (2004), http://esa.un.org/unpp/; authors’ calculations.

146

The data for 2003 already show thaton one hand, the number of countrieswith a shrinking native-born popula-tion is growing; on the other, the num-ber of countries with a negative migra-tion balance has become very small(Table 2). This contrasts with the situ-ation in neighboring regions to thesouth and southeast, where fertility ismuch higher, albeit declining, lifeexpectancy is increasing, and the over-all population is projected to continueto grow at a rapid pace.

Even more worrisome is the change inthe ratio between economically activeand retired persons. With an employ-ment rate of 70 percent, the number ofpeople employed per person aged 65and over will decline from 2.7 in 2010,to some 2.2 in 2020, 1.8 in 2030, and

1.5 in 2040. If EU Member States wereto achieve the goal of 75 percentemployment set by the LisbonEuropean Council between 2010 and2020, the decline in this ratio wouldbe attenuated, reaching 2.4 in 2020.

Labor Force Structure

Large changes in the size of Europe’slabor force are expected for thedecades to come. However, thechanges in the economically activepopulation will be smaller than theprojected changes for the “active” 15to 65 age group, because only 60 to 80percent of this group is currentlyemployed or self-employed. After2010, the EU 25 can expect a decreasein this active population. By 2025, this


-2.5EELVBGLTHUSIITCZN12FIDEPLROELATESPTSEEU15SK DKBEMTNLFRUKCYELU

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2010-20252000-2010

Figure 4: Projected Decline in Working-Age Population,

2000 – 2025

Source: UN demographic projections.


age group is projected to shrink by 16million. In European countries notbelonging to EU 25, such as Bulgaria,Moldavia, Romania, and Serbia andMontenegro, the active or job-seekingpopulation is already shrinking.

In addition to shortages due to demographic changes, significantskills shortages or qualitative mismatches are on the horizon due to structural change and innovation.

In terms of structural change,European countries can expect adecrease in the employment share ofthe manufacturing and agriculturalsectors, and an increase in the servicesector’s share. These structural changeswill be accompanied by changing qual-ifications requirements. While theshare of the service sector in EU 15countries is already relatively high, significant structural changes will takeplace in the new EU Member States.In these countries, a relatively highshare of the labor force is stillemployed in the agricultural sector,while the service sector is underdevel-oped compared to the EU average.

With regard to finding the appropriatemigrants to fill empty jobs, there aresubstantial mismatches dating back topost-communist economic transforma-tions of these countries, which broughtabout a decline in the oversized publicsector. Further structural changes innew EU Member States and EU acces-sion countries may mean continuinglabor market problems. Low-skilledworkers will lose their jobs in the agricultural sector, while parts of the

expanding service sector will probablyhave to cope with skills shortages.These problems will become evenmore acute if brain drain within theEU 25 and to traditional countries ofimmigration becomes a quantitativelysignificant phenomenon.

In the years to come, trends towardthe service society and changing production processes imply a qualita-tive change in labor demand (i.e.,changing demand for particular occu-pations or skills). If the labor supplyfails to keep pace with these changes,there are likely to be serious skillsshortages in EU markets. This type ofqualitative mismatch of labor demandand supply could in turn become aserious problem for economic growththroughout Europe.

However, an analysis by the OECDimplies that labor supply is expectedto adjust to increasing demand for awell-educated labor force (Table 14).For their part, students seem to beanticipating the impending structuralchange, resulting in a higher share ofwhite-collar jobs in total employment(Table 15). Compared to currentemployment patterns, the figures presented in Table 14 imply that amuch higher share of the EU popula-tion will occupy high-skilled jobs thanis the case today. However, it remainsunclear whether or not the growingnumber of EU residents participatingin tertiary education and aspiring towhite-collar jobs will be enough tocompensate for the expected increasein demand for highly qualified labor.


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Relatively robust demographic projec-tions clearly indicate a decline inEurope’s working-age population forthe foreseeable future (Figure 4).There are, however, significant obsta-cles to deriving accurate projections tohelp with the middle- and long-termplanning of policies to meet labor supplyrequirements. This is partly linked toproblems with predicting phenomenathat are influenced by complex, oftenvolatile economic factors, and whichmay also be significantly affected byunforeseeable policy developments.Analysts attempting to make accurateprojections are confronted with furtherproblems when attempting to make

predictions about specific occupationsand skills requirements. In any case,while demographic projections give aclear picture for the next 40 years, pro-jections of emerging skills gaps cannotrealistically cover more than a 15-yeartimeframe. More accurate projections,or ones broken down into more specificcategories, may not be possible evenwithin that 15-year span.

The migrants most likely to help meetshortages of labor and skills, and withthe best chances to integrate, are prob-ably those most able to adapt tochanging conditions, in view of theirqualifications, experience, and personal

Table 15: 15-year-olds' occupational expectations by age 30,

by gender; Percentage of 15-year-olds expecting to have a

white- or blue-collar occupation, by gender (2000)

Total Male FemaleWhite/blue w w b b w w b b w w b bHigh/low high Low High low High low high low high low High lowAustria 55.3 17.2 11.7 15.8 56.3 8.6 21.9 13.3 54.8 25.1 2.2 17.9Belgium 65.6 14.2 15.4 4.9 58.5 7.6 27.9 6.0 73.1 21.3 1.8 3.7Czech Republic 44.5 22.0 16.2 17.3 41.1 11.9 28.3 18.7 47.6 31.1 5.3 16.0Denmark 58.5 17.5 19.6 4.3 50.5 10.9 34.1 4.5 67.7 25.1 2.9 4.2Finland 60.4 15.8 12.2 11.5 55.5 9.1 21.4 14.0 65.0 22.0 3.7 9.2France 48.9 14.7 9.9 26.5 44.1 8.5 18.7 28.7 53.4 20.5 1.7 24.4Germany 48.8 20.9 17.2 13.2 44.7 13.3 30.1 11.9 53.1 28.0 4.6 14.3Greece 72.3 11.7 9.4 6.6 66.0 8.6 17.9 7.6 78.5 14.6 1.3 5.6Hungary 52.7 19.0 16.6 11.7 50.3 9.5 28.0 12.2 55.3 28.5 5.1 11.1Ireland 64.1 12.2 11.7 12.1 57.5 7.2 22.6 12.7 70.3 16.9 1.3 11.5Italy 69.1 15.2 5.8 9.9 66.6 11.9 10.6 10.9 71.6 18.7 0.9 8.8Luxembourg 59.6 14.3 8.7 17.4 55.7 11.3 15.4 17.6 63.0 16.9 2.8 17.2Poland 68.8 15.4 14.2 1.7 63.3 9.4 24.4 2.9 74.5 21.7 3.5 0.4Portugal 76.5 9.5 5.1 9.0 72.7 7.0 9.8 10.5 79.8 11.7 0.8 7.7Spain 66.6 12.2 8.2 13.1 61.2 7.7 16.1 15.0 71.7 16.6 0.7 11.0Sweden 63.2 10.3 8.1 18.5 62.0 5.8 13.6 18.6 64.5 14.8 2.4 18.3UK 57.1 16.3 7.6 19.0 51.0 14.0 14.5 20.5 63.0 18.6 0.8 17.6

Source: OECD, 2003b, p. 137.

150

abilities. Selection mechanisms mustbe incorporated into future migrationand admission policies in order toassess both the qualifications andadaptability of potential immigrants.

At the same time, given the politicalsensitivity of immigration, it is likelythat governments will find it difficultto justify introducing programs in theabsence of already existing acute laborshortages. Even if projections mighthighlight quantitative and qualitativeshortages with a sufficient degree ofcertainty, governments may requiremore tangible “proof” in order to con-vince their electorates of the need foradditional foreign labor. This impliesthat while projections may provide abasis for policy planning in the areas ofeducation, labor market, welfare, orsocial reforms, because of the specialpolitical sensitivity of immigration, itis likely that migration policy willremain subject to more short-term, adhoc planning. In this context, the EUis better positioned to develop medium-and long-term migration policies ableto cope with Europe’s looming demo-graphic and economic challenges thanto make short-term adjustments.

Conclusions and

Recommendations

Both demographic and economictrends point to Europe’s future need torecruit increasing numbers of third-country nationals as a main way ofmeeting its rising demand for low-,medium-, and high-skilled labor. Inthis context, all of the EEA states will

either remain or become countries ofimmigration.

The main challenge for Europeanpolicymakers in the decades aheadwill be to position their countries torecruit migrants matching their laborneeds, while still sustaining economicgrowth and supporting their publicpension systems. In the medium andlong term, potential migrants willneed to be recruited from regions ofthe world beyond Europe. At thatpoint, Europe will have to competewith the world’s other traditionalcountries of immigration for qualifiedmigrants to fill labor gaps.

Given those goals, European policymak-ers have several options to maximizethe opportunities migration presents,specifically, to meet labor demand:

� Develop common European medium- and long-term migrationpolicies. This approach can play acrucial role in tackling shortagesof labor and skills, provided thequalifications of immigrants areappropriate. A common approachwill be an advantage as all EUMember States will face competi-tion from traditional countries ofimmigration and emerging immi-gration countries such as Russia.

� Refine selection mechanisms.Future migration and admissionpolicies must be modified in orderto better assess both the qualifica-tions and adaptability of potentialimmigrants. This will pay dividendsas the pace of socio-economic



integration largely depends uponqualifications of migrants matchinglabor market needs in receivingcountries.

� Incorporate gender analysis intopolicies. With several EU statesreporting wide gaps in theemployment rates of men andwomen, labor market (and family)policies that address the causesand consequences of such differ-ences can contribute to higherlabor force participation rates ofnative and foreign-born women.

� Address brain drain. The prospectof investing in an educated popula-tion, only to watch them emigrate,has policymakers in many parts ofthe world struggling to eitherretain their nationals or exploitbenefits such as remittances.Europe’s common policy shouldhelp develop skills in other parts of the world before startingselective recruitment.

� Expand public education onlabor/immigration. Policymakers’planning will come to naught ifpolicies are not politically viable.Governments need improvedcommunication with their elec-torates to convince them that thefacts and data support the needfor additional foreign labor.

In the end, the interaction of Europe’slabor markets and migration flows canhave positive outcomes for both nativesand the foreign born; in particular, ifmore emphasis is given to admission

and integration policies. But the wayforward requires thoughtful planningbased not only on the available data,but also on public perceptions andcareful weighing of political costs.


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Is Immigration an Enemy

of the Welfare State?

Between Human Rights and

Realpolitik in European

Immigration Policies

Grete Brochmann and

Jon Erik Dölvik

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The welfare state is a central element in explaining theapproach to immigration

policies in Western Europe. Generouswelfare models that embrace all legalinhabitants can be undermined byexcessive burdens. This fact requiresthat some limits be set on the numbersand characteristics of potential newmembers from outside the state. Inextensive welfare states that espousethe principle of equal treatment of allresidents, immigration challenges thepopulation’s generosity. If large numbersof newcomers are unable to supportthemselves, it may, in the longer term,affect the sustainability of the welfaresystem itself. Crucial here is how largea share of those who come is absorbedinto gainful employment. Thus, con-trolling inflow into the country — thefirst gateway to the territory and, byextension, access to welfare benefits —has been seen as a prerequisite for governing a welfare state.

Most thinking in Western Europesince the 1970s has been based on theassumption that immigrants representa burden on public budgets: They areconsumers of welfare. The prevailingimmigration policies have turned thisassumption into a fact. Restrictions onlabor immigration have channeledmost immigrants through the humani-tarian gate, thus generating burdens onthe welfare system — at least in theshort run.

The fairly recent awareness that anaging society calls for a more liberallabor immigration policy has turnedthe conventional wisdom about

welfare on its head. It is now widelybelieved that supplies of foreign labor are necessary to maintaineconomic growth and the level of welfare in a society. This newapproach emphasizes the role of immigrants as producers of welfare.

Exploring this new paradigm firstrequires an in-depth look at howimmigration may affect the waysEuropean welfare states and labormarkets are run, as well as how variations in such regimes may influence the patterns and volume of migratory flows. This chapter will frame the central dilemmas and political mechanisms facingmodern welfare states, mapping outtheir room to maneuver under theoverlapping pressures of labor needs,international humanitarian responsi-bilities, and welfare budget constraints. Using the enlargement of the European Union (EU) andEuropean Economic Area (EEA) asexamples, the chapter will then illuminate how changes in bordercontrol and free movement of laborwithin the EU/EEA may influencenational strategies for reform of thewelfare state/labor market nexus.Finally, the prospect that increasedlabor immigration from the newEU/EEA states might affect politicalapproaches to admission of third-country immigrants will be addressed,followed by conclusions and recom-mendations for policymakers. Ratherthan conducting a detailed empiricalanalysis, the aim here is to provide abasic analysis of the mechanisms atwork and their principle effects.


Is Immigration an Enemy of the Welfare State? 157

Framing the Issues

Whether increasing immigration represents a threat or a cure for Europe’sailing welfare states depends on theextent to which immigrants becomeconsumers of welfare or net contributors.Their mix of consumption and contribution shifts over their lifespan,and varies between different categoriesof immigrants, just as it does for thenative born. Regardless of the nationalbackgrounds of the population, twoissues are critical for the viability of thewelfare state. First, people must bechanneled into gainful employment.Second, states must counteract thedemographic trend towards an evermore unfavorable ratio of workers toretirees and others not in the labor force.

In this context, the issue of immigra-tion is particularly important, repre-senting both an opportunity for swiftincreases in the labor force (withoutthe costs of education, etc., associatedwith the native born) and a risk ofimmediate growth in the number ofwelfare recipients. As such, immigrationis a high-stakes game that heightens theinherent challenges of welfare state/labor market reform in most EU countries. Because various kinds ofimmigration (e.g., asylum seekers versus labor migrants) are likely toweigh differently on the sides of thecost-versus-revenue budgetary equation,new links and interdependencies arebeing created between internal labor-market-cum-welfare-state policies andexternal immigration policies. This ismagnified by migrants’ choices of particular destination countries,

choices that are influenced by a coun-try’s specific mix of social provisions,civic obligations, and employmentopportunities. This implies that agiven country’s ability to attract ordeter specific groups of immigrantsdepends not only on its domestic welfare and labor-market policies, butalso on those of neighboring countries.

The addition of ten new states to theEU on May 1, 2004, opened the possi-bility of free movement of labor, services,capital, and goods within that zone,spotlighting potentially sensitive questions about the relationshipsamong individual states’ and the EU’spolicies to accommodate migrationfrom both inside and outside theEU/EEA area. Although cross-borderlabor mobility in the EU has remainedlow throughout previous phases ofenlargement, the phased abolition oflabor-market frontiers between thepoor and rich sides of the former IronCurtain is making Europe into a historically unprecedented laboratoryfor “globalization on one continent.”Given their gaps in income and welfarebenefits, geographical closeness, existingmigration “bridges,” and the proximityof cultures and language, the reunifica-tion of European labor and productmarkets has opened new and unpre-dictable trajectories for migration oflabor, services, and companies. Theprospect of extending the EU to coun-tries such as Croatia, Romania, andBulgaria — let alone Turkey — willfurther accentuate this unpredictability.

The existing welfare state/labor market regimes in Western Europe

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are precariously balanced due to prob-lems of competitiveness, budgetarydeficits, unemployment, and socialexclusion. In that context, even limitedflows of companies and labor may havea significant impact on the viabilityand scope for renewal of Europe’s post-war welfare states and class compromises.The first instance of such an impactmay appear when such flows transformthe links among migration, welfare,and labor policies into a burning issue in the development of nationaladjustment/reform strategies. The nextimpact may be manifested in the riskthat competition among individualstates’ welfare state/labor marketregimes could produce unintendedaggregate effects on a European scale.Both scenarios suggest a need forimproved transnational coordinationacross these policy fields. The EUCommunication on Immigration, Integration, and Employment (COM2003) is a first and promising sign thata new approach may be in the makingwhen it comes to more comprehensiveapproaches and coordination.

So far, European research in this realm has been marked by a lack ofexchanges among scholars studyingmigration, labor relations, and welfare-state policies. European politicaldebates in recent years increasinglyhave focused on the need for reformsto the labor market/welfare state nexusin order to get more people into gainfulemployment and reduce the numbersliving on public benefits. These havebeen central issues in the EU employ-ment strategy and the high-profileDutch and Danish reforms in the

1990s, emphasizing training, activelabor-market schemes, in-work benefits,and elimination of easy access to wel-fare as key elements of raising labormarket participation. However, thelinks between such domestic policyreforms and external policies formigration have been subject to littlesystematic deliberation.

An important impetus for the recentshift towards more restrictive immigra-tion policies in Denmark, the UK, andthe Netherlands, among other coun-tries, stems from the public’s panicover revelations of the extent to whichmany communities, particularly ofrefugees, are unemployed and depend-ent on social welfare. This situation, incombination with the prospect ofincreased migration from the newMember States driven by a search forwork and possibly welfare benefits,calls for more comprehensiveapproaches to the study of social integration. The most productive focus would be on the interplay amongpolicy developments in the fields ofmigration, labor market, and welfarestate reform.

Such approaches will also have to takeinto account the two-level interplaybetween policy developments at thenational and European levels. This isespecially so given the contingent relationship between the eliminationof internal EU/EEA frontiers and thecontrol of external borders with thirdcountries. The scope for national policyreform thus becomes increasinglydependent on the concurrent choicesof fellow countries.



The National Setting

Today, many unemployment-riddenWestern European welfare states findthemselves in a paradoxical situation,with some sectors in need of labor thatis hard to find at home, and sometimeseven internationally. While this ispartly due to structural constraints, itis also due to competition for laboramong Western countries. Authoritiesare under pressure from trade andindustry to liberalize immigration poli-cies. At the same time, asylum seekersare constantly arriving, often to bejoined by family members. Althoughthe labor market is, in principle, irrele-vant when processing asylum applica-tions, it is nevertheless crucial to theeconomic integration of those asylumseekers and refugees who are acceptedfor long-term residence.

In this context, authorities are con-fronted with a mismatch betweenimmigrant supply and demand. Thosewho actually come are often not theones needed: Either they have thewrong qualifications, or — if theyshould match — retaining themdepends on approval of their asylumapplication. A third category — unreg-istered or unauthorized migrants —may be working illegally, thus neithercontributing to nor being protected bythe welfare state. If they are detected,they should in principle be sent out ofthe country (unless they are offered anamnesty — a policy only applied insome countries). Thus, receiving coun-tries do not get the labor they want,while many of those who actually comecannot be incorporated productively

for various reasons. This illustrates howtoday’s welfare states are torn betweenhumanitarian responsibilities and economic imperatives — the contra-dictory situation European welfarestates must act upon in the near future.The following are some factors thatmust be taken into consideration:

The interplay between admission andintegration. Social-welfare approachesand immigration flows are closelyrelated, yet it is not always clear howtheir relationship operates in practice.Changes in general welfare policiesmay affect actual flows of migrants, interms of both control policies andintegration measures. On the otherhand, immigration policy and immi-gration flows may influence the welfare policies of receiving countries.It appears that the basic approach to welfare — i.e., the particular welfare-state regime formed historicallythrough institution-building — doessignificantly affect the range of optionsavailable for policymakers in differentcountries. The path dependencies ofhistorically formed welfare policieslimit the scope of structurally possibleand politically legitimate action ineach context. This is true to a certainextent, yet even path dependenciesencounter dead ends when externalpressures reach a certain strength, orinternal contradictions completelydrain the system.

Immigration policy is generally dividedinto two main spheres: an externalsphere of admission (who is given theopportunity to enter the country), and an internal sphere of rights

160

and possibly integration (what termsentrants are offered).

Politically and legally, these spheresare usually treated separately.Regulation of admission to a country is closely connected with the nation-state’s historical right to control its territory. Civil, social, and politicalrights for aliens who settle in a countryare closely linked to the country’slong-term general development as arechtsstaat — a state ruled by law.Modern welfare states have further-more developed policies to promoteintegration — a genuine incorporationof aliens into the community beyondthe granting of rights pure and simple.

Developments in the wake of the so-called “new immigration” (i.e., fromcountries outside the Organisation for Economic Cooperation andDevelopment (OECD) from the end ofthe 1960s onwards) brought to light anextensive and complicated interplaybetween the two main spheres ofimmigration policy. The politicalspace between the external and internal spheres has developed into anarena for unforeseen consequencesthat governments throughout WesternEurope have had problems facing.Although the external and internalspheres are still generally dealt withseparately in legislation, and theirinterfaces are difficult to regulate, it may be useful to examine the mechanisms operating between them.

The basic structure of immigrationpolicymaking. At the start of the1970s, the issue of integration of

immigrants received growing attentionin Western Europe. Immigrants whocould not be encouraged to return totheir home country, and who could be expected to wish to remain in thereceiving country, had to be incorpo-rated into the community. The “immi-gration stop” introduced in manyreceiving countries early in the 1970swas in the form of a dual strategy:Authorities would apply strict regulations to prevent or limit newimmigration, and concurrently takesteps to improve the adjustment ofimmigrants who had come to stay.This dual strategy was first announcedin France, but soon set the tone forother Western European countries.The justification for the dual strategywas the presumed causal connectionbetween external control and condi-tions for integration: A successfulintegration policy was said to dependon strict entry control. Conversely,free immigration was viewed as athreat to peaceful coexistence amonggroups of the population.

This dual strategy reflects bothrealpolitik and rhetoric. Free immigra-tion may, under certain conditions,threaten the community by undermin-ing central-government regulation ofthe labor and housing markets andimpeding social planning in general.In the longer term, free immigrationmay alter the premises underlying thetype of welfare state built up inWestern Europe since World War II;more permanent segregation of thepopulation along ethnic lines maythreaten social and political stabilityin the community.



The dual strategy’s rhetorical elementrefers to the “moral compromise”inherent in it: Declarations of intentto stimulate integration of establishedimmigrants may function as a legitimization of stricter immigrationpolicy. Over time, a growing number ofincreasingly complex connections havebecome clear in the wake of changedmigration patterns, and not least as aresult of European integration.

Rights and restrictions. Economic andsocial rights are mainstays of modernwelfare states and play an importantrole in the successful realization of theideals of the rechtsstaat for all members

of such states. Concurrently, the welfarestate’s need to control its geographicalboundaries increases in step with newrights given to newcomers. It is herethat the basic tension exists betweenentry control and conditions for immi-grants’ lives in welfare states. Themodern rechtsstaat is required by inter-national agreements to give lawfullyestablished immigrants the same treat-ment as its own citizens in terms ofmost civil and social rights. Two furtherfactors play a part and set premises forpolicy development: first, labor marketdynamics, and second, public educationof the population when it comes toimmigration and multicultural societies.

CompetitionEmployment Attitude

molding

Social integration(welfare state)

INFLUX

RightsDuties/Contributions

The basic structure of immigration policy

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Over and above this, many welfarestates have formulated an integrationpolicy addressed to lawfully establishedimmigrants, designed to promote anintegration process in the communityand to improve immigrants’ opportuni-ties to realize their rights. This policygenerally covers an array of areas witha bearing on immigrants’ situation in areceiving country, such as labor marketschemes, social care and general welfare,education, language training, supportfor NGOs, and so on.

Efforts to incorporate newcomers intothe economy and the constitutionalstate have become a consequence of the welfare-state model. Good welfarestates do not tolerate significant elements of persons or groups who failto make the grade, disturb the regulatedworld of work, or burden social budgets.If the political framework of the welfarestate is to be maintained, new inhabi-tants must be made a part of it throughinclusion in work and society. Oncenew immigrants are lawfully present inthe country, they should be integratedfor the good of themselves and thecommunity. Hence, important societalconsiderations underlie the country’spolicy of integration of new members,in addition to humanistic principles inthe form of rights and norms.

Immigration policy since the 1970s hasoperated in a somewhat contradictoryway; immigrants are not desired at theoutset, but if they manage to enteranyway, they must somehow be incor-porated. The responsibilities of thestate go further still — it must lay thebasis for a positive attitude in the

general population in order for theintegration project to succeed. It must,in other words, win support for thispolicy, through “public education.”

At the same time, a country’s direct orindirect integration policy may bear onthe number and type of immigrants whocome. A duality or dilemma is inherentin a state’s granting of rights and welfarebenefits to newcomers. While thesegoods represent a desirable and neces-sary aspect of rechtsstaat principles inmodern welfare states, in many contextsthey are also a premise for the success ofthe integration policy. In addition, generous integration conditions mayconstitute a pull factor for potentialimmigrants. Making integration difficult is counter-productive to politi-cal stability and immigrants’ functionalityin society in the long term, whileappearing necessary in the short term to avoid a “magnet effect.”

In this context, differences in condi-tions between countries have acquiredincreasing significance. Within a regionsuch as the EU, where immigration policy is in general restrictive, marginaldifferences in the package of rights/ben-efits and duties/contributions may havemajor effects on the influx of immigrants.Welfare-state regimes based on univer-salism and taxation are more attractiveand vulnerable in this regard than moreinsurance-based regimes that offer benefits according to previous input. In recent years this duality — i.e., the presumed or de facto interplay of controland rights — has heavily affected policydevelopment in the sphere of immigra-tion throughout Western Europe.



Family reunification is an example ofa policy area where varying degrees ofgenerosity can be a means for countriesto make themselves comparativelymore or less attractive to certain immi-grants. However, the calculationsinvolved in liberalizing or restrictingfamily-reunification rules pose a problem for Western Europe’s policy-makers. On the one hand, someWestern European authorities havecharacterized family reunification as anincreasingly important channel forfraudulent migration, which wouldargue for more restrictiveness. On theother hand, in terms of realpolitik (i.e.,control), established immigrants can-not be expected to adjust to societyeasily if family members are denied res-idence. Furthermore, in terms ofhumanitarianism (i.e., rights), the uni-versal human need to live with one’sfamily is protected by internationalconventions.

The September 22, 2003, approval of the EU Directive on FamilyReunification for Third CountryNationals (Council Directive2003/86/EC) does only a partial job ofsmoothing out variations in family-reunification policy, as it only prescribesminimum standards. While preventinga “race to the bottom” by states tryingto deter immigration by tighteningrestrictions, the directive may encouragethe more generous states in theEU/EEA to sink towards the median/minimum standard. This may, never-theless, increase uniformity of family-reunification rules in the longer run,and thereby also reduce the “pulleffect” of this policy area.

Visa policy for visitors has similar features: The opportunity to receivevisits from close family members orfriends can be seen as an importantmeasure of life quality and hence abilityto adjust, although the interplay isprobably weaker here than in the case of family reunification. However,the potential for defection (visa over-staying) is regarded as high in manycases, prompting restrictive practices.The EU has already established a common policy in this area, restrictingnational scope for discretion. Extensiveimmigration to the EU area fromcountries assigned to the “defection-risk category” makes for a problematicsituation: The fact that significant sections of the population are affectedby curbs on opportunities to receivevisitors gives food for thought. Basedon this logic, the potential for furtherimmigration rises concurrently in proportion to increased immigration,in a self-reinforcing manner.

Amnesties or regularization extendedto people not lawfully resident in acountry have in some cases involvedseveral hundred thousand people at atime. These amnesties — which in many ways are a governmentaladmission of defeat in relation to frontiercontrols and labor-market regulations— have their own rationale. Authoritieshave tried to “legalize” the sizeableclandestine labor market in a bid to get an overview of the situation, bringorder to working conditions, andimprove immigrants’ opportunities forintegration and inclusion in welfare-state arrangements, generally speaking.However, the repeated amnesties are

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an unequivocal message to potentialnew immigrants that anyone who succeeds in entering the country willeventually have a good chance ofbeing allowed to stay.

Amnesties have been a national policy in the countries in question.However, EU integration means thatthe amnesties have indirect relevanceto other member countries, to theextent that the volume of immigrationincreases to the EU as a region, andthat the pull effect towards potentialunauthorized migrants is maintained.

An important lesson to be learnedfrom the immigrant amnesties inSouthern Europe is that control ofirregular immigration is hard toachieve without addressing structuralaspects of the labor market. Alongsideentry control and international policecooperation, facilitating access to regular employment and imposingfines on employers and their interme-diaries are relevant aspects of a policyfor overcoming illegal immigration.

The increase in illegal immigration isone of the unforeseen consequences ofthe “immigration stop” in the 1970s.The more difficult it is to enterWestern Europe legally, the greater thenumber of people who attempt to doso illegally. In addition, the greater therisk associated with illegal immigration,the larger the profits reaped by thoseacting as intermediaries.

While Western European countrieshave pursued a restrictive policy onlabor migration since the 1970s,

alongside high labor costs and extensivelabor rights, the de facto demand forcheap, poorly qualified labor has actedas a pull factor for immigrants.

Irregular immigration usually bringsuncertainty and turbulence to thelabor market, which in turn may makeit more difficult for lawfully establishedimmigrants to obtain registeredemployment and be recognized as fullcitizens. This again has specific conse-quences for advanced welfare states,where an orderly labor regime is one of the basic preconditions for the oper-ation and maintenance of the system.

Incorporating new members of societyinto the regular labor market relievespublic welfare budgets and can stimulateeconomic growth. For immigrants aswell as other citizens, the labor marketcan also act as a springboard for individual social integration.Conversely, unemployment regularlyleads to marginalization and strains onpublic budgets. These are familiarmechanisms to the population in gen-eral, but their effect is probably evengreater for immigrants, many of whomhave developed fewer alternativeresources for survival in the new society.

The question of integration in connec-tion with unauthorized immigrants hasboth formal and substantive aspects.The absence of rights in the form ofvarious kinds of social support, servicefacilities, and other welfare goods con-strains these immigrants’ integration inthe receiving country. On the otherhand, irregular immigrants may defacto be relatively well integrated into



their particular niche of society byvirtue of employment and residentialsetting. In many cases, they may evenbe better integrated than refugees andasylum seekers, who often remain inreception centers for long periods oftime without employment.

Hence there is a complicated interplayamong entry control, labor-marketstructure, potential social rights,demand for foreign labor, and integra-tion opportunities. In the nationalcontext, labor market dynamics —reflected in the type of demand, wagestructures, extent of unemployment,and size of the illegal market — willaffect the scope and composition ofimmigration, and, conversely, actualimmigration will affect the labor market. Consequently, entry controland internal control will (directly andindirectly) affect labor-market dynamics,at the same time that the regulationsand structure of the labor market areimportant premises for effective control and integration. On the otherhand, restrictions on lawful entry haveoften led to illegal immigration.Moreover, restrictive policies oftencause people who would otherwisehave returned home to choose to stay,i.e., an integration problem may ariseas an indirect consequence of a restric-tive control policy. There is thus acomplex relationship between regimesof employment regulation and the pattern of immigrant integration inthe labor market. In regimes with strictemployment protection, high laborcosts, and compressed wage structures,immigrants (with assumed low produc-tivity) tend to face high entry barriers

and consequently often end up ininformal segments of the labor market.In liberalized labor markets of theAnglo-American kind, in contrast,entry into legal or illegal work is ofteneasier but many immigrants end up inunstable, low-paid jobs and are overrepresented among the growingunderclass of the working poor.

Overarching this whole complex picture is the issue of “public educa-tion”: the population’s interpretationof the situation and the rules, thepolitical support and steps taken, andthe population’s actual receptivenessto newcomers who wish to be integrated.

This issue has become increasinglysalient and disturbing in WesternEurope. Real problems and phantomsare mixed together among the public,and translated into broad generaliza-tions and stereotyping. This affects foreign-looking or sounding people at random, and feeds policymaking inways that are hard to fully grasp.

As long as the major concern of policymakers was how to keep peopleout — as was the case after the stop-policies of the 1970s — popularsupport for restrictions was necessaryand tolerable, as long as it did not takeviolent or aggressive forms. Politicians,on the other hand, were pushed in aneven more restrictive direction byincreasingly negative public opinion,particularly after the fall of the IronCurtain, and the alleged prospects formass immigration from Eastern Europe.Yet, when attracting foreign labor nowbecomes an issue alongside the urge to

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keep unwanted immigrants out, policymakers are enmeshed in commu-nication problems.

Today, the fact that selective frontiercontrols are in place that regulate categories of immigrants renders thisdual message unclear for most people.This is compounded by the fact that tomost people, the specific category towhich an immigrant belongs is notimmediately obvious. Popular interpre-tations are, furthermore, sensitive toshifts in the labor market and unem-ployment in particular, fueling percep-tions of rising competition for jobs andgrowing immigrant welfare dependency.As employment growth is consideredboth a result and precondition for successful integration of immigrants,politicians face an uphill battle to con-vince the public that long-term gainsfrom immigration justify the short-term costs, whether real or perceived.

In addition, where integration is con-cerned, public opinion can play a rolethat is full of contradictions. Publicopinion may become intolerant andxenophobic not only when welfareconditions are so (relatively) generousthat they act as a pull factor, but alsowhen discrimination and exclusion,depending on welfare provisions, createlarge marginal groups in society.

Reforming

the welfare state

These very basic dilemmas have con-fronted European welfare states to different degrees, depending on societal

structures, institutional arrangements,and the history of immigration interms of magnitude and duration. Over the last 30 years, and increasinglysince the beginning of the 1990s, mostof these states have tried various waysof curtailing immigration. Severalcountries (e.g., Germany, the UK,France, the Netherlands, and those ofScandinavia) have tried in recentyears to compensate for their loss ofcontrol over access and residence intheir territories by diversifying immi-gration regulations, making them morespecific in terms of defining series ofcategories entitled to very different setsof rights (and subject to different poli-cies). These distinctions of categoriesof migrants have come along withattempts to reduce access to nationalterritory, in tandem with fewer orshrinking entitlements and permits. Inaddition, tests of newcomers’ economicmeans have become more common,hand in hand with measures thatreduce assistance, leaving many immi-grants with only basic provisions.

These more restrictive policies takemany forms. Some countries deny asylum seekers a work permit whiletheir applications are being processed.In others, financial support has beenreduced and is increasingly deliveredas benefits in kind; in still others,reception facility standards have beensimplified and internment has beenintroduced as a policy instrument. InAustria, for example, family reunifica-tion is part of the general quota system;applications for reuniting families afterthe completion of the annual quotaare not taken into consideration.



The Scandinavian countries’ experi-ences with welfare and asylum seekersare particularly illuminating. Swedishauthorities found their country’s gener-ous image abroad to be such a problemthat in the beginning of the 1990s, theyfelt compelled to actively — and possi-bly more forcefully than others —demonstrate the will and power to limitthe number of asylum seekers. The burden on the already drained welfaresystem was considered too heavy.Sweden, despite having implemented amore restrictive policy, today still repre-sents one of the most generous welfarestates in relation to asylum seekers.

For its part, Denmark has been in theforefront of far-reaching reforms, makingchanges both to welfare for immigrantsand to its Foreign Law. Denmark wasactually the Scandinavian countrywith the most generous welfare systembefore the reform process began in the1990s. Eligibility requirements weremuch weaker than in Sweden andNorway. The level of support was alsosomewhat higher, creating disincentivesfor marginal groups to work.

In all three countries, income transfersthrough the public-support systemhave disproportionately gone to immi-grant groups. The fact that newcomersto the labor market have earned weakrights in insurance systems (i.e., havehad meager possibilities to pay the premiums, and therefore do not qualifyfor this support) has put pressure onnoncontributary provisions such associal assistance (which most oftenmeans less money and less security).This has become a major burden on

welfare budgets in all threeScandinavian countries, and it is alsoused as an indicator of the failure ofintegration policy. In Denmark, beforethe reforms in 2002, 35 percent of the public social assistance went tonon-Western immigrants, both firstand second generation, who constituteonly 5 percent of the population. The equivalent figures for Sweden are50 percent to 11 percent of the popu-lation, and in Norway the equivalentfigures are 34 percent to 4.5 percent.

In response to this growing dependencyon transfers, most Western Europeancountries in the 1990s strongly empha-sized compulsory participation inemployment-activation schemes, training, and workfare programs. InDenmark, such measures were success-ful in reducing general unemploymentin the 1990s. In 2002, the Danish government implemented a number of new, targeted reforms aimed at 1) reducing the number of foreignersarriving in Denmark; 2) ensuring thatnewcomers are to the largest extentpossible self-sufficient, rather than burdening the welfare system; and 3) curtailing arranged marriages andforced marriages partly blamed forfacilitating immigration fraud. It is too early to evaluate possible concreteeffects of these reforms.

The most striking adjustments madeunder the Danish reforms includederadicating the category de factorefugee, i.e., only giving protection to refugees under the 1951 GenevaConvention relating to the Status of Refugees. In addition, to be able to

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marry a foreigner, both partners nowneed to be older than 24, and theircombined attachment to Denmarkneeds to be stronger than to theircountry of origin. This is estimated bythe authorities according to mixed criteria. The reforms also addedrequirements for the applicants’ economic capacity to support them-selves with a decent standard of housing, as well as a bank guarantee ofDkr 50,000 to cover any sort of publicassistance needed for the foreignspouse. Permanent residency will onlybe given after seven years (a changefrom the previous three-year require-ment), conditioned upon knowledge of Danish and a clean police record.Social assistance will be differently distributed, and full rights will not begiven before seven years of residency.

Sweden and Norway have so far notfollowed Denmark in these specificreforms, although the general tendencyhas been more restrictive even there.Norway is extensively revising itsForeign Law, with further restrictionslikely to appear. The purpose of thesetightening measures is clearly to discourage the arrival of asylum seekers and family members of established immigrants.

In welfare states there are, however,limits to the rationality of cuts. Anintrinsic part of the welfare system isalso control and supervision. The verysame welfare state that allocates rightsto citizens and residents (and to a cer-tain degree also to immigrants withoutpermanent residency) can also controland restrict the movement and actions

of newcomers. Providing social rightsis also a way of managing marginalgroups and monitoring those who areresiding in the nation’s territory temporarily or more permanently.States that refrain from providing orcut back material support to immigrantpopulations simultaneously relinquishmany of the government’s chances tokeep tabs on those same immigrants.In Germany, an amendment aimed atending support for asylum seekers wasturned down based on such reasoning.The support was subsequently reduced,instead. In other places, material support is used to direct asylum seekersto specific geographical areas due tolabor needs or housing considerations.In Italy, in contrast, where public welfare is very limited and asylumseekers are not allowed to work, thereis a clear likelihood of such immigrantsfinding illegal employment.

Another limit pertains to the questionof integration, as discussed earlier: Inmany cases, these new welfare cuts andrestrictions create obstacles to the veryintegration that these societies mayseek in the long term. Cuts in language training, daycare for children,social assistance, and so on, are clearlynot conducive to inclusion in society.

The process of restricting access towelfare benefits has accelerated rapidlyin the last five years, and have beentrying to accommodate the very mixedand contradictory concerns of mostreceiving countries in Western Europe.On the one hand are demands for cer-tain kinds of labor; on the other areefforts to reduce what are perceived as



excessive flows of asylum seekers.These reform processes were wellunder way when the question arose of the EU’s eastward expansion.

Interplay of national and

EU levels

Immigration policy in the EU (alongwith Norway and Iceland, two coun-tries of the “Schengen” treaty area ofeased cross-border movement for sig-natories’ nationals) is under pressureon two fronts. On the one hand, thereis rising pressure from the nationalcontrol complexes — the places whereentry control, integration efforts, labormarket conditions, and public opinioncombine to set the premises for whatkind of policy can feasibly be pursued.On the other hand, EU quarters arepushing for stronger coordination andsupranational control. The governanceof immigration policies in the EU thus entails a twofold coordinationchallenge, reflecting on one side thegrowing horizontal interdependence ofnational immigration policies, and onthe other, the vertical interactionbetween national and EU-level policies.

The complicated dynamic betweenintegration and control sets the frame-work for nation-states’ planning andpolicy development. At the same time,the nation-states are confronted byforces outside this dynamic, and haveto take into account the policies of theother Member States as well as commonEuropean commitments. The interna-tional context sets the outer parame-ters for political action, boundaries

that increasingly constrain nationalpolicy formation. Since the respectivenation-states’ actions have conse-quences for other states’ maneuveringroom, and for any common inter/supranational political development,immigration policies are becomingincreasingly Europeanized.

The establishment of the singleEuropean market and the eventual abolition of border controls within theSchengen area imply that market forces,to a larger degree than before, willdetermine migration flows across theEU region. By allowing free movementof persons and labor in the EU/EEA, the nation states have in practice relinquished control over intra-EU/EEAmigration flows. This represents a radical break with the thinking andpractice that have dominated the migration sphere in recent times, i.e.,the sovereignty of the state in relationto its territory and population.

So far, mobility within the EU has beenlimited. With the extension eastward,this may change — at least in the shortrun, before the new Member Stateshave closed part of their earnings gap in relation to the existing members.The opening of new avenues for immi-gration from the new Member Statesmay stimulate contradictory dynamicsof regime competition among the oldMember States, be they to attract,divert, or control labor flows from theextended EU area. For single MemberStates, the enhanced potential for laborimmigration from other EU states may,in turn, trigger a tightening of policiestowards third-country immigration.

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For the EU as a whole, the effect ofsuch national adjustments may entail atwofold set of unintended consequences.First, there may be an undesired reduc-tion in external immigration flows at atime when the aging and shrinking ofthe EU labor force would suggest theopposite. Second, a competitivedynamic of poaching and reshuffling of labor among the Member Statesmay take place. Accentuating thelinks between internal and externalcontrol policies, such dynamics willstrengthen the case for coordination at the European level. A possible thirdconsequence may be that attempts toaccommodate (short-term) inwardlabor migration become associatedwith the retrenchment of nationalwelfare-state schemes, in effect impeding the long-term integration of third-country immigrants.

Enlargement —

Catalyst forWelfare

and Labor Reform?

The transformation of the EU frombasically a club of rich, advanced wel-fare states to an arena for “globalizationon one continent” implies a significantshift in the external conditions fornational labor-market and welfare-statepolicies. Never before has there beensuch a simultaneous opening of themarkets for capital, goods, services, andlabor among highly developed industri-alized countries and underdeveloped,transitional economies. Contrary totheir original promises (to open up fromday one), all the “old” Member States,except Sweden, the UK, and Ireland,

thus eventually chose to apply transi-tional arrangements allowing for a con-trolled, phased introduction of freemovement of labor vis-à-vis the eightnew Central and Eastern EuropeanMember States until May 1, 2011. This instance of policy imitation under-scored the growing interdependence ofnational policies in this realm. Asregards the mobility of labor associatedwith cross-border provision of services,however, no transitional arrangementsapply. This implies that serviceproviders from the new low-wageMember States can bring their ownworkers and compete for temporarycontracts in the old high-wage states.

The new trajectories for company andlabor migration opened by this eventmay represent a crystallization of theinternal and external challenges facingthe advanced European welfare states,possibly serving as a catalyst for change.Whether enlargement will prove athreat or a cure for these ailing regimesis a matter of dispute and uncertainty,reflecting the fact that even minorchanges to policy may sometimes causebig differences in outcomes. Given theprecarious internal balance of the exist-ing welfare state/labor market regimesin Western Europe, even limited migra-tory flows of companies and labor maydisturb the balance of the post-warsocial compromises.

In a Western European context, risingoutflows of capital and companies mayeat into the revenues of alreadydeficit-ridden welfare states, while atthe same time adding to the cost sideby increasing unemployment. The pos-



sibility of outsourcing production andserving domestic customers from closeand cheap havens in the new Europemay improve company competitivenessbut strain domestic production andemployment. Although expandingmarkets and growing direct investmentflows into these countries may alsostimulate domestic export production,the capital “exit threat” is likely tostrengthen employer and politicaldemands for tax relief, labor-marketderegulation, and reduction of laborcosts, potentially narrowing the tax-baseof the welfare state. Many of the newMember States make no secret of theirenthusiasm for tax competition as ameans to attract foreign investmentand boost domestic growth. Hence,the long-disputed mechanism ofregime competition may eventually beset in motion by enlargement, addingto existing pressures to roll back thewelfare state.

The dynamic link between the effectsof capital and product-market integra-tion, on the one hand, and migration,on the other, is the labor market,which plays a twofold role. First, itoffers the option to take advantage of the untapped sources of often high-skilled, low-paid labor in the newMember States. This may, as mentioned,stimulate outward company migrationand import of labor-intensive services.Conversely, the welfare gap and highunemployment in the new MemberStates may encourage westward labor migration.

The prospect of increased immigrationof Eastern European labor may, from

the Western welfare states’ point ofview, represent both opportunities andrisks. In the long run, increased labormigration may help to fill the demographic gaps in domestic laborsupply, but the parallel aging of thepopulation in the new Member Statesindicates that the potential will belimited (and may pose ethical problemswith regard to drainage of scarcehuman capital needed for the recon-struction of these countries). In theshorter term, the picture is more complex. If company emigration turnsout to be the scenario, then stagnatinglabor demand in the private sector ofthe West, combined with increasedlabor supply from the East, mayprompt tougher competition for jobs.Combined with a growing supply ofcheap services from the East, thiscould, in turn, impede the inclusion of marginal domestic groups and third-country immigrants in the private-sector labor market. Growinglabor immigration may, on the otherhand, make it easier to fill labor short-ages in public welfare and care services.

Although there are considerableuncertainties regarding the balance oflabor demand and supply in the shortto medium term, enhanced inwardmigration may, in combination withthe impact of regime competition,strengthen the employer’s hand andexert pressures on existing standardsfor wage and working conditions incertain labor-market segments.Nevertheless, increased labor immigra-tion is likely to be positive for economicgrowth and hence for the financing ofthe welfare state.

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Transitional arrangements,

short-term cut-backs, and

long-term retrenchment

Whether such gains will balanceincreased burdens on the costs side,however, is not as crystal-clear as isoften claimed in official parlance.The generosity and high level of wel-fare benefits in most Western welfarestates, combined with the principle ofequal treatment of EU/EEA citizensin this regard, may act as a pull factorfor immigrants. The gate of entry hereis, once again, the labor market. Thetransitional arrangements, which areto be phased out in two to sevenyears, ensure the right to come tomost countries and search for a jobfor six months. The usual formula isthat a temporary work/residence permit is granted if a full-time jobwith host-country pay is obtained.After one year of work, the EU ruleson free movement of labor and socialsecurity fully apply. The signing of awork contract then opens the way forlong-lasting legal residence, includingfor the extended family. In the case ofinvoluntary loss of work, sickness,workplace accidents, or a shift towork-related education, the residencepermit is to be extended, along withthe right to partly portable social-security provisions. When the transi-tional arrangements are phased out,there are, according to EuropeanCourt of Justice jurisprudence, verymodest thresholds concerning thekind of job required for obtaining aresidence permit. Entry through aminor, short-term job might thus represent a tempting avenue towards

qualifying for long-term rights in theWestern welfare states.

In reality, individual labor immigrationproved quite modest during the firsteight months following the newMember States’ accession in 2004. Inthe fully opened Swedish labor market,for example, only some 3,000 workersfrom the new Eastern EuropeanMember States found a three-monthjob qualifying them for a residencepermit. Yet the number of short-termand seasonal workers was presumablyhigher, as indicated by the Norwegiancase, where some 25,000 workers(mainly from Poland and the Balticstates) registered in 2004, of which7,000 had obtained a job for morethan three months. It is not clear,however, what the workers in short-term positions would do when the jobwas over. In England, some 90,000workers from the new EasternEuropean Member States registeredduring the first seven months afterMay 1, 2005, of which roughly 40 per-cent had already been present on anillegal basis. Although registered laborinflows during 2004 were modest, gov-ernments are closely monitoring devel-opments, partly due to uncertaintyabout the magnitude and character ofunregistered migration. In the Nordiccountries, at least, authorities also seembetter prepared to crack down on illicitwork and misuse of welfare benefits.

Furthermore, in most NorthernEuropean countries, governments havebeen busy figuring out how eligibilityrequirements can be reviewed in orderto prevent undesired welfare tourism



after the transitional arrangements arefinished. In Denmark, for instance, itwas proposed that only tax-paying citi-zens should be entitled to social bene-fits, but the idea was dropped becauseit collided with international humanrights. At the same time, thresholdsand time limits are being introduced in the basic social allowance system,alongside changes to generous,exportable financial schemes for supporting the children of employees.Similarly, critics in Norway would liketo see such schemes converted into taxrelief or territorially bound subsidiesfor child-care services. In several countries, e.g., Germany, Norway, andSweden, the eligibility criteria forobtaining sick pay and unemploymentbenefits have been tightened; inDenmark, laid-off workers from newMember States have been deniedunemployment benefits. Such measuresillustrate how even prospects for limitedlabor/welfare immigration can causesignificant concern and trigger potentially important changes in the universalist principles of formerlyinclusive welfare states.

The flipside of measures to restrictlabor immigrants’ access to welfareconsumption is, however, that theyinteract with and tend to give direction to ongoing reform processesdesigned to tackle the inherent imbal-ances of the welfare states themselves.It is too soon to assess the overallimpact of this interplay, but it seemsplausible to expect strengthened pressures for the introduction of moreelements of targeting, thresholds, eligibility tests, and required previous

contributions in accordance with theinsurance principle. Given the EUprinciples of non-discrimination, suchreforms will have to be given generalapplication and will thus also affectthe access to Social Security of nationalcitizens and third-country residents.The asylum seekers among the lattergroup will be particularly vulnerable inthis respect.

Furthermore, the outlined interplaybetween internal and external pressuresfor reform is likely to have the greatestimpact in the most inclusive welfarestates, i.e., the universalist, tax-basedregimes in Scandinavian countries.This may, in turn, promote convergencein the direction of the less inclusive, contribution-based systems.

Besides, most EU countries have inrecent years been turning towardsmore activation-oriented welfare policies based on compulsory participa-tion in employment schemes, training,and workfare. This is in accordancewith the Nordic tradition of an activelabor-market policy, now also incorpo-rated into the European employmentstrategy. One example is the contestedreforms of the German welfare state,according to which the duration andsize of unemployment benefits havebeen cut, pressure to accept “offered”jobs has been strengthened, and theretirement age has been raised.

The corollary of the shift towards a“workfare state” is the ongoing struggleover the reform of European labormarkets. While there is broad consen-sus about the need to improve the

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adaptability and inclusiveness ofEuropean labor markets, the issue ofderegulating labor markets and industrial relations remains a flash-point between capital and labor, rightand left. With still relatively highunemployment and low employmentrates in many EU countries, especiallyamong women and elderly workers,increased labor immigration andmobility of services is causing concernin many camps, not least amongorganized labor and its allies. While the European Trade UnionConfederation has been a stealth supporter of enlargement and theopening of labor markets from the firstday of the latest EU expansion, manynational trade unions have complainedthat increased provision of cross-borderservices delivered by underpaid workers posted in their countries hasled to social dumping and put pressureon existing labor standards and collective agreements. Concernedvoices are sometimes also heard fromcorners of the employer camp, com-plaining that Eastern European serviceproviders can put them out of business.

Three scenarios

From the perspective of labor-marketand industrial-relations governance,the opening of a common labor andservice market spanning two regionsonce separated by the Iron Curtainraises profound challenges, especiallyin the encompassing high-cost, high-standard Northern Europeanregimes. Uncertainty is high becauseof an East-West gap in labor costs and

welfare that in many ways remindsanalysts of the chasm separating theUnited States and Mexico.

The challenges to national employmentconditions have, at least thus far, beenmuch less associated with the fairlylimited inflows of individual job seekersthan with growing short-term mobilityof workers tied to cross-border provisionof services, construction projects, andthe like. The EU Directive on Postingof Workers (COM 96/71EC) stipulatesthat service providers from abroadmust respect certain minimum laborstandards of the host country, and, ifspecific legislation is in place, payminimum wages set by statute or generalized collective agreements. Inthe Scandinavian countries, however,such practices are alien and the unionshave relied on direct action to compelforeign employers into national collective agreements. This traditionwas recognized when Sweden joinedthe EU in 1995. But when a Latvianfirm building a school in Swedenrecently became stalled by unionaction, the Latvian government andtrade unions accused Sweden ofbreeching EU principles of freedom of movement. The Labor Court ruled,however, that the union action wasentirely lawful. Regardless of rules, it is indeed a demanding task forunions and/or labor inspectorates tomonitor companies and conditions influid transborder construction marketsand service-delivery chains. In practice,foreign companies therefore often reapcompetitive advantages by paying their employees home-country rates. With wages in the new Member States



averaging anywhere from a seventh to a tenth of those in the West, radicalchanges in the terms of competition for contracts and jobs are thus unfoldingin certain markets for services. Short-term supplies of foreign laborcan also be provided by temporarywork agencies and hiring firms, opening new avenues for revolving-door labor migration.

Such temporary imports of cheap labor represent an attractive option for host-country companies (whichcan replace expensive domestic staff)and for Eastern European workers whocan obtain higher wages than at home.The host country, furthermore, standsto avoid incorporating such workersinto the system of welfare-state rights.Besides domestic unions and workersin the affected branches, who face the risk of diminished wages, fewer job opportunities, and more limited bargaining power, the most likely losers are subdelivery companies in the host country. Vulnerablebranches are typically construction,cleaning, catering, home services, and restaurants.

If the supply of labor and services fromthe Eastern European Member Statesproves to manifest itself in the sameniches in the market where establishedimmigrants already operate — as itmay seem — EU immigration will alsopose a competitive challenge to thesegroups. If this happens, it may weakenthe position of groups that are possiblythe most vulnerable to marginalizationin the labor market, thus reinforcingtheir dependence on welfare.

With respect to the impact of enlarge-ment on national labor relations, threestylized trajectories can be envisaged.In the first, imports of cheap EasternEuropean labor and services areexploited to circumvent national collective bargaining agreements andundermine unionism, serving as aTrojan Horse for fragmentation andthe Americanization of national labormarkets. In the second, the externalcompetitive pressures spur factions ofnational business, labor, and politiciansto unite in attempts to protect theircommon interests through re-regulationand stricter control of employmentalong a path of tripartite renationaliza-tion. In the third, the reunification ofEuropean labor and service marketssounds the death knell of the nation-state as a framework for labor marketgovernance and triggers initiatives toforge a broader Europeanization of collective organization and regulationof employment. Hence, much like thecase of the welfare state, the externalopening of the labor market accentuatescontested issues as regards the direction,pathways, and levels for internalreform in labor market governance.This also poses difficult questionsabout the boundaries of solidarity andthe interplay between national andEuropean policies in counterbalancing(or re-embedding) market forces.

To date, attention seems overwhelm-ingly concentrated on nationalresponses. In most countries, the tran-sitional arrangements are assigned tosecure host-country conditions forindividual employees. There is also acommon thrust towards development

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of more stringent regimes for control-ling and monitoring the granting ofwork-based residence permits for EUcitizens, alongside strengthening oflabor and tax inspectorates. Also in theworks is better statistical monitoring oflabor-market developments, wages, andworking conditions, in order to ensurethat safety clauses can be activated incase of imbalances. In Norway, forexample, a legal mechanism for thegeneralization of collective agreementshas been invoked for the first time,aimed at preventing social dumping byforeign providers on seven large-scaleconstruction sites in the petrochemicalindustry. The external liberalization of labor and service markets has thusprompted tendencies towards internalre-regulation of national labor-marketgovernance. But it remains to be seenwhether such attempts will suffice toregain national control or rather willbe hollowed out by growing streams ofcross-border mobility.

Scope for Action and

Recommendations

This chapter draws attention to threefacts: First, the labor market is themain gate of entry to the nationalcomplexes of work-based welfare-staterights; second, the inflows of potentialjobseekers are highly contingent onthe policy responses of neighboringcountries, and third, all countries aretherefore keeping their cards close tothe chests and looking over theirshoulders. This situation is promotinga complex game of labor-market andwelfare-regime competition, in which

each country is trying to strike a bal-ance among attracting desired labor,fending off welfare seekers, and pro-tecting national working conditions.EU enlargement is reinforcing suchdynamics, making labor immigrantsfrom the new states a more attractiveoption than third-country residentsknocking on the humanitarian gate.Accordingly, the restrictive asylumregimes developed in recent years inWestern Europe are likely to be developed even further. Acting solelyon the nation-state level, apparentlyrational strategic responses could thuseasily aggregate into unintended andundesirable collective outcomes forEurope as whole. Attempts to divertun/low-productive immigrants could,for example, strengthen spirals of policytightening and social cutbacks thatrender integration more difficult andreduce overall EU immigration at atime when the opposite is needed.

In this perspective, this chapter’sanalyses suggest a strong case for closerintegration of both the research andpolicies of migration, labor markets,and welfare-state reform in Europe.The social and political actors of welfare, labor, and immigration policiesat national levels are faced with common and multiple collective-actionproblems. This quandary can only beresolved through better and more openmethods of coordination, informationexchange, learning, and policy integra-tion across the vanishing boundariesbetween nation-states and the EU. To prevent the enlarged EU, with itsimmense social inequalities, frombecoming a neo-colonial playground



for companies searching for the lowesttaxes, the cheapest labor, and the laxest regulations for work and theenvironment, European politicians and institutions would do well toadopt the following recommendations:

� Strengthen policies for economicgrowth, restructuring, and employment in the new MemberStates of the EU;

� Develop (and improve monitoring)of proper EU minimum standards inthe field of social security, laborprotection, working conditions, andcompany taxation;

� Strengthen common policy orienta-tions in these fields by definingjoint objectives, informationexchange, and learning in accor-dance with the open method ofcoordination;

� Promote social institution-buildingand cooperation among social actorsand working-life organizations acrossthe East-West divide;

� Ensure that the integration of service and labor markets does notundermine Member States’ capacityto monitor and apply nationalworking conditions;

� Clarify the range of rights availableto newcomers of different cate-gories, both for purposes of compari-son within the EU, and as a basisfor coordinated policymaking; and

� Support research that combinesanalyses of immigration, welfare,and the labor market.

References

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Commission of the European Communities.Directive concerning the posting of workers in theframework of the provision of services. COM96/7Ec final, 1996.

Commission of the European Communities.Communication from the Commission to theCouncil, The European Parliament, TheEuropean Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions on Immigration,Integration and Employment. COM (2003) 336final, 2003.

Dölvik, J. E. Redrawing Boundaries of Solidarity?ETUC, social dialogue and the Europeanisation of trade unionism in the 1990s. Oslo:ARENA/FAFO Report 238, 1997.

Dölvik, J. E. “European trade unions: coping withglobalisation?” In The Solidarity Dilemma:Globalisation, Europeanisation and the TradeUnions, edited by J. Hoffmann, 83-118.Brussels: ETUI, 2001.

Dölvik, J. E. “Industrial Relations in EMU: Are Re-Nationalization and Europeanization Two Sidesof the Same Coin?” In Euros and Europeans.Monetary Integration and the European Model ofSociety, edited by A. Martin and G. Ross.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.

Entzinger, H. “The rise and fall of multiculturalism:The case of the Netherlands.” In Towards assimilation and citizenship: Immigrants in liberalnation-states, edited by C. Joppke and E.Morawska. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan,2003.

Esping Andersen, G. The Three Worlds of WelfareCapitalism. Cambridge: Cambridge UniversityPress, 1990.

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Lundh, C. et al. Arbete? Var god drøj! Innvandrare i välfärdssamhället. Stockholm: SNS Förlag, 2002.

Lödemel, I. and H. Trickey, eds. An Offer You Can’tRefuse: Workfare in International Perspective.Bristol: The Policy Press, 2000.

Meardi, G. “The Trojan Horses for theAmericanization of Europe? Polish IndustrialRelations Towards the EU.” European Journal ofIndustrial Relations 8, no. 1 (2002): 77-99.

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Ponzellini, A. “Italy: The Services Sector —Towards a More Inclusive and Flexible LaborMarket?” In At Your Service? ComparativePerspectives on Employment and Labor Relationsin the European Private Sector Services, edited byJ.E. Dølvik, 305-341. Brussels/Oxford/NewYork:P.I.E.-Peter Lang, 2001.

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The New Role of Migrants

in the Rural Economies of

Southern Europe

Charalambos Kasimis

180

Migration flows into SouthernEurope, particularly intoGreece, have grown over

the last 15 years. This influx has bothshaped and been shaped by importantdevelopments in the large agriculturalsector in Southern European countries,where farming’s share of GDP is onaverage double that of the average forEuropean Union states as a whole. Inthis context, policymakers are increas-ingly confronted with a thorny question:How can Southern Europe’s growingdemand for migrant labor be balancedwith the many blueprints, often morerestrictive, for Europe’s future migrationmanagement?

Complicating matters is a rapidlychanging context, including reforms tothe EU’s Common Agricultural Policy(CAP) for rules and subsidies; the EU’sMay 2004 enlargement to include several new Member States with com-petitive agricultural sectors; and WorldTrade Organization (WTO) negotia-tions on reducing direct subsidies andtariff protection to farm products. Thepossibility of a vastly changed economiclandscape for farming has large parts ofSouthern Europe’s agricultural sectorfeeling threatened not only by cheapimports, but also by innovative andtechnology-powered competitors. Inthis context, inexpensive migrant labormay be more sought after than ever.

Policymakers striving to meet the chal-lenge of importing labor for SouthernEurope’s vital agricultural sector mustgrapple with a wide range of factors.For example, they must take into con-sideration a growing hostility towards

further immigration among some sectorsof the native-born population in manyEU states, whose anxiety appears tostem partly from cultural apprehen-sions and fear of competition for jobs.

On closer examination, however, sev-eral of the obstacles to sound migrationmanagement appear less formidablethan some media and political leadersportray them. An in-depth look atGreece’s migration and the agriculturalsector, for example, shows thatmigrants are mainly filling agriculturaland other low-skilled jobs, not com-peting with the native born for skilledpositions. Furthermore, suggestions ofmonolithic public hostility to moreimmigration actually mask a moresympathetic reality, in which ruralGreeks recognize the valuable contri-butions of foreign workers.

In short, a more detailed examinationof the new role of these migrants is inorder. What follows is an overview ofmigration patterns in SouthernEurope, and then a focused look atGreece and the lessons its experienceswith migrants and agriculture mayhold for the region. Finally, a series ofrecommendations will outline hownational and EU-level policymakers canbest balance calls for more restrictiveimmigration policies with increasingdemand for migrant workers.

Southern Europe and

Labor Migration

In the period of reconstruction thatfollowed World War II, Southern


The New Role of Migrants in the Rural Economies of Southern Europe 181

Europe was the main contributor ofmigrants to the labor-hungry industri-alized nations of Northern Europe.However, the oil crises of 1973 and1979 helped cause an economicdecline and a sharp drop in demandfor labor. This led to the introductionof restrictive immigration policies inNorthern Europe, as well as returnmigration by Southern Europeans totheir homelands. Later, in the 1980s,Southern European countries becametransit points for African, Asian,Polish, and Yugoslav migrants whosefinal destinations were the US, Canada,and to a lesser degree, Western Europe.

In the last 15 years of this process ofchange, migration flows to SouthernEurope, particularly Greece, haveincreased considerably. The end resulthas been a transformation so sweepingthat all Southern European countrieshave evolved from senders of migrantsto migrant receivers and permanentimmigrant destinations.

One particularly important aspect ofthis process of change is connected tothe agricultural sector. Migrantemployment in agriculture is no longera secondary phenomenon. Evidencefrom Southern European countriesshows a rapid increase in migrantemployment in agriculture and ruralregions during the past 15 years. Thisis related to agriculture’s significantrole in the economies and societies ofall Southern European countries. Infact, half of the agriculturally employedpopulation and two-thirds of the farmholdings of the EU are concentrated inSouthern Europe. It is also related to

the abandonment of agriculture, forreasons described later, by manynative-born Southern Europeans.

To fuel this often labor-intensiveregional economy, migrants have beenarriving from the Balkans, Africa, andeven Asia, bound for work in econom-ically restructured rural areas andincreasingly specialized seasonal agricul-ture. However, they are not restrictedto agriculture. These migrants are alsoengaged in non-agricultural economicactivities and in the overall support ofaged populations, especially in marginalor mountainous rural areas.

The influx into Southern Europe hascome from various source countries,and continues to evolve. Spain’s 2001Census showed that 17 percent of allmigrants are settled in mostly ruralareas with less than 10,000 people,concentrated in regions like Alicante,Malaga, Las Palmas, Tenerife, theBalearic Islands, Murcia, and Almeria.This pattern was confirmed by the2001 regularization program, in which13 percent of all work permits wereprovided for the agricultural sector.Recent evidence shows that Romaniansand Bulgarians have nowadays sup-planted the once-dominant Africanmigrants in the Spanish labor market.

In Italy, migrants are over-representedin agricultural employment in compar-ison with the economically active population of the country (13.1 percentas against 5.3 percent). They make up60 percent of the total seasonal laborforce in agriculture, while the majorityof them, three-fifths, are illegal. The

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presence of seasonal labor arrivingfrom present and former non-EUcountries increases by 15 percent everyyear; two-thirds of this workforce origi-nates from Poland, Slovakia, theCzech Republic, and Romania.

The role of migrant workers in theItalian labor market varies by sector andregion. In Northern Italy, regularizedforeign labor is in demand. Migrantsare mostly employed by pig and cattlefarms. Moroccans and increasing numbers of Indians are taking thesejobs because local youths are not prepared to do this kind of hard andunpleasant work, even for the relativelygood wages offered. Migrants fromCentral and Eastern European countriesare mostly employed in vineyards andthe fruit and vegetable sectors. In theSouth, because of the massive, oftenorganized-crime-controlled, continu-ous arrival of migrants and the seasonalcharacteristics of the regional economy,the demand is for illegal, highlyexploitable labor.

Only in Portugal has migrant employ-ment been largely locked out, in thiscase due to very strong cooperativenetworks among locals. But evenPortugal’s large-scale agriculture nowreportedly relies heavily on inexpensivemigrant labor. A qualitative change inmigration inflows to Portugal has beenobserved in recent years. All previousinflows were part of an internationalmigratory system united by thePortuguese language, but nowadaysthere is greatly increased migrationfrom Eastern European countries(Ukraine, Moldava, Romania, Russia),

and to a lesser extent from SoutheastAsia. Non-EU Eastern Europeanmigrants are concentrated in theLisbon metropolitan area and theregion of Algarve, but they are alsospread out in rural regions. There, theyare employed in construction and theagricultural sector (especially in theAlentejo, Ribatejo, and Oesteregions). Brazilians and “traditional”migrants from PALOP (Portuguese-speaking African) countries generallyare employed in construction and theservice sector.

The arrival of migrants from EasternEurope in Portugal has put pressure on“traditional” migrants, much as it hasin Spain, leading to strong competitionfor jobs and to social conflicts amongdifferent ethnic groups. The Ukrainians,the most dominant group from EasternEurope, have the reputation of beingcompetent and disciplined workers andseem to benefit from a sort of “reversediscrimination.” As a result, resentmentand tensions are brewing amongAfrican and Latin American migrants,who are seeing their employment situation deteriorate.

Reasons for Increased

Labor Migration

Efforts to analyze the causes ofSouthern Europe’s growing dependenceon migrant labor are complicated by alack of research. While there is a longtradition of studying migration to ruralareas, this is more true of the UnitedStates than of Europe. Such studies,where they have been undertaken in



Europe, have tended to concentrate onthe implications of a rural exodus fromsending societies rather than on ruralareas as receivers of migrants.

In view of this research shortfall, theEU Social and Economic Committeehas recognized the importance ofstudying migration to rural areas. In a2000 report, the committee stated thatalthough migrant labor in agricultureand rural regions has increased exten-sively, there is still insufficient quanti-tative and qualitative research.Furthermore, the report states thatdata are not being collated at the EUlevel, and that no analyses are availablewith respect to specific groups.

Despite these gaps in availableresearch, some factors that are drivingmore migration to Southern Europeare fairly clear. The most importantinclude:

Demand fueled by economic restruc-turing. Increased demand for migrantfarm workers can be traced in part tothe integration of Southern Europeannations (Greece, Spain, and Portugal)into the EU in the 1980s. This helpedspur a rapid economic transformationthat has narrowed the economic andsocial distance between Southern andNorthern Europe, and in turn helpedtrigger an exodus of farm family laborto off-farm employment. Periods ofprosperity, coupled with CAP subsidiesand protectionism, have further fueledthe expansion of agricultural sectorjobs. Additional demand for labor hasstemmed from the expansion of non-agricultural activities such as tourism,

housing construction, return migrationof urban dwellers to their place of origin,and the growth of new consumptionpatterns connected to leisure and recreation. Out of a desire for “flexible”manpower, free of constraints liketrade unionism, businesses large andsmall have increasingly turned tomigrant labor to fill their empty posts.

Additional demand for paid workershas been created by the increasingintegration of native-born women intothe labor market, primarily starting in1980s. Their departure from the homehas led to the creation of domesticjobs — e.g., child and elder care — ofthe low-paid, low-prestige kindincreasingly turned down by local populations for reasons detailed below.

Changing social attitudes. Improvedliving standards and young people’sattainment of higher levels of educationin the last few decades have loweredthe native-born population’s willing-ness to work away from home, particu-larly in low-status, seasonal, and low-income jobs. These are preciselythe kinds of jobs often available inseveral of Southern Europe’s key economic sectors: agriculture, tourism,fisheries, construction, and commerce,as well as the large informal family-based sector. With higher expectations,the young people of the countrysidehave increasingly sought out better-paid,higher-status urban jobs, leaving labormarket “holes” in rural areas to befilled by migrants.

Demographic imbalances. Migrationhas also been encouraged by the

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youthful nature of the migrant popula-tion as compared to the increasinglylarge elderly population of native-bornSouthern Europeans. Policymakers havenoted that falling birthrates and thegraying of the native-born populationin Southern European receiving coun-tries will make it difficult to sustaineconomic growth and a healthy taxbase, prompting more tolerant officialattitudes and policies towards migrants.At the same time, the retirement ofthe native born from their jobs hascreated more demand for labor, as hasthe expansion of medical and careservices for the elderly.

Visa overstay opportunities. Thecross-border nature of Southerneconomies — e.g., heavily weightedtowards mobile commerce, shipping,and tourism — has facilitated the legal entry of migrants as tourists andvisitors. Many of these individualshave remained illegally after theirvisas have expired. Government effortsto rein in such activity have been laxbecause officials recognize thesemigrants’ economic value.

Proximity to sending countries.Extensive coastlines and easily crossedborders, which are difficult to police,have facilitated migrants’ entry intoSouthern Europe. At different times,nearby countries in Eastern andCentral Europe have been vigoroussending countries, particularly afterthe collapse of the Communist Bloc in the late 1980s and early 1990s.Moreover, Southern Europe’s neighborstates on the far shore of theMediterranean, as well as relatively

close West Asian states such as Iraqand Afghanistan, are experiencingwaves of emigration spurred in part bypoverty or conflict. Southern Europe’slocation has combined with the otherfactors mentioned above to make it adestination for these migrants.

A multitude of similarities along theselines exist among the countries ofSouthern Europe. At the same time, itwould be impossible to catalogue themany ways in which they differ, makinga country-by-country breakdown prob-lematic. More useful, in terms of poli-cymaking, is to focus on one country’sexperience in order to glean lessons inhow to properly manage the new roleof migrants in Southern Europe.Greece’s status as a receiver of largemigrant flows, as well as its importantposition in Southern Europe’s agricul-tural sector, makes it a good candidatefor such an examination.

The Case of Greece

Greek agriculture employs almost 17percent of the economically activepopulation, contributes approximately10 percent of GDP, and accounts foralmost one-third of the total value ofexports. Immigrant wage labor hasgrown extensively in the past decadeand now accounts for almost 20 percentof the total labor expended in the sector. Understanding how Greecearrived at this situation, which in vari-ous ways mirrors the experiences of itsSouthern European neighbors, requiresa focused look at the country’s overallmigration patterns, past and present.



These patterns have their modernroots in the period following WorldWar II, when Greece became, alongwith other countries of SouthernEurope, one of the main contributorsto migration to the industrializednations of Northern Europe. Morethan one million Greeks migrated inthis wave, mostly between 1950 and1974. Most emigrated to WesternEurope, the US, Canada, andAustralia. Their movement wasprompted by various factors,primarily economic, but also political(connected with the consequences of the 1946-1949 civil war and the1967-1974 period of military rule).Official statistics show that in theperiod 1955-1973 Germany absorbed603,300 Greek migrants, Australia170,700, the US 124,000, andCanada 80,200. The majority of these emigrants came from rural areas, whose residents supplied both the national and internationallabor markets.

Following the oil crisis of 1973 and theadoption of restrictive immigrationpolicies by Northern European coun-tries, these immigration flows wereseverely reduced and return migrationincreased. Other factors contributingto these changes included integrationdifficulties in the receiving countries,the restoration of democracy in Greecein 1974, and the new economicprospects developed following the1981 entry of the country into theEuropean Economic Community(EEC). Between 1974 and 1985,almost half of the emigrants of thepost-war period returned to Greece.

Trading Places:

Immigration Replaces

Emigration

Declining emigration and return migra-tion created a positive migration bal-ance in the 1970s. Immigration grew atthe beginning of the 1980s when asmall number of Asians (primarilyFilipinos), Africans, and Poles arrivedand found work in construction, agricul-ture, and domestic services. Nevertheless,immigration was still limited in size. In1986, legal and unauthorized immi-grants totaled approximately 90,000.One-third of them were from EU countries. The 1991 Census registered167,000 “foreigners” in a total popula-tion of 10,259,900.

The collapse of many Central andEastern European regimes in 1989transformed immigration to Greeceinto a massive, uncontrollable phenomenon. As a result, althoughGreece was at that time still one of theless-developed EU states, in the 1990sit received the highest percentage ofimmigrants in relation to the size of itslabor force.

Many factors explain the transforma-tion of Greece into a receiving country.These include geographic location,which positions Greece as the eastern“gate” of the EU, with extensive coastlines and easily crossed borders.Though the situation at the country’snorthern borders has greatly improvedsince the formation of a special bordercontrol guard in 1998, geographic accessremains a central factor in patterns ofmigration to Greece.

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Also key have been rapid economicchanges that have narrowed Greece’seconomic and social distance from theNorthern European countries since theintegration of Greece into the EU in1981. In step with economic develop-ment, the improved living standardsand higher levels of education attainedby young people have led most Greeksto reject low-status and low-incomejobs. Meanwhile, the large size of theinformal, family-based economy,together with the seasonal nature ofindustries like tourism, agriculture, andconstruction, have created demand fora labor pool independent of trade unionpractices and labor rights legislation.

Greece’s Migrants in

Context

According to the latest census, thepopulation of Greece increased from10,259,900 in 1991 to 10,964,020 in2001. This increase can be almostexclusively attributed to immigrationin that decade. The census shows thatthe “foreign population” of Greece in2001 was 762,191 (47,000 of them EUcitizens), making up approximately 7percent of the total population. Ofthese migrants, 2,927 were registeredas refugees.

It is estimated that the real number ofimmigrants is higher; many analystsbelieve that migrants make up as muchas 10 percent of the population. Theycite, among other factors, that the 2001Census was carried out before the implementation of Act 2910/2001,otherwise referred to as Greece’s second

regularization program. This legislationdealt with “the admission and residenceof foreigners in Greece and the acqui-sition of Greek nationality throughnaturalization.” Because of their illegalstatus, a good number of immigrantswere not included in census registra-tion, while still others entered thecountry specifically to take advantageof regularization.

Immigration was the main cause ofpopulation increase and demographicrenewal in Greece in the periodbetween the 1991 and 2001 censuses.The average number of children perwoman in Greece has fallen to 1.3,against a European average of 1.5, andwell below the average of 2.1 requiredfor the reproduction of a population.Of the immigrant population, 16.7percent are in the 0-14 age bracket,79.8 percent in the 15-64 age bracket,and only 3.5 percent in the over-65age bracket. The respective percent-ages for the national population are15.2 percent, 67.7 percent, and 17percent, demonstrating the key roleimmigrants of child-bearing age play in the population as a whole.Albanians, who are mainly marriedcouples raising families, are theyoungest population overall. In contrast, immigrants from the UnitedStates, Canada, and Australia havethe highest percentages of people inthe over-65 age bracket, because theyare mainly returning pensioners of Greek origin.

Males and females make up 54.5 percent and 45.5 percent of the total, respectively. However, gender



composition varies widely among thevarious nationalities. Albanians andRomanians show the most balanced picture, because the percentages ofmales fluctuate just above the averagewith 59 percent and 57 percent, respec-tively. Other nationalities show sharpasymmetries, such that either males orfemales far outnumber the other gender.For example, females make up almosttwo-thirds of the immigrants from theformer Soviet Union and Bulgaria, aswell as approximately four-fifths of theFilipinos. On the other end, immigrantsfrom Pakistan and India are almostexclusively male.

Fifty-four percent of immigrants enterthe country for work. Family reunifica-tion (13 percent) and repatriation (7percent) are other main reasons theygive for their arrival. Albanians showthe highest level of participation infamily reunification, while immigrantsfrom United States, Canada, andAustralia are the most often repatriated.An unspecified “other reason” con-cerns 21.5 percent of the total, while“asylum” and “refugee” status seekersaccount for 1.6 percent.

National Origins of Recent

Migrants

In the 1990 to 2001 period of massimmigration to Greece, immigrantsarrived in two waves. The first wasthat of the early 1990s, in whichAlbanians dominated. The secondarrived after 1995 and involved muchgreater participation of immigrantsfrom other Balkan states, the former

Soviet Union, Pakistan, and India.The majority of Albanians arrived inthe first wave; however, the collapse ofenormous “pyramid schemes” inAlbania’s banking sector in 1996 alsospurred significant migration.

According to the 2001 Census, thelargest group of immigrants draws its origins from the Balkan countries ofAlbania, Bulgaria, and Romania. Peoplefrom these countries make up almosttwo-thirds of the total “foreign popula-tion.” Migrants from the former SovietUnion (Georgia, Russia, Ukraine,Moldova, etc.) comprise 10 percent ofthe total; the EU countries approxi-mately 6 percent. A heterogeneousgroup of people from places such as theUnited States, Canada, and Australia(mostly first- or second-generationGreek emigrants returning home), alsoaccount for around 6 percent. Finally, aremaining group drawn from a widevariety of countries makes up 13 percent.None of the individual countries includedin this last group exceeds 2 percent ofthe total “foreign population.”

Of the main countries of origin,Albania accounts for 57.5 percent ofthe total, with second-place Bulgaria faroutdistanced at 4.6 percent. Commonborders with both of these countrieshave facilitated crossing over to Greece,leading to a cyclical form of migration.

Education and Workforce

Participation

Immigrants have contributed signifi-cantly to the improved performance of

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the Greek economy over the past fewyears, and they have boosted Greece’ssuccessful participation in the EU’seconomic and monetary union. Theirstructural role in the workforce of theagricultural and construction sectorshas been widely acknowledged. Despitea high unemployment rate, estimatedat 11 percent for the country as awhole in the first half of 2004, thereappears to be no serious competitionby native Greeks for the kinds of jobssecured by immigrants. On the contrary, immigrants have played acomplementary economic role.

Nearly one-half of all migrants have secondary education (including technical-skill schools) and one-thirdhave either completed or acquired primary school education. Almostone-tenth have a higher education.A qualitative analysis of the educational levels of the variousnationalities shows that, comparativelyspeaking, Albanians have the lowestlevel of education and former Sovietcitizens the highest. In terms of higher education, females have thelargest share of the total, while malesappear to predominate in all othereducational categories.

Immigrants are almost exclusively (90 percent) engaged in wage workand, to a much lesser extent, are self-employed (6.5 percent). Most ofthe jobs are non-skilled, manual workwell below the immigrants’ level ofeducation and qualifications.

According to the 2001 Census data, the majority of immigrants

(54 percent) enter Greece for work.Bulgarians and Romanians are thenationalities that most often citeemployment as the most importantreason for migrating to Greece.Immigrants are mainly employed inconstruction (24.5 percent), “otherservices,” meaning mostly domesticwork (20.5 percent), agriculture (17.5 percent), and “commerce, hotels,and restaurants” (15.7 percent).

Because of the size of their presence in the total immigrant population,Albanians dominate in all sectors.Within the Albanian nationality, however, construction absorbs thehighest percentage (32 percent), followed by agriculture (21 percent),and then “other services” (15 percent).In contrast, Bulgarians are mostlyoccupied in agriculture (33 percent)and “other services” (29 percent).

In the construction sector, immigrantscurrently provide a quarter of thewage labor, and in agriculture, a fifth of the total labor expended(and almost 90 percent of the non-family wage labor). Immigrantsplay an important structural role inboth sectors.

“Other services” — a sector identi-fied with domestic services where female migrant labor predominates —mostly employ immigrants from the former Soviet Union (37 percent) and Bulgaria. At the sametime, migrants’ employment indomestic services allows larger numbers of Greek women to join thelabor market.



Immigration Policy

Developments

The Greek government has beenunprepared to receive the large num-bers of immigrants of the last decade,and has hesitated to introduce thenecessary legal and institutionalchanges necessary for the regularizationand integration of this population.

The government has, however, beenforced to adopt a regularization proce-dure, under often contradictory pres-sures. From one side, in an environmentof growing xenophobia, the public hasdemanded the registration of immi-grants. From another, human rightsand labor organizations have soughtmore humanitarian and less exploitativetreatment.

The first regularization program tohandle recent illegal migration wasintroduced in 1997 with presidentialdecrees 358/1997 and 359/1997. Theseaimed at the implementation of Act1975/1991 on the “entry-exit, residence,employment, expulsion of foreigners,and procedure for the recognition of the status of refugee for foreigners.”

The twin decrees gave unregisteredimmigrants the opportunity to acquirea temporary residence permit known asa “white card.” This, in turn, gavethem time to submit the complementarydocuments necessary to acquire a“green card,” essentially a combinedwork and residence permit. To qualifyfor the “white card,” they had to havelived in Greece for at least one year,and submit documents testifying to

their good health, a clean court andpolice record, and proof of having paidnational social-insurance contributionsfor a total of 40 working days in 1998.A total of 150 days of social-insurancecontributions were required for theacquisition of the “green card.” No registration fees were charged atthis stage.

By the end of the first regularization,371,641 immigrants had been regis-tered for the “white card,” but only212,860 received a “green card.” It isestimated that less than half of themigrants living in the country wereregistered during this first regulariza-tion program.

In 2001, the government passed Act 2910/2001 on “the admissionand residence of foreigners in Greece and the acquisition of Greeknationality through naturalization.”This gave immigrants a secondopportunity to legalize their status,provided they could show proof ofresidence for at least a year before the implementation of the law.Immigrants were given a six-monthperiod to submit all the necessarydocuments to acquire the work permit,which became the precondition forobtaining a residence permit.

The two regularization methods differed, but the documents requiredfor both were similar. The most important differences were that in2001 the immigrant had to submit acopy of an official contract with his orher employer for a specific period oftime, as well as confirmation that

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national social-insurance contributionshad been paid for at least 200 workingdays (150 days for those employed inagriculture, construction, and domesticservices). The immigrants themselvescould also pay for their insurance con-tributions. In addition, a payment of147 euros per person over the age of14 was required. All applicants to the1997 regularization program whosepermits had expired by 2001 were sub-ject to the provisions of the new law.

The 2001 act also set preconditions forfuture legal migration into the country,giving the Organization of Employmentand Labor (OAED) responsibility forpreparing an annual report that wouldspecify labor requirements at the occu-pational and regional levels in order todefine quotas for temporary work per-mits. These job vacancies would beadvertised in the sending countries byGreek embassies, which would also beresponsible for receiving the applica-tions for those jobs. To date, however,the government has not made wide useof this procedure.

When the official application deadlinefor this second regularization programexpired in August 2001, it was reportedthat 351,110 migrants had submittedtheir documents for the acquisition ofa work permit — a precondition forthe provision of a residence permit.However, bureaucracy and a lack ofnecessary infrastructure createdtremendous problems and delays inapplication processing. This forced the government to give temporary residence to all applicants until theend of June 2003, subsequently

extended to the end of October 2003.By then, the government expected tohave all the applications processed. A year later, however, all of the applications had not yet beenprocessed. Once more, promises werenot fulfilled, and to date, thousands ofmigrants remain “hostage” to a sluggishlegal and institutional structure.

The enthusiasm shown by immigrantsupon the announcement of the latestact has now vanished. This is as a resultof, on the one hand, the weakness ofpublic administration in supporting theimplementation of the act and, on theother, the act’s “philosophy” of contin-uous checks and controls that make itdifficult to implement. These weak-nesses have been identified and raisedby many organizations and institutionsdirectly or indirectly involved with theissue. The Greek ombudsman, in areport to the minister of the interior,warned as early as 2001 of the imple-mentation problems and asked foramendments that would make it workfor the benefit of both immigrants andthe Greek public administration.

However, amendments to the act introduced by the government in 2002did not address the problems connectedwith the one-year duration of the workand residence permits, the yearly fee forthe residence permit for the applicants,and the insurmountable bureaucraticproblems. Only recently, the govern-ment decided to extend the residencepermit to two years starting fromJanuary 2004 (Act 3202/2003). In the meantime, in order to overcome bureaucratic obstacles,



many immigrants have had to eitherhire lawyers to handle their regulariza-tion procedure, or lose time and moneystanding in lines.

Integration

To date, the integration of migrantsinto Greek society appears to haveresulted largely from individual/familystrategies of the migrants themselves,rather than from the provisions of aninstitutional framework. This maychange as government efforts to systematize integration take hold.

Greece’s integration policy wasdesigned and announced by the government in 2002 in its “ActionPlan for the Social Integration ofImmigrants for the Period 2002-2005.”The plan included measures for thelabor-market integration and trainingof immigrants, improved access to the health system, emergency centersfor immigrant support, and measuresfor the improvement of culturalexchanges among the various ethniccommunities. No special provisionswere made, however, for migrants living and working in rural areas. The plan has not yet been implemented and recently it wasreported that the government intendsto redraft it. Two of the reasons forthe non-implementation of the planappear to include pressure on the statebudget resulting from the nation’shosting of the 2004 Summer OlympicGames, as well as the long, politicallysensitive period before the nationalelections of March 7, 2004.

At this stage, despite the acknowledgedimportance of migration in Greece’seconomy and society, migration ingeneral and integration specifically do not seem to be high on the govern-ment agenda. The expressed anxietiesof human rights and migrant organiza-tions about integration and migrationpolicy seem to have done little to shiftthe debate.

Integration may come to the fore-ground again, however, in connectionwith social unrest that could followthe foreseen negative prospects of theeconomy in the post-Olympics period.The high growth rate of the Greekeconomy — 4.3 percent in 2003 — isexpected to slow after the OlympicGames, which drove huge amounts ofactivity in construction and other sectors. If not dealt with, this type ofeconomic pressure, along with theuncertainties evident in the legal and institutional framework for the regularization and integration of immigrants, is expected to lead tosocial friction and extensive racismand xenophobia in the next few years.

Changes in the EU

and Beyond

The arrival of large numbers ofmigrants in the past 15 years has coincided with regional and globaldevelopments with important implications for Southern Europe’srural areas in general, and its agricultural sector in particular. These developments have specialweight in Greece’s family-centric farming,

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which still holds an important positionin both the economy and society.

As the agricultural sector changes inresponse to national and internationaldevelopments, migration patterns canalso be expected to evolve. Morespecifically, the most recent importantdevelopment is the 2003 introductionof reforms to the CAP. The need forCAP reform was pushed to the forefrontby the EU’s May 2004 enlargement toinclude 10 new Member States whilesimultaneously holding steady the totalEU financial support to agriculture upto 2013. WTO negotiations for a newagreement on agriculture, which haveimplied adjustments to the level ofagricultural supports, have also playeda role. Rounding out the factors creatingmomentum for reform has been pressurefrom European citizens for the produc-tion of safe food and protection of theenvironment.

The new elements of the CAP reforminclude the following: “decoupling” ofsupport for production and the provi-sion of “single-area payment” decoupledfrom what the farmer produces; “cross-compliance” with EU-defined “goodfarming practices” for the protection ofthe environment, public health, foodsafety, and animal welfare; and “modu-lation of support,” which provides forthe redistribution of a portion of directpayments away from large farm holdingsfor the support of rural development.

The implications of CAP reform forthe future of European agriculture aredifficult to foresee and quantify. Someearly studies carried out for the EU

predict extensive restructuring of culti-vation, reduction of agricultural pro-duction in some sectors, extension ofboth crop and animal production, anda 20 percent reduction in the popula-tion in the agricultural sector. All thisis expected to result in an increase inagricultural incomes of no more than1.7 percent. For Greece in particular,contradictions seem to be on the hori-zon. On the one hand, no seriousreduction is expected in the total sup-port for agriculture until 2013. On theother hand, certain producer groups,e.g., cotton cultivators, have alreadyexperienced important income cutsand others are expected to find itimpossible to adjust to the new com-petitive conditions. As a result, theywill have to withdraw from agriculture.

With the old CAP benefits now inquestion, large parts of the agriculturalsector feel threatened not only bycheap imports but also by innovativeand technology-powered competitiveagriculture. The pressures for technolog-ical modernization and the restructuringof agriculture towards both capital andlabor-intensive crops have incited, onthe one hand, a further exodus of farmfamily labor to off-farm employment.On the other hand, they have createdgreater seasonal demand for labor.These developments have been rein-forced by the demographic deficiencyconnected with the aging of the ruralpopulation and the flight of working-age people in particular, which wascreated by the massive rural exodus ofthe 1950s and 1960s and by therestructuring of rural areas. The expan-sion of other non-agricultural activities



such as tourism and housing construc-tion, the return of urban dwellers totheir land of origin, along with thegrowth of new consumption patternsconnected to leisure and recreation,has created a rural environment char-acterized as “multifunctional.” Thelabor demands of this multifunctionalenvironment, in which a combinationof agricultural and non-agriculturalactivities support rural householdincomes, cannot be met by the native-born population.

Dynamics of Migrant

Labor in Rural Greece

While much research remains to bedone, the available data and research bythe author suggest that migrant workershave addressed four structural develop-ments in rural Greece: first, the long-standing shortages of labor that resultedfrom the restructuring of the agriculturalsector and rural economy; second, thedemographic crisis resulting from the1950-1970 rural exodus connectedwith emigration; third, the youngergeneration’s increasing rejection ofrural life and jobs; and fourth, thegrowing opportunities of the rural pop-ulation to obtain off-farm employment.

The way migrant labor has incorpo-rated itself into rural Greece has produced its own dynamics that correspond to each area’s particularsocio-economic conditions. Threerepresentative rural regions, all moreor less equal in population size (4,000 households), are consideredhere based on the author’s research

between 2000-2002. The first is the “marginal/mountainous” regionnear the Albanian border, in thePrefecture of Ioannina, which isdefined by small-scale agriculture and extensive livestock production.The second is a “dynamic” region in coastal Peloponnese, in thePrefecture of Corinthia, which isdefined by labor-intensive agricultureand lowland second-home develop-ment. The last is a “pluriactive”region on the island of Crete, in thePrefecture of Chania, that is typicalof island areas combining agricultureand small-scale tourism.

Marginal/mountainous. This region,which runs along the Albanian border, has been the main gate forboth legal and illegal migrants entering Greece. It is characterized byan elderly population left behind bythe massive rural exodus of the 1950sand 1960s and by limited productiveactivities concentrated in agricultureand stockbreeding. Its marginalityresults not only from its geographyand economy, but also from the cold-war climate in the region developed after the defeat of the leftin the 1946-1949 civil war and theestablishment of communist Albania.The recent development of themountainous communities as “returnsites” for older Greeks and as “recre-ation sites” for the young, the rebuild-ing of the region after a devastatingearthquake in 1996, and the increas-ing support needs of the aged popula-tion have increased the demand forlabor and set the context for thereception of migrants.

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Dynamic. This region has a long historyof market integration and export-drivenagricultural development. Cultivation ofgrapes, the dominant crop, has expand-ed rapidly over the past few years, occu-pying a large part of the cultivable land.Processing and commercial companiesin the region are involved in the exportof this product. The seasonality of thegrape harvest has spurred intensivedemand for labor, particularly during thesummer. The region is characterized bya good age structure and improved educational levels that often lead thenative born into off-farm employment.

Pluriactive. This region combinesactivities that are considered traditionalagriculture, such as olive groves,“dynamic” agriculture such as green-house cultivation, and non-agriculturalbusinesses, particularly small-scaletourism. These activities take place atboth individual and household levels.The local population is aging withoutbeing satisfactorily replaced by ayounger generation. These elementshave created the need for a low-skilled,flexible labor force.

In order to gain insight into thedynamics of migrant labor in ruralGreece, the authors carried out threeempirical studies in each region.

First, a qualitative study was carried outthrough semi-structured interviews oflocal/regional administrators and opin-ion leaders in order to understand thecharacteristics of migration in theregion and opinions on the implicationsof migration for the local economy andsociety.

Second, a survey was made of a repre-sentative sample of households aimedat the collection of information on therole of migrants and the implicationsof migrant employment for the opera-tion of farms, family businesses, andthe overall support of households. Thesurvey also registered the opinions andattitudes of local populations towardsmigrants and their evaluation of theprospects for the migrants’ integration.

Third, a qualitative study was made ofmigrants, in the form of semi-structuredinterviews, aimed at the documentationof the social, economic, and culturalexperiences of the migrants, as well astheir future plans.

This chapter continues by examiningthe impact of migrant employment onthe operation of farms and households,as well as the wider implications migra-tion has for the economic and socialmake-up of rural societies. In the finalpart, some conclusions are drawnabout the contribution of migrantemployment to agriculture and ruralsociety. Recommendations with widerelevance to Southern Europeanmigration policymakers are then pre-sented in the light of developments inboth rural and migration policies.

Migrants and the Farm

Migrants offer an unexpected solutionto Greece’s chronic rural labor short-ages, which are a pressing structuralneed, mainly in regions of intensiveagriculture. The mass availability ofmigrant labor has covered a large



deficit in the workforce and in theearly years of its arrival contributeddecisively to lowering the cost of agricultural production.

The authors’ research shows that two-thirds of the rural households surveyedoperated a farm holding. Just over halfof the total number of rural households(53 percent) and two-thirds of thefarm-operating households (66 per-cent) employed migrant labor. Thesefigures varied widely in the threeregions (Table 1).

Non-family labor contributed almost25 percent of the total labor spent onthe farm, nine-tenths of which wasmigrant labor. The nationality ofalmost four-fifths of these migrantlaborers was Albanian.

The positive contribution of migrantlabor to the local economy varied inaccordance with the size and position

of the agricultural sector in each ofthe three regions. In the “dynamic”region of Corinthia, the contributionof migrants was primarily in agricul-tural production and processing, andonly secondarily in the constructionsector. In the “pluriactive” region ofChania their contribution was to allsectors — not only in agricultural production (seasonal in the case oftraditional agriculture and permanentin the case of modern/intensive) butalso in manufacturing, construction,and tourism. In this region, their contributions were particularly important to “marginal” areas, wheretheir role was expanded to all-aroundsupport for aged rural households.Finally, in the “mountainous/marginal”region, migrants’ contributions weremostly associated with construction of houses and public works, as well as the general support of aged households, while only secondarily in farming and stockbreeding.

Table 1. Employment of Migrants by Rural and Farming

Households, 2000

Ioannina Corinthia Chania Total

Total number of rural 98 96 99 293households

% of rural households 31% 68% 62% 53%employing migrants

Total number of farm- 39 72 81 192operating households

% of farm-operating 28% 88% 65% 66%households employing migrants

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Migrants contributed to the survivaland expansion of the farm holdings.However, the use of migrant laborwas, in economic terms, more significant for the larger farms thanfor the smaller ones. As the size of thefarm increased, so did the weight ofmigrant labor. In farms of 3-5hectares, migrants offered 62 days ofwork annually per farm, while forthose of 5-10 hectares, they offered163. The employment of migrants inagricultural production seemed tohave contributed to an increase insocio-economic differentiation in thecountryside. It is important to notethat a good number of farmers whohave increased the size of their farmoperations in the past decade relate itto the availability of migrant labor.

The employment of non-family/migrant labor in all three researchregions increased extensively in termsof both duration and size in the 1990s.At farms that employed non-familylabor both before the arrival of migrants,in the late 1980s, and after their arrivalin 2000, the number of non-familylabor days per farm doubled from 80 to157 days per farm. In fact, according tothe National Statistical Service ofGreece, between 1991 and 2000 familylabor in Greek agriculture decreased by20 percent, while permanent non-familylabor increased by 85 per cent and sea-sonal labor by 43 percent.

Migrant labor in all three regions hasnot substituted for the local workforce;instead, it has complemented familylabor by covering labor deficits andmeeting increasing demand. At the

same time, it has facilitated the adop-tion of new family employment strate-gies and the partial withdrawal of familylabor from the farm. This dynamicappears to be explained by a combina-tion of developments connected withthe regions’ general lack of working-age people, the new seasonal demandsof agriculture in some rural regions,and the shift of local labor towardsnon-agricultural, more demanding, and specialized job placements.

Evidence of the complementary role ofmigrants appears in the answers givenby survey respondents to the questionasking why they employed migrants.The most common answer (59 percent)to the multiple-choice question was“Because migrants were all we couldfind,” followed by “Because Greeks donot work in the fields” (40 percent),and finally “Because they cost less” (9percent).

Competition for work between thenative born and migrants was noted ina limited number of professions, con-cerning mainly unskilled Greek workersand apprentices in the constructiontrades who could not compete with thelow wages charged by migrant workers.In the agricultural sector, a small num-ber of field hands and a number ofolder women in the food-processingindustry were driven out of the labormarket by low-paid migrant labor.

Following the introduction of migrantemployment, important changes tookplace in the division of family labor onthe farm. The participation of migrantlabor in farm work increased substan-



tially, allowing not only the farmer but also his wife and other familymembers to significantly disengagefrom heavy manual work. As a conse-quence, a division developed betweenmanual and organizational/managerialwork, especially for those operatinglarge farms. Almost 60 percent of thefarm heads reduced their workload anddevoted more time to their farm’sorganization and management. At the same time, their spouses eitherreduced their workload or abandonedfarm work altogether to return exclusively to housework, while otherfamily members sought employmentoutside agriculture.

The developments described abovehave strengthened the existing economicand social pressures connected withthe intensification of competitionamong Greek farmers and foreign com-petitors, the technological moderniza-tion and the specialization of productionfor the professionalization of agriculture,the integration of women into thenon-agricultural labor market, and thetransformation of domestic work intowage labor. To this end, migrants haveprovided, at a low cost, the necessarylabor for the modernization of agricul-ture and an alternative farm anddomestic labor pool that has allowedfamily members to pursue personalemployment and career goals. Forexample, rural women liberated fromfarm work and/or domestic and otherfamily labor have had better prospectsfor seizing opportunities in the non-agricultural labor market. Even theirdomestic work has often been out-sourced to migrants. Thus, a gender

differentiation has been evident in howmigrants contribute to the substitutionand/or complementing of family mem-bers’ farm and household work roles.

In this way, and because of the expan-sion of the wider labor-market charac-teristics to rural areas, migrant workersmay have supported a form of “de-agriculturalization” and “urbaniza-tion” of the Greek countryside. Thismay have been accompanied by a dif-fusion of middle-class attitudes andpractices to rural households. Twoexamples of this can be provided. The first concerns the expansion ofdomestic services provided to ruralhouseholds by migrants — somethingnew compared to the experience ofurban areas — and the second concernsthe development of a new “boss” atti-tude in some parts of Greece’s formerlymore egalitarian rural population.

Migrants and Rural

Households

Migrants can take much of the creditfor maintaining Greece’s elderly popu-lation in their own villages and forpreserving their small-scale activities.In marginal regions, in particular, thehouseholds of the elderly employlaborers needed to repair their houses,look after their vegetable gardens andanimals, and cut their firewood for thewinter — to maintain, in other words,their traditional way of life, which theywould otherwise most likely have lost.

Migrants offer support for the care ofthe aged and physically challenged

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members of rural households. Needlessto say, this development greatlyrelieves the burden on the able-bodiedchildren of these households, whooften had to provide this support inthe absence of a satisfactory social-wel-fare system. All types of labor are usually provided by one or two migrantfamilies settled in a village, or by indi-vidual migrants who arrive periodicallyto cover seasonal labor needs. In someremote villages, migrants also managethe village café, often provided rent-free by the community, thus helping tomaintain the traditional social life.

Beyond these benefits, migration has improved the demography of ruralregions. In mountainous regions, forexample, stockbreeders can now findboth women to marry and the oppor-tunity to establish families. Laborersfacilitate the preservation and expan-sion of their flocks, simultaneouslyimproving working conditions for thenative born.

In the same regions, the extensiveconstruction of housing and publicworks owes much to migration. Sincethe arrival of migrants, people whohad their origins in the region but livedpermanently in cities have found it eas-ier to either repair their family house orconstruct a new one, in a symbolicmove back to the family roots. Migrantsalso contribute to the renovation of oldbuildings and the revival of traditionalarchitectural styles through their car-pentry and masonry skills.

There are two main modes of usingmigrant labor that determine local

attitudes towards migrants. Bothmodes are widespread in the Greekcountryside, but how they are mani-fested varies in accordance with localrural socio-economic conditions andthe availability of migrant labor suitedto those conditions.

The first mode can be defined as entre-preneurial, purely maximizing use, andis connected mostly with large farmsthat extensively employ migrant labor.This mode creates the basis for thewidening of socio-economic inequalityin these regions, because its extensiveapplication leads to higher profit mar-gins for large farms while facilitatingtheir modernization and expansion.This, in turn, is likely to adverselyaffect local social and economic cohesion in ways that have not yetbeen clearly defined. The second canbe defined as a utilitarian, purely functional use that involves a range of rural social groups according to theirneeds and specific conditions underwhich they may employ migrants. Inthis case, migrants play a balancingrole, meeting multiple, small-scaleneeds and labor deficits that cross-cutlocal social structures. What distin-guishes the two modes is the fact thatin the first case, migrants are employedexclusively on farms in accordancewith entrepreneurial principles, whilein the second, their employment islimited in size and multifunctional inrole, satisfying the very basic needs of the rural household.



Local Attitudes Towards

Migrants

In the three regions studied, therewere varied, but in some cases similar,opinions and attitudes towardsmigrants and their contributions tolocal society. These opinions and atti-tudes were not always consistent orpredictable.

In all three regions, both householdmembers and local administrators/representatives of organizationsthought that the presence of migrantshad a positive effect on the local economy, mainly because labor supplyincreased, labor costs fell, and con-sumption expanded. More specifically,almost half of the households surveyedcalled the impact on the local economy“positive,” 30 percent assessed it asboth “positive and negative,” and only 17 percent characterized it solelyas “negative.”

The native-born respondents relatedthe positive impact of migrants primarily to the acquisition of workersand secondarily to lower labor costs.Those respondents who saw negativeimplications mostly referred to areduction in work available to locals.However, such a consequence was notidentified in the regions surveyed.Both respondents who were older andemployers of migrants had the mostpositive attitude of all the respondentstowards the newcomers. This responsemay be connected to declarations bysome of the older respondents that thedeprivation experienced by migrantsreminded them of their own difficult

lives. Another factor reinforcing more positive attitudes among the older generation appears to be bonding inconnection with many migrants’ rolesas caregivers to the elderly.

More negative attitudes were found in younger respondents and those whodid not hire migrants. These respon-dents showed a lack of experience with migration and deprivation. This,coupled with a “perceived fear” of anincoming economic, social, and cultur-al “threat,” seemed to lead to expres-sions of xenophobia.

Respondents expressed the belief thatthe local economic sectors that bene-fitted the most from migrant laborwere first, agriculture, and second,construction. As a consequence, farmholders had positive impressions aboutmigrant labor on their land. Themajority of respondents (60 percent)saw only “positive” implications and alarge number (29 percent) “no impact”at all. “Negative” implications wereonly noted by a limited number ofrespondents.

When asked to clarify the positiveimplications of migration, the mostpopular answers given by farmers werethat migrants helped them “preservethe farm” (35 percent) and “reduce the cost of labor” (22 percent). In thedynamic region, respondents also mentioned that they were “able toenlarge the farm holding” and “devotemore time to the management of theirfarm.” In the pluriactive region,respondents emphasized that their“production increased,” that they were

200

allowed to be “employed in off-farmactivities,” and that they were able to“secure a better quality of production.”Finally, in the marginal/mountainousregion, respondents stressed that thepresence of migrants made possible the“maintenance of unprofitable/subsis-tence agricultural activities.”

There were, however, negative stereo-types common to all three regionsstudied, mainly concerning Albanianmigrants. These stereotypes appearedto reflect national stereotypes, alllargely shaped by the mass media,rather than stereotypes developedlocally as a product of the respondents’everyday social experiences.

The research indicated that migrantworkers were relatively more acceptedand integrated in the less-developedrural regions than in the developedones. This was related to the the proportion of migrants in the totalpopulation of each region, their familystatus, and their job characteristics.For example, there seemed to be agreater acceptance of intergratingmigrants who lived permanently inone region together with their families,as opposed to seasonal/irregular laborers traveling without families.

Migrants and the local population hadlargely overlapping opinions about theprospects for integration. Both popula-tions believed that the prospects forintegration were much better formigrants who lived in the countrysidewith their families. In addition, bothpopulations shared the feeling thatintegration was not unfeasible and that

the last decade’s changes had alreadyleft their mark on the social and eco-nomic life of rural regions.

These migrants adopted strategies thatwere immediately related to the futureof their children. Education and strate-gies for these migrant families’ integra-tion into the local economy and societyseemed to be more successful. Formigrants with no family members inGreece, a longer timeframe was consid-ered necessary because their integrationprocess was much slower.

A consensus was evident amongrespondents on the issue of regulariza-tion of undocumented migrants.Regularization was widely consideredan essential precondition for the inte-gration of migrants into local societyand the labor market. In step with thisattitude, the majority of respondentstook a positive position on the mostrecent regularization initiatives (Act2910/2001) of the central government.

Conclusions and Policy

Recommendations

Over the past 15 years, migrant laborhas contributed to the economic, social,and demographic survival of Greekagriculture and rural regions, whichhave been threatened by demographi-cally, structurally, and socially createdlabor shortages. Migrants had a positiveimpact in the following key ways:

First, they have been very importantfor the agricultural and wider economicdevelopment of rural areas. Migrants



have been employed in many tasks, with differing skills, and withsignificant geographic mobility overthe seasons. In short, they have provided a highly flexible labor force.They have not supplanted native wagelaborers; rather, they have comple-mented family labor, improving theorganization and management offarms, relieving family members ofmanual tasks, and facilitating thesearch for off-farm employment. Hiredto do arduous, health-threatening, andlow-paid jobs, they have greatly servedagriculture and other sectors such asconstruction and tourism that areoften shunned by native-born workers.

Second, in regions where agricultureholds a significant position in thelocal economy, the positive conse-quences of migrant labor have rangedfrom farm preservation to farmexpansion and modernization. Themost appreciated economic effectshave been on large-scale farms andbusinesses that depend heavily on theavailability of migrant labor. Migrantshave played a significant role in thesefarms’ expansion, agricultural intensification, and modernization. Forsmaller and pluriactive farms, theyhave offered the opportunity to preservethe farm while the farm operatorand/or family members hold off-farmjobs. In marginal areas, migrants haveprovided rural households with thelabor necessary for the maintenanceof their traditional/cultural life. This last contribution is key tounderstanding the social and demographic implications ofmigrants’ presence in rural Greece.

Third, migrants have offered greatservices in other forms of rural economic activities such as construc-tion, tourism, and personal/domesticservices. The generally positive view ofmigrants’ contributions to the localeconomy has been further strengthenedthrough migrants’ support for themaintenance of social and economiccontinuity in the Greek countryside.

The Greek experience is a valuableframe of reference for policymakers of most Southern European countries— and indeed, some in NorthernEurope — as they grapple with thechallenges and opportunities of migration. These policymakers mustcope with Southern Europe’s persistentdemographic and structural problems,the informality of rural labor markets,and the exodus of native workers fromrural areas as a result of increasedsocial and economic expectations. Ifnot tackled, these issues are expectedto negatively affect the future of ruralareas at a time of severe worldwidepressures connected with the WTO negotiations, CAP reforms, and EU enlargement.

Prevailing policy instruments, however,are generalized and are not sufficientlytargeted. They are predominantly basedon production or factors of productionsuch as land and capital. In addition,they have a negative impact on equityand income distribution, and much ofthe funding is transferred to beneficiarieswho are not in need of support.

European policymakers must formulateflexible responses to this combination

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of pressures and inadequate agriculturalpolicies, including the need to:

� Judge policies on how effectivelythey reverse the trend of migrantworkers flowing from rural areasto urban centers. Strong evidenceindicates that conventional sector-specific agricultural policy meas-ures, despite their high cost, donot deliver sufficient income sup-port to households and smallfarms, especially those in remoteand mountainous areas. Improvedincome distribution and enhance-ment for such households wouldundoubtedly have a beneficialimpact on migrant workers’ well-being and would provideincentives for them to continuetheir activities in such areas.

� Define target groups at thenational level on the basis ofsound criteria in order to designand implement proper policies.Farms and rural households thatlack resources and that are located in areas with no viableeconomic alternatives are earning low incomes. Such areascould be made more attractive to investors by properly designed rural policies such asinfrastructure improvement.

� Provide the appropriate incentives(targeted payments, training, andinformation, etc.) to less-efficientsmall farmers and rural householdsin target areas to ensure that theycan continue to provide desiredpublic goods by remaining in thecountryside with the support ofmigrant workers.

In relation to migration and migrationpolicies, the plethora of more or lessrestrictive national policies and bilateralagreements on migrant entry, quotas,etc., highlight the need to:

� Regulate migration at the EUlevel and consolidate the widerange of national provisions under an EU directive that wouldsecure the balanced integration of migrants in rural economiesand societies.

� Design operational plans at anational level and adopt differentiated policies, on thebasis of varying regional charac-teristics, for the management ofregional/seasonal or permanentdemands for labor. Greece, forexample, needs to redesign thelegal and administrative frameworkfor the legal entry of migrants. For agriculture, in particular, therecent regularization (Act 2910/2001) makes it nearly impossiblefor migrants to obtain legal entryfor seasonal employment — hencethe danger of new illegal migrationin the future, particularly inregions of intensive agriculture.

� Expand EU agricultural trainingprograms to include migrants in a way that improves their professional capabilities andunderstanding of new farmingpractices within the framework ofnew EU agricultural policies.

Policy formulation of this sort presupposes an informed discussion byall parties of the nature and implica-tions of this complex and spreading



phenomenon. A step in the right direction would be for the EU to establish a rural migrant labor observa-tory that would provide the quantita-tive and qualitative information need-ed to regulate and monitor migration,while identifying the needs, difficul-ties, and experiences of migrantsthemselves.

The demographic and structural prob-lems of Southern Europe’s agricultureand rural regions require policies thatwill regulate and monitor integration,while evaluating policies with an eye tosocial justice and economic efficiency.This must be done within the scope ofsupporting the restructuring of theagricultural sector and the developmentof the countryside, which faces inter-national pressures and the new EUpolicies of rural environmental protec-tion, production of quality agriculturalgoods, and multifunctionality.

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Future Demographic Change

in Europe : The Contribution

of Migration

Wolfgang Lutz and

Sergei Scherbov

208

Europe is frequently called the“Old Continent” and it trulydeserves this name in a demo-

graphic sense. Europe’s populationcurrently has the highest median ageof any world region, 37.7 years,according to the United Nations. Bythe middle of the century, the medianage is likely to be as high as 48 years inEurope, while in the “New World,”i.e., North America, the median agewill be around 40. The rest of theworld will be younger still.

Europe spearheaded global demographicgrowth in the 19th and 20th centuries,and it is likely to spearhead populationaging in the 21st century. Thepopulation above age 60 has beenincreasing rapidly, and that below age20 has been diminishing. Because ofthe very low levels of reproduction thathave prevailed in large parts of Europeover the past decades, the age structureof the population has already beenaltered to such a degree that there will be fewer and fewer women ofreproductive age in the years to come.The total population size of Europe isexpected to decline in the long run,even when assuming sizeable immigra-tion and continued increases in lifeexpectancy. Without migration gains,Europe’s population would age evenmore rapidly and population size wouldstart to decline in the near future.

Although significant future populationaging in Europe is a near certainty, theexact degree of aging will depend onfuture trends in fertility, mortality, andmigration that cannot yet be fullyanticipated. There is significant

uncertainty around the three keyquestions: Will the birth rates inEurope recover, stay around thecurrent level, or even continue to fall?Are we already close to a maximumlife expectancy beyond which therewill be no further decline in mortalityrates? And how many migrants willenter Europe in the coming decades?

All three of these factors matter forthe future population size and structureof Europe, but this chapter willprimarily focus on the role of migra-tion in future population dynamics.This will be achieved by looking atdifferent possible future migrationregimes against the background ofrealistic ranges of future fertility andmortality changes. A short summary ofthe principles of population dynamicswill be followed by a look at proba-bilistic population projections for theEuropean Union and an attempt toquantify the importance of futuremigration for this outlook. The finalpart of the chapter will explicitly andsystematically address the frequentlyasked question: To what degree canimmigration compensate for the lowbirth rate in Europe?

Population Dynamics

As compared to other social andeconomic factors, demographic trendsare very stable and have great momen-tum. For this reason, populationdynamics can be projected with greateraccuracy over a longer time span. Ofcourse, such projections are notabsolutely certain because human


Future Demographic Change in Europe: The Contribution of Migration 209

behavior is not purely deterministic,and there can be unforeseen trendsand disasters. But since most of thepeople who will be alive in 2020 arealready alive today, we know with ahigh degree of probability what the agestructure of the labor force is likely tobe in that year.

Future population size and agestructures are determined by thepresent age structure and the futuretrends in three basic demographiccomponents: fertility (birth rate),mortality (death rate), and migration.Any change in the population mustoperate through one of these threefactors. But due to the great inertia ofpopulation dynamics, even ratherrapid changes in one of the factorsmay take quite a long time to have animpact on the total population. If, forinstance, smaller and smaller cohortsof women are entering the childbearingages, even a possible increase in themean number of children per womanmay not lead to an increase in thetotal number of births. Similarly, theso-called “Baby Boom” (and not adiscontinuity in life expectancy gains)is the main reason why we expect theproportion of the population above age60 to increase sharply after 2020.

The fact that there are only threefactors to be considered in populationprojections does not necessarily makethe task easier, because the projectionof each of the factors is difficult andassociated with significant uncertainties.Even the future of mortality, whichtraditionally has been considered themost stable demographic trend with

steady improvements over the years,has recently become more uncertain.Over the last 50 years, life expectancyin Western Europe has increased byabout 10 years, implying an averagegain of two years per decade. Despitethis significant gain, which hassurpassed all expectations expressed inearlier years, most statistical officesproducing projections assume aslowing of improvements over thecoming years and in some cases evenconstant life expectancy. Eurostat, thestatistical office of the EuropeanCommission, assumes, in the mediumprojection, a gain in life expectancy atbirth of about three years over a periodof 20 years. But there is increasingscientific uncertainty about limits tohuman longevity and consequentlyabout the future gains still to beexpected. In contrast to the traditionallydominant view that we are alreadyvery close to such a limit (actually, theassumed limits are being constantlymoved upwards by projectors as realgains surpass their expectations),alternative views suggest that suchlimits (if they even exist) might bewell above 100 years. This scientificuncertainty about the future trends inold-age mortality also needs to bereflected in the population projections.

Fertility is the most influential of thethree demographic components undera longer time horizon. Changes infertility not only impact the number ofchildren, but also the number ofgrandchildren, etc. For this reason,relatively small changes in fertilitymay have very significant consequencesfor population size and age structure in

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the longer run. Despite its significance,we know fairly little about the futuretrends of fertility in Europe. Historysince World War II does not help usanticipate the future trend. During the“Baby Boom,” most Western Europeancountries had period fertility rates ofabove 2.5 children per woman. Thiswas followed by a rapid fertility declineduring the 1970s, bringing theEuropean average down to about 1.5.Since then we have seen divergingtrends, typically at levels well belowreplacement fertility. The mostsignificant fertility declines haveappeared in the Mediterraneancountries, with Italy and Spain havingaround 1.2 children per woman. Someof the Central and Eastern Europeancountries have reached even lowerlevels, while France and the NorthernEuropean countries have showedsomewhat higher levels. There havealso been significant regional differen-tials within countries, e.g., betweennorthern and southern Italy.

A further uncertainty is due to the factthat part of these trends is caused bythe depressing effect of “tempo”changes, i.e., a postponement of births,and it is unclear for how long this willcontinue. There is no clear scientificparadigm to adequately anticipatefuture reproductive behavior. Thenotion of a “second demographictransition” has been suggested tocapture these trends, but it does not saywhere and when the end-point of thistransition might be reached. For thisreason, again, population projectionsneed to reflect uncertainty through arange of fertility assumptions.

Migration is the most volatile of thethree demographic components. Thenumber of people entering or leavinga country can change from one yearto the next due to political events orthe enforcement of new legislation.The past 10 years have witnessedgreat ups and downs in Europeanmigration levels. The problem withprojecting migration trends is notonly the intrinsic difficulty offoreseeing such political events, butalso the fact that net migration is theresult of two partly independentstreams (in-migration and out-migration) that depend on conditionsin both sending and receivingcountries. In this respect, projectionscan do little more than demonstratethe impacts of alternative net-migration assumptions.

Policies to manage the future andmeet demographic challenges requirethe best available information aboutfuture demographic trends. Thestandard way to project the futurepopulation path that is consideredmost likely by experts is a well-established methodology, the so-called“cohort component” method. Themore difficult issue is how to deal withuncertainty in future demographictrends. As indicated above, there aresignificant uncertainties associatedwith all three components: fertility,mortality, and migration.

The conventional way of handlingthese uncertainties is to producedifferent scenarios or variants thatcombine alternative fertility assumptions with single mortality and



migration paths. The current practice of providing “high” and“low” variants to communicateuncertainty around the mediumprojection suffers from severaldrawbacks. The most important are:(a) in many cases, variants onlyaddress fertility uncertainty, ignoringmortality and migration uncertainty;(b) the variants approach is unspecificabout the probability range coveredby the “high” and “low” variants; (c) the variants are probabilisticallyinconsistent when aggregating overcountries or regions because thechances of extreme outcomes in manycountries or regions at once areportrayed as being the same as anextreme outcome in a single country or region; and (d) thevariants typically do not allow forfluctuations such as baby booms andbusts that can produce bulges in theage structure.

These problems can only be solved by turning to “fully probabilisticprojections” to cover the uncertainty.

Probabilistic population projectionsare a rather recent methodologicaldevelopment about which a large bodyof literature has been written. Thespecific methodology applied in thispaper has been extensively describedelsewhere and cannot be described indetail here. The model specificationsfollow those of the 13 world regionsdelineated by the authors and WarrenC. Sanderson in 2001.

Comparing Population

Outlooks

This section presents two different setsof population projections for the EU(with its 15 Member States as of2003)1. Both are based on identicalassumptions about the future ranges offertility and mortality, but havedifferent migration assumptions. Thecase labelled “regular” considers the fullrange of uncertainty in future migrationas it looks plausible from today’sperspective. In the second case, whichis labelled “no migration,” the purelyhypothetical, unrealistic case of Europebeing entirely closed to migration isexamined. The comparison betweenthe two projections will allow us toevaluate the contribution of migrationto Europe’s demographic future.

In numerical terms, the followingassumptions are made about futuretrends. For fertility, we assume that by 2030 there is likely to besome recovery, with the total fertilityrate (TFR) increasing from thecurrent 1.5 children per woman to1.7. The 80 percent uncertainty rangeis half a child up and down from thismedian. In other words, we assumethat in 80 percent of all simulatedcases in 2030, the TFR in the EU 15will lie between 1.2 and 2.2. Thisrange is kept constant until 2050. For female life expectancy, whichcurrently stands at 81.5, we assumethat the 80 percent range will be82.9-88.9 in 2030 and 84.9-94.9 in

1 The text of this chapter was completed in early 2005, using the most recent data available at that time. Populationprojections that incorporate the EU accession countries would follow a similar trajectory.

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2050. For male life expectancy, whichpresently is 75.5, the assumed 80percent ranges are 77.0-83.0 for 2030and 78.3-88.7 for 2050. Each uncer-tainty distribution is modeled interms of a normal distribution withtails of 10 percent of the cases aboveand below the stated values.

For future migration into the EU 15,the following assumptions were made.In the “regular” case, the annual netmigration gain for the EU was considered to lie between zero and onemillion in 80 percent of the cases forevery year. This means that an averageannual migration gain of half a millionwas assumed. But the assumed uncer-tainty distribution also implies that in10 percent of the cases, Europe actuallyloses migrants and in another 10percent will gain more than onemillion. In the “no migration” case aclosed population was assumed, i.e., theEU is neither winning nor losingpeople by migration. For each of thecases 1,000 independent populationprojections by age and sex wereperformed drawing each year from the above-defined fertility, mortality,and migration distributions withstochastic annual fluctuations (whichavoid traditional but unrealisticassumptions of linear trends, insteadproviding for more realistic annual upsand downs in rates).

Figures 1a and 1b show the resultinguncertainty distribution for the future total population size of the 15 Member States of the EU. Theyshow that, as can be expected, theuncertainty range expands over time.

For the coming decade, the range isvery narrow, while in 2050 the 95percent range goes almost from 300million to 450 million inhabitants. Inthe “regular” case (Figure 1a), the totalpopulation of the EU 15 is still likely(in more than half of the simulations)to increase somewhat until around2020 and then start to decline. Themedian of the projection shows a smallincrease from the current 376 millionto 385 million in 2025, followed by adecline to 376 million in 2050 (seeTable 1). In other words, even in thecase of significant immigration (on theorder of half a million per year) thepopulation size in the EU 15 is likelyto be smaller in 2050 than it is today.

In the case of a hypothetically closedpopulation (the “no migration” caseshown in Figure 1b), the median startsto fall immediately. An initiallymoderate decline will then gainmomentum over time and result in arather steep decline after 2030. In thiscase, the median would decline byaround 10 million over the coming 25years, but by more than 30 millionover the second quarter century. Acomparison of the two “trumpets” ofuncertainty in Figure 1 shows that theuncertainty range for the “regular” caseis much broader than for the “nomigration” case because of the addedmigration uncertainty, which makes asignificant difference in the totaluncertainty. The comparison of thetwo graphs shows that in the case of“no migration” the uncertainty isessentially downwards, i.e., the openquestion would not be whether thepopulation declines, but by how much



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migration into account and including fractiles of the

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Figure 2. Age pyramid of the population of the European

Union (EU 15) in 2000

it declines, depending on futurefertility and mortality trends.

In 2050, the median of the “nomigration” projection is 35 millionlower than that of the “regular”projection. This is on the order of 10percent of the total population of theEU 15. In other words, this shows thatover a 50-year horizon, migration gainsin the EU 15 are likely to make adifference of 10 percent in totalpopulation size.

But migration matters not only forpopulation size; the speed and thedegree of population aging are alsosensitive to migration. Table 1 showsthat the proportion of the populationage 65 or above is almost certain toincrease from its current level of 16.3percent under practically all condi-

tions, with or without migration. Anymeaningfully assumed level of immi-gration, even when combined withhigh fertility and low gains in lifeexpectancy, cannot stop a verysignificant increase in the proportionof the elderly. In terms of the medians,it would increase to 30.8 percent inthe “regular” case and to 32.5 percentin the “no migration” case by 2050(see Table 1). This difference looksrelatively minor when compared to thehuge change from the current 16.3percent. The difference is on the orderof 10 percent of the expected increase.Ninety percent of the increase isalready embedded in the current agestructure due to continued low fertilityand increasing life expectancy.

A look at the full age pyramids isvery illuminating. Figure 2 shows the


Table 1. Total population and proportion above age 65

in the EU 15 (medians with 80 percent uncertainty ranges),

“regular” and “no migration” cases

Year Total Population Proportion 65+(in millions)

2000 376 0.163

2025 “regular” 385 0.226(369-401) (0.214-0.238)

“no migration” 367 0.235(355-378) (0.222-0.246)

2050 “regular” 369 0.308(325-418) (0.268-0.355)

“no migration” 334 0.325(300-372) (0.282-0.368)

current age pyramid of the EU 15.There the picture is clearly dominatedby the so-called “Baby Boom” generation, those large cohorts bornduring the 1960s. Never before andnever since have birth cohorts been thatlarge. The pyramid is narrow at thebottom as a consequence of the declinein birth rates since the 1970s. This agestructure has future population agingand even shrinking pre-programmed. Atthe moment, the sizes of youngercohorts are still a bit inflated by the factthat the large “Baby Boom” cohortshave just moved through their primereproductive ages, increasing thenumber of potential mothers. Over thecoming years, the number of potentialmothers in Europe will significantlydecline and therefore the number ofbirths will go down, even in theunlikely case that fertility would fully

recover to the replacement level of twosurviving children.

Figure 3 gives probabilistic agepyramids for the population of thecurrent EU 15 for the year 2050.These pictures are still dominated bythe “Baby Boom” generation, which in2050 will be above age 80. The femalesides of the pyramids show that thiscohort of women ages 80-85 is stilllikely to be the biggest cohort alive.This is difficult to imagine today, butespecially in the “no migration case,”Figure 3b clearly shows that in 2050no other age group of women will beas numerous as those ages 80-85. Thisincredible pattern is somewhat lesspronounced for men because of theirlower life expectancy. By 2050 a higherproportion of male members of the“Baby Boom” generation will have died.

216

Figures 3a and b also show howimportant fertility uncertainty is in thelonger run. Under the “regular”projections (Figure 3a), the 95 percentuncertainty range for children aged 0to 1 goes from less than one millionchildren to about three millionchildren, i.e., it differs by a factor ofthree. No other age group has suchhuge uncertainties. Uncertainty at thehighest ages is also quite sizable due tothe uncertainty about the futureincrease in life expectancy. The rangeis smallest for ages 50-70, which arethe cohorts born between 1980 and2000. These cohorts are only affectedby migration uncertainty, because theyare already alive today (we know theactual cohort size; there is no fertilityuncertainty) and they have not yetentered the high mortality ages inwhich mortality uncertainty mattersgreatly. This is also evident in the “nomigration” case (Figure 3b). There, forthe cohorts born shortly before 2000,there is no uncertainty because in thisprojection there is zero migration andtherefore no migration uncertainty.

Figures 3a and b, which provide acomparison between the two agepyramids, also illustrate visually whathas been discussed about the contribu-tion of migration to population sizeand aging above. In the “no migra-tion,” case the pyramid is narrower atthe base because of fewer youngpeople in Europe and smaller in totalarea because of smaller total popula-tion size. The “regular” pyramid has abroader base because migrants tend tocome at a younger age and becausemigrants also have children. These

projections assume, for simplicity’ssake, that immigrants have the sameaverage birth rates as the generalpopulation. If it is assumed thatimmigrants have on average morechildren, the difference between the two cases becomes even morepronounced.

Can Immigration

Compensate for Low

Fertility?

The second part of this chapterchooses another demographicapproach to studying the quantitativecontribution of migration. Withoutconsidering the full uncertainty offuture demographic trends, it focuseson this specific question: What are the implications for Europe’s popula-tion size and structure of alternativefuture fertility levels combined withalternative levels of immigration?What follows presents the results of 28 scenarios that combine sevendifferent fertility levels with fourdifferent migration levels for the 15 Member States.

Figures 4 and 5 present selectedfindings from a large number ofdifferent simulations that werecalculated at the level of the EU 15with a population of 376 million in2000. Since the discussion of thisquestion mainly concerns the long-termimpacts, the figures only show theresults for 2050. They are based onalternative population projections inwhich fertility and net migration arekept constant over time at the levelindicated, while mortality — the third



Figure 3b. Probabilistic population pyramids for the European

Union (EU 15) for 2050, with the “no migration” case. The

different shadings refer to the fractiles of the uncertainty

distributions (see Figure 1)

0 1 2 3 42050204520402035203020252020201520102005200019951990198519801975197019651960195519501945

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MALES FEMALES

Figure 3a. Probabilistic population pyramids for the

European Union (EU 15) for 2050, with the “regular”

projection. The different shadings refer to the fractiles of

the uncertainty distributions (see Figure 1)

218

component of population change — is improving slowly, as assumed inthe regular projections (the median ofthe above-discussed uncertaintydistribution). The figures group theprojection results by the assumed TFRranging from 1.0 to 2.2. For 1999,Eurostat gives a TFR of 1.45 for theEU 15, which covers a range fromSpain (1.19), Italy (1.21), Greece(1.30), and Austria (1.30), at the lowend, to Denmark (1.74), Finland(1.74), France (1.77), and Ireland(1.89), at the high end, according tothe European Commission in 2001.The different bars under each fertilityassumption refer to different assumedlevels of net migration gain. For 1999,Eurostat estimates a positive netmigration rate of 1.9 (per 1,000population) for the EU 15, which inabsolute terms implies a migration gainof 714,000 persons.

Over the past decade, however,migration flows have shown strongannual fluctuations and great differ-ences between the 15 Member States.The figures show the results for fourdifferent levels of annual net migra-tion, ranging from zero (no migrationgains) at the low end to a constantannual gain of 1.2 million, which overthe 50-year period would accumulateto a 60 million immigration surplus.

Figure 4 presents the results withrespect to the total population size oftoday’s EU 15. Not surprisingly, thelowest population size in 2050 (271million, or a 28 percent decline fromtoday) results from the combination ofa TFR of 1.0 with the assumption ofzero net migration gains. At the highend, the combination of a TFR of 2.2with a 1.2 million annual migrationgain results in a population size of 431


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Figure 4. Total population of the European Union (EU 15) in

2050, according to alternative projections assuming a

wide range of fertility and annual net migration levels.

The level of 2000 is marked as a black line


million in 2050, which is an increaseof 15 percent as compared to today. Of all the alternative scenariosincluded in the figure, the overwhelm-ing majority point to populationdecline, but the impacts and thedifferences among the scenarios arenot too dramatic considering that theyreflect change over half a century. Thisshows that total population size is arather inert variable, and even ratherextreme combinations of assumptionsaffect it very slowly.

Figure 5 shows that the populationage structure is expected to changemore rapidly and more profoundlythan population size. The graph plotsthe so-called old-age dependencyratio, which is defined here as theproportion of the population aboveage 65 divided by the population ages15-64. At the level of the EU 15 this

ratio is presently 0.24. Due to theinevitable changes that are mostlypre-programmed in the current agestructure of the population, this ratiois bound to increase significantlyunder all scenarios. Up to 2050, thisdependency ratio will increase by afactor of roughly two to threedepending on the future fertility andmigration levels assumed. It isinteresting to see that even massiveimmigration to Europe makes littledifference for the old-age dependencyratio. This difference is somewhatmore pronounced in the case of very low assumed fertility and lesspronounced for the higher fertilityscenarios. Even in the extreme case of60 million young immigrants added tothe EU labor force, over the next fivedecades the expected increase in theold-age dependency ratio would beonly slightly more moderate than

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Figure 5. Old-age dependency ratio for the European Union

(EU 15) in 2050, according to alternative projections

assuming a wide range of fertility and annual net migra-

tion levels. The level of 2000 is marked as a black line

220

under current migration rates and not even significantly different from the other extreme case of nomigration gains.

The above-described analysis showsthat there is a clear compensatoryrelationship between fertility andmigration: A TFR of 1.0 combinedwith a migration gain of 1.2 millionper year yields the same old-agedependency ratio in 2050 as a TFR of 2.2 and a migration gain of zero.There even is a fairly clear generallinear relationship that holds for bothpopulation size and the old-agedependency ratio: One millionimmigrants per year have the sameeffect as a TFR difference of 1.0. On a more realistic scale, the effect of 100,000 additional immigrants peryear corresponds to that of an increasein the TFR of 0.1.

Discussion and

Recommendations

The question discussed in this chapterhas gained wide public prominencefollowing the 2000 publication of aUnited Nations (UN) study entitled“Replacement Migration: Is It aSolution to Declining and AgingPopulations?” This study presentsseveral scenarios for a set of eightcountries as well as Europe and theEU as aggregates. One scenariocomputes and assumes the migrationrequired to maintain the size of totalpopulation; another keeps theworking-age population constant; and yet another maintains the current

support ratio, i.e., the proportion ofthe population ages 15-64 over thepopulation 65 or older. For theindividual countries, the results showthat significant immigration can resultin constant population sizes and evenconstant sizes of the working agepopulation, whereas the support ratio can only be maintained withimplausibly high immigration levels.The absurd number of 5.1 billionimmigrants necessary to maintain aconstant support ratio until 2050 inthe Republic of Korea has received alot of attention in this context. Forthe EU 15, these calculations showthat a total of 47.5 million migrants(or 0.95 million per year) would berequired to keep the population sizeconstant; 79.4 million (or 1.6 millionper year) would be needed to maintainthe working-age population; and animpossible 674 million (13.5 millionper year) would be needed to keep the support ratio constant. It wasinteresting to see that in terms ofpublic reactions to these calculations,one could find opposing conclusionsranging from “immigration can never solve the aging problem” to“immigration is urgently needed tosolve the aging problem.”

This UN study chose an approach that works top down — or moreprecisely, “back from the future.” A certain demographic target (such as keeping the working agepopulation constant) is set and thenone calculates what immigrationwould be needed to achieve this goal,assuming invariant paths of futurefertility and mortality. This chapter



does not set a target, but rathercalculates the outcomes of possiblevariations in the future paths of allthree demographic components:fertility, mortality, and migration.Since policy considerations typicallyare not based on a certain target in thedistant future that is difficult toestablish and defend substantively, butrather work in terms of processesevolving over time, the approachpresented in this chapter may be morerelevant for policy discussions aboutmigration in the context of an agingEuropean population.

From the above analysis, two specificpolicy recommendations can be drawn:

1) It is not correct to speak of a “need of migrants for demographicreasons,” a phrase often heard inpolicy circles. Demography andexercises in population dynamicsof the kind presented in thischapter are transparent andobjective calculations that do notprove or disprove any “need.”Demography can show that withnear certainty in Europe, the ratioof people ages 20-30 to people ageabove 60 will decline over thecoming decades. Whether or notthis is seen as a serious problemdepends on judgments about theconsequences of such trends thathave little to do with demography.And even if it is considered aproblem, immigration is not theonly solution; there are otherpossible counter-strategies, such asincreased female labor forceparticipation, increases in the ageof retirement, or faster gains in

labor productivity through better,continued education. Having saidthis, it is difficult to imagine that aEurope entirely closed to migrationwould not suffer welfare losses.

2) Of the three determinants ofpopulation change, only fertilityand migration can be subject toinfluence by policies in order todiminish the speed of aging (formortality, only interventions thatcontinue to bring down old-agemortality are acceptable, althoughthey reinforce population aging).It is important to be clear thatfertility and migration have a verydifferent timing with respect totheir impacts on populationdynamics. Migrants can be letinto the country at rather shortnotice (provided that themechanisms are in place) at thetime when a labor shortage isimminent. In contrast, policiesaimed at increasing the birth rateneed more than two decades inorder to result in additionaleducated members in the laborforce. This crucial difference intiming is often forgotten in thedebates, but it makes a bigdifference when it comes to theplanning of policies.

222

References

Bongaarts, J. and F. Griffith. “On the quantum andtempo of fertility.” Population and DevelopmentReview 24, no. 2(1998): 271-291.

Bucht, B. “Mortality trends in developingcountries: A survey.” In The Future Populationof the World: What Can We Assume Today?Revised Edition, edited by W. Lutz. London:Earthscan, 1996.

Cliquet, R.L. The second demographic transition: Factor fiction? Population Studies Series, no. 23.Strasbourg: Council of Europe, 1991.

European Commission. Demographic Report 1997:Employment and Social Affairs. Luxembourg:Office for Official Publications of the EuropeanCommunities, 1998.

European Commission. The Social Situation in theEuropean Union 2001. Luxembourg: Office forOfficial Publications of the EuropeanCommunities, 2001.

Lutz, W. “The future of international migration.”In The Future of Europe’s Population. PopulationStudies Series, no. 26, edited by R. Cliquet.Strasbourg: Council of Europe Press, 1993.

Lutz, W. and J. Goldstein, eds. “How to Deal withUncertainty in Population Forecasting.”International Statistical Review 72 (2004): 1-4.

Lutz, W., B.C. O’Neill, and S. Scherbov. “Europe’spopulation at a turning point.” Science 299(2003): 1991-1992.

Lutz, W., W.C. Sanderson, and S. Scherbov. “Theend of world population growth.” Nature 412(2001): 543-545.

Lutz, W., W.C. Sanderson, and S. Scherbov. “Theend of world population growth.” In The End ofWorld Population Growth in the 21st Century:New challenges for human capital formation andsustainable development, edited by W. Lutz andW.C. Sanderson. London: Earthscan, 2004.

Lutz, W., J.W. Vaupel, and D.A. Ahlburg, eds.Frontiers of population forecasting. Supplement toPopulation and Development Review 24 (1999).

United Nations Population Division. Replacementmigration: Is it a solution to declining and aging populations? New York: United NationsPopulation Division. ESA/P/WP.160, 2000.

United Nations Population Division. WorldPopulation Prospects: The 2002 Revision. NewYork: United Nations, 2003.

Van de Kaa, D.J. “Europe’s second demographictransition.” Population Bulletin 42, no.1 (1987):1-59.

Vaupel, J.W. and H. Lundström. “The future ofmortality at older ages in developed countries.”In The future population of the world: What canwe assume today? (Revised Edition), edited byW. Lutz. London: Earthscan, 1996.


Selecting Economic

Migrants

Demetrios G. Papademetriou and

Kevin O’Neil

224

Introduction

The demographic predicament of most advanced industrialnations is by now clear enough.

So is the fact that the market forgoods, many types of services, and,indeed, workers of all skill levels nowcuts across international borders. Therole that immigration will play inmaintaining the economic vitality ofthe developed countries through thedemographic transition, globalization,and other challenges, however, is anything but clear.

The so-called “Traditional Countriesof Immigration” (TCIs) — for thepurpose of this chapter, Australia,Canada, New Zealand, and theUnited States (US) — have longrecruited immigrants for economicreasons and are most explicitly opento immigration. Even in these coun-tries, the question of how many andwhich immigrants to admit remainsvery much open. Although immigra-tion is clearly a part of these coun-tries’ economic futures, none hasachieved a perfect formula for manag-ing it, and each is continually redefin-ing and changing their policy.

Europe is even more deeply ambiva-lent about immigration. Althoughmany European countries now rivaland even exceed the TCIs in numberof immigrants per capita, Europeancountries in general have a less devel-oped framework for admitting economicimmigrants. On one hand, there isgreat concern over the social and cul-tural change that immigration brings

and the possibility that migration maythreaten the sustainability of Europeanwelfare states. On the other hand,there is growing acknowledgement thatEurope needs the young workers thatthe rest of the world has to offer andthat the rhetoric of “zero immigration”is impossible to put into practice.

This latter, new line of thought has ledmany forward thinkers to concludethat Europe would benefit from aproactive approach to immigration, inwhich immigrants would be recruitedspecifically for the economic benefitsthey would bring. Such a strategy wouldraise the proportion of immigrants thata country “chooses” for economic andrelated reasons relative to those overwhose admissions it has relatively littlecontrol (immigrants who are reunifyingwith family members, humanitarianimmigrants, and irregular migrants).This would have countries like France(which admits only about 10 percentof its permanent immigrants each yearfor “economic” motives) adopt policiesmore like those of countries such asCanada (which selects around 23 percent of its immigrants for economicpurposes, primarily by level of educa-tion and other personal characteristics,and admits another 30 percent of itsimmigrants as the immediate family ofthese immigrants).

This chapter discusses various strategiesthat have been developed for recruiting,selecting, and admitting economicallyactive immigrants, and examines theadvantages, pitfalls, and potential ofeach. It does not attempt to exhaus-tively catalog the immigration policies


Selecting Economic Migrants 225

and outcomes of developed countries— an exercise which has been carriedout elsewhere. The strategies discussedhere include ones that could beapplied for temporary immigration programs, permanent settlement, or forboth, and although the mechanics ofsuccessfully administering a temporarywork program are too complex to beadequately discussed here, the impor-tant intersection between temporarymigration and the selection of perma-nent immigrants will be addressed.Many of the examples it uses aredrawn from the TCIs, with the goal ofnot only educating European audiencesabout the state of the art in selectingimmigrants, but also of provokingexamination of how TCI immigrationsystems might be improved.

The chapter begins by proposing a set ofprinciples that should inform the designof immigrant recruitment practices andpolicies. It continues with a discussionof the evolution of “economic” immi-gration into the developed countriesthat actively welcome it on a significantscale, including the changing balancebetween permanent and temporarymigration programs. It then describesthe four major selection strategies usedto choose both temporary and perma-nent immigrants, and moves on to dis-cuss variants of these techniques andother strategies that can facilitate theselection of economic immigrants.Finally, it will point out some emergingchallenges and opportunities related tothe recruitment of immigrants.

Three points should be emphasized atthe outset of the discussion. The first is

the importance of context in under-standing the outcomes of immigrationpolicy. “Best practices” applied clumsi-ly in different economic, social, andhistorical settings may very well resultin worst outcomes. In particular, acountry’s labor market and social welfare policies strongly influence thelabor market experience of immigrants,and thus the outcome of immigrationpolicies.

The second point is that while recruit-ment of “desired” economically activeimmigrants may be a valued economicresource, and may enhance social stability and the public perception ofthe overall experience with immigration,it cannot reduce or replace in any substantial way the “other” migrationstreams. Canada, for example, hasachieved such a high percentage ofselected immigrants primarily byexpanding its entire immigration program quite significantly. Familyreunification immigration makes laborimmigration more stable, improvesintegration outcomes, and, in mostcountries, comes close to being a legalright for citizens and permanent settlers.Humanitarian immigration is clearlypart of international law and is animportant element of most developedcountries’ foreign policy and chosen rolein the world. Additional opportunitiesfor legal immigration for economic reasons may discourage some “unwantedimmigration” by providing an alterna-tive to unjustified asylum claims or clandestine immigration and employ-ment, but this effect is likely to be limited,particularly if legal immigration isoffered only to the educated and skilled.

226

The third point is that “economic”immigrants need not be highly skilled.It is true that the vast majority of theTCIs’ permanent “economic” immi-grants and the majority of their tem-porary migrants are required to have acollege degree or equivalent skills orexperience. Many argue that high-skilled migration alleviates incomeinequality, leads to better integrationoutcomes and public acceptance ofimmigrants, and creates fewer burdenson the welfare system. In addition,only skilled migrants, by definition, can relieve a “skills shortage.”

Without disputing these arguments,there remain legitimate reasons to consider accepting immigrants of a variety of skill levels. Most developednations, particularly European ones,will have unskilled workforces thatdecline quickly in the coming years,while demand for low-skill, low-statusservices such as home health care,domestic duties, or food service willlikely remain robust and climb withincreasing prosperity and demographicchange. In addition, there are interna-tionally traded sectors, such as agricul-ture or manufacturing, in whichwealthy countries will not be able tocompete without access to lesser-skilledworkers. Such demands can be metwithout legally admitted low-skilledimmigration beyond that of humanitari-an and family reunification immigrants,but this would involve its own costs,including the likely costs of acceptingor combating illegal immigration.However, because high-skilled migrantsare relatively scarce and choosingamong skill sets and qualifications is

an important part of the migrant“recruitment” process, much of this dis-cussion will speak to the selection ofskilled migrants.

Thinking Harder About

“Recruiting” Immigrants

Recruiting immigrants today is largelya matter of setting a framework foradmitting immigrants: Depending onthe method, criteria, and type ofadmission chosen, the recruitingprocess will be facilitated by outsideallies, from employers and recruitingcompanies, to powerful networks ofco-nationals, to foreign governments,to the initiative of migrants them-selves. However, an effective admis-sions policy should be regarded as arecruitment process, and shouldaddress the following questions:

� What economic and social goals isthe immigration program intendedto meet, and what are the criteriafor success derived from these goals?

� What personal characteristicsshould admitted migrants have,and how will these be assessed?

� What is the anticipated periodthat the immigrant will beallowed to stay and work, andwhat happens at the end of thatperiod?

� What balances will be struckbetween the need of employers torespond quickly and precisely toeconomic demand by choosing



their employees and the need toprotect the labor-market interestsof resident workers and foreignworkers from exploitation?

� How can the admissions processallow employers to gather infor-mation about the potentialmigrant and give the prospectivemigrant a chance to learn aboutthe domestic labor market andacquire useful local knowledgeand skills prior to admission to agiven migration status?

� Will the strategy chosen and theadministrative resources deployedto support it make the admissionprocess timely enough to satisfythe program’s goals?

� How will the number of migrantsadmitted be controlled?

� How will admissions be distributed“efficiently” across different immi-gration programs?

� In the case of sought-after highlyskilled migrants, will the immigra-tion “package” offered be enoughto attract them?

A quick survey of the immigration pro-grams of developing countries, particu-larly those of the TCIs, reveals volving,and in many cases, converging practices.

The State of the Art in Selecting

Economic Immigrants

Today, most better-educated andskilled immigrants who are admitted to work in developing countries on a

truly discretionary basis are selectedaccording to such factors as anemployment offer and/or potential foremployment, education, experience,age, and demonstrated business skills,among others. Increasingly, the willingness to commit to move to a specific location for a minimum numberof years is gaining in importancein Canada and elsewhere. A signifi-cant, but usually smaller, group ofimmigrants are admitted to work inlow-skill occupations — but almostalways on a temporary or seasonalbasis, at least in theory. Finally, a verysmall number of immigrants areadmitted because they will invest significant amounts of money in startingor expanding a domestic business.This discussion will focus on themuch larger stream of immigrantswho are admitted primarily because of their human, not financial, capital.This “economic stream” of workers isrounded out by a group whose admis-sion is only partly discretionary: intracompany transferees and otherprofessional workers whose entry maybe protected under World TradeOrganization (WTO), regional,and/or bilateral trade agreements.

There are two basic component flows to economic migration: perma-nent immigrant, or settlement, admissions that grant permanent permission to live and work in thedestination country; and temporary,or “non-immigrant” (the US term ofart) admissions that grant stays andwork permits of a determinate lengthto a foreigner, usually anywhere fromone to eight years.

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Permanent visas for economic immi-grants are rather limited. The fourTCIs, for example, which have thelongest and strongest traditions ofgranting permanent residence up front,admit a total of roughly 400,000 people,including principal applicants andtheir immediate family members, forpermanent residence as part of eco-nomic immigration streams each year.

On the other hand, temporary admis-sions of foreigners who enter eitherexplicitly in order to work or gain aderivative right to do so (also referredto here as labor migration) have beengrowing by leaps and bounds, particu-larly in the TCIs but also in Europe,which is reconsidering (opponents ofsuch openings will say “forgetting”) itsexperience with guestworker programsin the 1960s and early 1970s. TheUnited States has been most aggressivein this regard with its “H” class of visasbut the other three TCIs have joinedthe competition with considerablevigor. Increasingly, temporary labormigration has become the means —the transmission belt, as it were — bywhich ever-larger proportions of per-manent immigrants initially find theirway legally into immigration countriesaround the world.

Most formal entries in the economicmigration stream, whether permanentor temporary, are skewed stronglytowards better-educated and skilled for-eigners. Admissions for jobs requiringfew formal skills but that reward relevantexperience, however, continue to bevalued by receiving and sending coun-tries alike and are thus a constant and

significant presence in most immigra-tion systems. The various schemes foragricultural and other seasonal work, aswell as for caretaking, domestic servic-es, and a constellation of personal(domestic) services recognize that reality.

While not all immigration countriestreat foreigners who ply their labor andskills in the international migration system identically, most follow commonmechanisms for the selection of perma-nent immigrants. Similarities betweenthe systems that countries use to matchthe proper worker to the proper jobgrow further when temporary immigra-tion programs are examined.

Converging Practices in

Recruiting Immigrants

The increasing popularity of tempo-rary admissions across TCIs (and otherstates) has been paced by a remarkableconvergence in admissions procedures.There are various reasons for this convergence. Among these is the realityof multilateral agreements, such asthose relating to trade-in-services thatare anchored on the principle of reciprocity, and demands among economic partners to codify reciprocalaccess for each other’s nationals in theareas of business, trade, investment, orcultural exchanges. Regional reciprocalarrangements (e.g., the Trans-TasmanTravel Arrangement betweenAustralia and New Zealand and the reciprocal rights to employment innearly seventy professional occupationsestablished between the US, Canada,and Mexico by the North AmericanFree Trade Agreement — NAFTA)have also proliferated. Finally, certain



categories of temporary entry allowemployment that is in some ways“incidental” to the visa’s primary purpose. Among those are studentvisas (under certain more or lessrestrictive circumstances), trainee orcultural exchange visas, under which avisitor is allowed to work as part of thetraining or exchange, or “holidaymaker” visa holders who are allowed towork for a period of time during theirstay in the host country.

However, there is another increasinglyconsequential reason for such conver-gence in practices. With “globalization”having advanced to the point wherespeaking of national firms may inmany ways be anachronistic, at leastamong the advanced economies, com-petitive pressures have put a premiumon cutting-edge technical skills andtalent — wherever these may be found.With trade barriers falling — in largepart as a result of persistent efforts bythe TCIs and the European Union —and with technology, like capital, recognizing neither borders nor nation-ality, individual initiative and talentare increasingly recognized as the mostvaluable global resources. The TCIshave long recognized this reality,designing and redesigning their immi-gration systems to gain ready access tothose who have the desired humancapital attributes. Increasingly, this has led to competition among TCIs inwhat might be called a human capitalaccretion “sweepstakes,” a contest inwhich increasing numbers of Europeancountries are now eager to participate,with Germany, the United Kingdom,and France leading the way.

The TCIs offer permanent immigra-tion status up front to many of theseforeign workers, but the administrativelysimpler route of entering on a temporaryvisa and then applying for permanentresidence is gaining in prominence,making some temporary visas into veritable “transition” visas. The most-traveled routes in this transition-to-permanence admission framework arehigh-skill temporary work and educationvisas. The first route initially involvestemporary work in information tech-nology and communications, engineer-ing, the medical professions, or otherhigh-skill sectors. The US’s high-skillH1-B visas may have provided thelargest opening of this type, but theother TCIs have been expanding theirown such pathways.

The second temporary-to-permanentroute is through a country’s institu-tions of higher education. In absolutenumbers, the United States has beenagain the leader in this form of entryfor decades. The other TCIs, however,have also expanded their opening tothe student talent pool by removingadministrative barriers to hiring foreignstudents directly out of tertiary education and converting them, in due course, to permanent immigrants.The greatest activism in this area,however, may be coming from severalEuropean countries, such as France,Germany, and the United Kingdom(UK), which have always had robustforeign student populations. (On a per capita basis, the foreign studentpopulations in some of these countriesexceed that of the United States.)These and other European destinations

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are experiencing somewhat of a “wind-fall” in foreign student applications asa result of the US preoccupation withsecurity screenings and the less welcoming attitude towards nationalsfrom a large number of countries.

The expansion of the temporary andtemporary-to-permanent immigrationstream is refueling two “old” discourses.The first one focuses on the receivingcountries’ failure to adequately adapttheir own training and education systems to the requirements of the so-called new economy sufficiently andeffectively enough to meet employmentneeds from within their own laborpool. The second dwells on the effect(and propriety) of deeper and moresystematic “takings” by the TCIs (and,increasingly, by other advanced indus-trial societies) from the human capitalpool of the developing world. Neitherissue falls within the scope of this discussion, but both raise enormouslyimportant questions.

Admitting Immigrants:

Competing Selection

Mechanisms

All developed countries, and/or theircorporate citizens, choose the foreignworkers they are interested in admit-ting permanently on the presumptionthat such admissions serve nationaleconomic interests. But each countryemphasizes different facets of thatinterest by using different selectionstrategies. In effect, most countries usedifferent combinations of three generalstrategies: (1) admitting workers whohave been hired by duly registered

corporate entities for a specific job; (2) admitting people who are qualifiedin occupations that the governmentdecides are in short supply; and (3)selecting immigrants based on theiroverall levels of human capital. Thepermanent-to-temporary transitionroute discussed above constitutes afourth major (and quickly expanding)selection strategy of sorts, although itnecessarily makes use of at least one ofthe other three strategies. As a result,the systems used by TCI countries thatselect immigrants, both temporary andpermanent, form a continuum of sorts.

At one TCI end is the United States,which emphasizes immediate economicneeds and allows employers to choosevirtually all economic migrants directly.At the other end lies Canada, whichadmits almost all of its permanent economic immigrants through a “pointssystem” that selects immigrants on thebasis of a mix of skills, experience, education, age, and other characteristicsthat presumably maximize the proba-bility of both immediate and long-termlabor market and economic success.New Zealand and Australia, whichadmit most of their economic immi-grants under similar points systems butalso have a small number of permanentand temporary employment-basedadmissions, lie in between on the continuum. In the United States,Australia, and New Zealand, a smallnumber of immigrants receive prefer-ence in admission in order to fill specificlabor needs identified by the govern-ment. Occupations identified includemedical doctors who will work in under-served areas (in the United States),



and medical and information technologyprofessionals (in New Zealand andAustralia).

The principal agent in each selectionscheme varies accordingly. In theUnited States, the principal agent isalmost always the employer, both forthe permanent and the temporaryemployment-based systems. In theother three countries, the principalagent for the permanent immigrationsystem is the public servant, with theemployer playing only a minor role. Inall TCIs, employers play a principalrole in the fast-expanding temporaryworker admissions system. In Australiaand New Zealand, nongovernmentalorganizations that assess occupationsalso play a key role in verifying theskills of potential immigrants.

Most of Europe also falls in betweenon this continuum. The UK may bemost advanced in its participation inthe selection sweepstakes. For example,the UK uses simultaneously a pointssystem, an employment-based system,and sector-driven admissions (the latter two primarily for temporaryimmigration). The United Kingdom’smost important innovation, however,may be an administrative techniquethrough which “pre-cleared” employers(presumably those with good records of“playing by the rules”) can gain accessto a needed foreign employee within a week or less.

The UK, however, is not the onlyhotbed of experimentation in theemployment of temporary foreignworkers. Italy, for instance, has

modified a French practice of about30 years ago and allows employerswho have found an unauthorized foreign worker to go to the Ministryof Welfare and register him or her.

Employment-based Selection

The primary focus of US economicimmigration is on rectifying labor market shortages and mismatches —with an increasingly pronounced tendency towards simplifying the labormarket tests it requires. Specifically,the US law has since 1990 establisheda maximum “quota” of 140,000 “permanent” visas for employment-based immigration (Table 7). Morethan 90 percent of such visas targetwell-educated and skilled immigrantsand their immediate families. Australiamaintains a database to match employersand skilled migrants and admits about21 percent of its economic permanentmigrants through employment-basedadmissions. A number of New Zealand’snew “work-to-residence” visas are pred-icated on an offer of employment froma government-approved employerwhen the visa is issued and later whenthe immigrant applies for permanentstatus. These entries also bypass thepoints system. Canada makes no permanent admissions based primarilyon employment but, like Australia and New Zealand, gives applicantswith an employment offer an advan-tage in entry under the points system(discussed below).

Allowing employers to select immi-grants has several advantages. It makesimmigration directly sensitive to laborneeds, puts the admission decision into

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the hands of those best able to assess the immigrant’s immediate labor market prospects, reduces bureaucracyand cost, and ensures that immigrantshave jobs when they arrive. Tyingimmigrants to a job, and requiring thatthey notify the immigration servicewhen they change jobs (if this is permitted), also facilitates monitoringof working and pay conditions by thegovernment. In addition, tying admis-sion of an immigrant to a specific jobthat “cannot be filled with a nativeworker” is thought to bolster politicalsupport for labor immigration. Thetemporary labor immigration programs,both high-skill and low-skill, in all of the TCIs and in most European countries continue to use the employ-ment-based selection approach.

However, placing so much of therecruitment process into the hands ofemployers runs the risk that employersmay use immigrants to undercut moreexpensive domestic workers, or thatimmigrants may be exploited withinferior wages or working conditions.When immigrants are granted perma-nent work and residency rights, thisrisk decreases dramatically becausethey are free to change jobs, but it canbe quite substantial in the case of tem-porary admissions, where immigrantsmay have to leave the country if theylose their job. Making work permits“portable” to other jobs with as fewrestrictions as possible is one way ofreducing this risk.

As a result of these concerns, devel-oped countries use a menu of controlsto ensure that admitted workers are

needed and that migrant workers andtheir already-resident colleagues arenot affected adversely by the immigra-tion process. Most use caps or quotasto restrict the number of employment-based admissions permitted in a givenyear. They may also restrict the abilityof the employers of migrants to sub-contract their services to other entities.In most cases, countries restrict employ-ment-based admissions to certain typesof occupations, educational levels, orsectors. In the United States, forexample, almost all permanentemployment-based admissions andmost temporary work visas are forimmigrants who have a college educa-tion or better. The United States alsoadmits between 5,000 and 10,000 permanent immigrants and a muchlarger number of temporary migrantsto fill low-skill positions, but virtuallyall of these admissions are restrictedeither by sector (the agricultural sector)or by type of work (the work involvedmust be seasonal, temporary, or meetthe demands of “peak load”) and areoften subject to an annual cap.

Regulating Employment-based

Admissions

� Case-by-case certifications (pre-entry control)

One method of selecting foreign workers is to test each applicationagainst the available pool of eligibledomestic workers interested in the jobopening. This process is called “laborcertification” in the United States,“job validation” in Canada, and “labormarket testing” in Australia and else-where. It requires the petitioner (typically the prospective employer)



to demonstrate two things to the government’s satisfaction: first, that no eligible workers are available forthe job in question; and second, thatthe employment of the foreign nationalwill not depress the wages and workingconditions of other workers in similarjobs. This approach is still the dominantprocess for admitting economic immi-grants (chiefly temporary ones) in continental European states. InMember States of the European Union(EU) and European Economic Area(EEA) these requirements are some-time taken to another level, asemployers may be required not onlyto demonstrate that they were unableto find nationally resident workers, butwere also unable to attract workersfrom other EU/EEA states.

These requirements have provedextremely vexing both on methodolog-ical and administrative grounds. As aresult, one notices a slowly emergingconsensus that the value and efficacyof processes that rely on case-by-caseassessments for choosing labor-market-bound immigrants are increasingly atodds with today’s globally competitiverealities. More specifically, firms todayoften choose workers (domestic or foreign) because small differences inattributes (both in the quality and inthe specificity of skills) can lead tosubstantial differences in the firm’sability to compete, and being obligedto hire a resident candidate who is“sufficiently” or “equally” qualified inthe government’s eyes may leave firmsat a significant competitive disadvan-tage. Additionally, the bureaucraticburden and delay imposed by the

case-by-case approach can seriouslyundermine the economic benefitsgained by labor migration. On theother hand, a test to see if residentworkers are willing to take the job issomewhat spurious if wages and workingconditions are not improved to attractthem. Thus, this “test” has the poten-tial to serve neither employers norworkers well.

Britain, when it revised its temporarywork-permit program in 2000, largelyretained the case-by-case admissionsmodel, but streamlined the process bycreating a two-tier system. For top-tierapplicants — including intracompanytransferees, board-level managers, andworkers whose occupational skills aredetermined by the government to begreatly needed — the requirementthat the employer search for residentworkers is waived. In that regard,entries in this tier emulate the UnitedStates’ H-1B system. Second-tierapplicants, like first-tier applicants,are not subject to a numerical cap, but their employers are required toshow proof that they have searchedfor qualified British residents and EEAnationals to fill the position.

� Multi-case attestationsAn alternative, pioneered in the US,to approving an immigrant’s employ-ment eligibility on a case-by-case basisprior to his or her admission is grantingthe employer access to certain types offoreign workers on the basis of an“attestation.” Attestations are legallybinding employer declarations aboutthe terms and conditions under whicha foreign worker will be engaged, and

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are used for both high- and low-skilltemporary work visas. Attestations aredesigned to reduce up-front barriers anddelays to the entry of certain foreignworkers while still protecting the wagesand other labor-market interests ofdomestic workers, so compliance issafeguarded through post-entry auditingand enforcement of the employer declarations. Attestations (or, moreformally, “labor conditions applica-tions,” LCAs), focus on four majorpolicy objectives: � First, safeguarding basic interests

of domestic workers in terms ofwages and working conditionswhile offering employers willingto play by pre-agreed rules timelyand predictable access to neededforeign workers;

� Second, meeting a “publicprocess” test by giving potentiallyaffected parties (such as otherworkers in a firm or their represen-tatives) an opportunity to knowabout and challenge the matters towhich an employer attests;

� Third, responding most directly tochanging conditions in labor mar-kets (by allowing employers thefreedom to choose and gain swiftaccess to foreign workers they need)while requiring the least amount ofhands-on engagement by the gov-ernment in areas such as employ-ment demand data and labormarket testing procedures, where it has proved to be weakest; and

� Finally, inducing more coopera-tive labor-management relationsby streamlining access to foreignworkers under working terms andconditions that are transparent

and that both worker representa-tives and management haveopportunities to influence.

Whether attestations are accomplishingthese policy goals or not is the subjectof much dispute, and attestations havereceived strong criticism for failing tosufficiently protect both domestic andforeign workers. Strengthening oversight of working conditions andcompensation after workers’ employ-ment begins is one way of addressingthese concerns. Australia, for example,monitors employers who sponsoremployees for temporary visas to ensurecompliance with the employment contract. Sponsors must show that theyare paying the proper wages, taxes, andpensions, and fulfilling any other obligations agreed to, such as imple-menting training programs for localworkers. Site visits are used to confirminformation the employer provides. Inthe event of a violation, the temporaryvisas in question can be cancelled andthe employer may be declared ineligiblefor future sponsorship.

New Zealand uses a slightly differentsort of control on a, thus far, extremelysmall scale. In the “work-to-residence”program, employers are accreditedannually by the government on thebasis of good labor relations, soundfinances, and a history of employingand training native workers. Onceaccredited, employers can bring inworkers on 30-month visas withoutany labor market tests and with mini-mal paperwork and delay. At the endof two years, these workers can applyfor permanent residence.



Labor Market “Waivers”

In a second general strategy for selectingimmigrants, the government identifieslabor market segments that are experiencing supply shortages or needstrengthening with well-prepared foreigners and grants preference toapplicants qualified in those occupa-tions or intending to work in thosesectors. These candidates may beadmitted outright, granted streamlinedprocessing, granted additional credit in a “points system,” or exempted frombureaucratic obstacles such as therequirement that employers search forresident workers. Labor-market waiversof this sort often consider a variety ofindicators such as vacancy rates, wagegrowth, forecasted demand, the unem-ployment rate, and the time needed totrain new workers.

The process is neither as methodologi-cally robust as it appears at first norsimple. In practice, governments aremost likely to respond to lobbying byemployers and tend to use the simplestof “tests”: When employers cannotfind employees at the current marketwage, a shortage is deemed to exist andthe inflow valve is adjusted accordingly.In some cases, labor unions and otherstakeholders may also be part of theprocess of “authenticating” that ashortage exists.

New Zealand, and, to a lesser extent,the United States, identify specificsupply shortages and streamline visaapplications in those occupations.Other countries have given explicitpriority to the entry of informationtechnology (IT) and communications

professionals. France does so by granti-ng streamlined permanent residencepermission to foreign students whograduate from a French university with an IT degree. The UnitedKingdom, Canada, and several other Organisation for EconomicCooperation and Development(OECD) countries now facilitateemployer access to foreign students,and under the still-pending Germanimmigration law, Germany would too.Australia keeps a list of occupationsthat receive preferential treatmentwhen being assessed in their generaleconomic immigration category.

Under the UK’s work-permit system,the requirement for a labor market testis waived if the industry in question is on the “shortage occupation list.”Applications from industries on thislist receive highest priority in process-ing. The shortage occupation list is set periodically with the consultationof “sector panels” including major companies, employers’ representatives,trade unions, government agencies,and other relevant actors. In recentyears, the sector panels have incorpo-rated industries such as finance, engineering, healthcare, catering, and teaching.

At the lower end of the skill spectrum,the UK targets sectors with laborshortages through its Sector BasedScheme (SBS), introduced in May2003 to specifically deal with laborshortages in the food, manufacturing,and hospitality sectors. While theprocess for obtaining the permit is similar to that of the regular work

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permit scheme, with employers filingapplications on behalf of the workers,the skill requirements are substantiallylower, and the eligible applicant age islimited to 18 to 30 (Rollason, 2004).

The sectors included in this schemewere agreed upon by representatives of key societal interests. These includedJobcentre Plus (the governmentemployment agency), workers’ representatives through the TradeUnion Councils, and employers’ repre-sentatives through the Confederationof British Industry. Employers muststill fulfill a labor-market test by advertising the position in questionthrough Jobcentre Plus and theEuropean Job Mobility Portal (theEuropean Commission’s job-postingwebsite). Each work permit is for a 12-month duration, with renewal onlyavailable if the applicant leaves theUK for at least two months. The workpermit can also be carried by the holderto another position, as long as the newjob is similar (Rollason, 2004).

Talent Accrual: Choosing the

Best and the Brightest

This strategy looks at the immigrant’sskills independently of the context of aspecific job offer or specific occupation.It recognizes that many highly skilledimmigrants will change jobs often andmay even change occupations. Thecharacteristics that make immigrantsimmediately employable may not necessarily be those that lead to long-term employment success or optimalintegration outcomes. Thus, the talentaccrual approach aims to admit the“best and brightest” as defined by such

indicators as the number of years ofschooling, training, or experience, rel-evant language ability, and degrees orcertifications when they can be prop-erly assessed.

Canada, Australia, and New Zealandrely most heavily on this method. Ineach of these countries, a points systemis used to select a large proportion ofimmigrants; the new German legisla-tion also follows suit. In all threesystems, education and experience inany skilled field are relied upon as theprimary criteria used in rating applicants.In one selection category, the UnitedStates also makes use of a variant ofthe talent accrual approach. Persons of“extraordinary ability” can be admittedsimply by demonstrating the highquality of their credentials and pro-fessional accomplishments, althoughthese are a small proportion of permanent admissions.

� The points testsBecause the employer plays a less pivotal role in the process of choosingimmigrants in a talent accrual strategy,and because the immigrant is not necessarily destined for a specific job,these systems rely little on labor markettests per se. In the points test system,only those foreign workers whosequantifiable personal attributes add up to a pre-agreed “pass-mark” areallowed to immigrate and/or settle.Among the characteristics currentlyreceiving the highest point totalsacross all three countries are educationand specific training; work experience,especially in occupations in demand;age; and language skills — generally in



that order. Offers of employment gen-erally play a small and diminishingrole (Table 1).

Other factors that promote integrationor employability, such as sponsorshipby a family member or experienceworking or studying in the country ofdestination, are also included. In thisway, there is significant “overlap” of

criteria both with the family reunifica-tion stream and with employment-based admissions — acknowledgingthe social and labor market value ofthese additional immigrant selectionsystems. Business skills and the willingness to invest substantial sumsin economic enterprises in the countryof destination are also rewardedthroughout the TCIs and elsewhere,

Table 1. Point Systems in Comparison: Relative Weights of

Selection Factors, as percentage of total possible score.

Factor New Zealand New Zealand Australia Canada UK (HSMP)(old) (new)

Education/Training 24 28 34 25 14Work experience (Relevant to occupation/Nonrelevant) 20/20 22/0 6/3 21/21 23/23Age 20 12 17 10 2*Family resident in destination country 6 0 9 5 0English and French (Canada only) language skills (beyond minimumrequired for eligibility) 0 0 14 24 0Job offer (Relevant to trainingor experience/Non-relevant) 16/4 24/0 4/4 10/10 0/0High-priority or high-demand occupation/skill set/location 0 12 9 0 23Prior work or study in destinationcountry 8 38 11 5 0Qualified/Skilled spouse or partner 4 8 3 10 5Prior income 0 0 0 0 23Other factors 4 0 6 0 11Pass mark, as percentage of points possible, March 2004 (except old New Zealand system, June 2003) 59 74 63 67 30

Note: Totals may exceed 100 percent because some points are awarded on the basis of multiple factors. The compar-isons of pass marks are not intended to assess the relative “difficulty” of qualifying under the various systems, but canbe used as an indicator of the flexibility of each system.

Source: Authors’ calculations from tables 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6.

*Applicants under 28 are assesed by less rigorous criteria in other areas. Thus, this figure understates the advantagegiven to the young under this points system.

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sometimes within the points system(in Australia and in the UK, whichhas its own points system for entrepre-neurs, separate from the one it uses toselect skilled workers), and at othertimes independently of it (the UnitedStates, Canada, and, presumably,Germany).

Generally, supporters perceive severaladvantages to points selection systemsover other selection mechanisms:

� First, they are thought to inspireconfidence because they seem toapply universal, and ostensiblyhard (i.e., quantitative data-based),selection criteria to economic-stream immigrants. Hence, theyare less susceptible to the criticismsassociated with the case-by-casesystem’s “gamesmanship” betweenemployers and bureaucrats.

� Second, depending on the attrib-utes a point system emphasizes, it isthought to reassure key segments ofthe receiving society that econom-ic-stream immigrants are selectedon the basis of criteria that placethe highest priority on the receivingstate’s economic interests. In anincreasingly competitive world, thisline of reasoning goes, choosinghighly skilled immigrants makeseconomic immigration politicallymore defensible than the alterna-tives discussed earlier. This primarilyis due to two reasons: first, becauseof the obvious potential for widereconomic multipliers, measured in“downstream” economic and labormarket gains; second, because point

systems are less politically “visible”(and hence “targetable”) than thegovernment certifying that nodomestic workers are available todo a specific job time and again orthat a specific sector can continueto absorb large numbers of foreignprofessionals without affecting the opportunities of domestic professionals.

� Third, a point system can adoptnew characteristics, discard obso-lete ones, and “tweak” the processby changing categories’ relativeweights and/or the overall passmark. This is thought to beadministratively valuable in thatregulators can respond quickly toshifting economic priorities and/orperceptions of what is “good” forthe receiving economy and society.In addition, because the pointssystem assesses people according toa variety of criteria, it can easilymake immigrant admissions serveseveral national goals (economic,demographic, and social) within asingle selection system.

� Finally, properly conceived andimplemented, and accompanied byopportunities for firms to select keyworkers on their own, a points system is thought to reinforce thegovernment’s ability to managethe system by allowing it to adaptadmissions to general occupationaltrends and the broad needs of the economy.

The points system approach, thus far,has been used exclusively to admit



highly skilled immigrants. However,the general principle — that of “earn-ing” admission through personal char-acteristics and behavior — could beused with other criteria and for lesser-skilled immigrants. While it might bedifficult to make the points frameworkpractical for the purpose of admittinglesser-qualified immigrants for the firsttime, it could be used for the purposeof granting permanent settlementrights to temporary workers or forregularizing unauthorized immigrants.For example, one approach to “earnedregularization” of the United States’unauthorized immigrant populationproposed by the authors would giveimmigrants the chance to earn points(or “credits”) for such characteristics as steady employment and tax-paying,having legally resident family members,English-language ability, and evidenceof social integration.

“Filtration” Systems

The fourth major strategy admitsimmigrants “temporarily” for work —usually but not exclusively to fill a spe-cific, high-skill vacancy — or as uni-versity students and later gives themthe chance to become permanent residents. This method selects immi-grants at two points: first, when theindividual is admitted on a temporaryvisa, and again, when the temporaryimmigrant is considered for permanentresidence. Thus, it is possible to useone set of selection criteria (drawnfrom the strategies above) for the firstselection and another set for the second.

This dual-stage selection can allow the government — or employers — to select immigrants based onobserved performance. In addition,the experience of working or studyingin the host country often better equipstemporarily resident foreigners forwork there and allows them to decideif they would like to make it their permanent home. New Zealand’s mostrecent version of its points system,introduced in 2003, makes qualifica-tions and experience gained in NewZealand a major factor in selection,clearly and directly rewarding thosecurrently employed in New Zealand(Tables 2 and 3).

This strategy also reflects two basicrealities of temporary work and studyprograms: first, that many temporaryimmigrants want to become long-termresidents and will find a way to do so;and secondly, that temporary workers(particularly skilled workers) generallybecome more valuable to their employ-ers (and the broader economy) withtime, and may be occupying jobs thatare, in fact, permanent. The recruitmentof immigrants through university systems is discussed more directly laterin the paper. Here, the focus is on thetransition from temporary work permitsto permanent residence.

The United States has long led theway with this method. In 2002, forinstance, 134,918 permanent immigrants admitted through employ-ment-based preferences — about 77percent of all permanent employmentadmissions — adjusted from some typeof temporary visa.


Table 2. “New" New Zealand Point System — 2004

New ZealandPoint system as modified in 2004 (introduced in 1991).Applicants must score 100 points to enter the “pool.” Every month, applicants from the pool areselected to meet admissions target. In March of 2004, the applicants scoring over 185 wereaccepted. Accepted applicants’ applications are then examined and verified. Applicants withoutskilled work or education experience in New Zealand or a job offer are normally issued temporaryresidence permission, convertible to permanent, while others generally receive permanent resi-dency up front.

1. Qualifications (Maximum: 70) PointsRecognized Basic Qualification: Qualifications and diplomas in certain trades, Bachelor’s degree 50Master’s degree or higher 55Bonus points for:

Qualification from study in New Zealand 10Qualification in prioritized fields (identified future growth area, identified cluster or area of absolute skills shortage) 5

2. Skilled Work Experience1 (Maximum: 55)2 years 104 years 156 years 208 years 2510 years 30Bonus points if work experience is in New Zealand:

2 years 54 years 108 years 15

Bonus points if work experience is in prioritized fields:2 to 5 years 56 years or more 10

3. Skilled Employment (Maximum: 60)Current employment in New Zealand, of more than 12 months duration 60Offer of employment or current employment in New Zealand of less than 12 months duration 50Bonus points if employment offer is:

Outside of Auckland 10In a prioritized field 5

4. Age (minimum age 20, maximum age 55) (Maximum: 30)20-29 years 3030-39 years 2540-44 years 2045-49 years 1050-55 years 5

5. Partner (Points scored only if partner has English proficiency) (Maximum: 20)Partner has basic qualification 10Partner has job offer in skilled occupation 10

Total Points Possible 250

1. Work experience only counts if it is relevant to the applicant’s qualification or current or offered skilled employmentin New Zealand, or allowed the applicant to gain specific specialist, technical, or management expertise. If the appli-cant is not currently working in New Zealand and does not have a job offer, experience only counts if the applicantwas working in a list of countries (primarily upper- and upper-middle income countries) or nationals of these coun-tries who were employed by a multinational corporation.

Sources: New Zealand Embassy in Washington DC, 2002 (public information announcements); New ZealandImmigration Service world wide web pages http://www.immigration.govt.nz/migration/general.html.


Table 3. “Old" New Zealand Point System — through 2003

New ZealandPoint system, first introduced in 1991.Applicants must score 29 points to be granted a visa (as of June 11, 2003).

1. Qualifications (Maximum: 14) PointsBase Qualification: A degree, diploma, or trade certificate of minimum 3 years training, study, or work experience. 10Advanced Qualification: Bachelor’s degree or equivalent. 11Master’s degree or higher 12New Zealand Qualification (bonus points if qualification is from study in New Zealand) 2

2. Work Experience (Maximum: 10)2 years 110 years 520 years 10

3. Employment (Maximum: 8)Offer of employment (relevant to qualifications and experience) 5-8*

4. Age (maximum age: 55 years for General Skills, 84 for investors) (Maximum: 10)18-24 years 825-29 years 1029-49 years, score reduces with age. 8-2

5. Settlement Factors (Maximum: 7)Settlement Funds

$100,000 1$200,000 2

Partner’s QualificationsBase Qualification 1Advanced Qualification 2

New Zealand Work Experience1 year 12 years 2

Family Sponsorship 3Non-relevant offer of employment 2

Total Points Possible 49*

* Score depends on current passmark.

Sources: New Zealand Embassy in Washington DC, 2002 (public information announcements); New ZealandImmigration Service world wide web pages http://www.immigration.govt.nz/migration/general.html.


Table 4. Australian Points Test-2004

AustraliaPoints test, first introduced in 1989.Applicants must score at least 115 points to be granted a visa, 110 if sponsored by family1. (As of March 20, 2003)Factors considered

1. SkillTraining specific to the occupation2 60General occupations 50Other general skilled occupations 40

2. Age (at time of application)18 to 29 years 3030 to 34 years 2535 to 39 years 2040 to 44 years 15

3. English Language AbilityVocational (reasonable command of English) 15Competent 20

4. Specific Work ExperienceApplicants with 60 points for nominated occupation3 and 3 years of work (in the 4 years immediately prior to application) in the nominated occupation or a closely related occupation receive full points. 10Applicants with 40 to 60 points under skill and experience working in any occupation (despite relevance to the nominated occupation) on the Skilled Occupations List for at least 3 of the 4 years before application. 5

5. Occupation in Demand4/ Job OfferOccupation in demand, but no job offer 10Occupation in demand, with job offer 15

6. Australian QualificationsAustralian qualification: Study for at least 12 months full-time in Australia toward the receipt of an Australian post-secondary degree (or higher qualification), diploma, advanced diploma, or trade qualification. 5Australian Master’s or upper second class Honours (or higher) Bachelor’s degree. 10Australian PhD, minimum of 2 years study in Australia. 15

7. Spouse SkillsPoints are awarded if the applicant’s spouse is also able to satisfy the basic requirements of age, English language ability, qualifications, nominated occupation, and recent work experience and if s/he obtains a skill assessment. 5

8. Bonus Points (for any one of the following)Capital investment (minimum AU$100,000) in Australia 5Australian work experience: At least 6 months of work experience in one of the occupations on the Skilled Occupations List immediately prior to application. 5Fluency in one of Australia’s Community Languages (other than English) 5

9. Points for Relationship (applicants with relatives in Australia only)Points are awarded if the applicant or the applicant’s spouse is sponsored by a relative who is an Australian citizen or permanent resident. 15

Total Points Possible5 165

1 Applicants must gain sufficient points to reach the pass mark. Applications scoring below the pass mark, but aboveanother mark, the “pool mark,” are held in reserve for up to two years. If within that time the pass mark is lowered andthe reserved score is above the new mark, the application is processed further. As of 2002, the pool mark for theskilled-Australian sponsored category was 105 and was 70 for the skilled-independent category. All other pool marksare currently equal to the pass mark of 110 or 115. Note that applicants who are sponsored by family receive a cumula-tive advantage of 20 points (extra points plus a lower pass mark).

2 The occupation nominated must be on the Skilled Occupations List published by DIMIA.3 See footnote 2.4 Published as the Migration Occupations Demand List.5 In practice, the maximum score is 150. Applicants scoring 150 points do not need to be sponsored by an Australian.

Source: Australian Department of Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA) world wide webpages (http://www.immi.gov.au/allforms/skill_general.htm); Philip Ruddock MP world wide web pages(http://www.minister.immi.gov.au/).


For another glimpse of the importanceof this de facto transition system for theUnited States, 102,316 of all perma-nent immigrants (including thosereunifying with family) adjusted fromtemporary work visas. (All US figuresinclude the principal visa-holders aswell as dependents.)

The United States’ H1-B visa categoryhas been perhaps the most important(although not the only) route fortemporary-to-permanent immigranttransitions. The H1-B visa allows highlyskilled (college educated or better) pro-fessionals from any country to receive athree-year (extendable to six) work andresidency permit. Large proportions ofH-1B workers adjust to permanentemployment-based and other statuses, aprocess that the US Congress has facili-tated further recently. H-1B workers arenot required to demonstrate that theyintend to return home and are allowedto bring family members. The latter arenot given permission to accept deriva-tive employment but can be employed ifthey get their own H-1B visas.

The qualifications required of H-1Bworkers correspond quite closely withthose expected of most permanent“employment-based” immigrant cate-gories, making the H-1B a natural fun-nel into permanent immigration. As of2000, the H1-B program grants visaholders a (theoretically) unlimitednumber of one-year extensions beyondthe normal six-year stay if the foreignworker has a pending application forpermanent residence or other status.From the perspective of both applicantand employer, the H-1B has the

advantage of being more administra-tively simple — the temporary visarequires the employer to file an attes-tation, while permanent sponsorshiptypically requires a case-by-case deter-mination of a vacancy. Thus, althoughthe up-front adjudication cost of an H-1B visa is higher (with a $1,000 feelevied on top of processing costs) thanfor permanent employment immigra-tion, lower legal fees and speedier pro-cessing make it an attractive alternative.

H-1B admissions are subject to anumerical cap set by Congress, but cer-tain categories of employers, includinggovernment research facilities, univer-sities, and nonprofit research institu-tions are exempt from the cap, as areapplicants applying for extensions ofexisting H-1B visas. As a result, H-1Badmissions have not always reachedtheir designated cap, and many typesof admissions occur even after the caphas been reached.

This route to permanent residence canbe cast both in a good and a bad light.For those more skeptical about or whooppose temporary immigration in gen-eral, using temporary work permits as aholding pen for those desiring perma-nent residence gives employers evenmore power over would-be immigrants.This perspective thus views temporarywork programs as poor alternatives tostreamlined and expanded opportunitiesfor employer-sponsored permanentimmigration. In addition, the multipleapplications and adjudications requiredin this transition visa are a significantbureaucratic burden. On the otherhand, the “filtering” effect of the

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temporary-to-permanent transitionmay be a particularly efficient way to“ration” permanent immigration slots.

To a significant degree, this “filter and transition” approach to choosing permanent economic stream immi-grants has been adopted by otherimmigration systems. In Australia,New Zealand, and Canada, which,unlike the United States and mostEuropean countries, select the bulk of their immigrants based on theapplicant’s general skills and educa-tion, domestic work experience oreducation while on a temporary visaearn an applicant extra points. So doesa job offer. In these ways, applicantsare able to “work their way into” permanent immigration.

For a period, New Zealand took this system one better by granting aone-year temporary visa to marginalapplicants who, if they could secure ajob offer, would qualify as permanentimmigrants — in effect, creating a “jobsearcher’s visa.” Under that country’scurrent point system, a variant of thisprovision remains available to applicantswho score above the pass mark but arejudged to have not demonstrated sufficient employment prospects.These individuals are thus issued tem-porary residence permission, with thepossibility of a transition to permanentstatus. New Zealand also has a “workto residence” visa that allows migrantsemployed by government-approvedemployers, in high-need occupations,or with exceptional talents to enter ona 30-month visa and apply for perma-nent residency after 24 months.

Britain’s Highly Skilled MigrantProgramme, started in 2002, grants all ofthe highly skilled migrants admittedthrough the program’s point system aone-year initial stay (Table 5). The program allows migrants to extend theirstay for an additional three years, afterwhich the migrant may apply for perma-nent settlement rights. It is too early totell at what rate migrants will seek permanent settlement in the program,and at what rate they will be accepted.(At this time, the criteria for receivingsettlement permission through the program appear rather undemanding.)

Other Immigrant

Recruitment Tools

Bilateral Cooperation

In the strategies outlined above, thegovernment plays a relatively passiverole in the recruitment process, servingprimarily as a gatekeeper. However,government or quasi-governmentalentities can play a more activist role,particularly when the personal charac-teristics of the desired migrants are notgreatly differentiated (i.e., for low-skilljobs) and where private recruitmentmechanisms have led to problems ofabuse. This type of approach can beeven more effective when it is admin-istered bilaterally, as has been done bya number of European countries. (Thisapproach is rarely used by the TCIs.)

In the immigrant-sending country, thegovernment (or its designated agent)can verify the bona fides of potentialworkers and give all relevant informa-tion that “qualifies” them for work



Table 5. UK Point System

The United Kingdom’s “Highly Skilled Migrant Program”: Applicants who score a sufficientnumber of points must also demonstrate that they are likely to find employment in their field ofexpertise in the UK and attest that they will make the UK their primary residence.Additionally, graduates of designated MBA programs are automatically allowed to work in theUK under the HSMP scheme. The program grants residency for one year, which can be extend-ed to four years provided the candidate is economically active. After four years, applicants whohave met residency requirements may apply for permanent settlement rights.

Applicants must score at least sixty-five points to be admitted (as of April 2005).

Factors Considered:Education (30 points maximum)Bachelor’s Degree (e.g., BA, BSc) 15“Exceptional” Achievement — The candidate will have “be at the top of their profession, be recognized beyond their field of expertise, and have obtainedinternational recognition.” 25PhD 30Employment experience (50 points maximum)Under 28 years old Over 28 years old2 years graduate level 5 years graduate level or PhD and 3 years graduate level. 254 years graduate level As above, including 2 years at senior or specialist level. 35As above, including 1 year at 10 years graduate level, including 5 years at seniorsenior or specialist level. of specialist level. 50Prior Income — Points are awarded according to income, depending on country in which income was earned. Examples, from the extremes of the schedule, are provided below. (50 points maximum)Under 28 years old Over 28 years oldUnited States - £27,000 per year United States - £40,000 per yearAfghanistan - £2,350 per year Afghanistan - £3,500 per year 25United States - £40,000 per year United States - £100,000 per yearAfghanistan - £3,500 per year Afghanistan - £8,750 per year 35United States £60,000 per year United States - £250,000 per yearAfghanistan - £5,250 per year Afghanistan - £21,875 per year 50Achievement — This is based on supporting evidence such as prizes, press articles, publishedwork, patent rights, or references. (25 points maximum)“Significant” Achievement — The candidate has “developed a body of work that isacknowledged by their peers as contributing significantly to their field of work.” 15“Outstanding” Achievement — The candidate should “be at the top of their profession, be recognized beyond their field of expertise, and have obtained international recognition.” 25Partner’s Achievements (10 points maximum)The spouse or partner that is intending to migrate with the applicant has at least a Bachelor’s degree or equivalent vocational or professional qualifications, or is employed in a graduate-level job. 10Priority applications — These are occupations determined of be of high importance.(50 points maximum)Qualified physicians intending to work as General Practitioners in the UK 50Age allowance (5 points maximum)Applicants under 28 5Total Possible Score 220

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abroad. In the immigrant-receivingcountry, the government can verify the wages, working conditions, andtypes of jobs offered through post-entryinspections and audits. Thus, the dif-ference between a so-called “govern-ment-to-government program” and an“employer-driven” admissions programis found not so much in principle, butin the degree of government involve-ment. Rather than playing passiveenforcement and regulatory roles, the governments involved play activeadministrative roles, granted additionaloversight that, presumably, safeguardsthe program’s integrity. Of course, suchactivism implies a substantial fiscal cost.

Canada provides one model of such aprogram in the form of a temporaryagricultural worker program that in2004 offered about 17,000 visas. Theprogram has been in place since the1960s. At that time, Canada negotiatedbilateral agreements with Mexico andseveral Caribbean states to providetemporary workers to fill vacancies inagricultural sectors from Quebec toSaskatchewan. Under the Canadiantemporary agricultural worker program,employers request foreign agriculturalworkers through the Canadian labordepartment (Human ResourcesDevelopment Canada — HRDC).HRDC aids the employers in assessing


Table 6. Canada Points Test — 2004

CanadaNew point system, implemented in 2002Applicants must have at least 67 points to qualify for admission (as of March 20, 2004). Factors considered are: Points1. Education: Additional years of tertiary vocational training or college education are rewarded equally, but points awarded for vocational training cap at 22 for 15 years of total education. Maximum points are awarded to applicants who have completed a Master’s or PhD and at least 17 years of study. 252. Language Ability: Applicants choose the language (English or French) with which they are most comfortable as their first language. The remaining language is counted as the second language. Points are awarded according to the applicant’s ability to read, write, listen to, and speak both languages. 243. Experience: This is awarded for work experience in a skilled occupation. Experience need not be in the occupation in which they will be employed in Canada, nor does it need to be in an occupation for which there is high demand in Canada. Applicants earn 15 points for one year’s experience in the occupation and two points for each additional year to a maximum of 21. 214. Arranged Employment: Applicants with a non-temporary job offer approved by Human Resources Development Canada (HRDC) or who have been working for at least one year as a temporary employee in an HRDC-approved position and have a non-temporary job offer earn 10 points. Applicants from NAFTA partners and intracompany transfers receive 10 points without HRDC approval. 105. Age: Applicants 21 to 49 earn a maximum of 10 points. Score is discounted 2 points for every year younger than 21 or older than 49. 106. Adaptability: This category awards points for a spouse or partner’s education, or if either the applicant or his or her spouse has previous work or study experience in Canada or relatives in Canada. Points are awarded for arranged employment in this category as well. 10Total Points Possible 100

Sources: Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) world wide web pages.http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/skilled/qual-5.html


the availability of domestic workers forthe vacant positions. Farmers areallowed to access Mexican and otherprogram workers only if HRDCacknowledges that a shortage ofCanadian workers exists and if they aremembers in good standing of ForeignAgriculture Resource ManagementServices (FARM), a nonprofit associa-tion of Canadian farmers and businesses.Employers pay a fee for each vacancyregistered. Applicants who meet therequisite criteria undergo a medicalcheck and confirmation of credentialsby the Secretariat of Labor and SocialWelfare in Mexico. FARM handlescontracts and travel arrangements(these costs are later deducted fromworkers’ pay). Workers are providedwith free housing, inspected annually,and are assigned to a job. Employerscan request specific workers by nameand typically do so. Temporary workersgenerally work 6 1/2 days per week forpay similar to that earned by Canadians.(The Mexican consulate in Canadaalso monitors the workers’ welfare.)Income taxes, unemployment insurance,accident insurance, and pension contri-butions are deducted from salaries butworkers may apply for an income-taxrefund upon returning home and apension return once retired. The finalpaycheck is withheld until the workerreturns to his home country.

The Canada-Mexico program hasreceived less criticism than low-skillagricultural-work programs in othercountries. This is especially the casewith regard to migrant rights, workingconditions, and control of overstaysand illegal work. That the program has

also had its own problems, however,points to the challenges other suchprograms have always faced. An earlierversion of the program, for instance,conducted with Jamaica, was marredby allegations of political patronageand embezzlement on the Jamaicanend. In the current program withMexico, both migrants and employershave complained of bureaucratic hassles,and the program has not been free ofcharges that it does too little to protect the workers. Further, the lackof widespread criticism of the programmay well relate to its size (it is quitesmall) and thus its relative “anonymity.”Finally, costs have been significantlyhigher than those of temporary agricultural-worker programs elsewherethat have less government regulation.Rather than a best practice thatdeserves replication elsewhere, theMexico-Canada program demonstratesthe value of bilateral cooperation indesigning and executing similar pro-grams; it also speaks to the importanceof responsibly enforcing contractualterms in the administration of tempo-rary worker programs, particularly inlow-wage sectors.

Databases

Databases are now a tool that immigra-tion programs can deploy more readilyand reliably than in the past to reducetime spent on administrative controls.For example, a shared database can beused both to register an employer’sintent to hire a foreign worker, to makethe job announcement available tolocal, regional, and national employ-ment agencies (in cases where employ-ers are required to search for resident

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workers), and/or to advertise the vacancyto qualified candidates from abroad.Once permission to recruit a foreignworker is granted to an employer, adatabase of applicants who havealready been precleared to emigrate — that is, their identities, credentials,employment experience, and legaland security vetting have all receivedat least initial verification — canspeed the process enormously.

Australia maintains a web-based “Skill Matching Database.” Employerscan search an archive of resumes ofpre-approved candidates (if theemployer decides to nominate a candi-date from the database, no further visaapplication is required). This databasecan be used for three of Australia’smigration categories: (a) entry under a “labor agreement,” by which aemployer receives pre-approval to hireimmigrants to fill vacancies; (b) underRegional Skilled Migration, in whichemployers in certain low-immigrationregions may sponsor applicants afterdemonstrating inability to fill a vacan-cy; and (c) in the “State/TerritoryNominated Independent” category,whereby the government of anAustralian state or territory selectscandidates for admission even thoughthey do not have a specific job offer.In each case, employers or states mayalso sponsor candidates who are not included in the Skill MatchingDatabase. All of these categories areonly for skilled migrants (both tempo-rary and permanent), but only theState/Territory Nominated Independentcategory requires the applicant to passAustralia’s “points test.”

intracompany Transfers

and Trade Treaty Workers

Another significant and widening routethrough which migrants are admittedinto the advanced industrial nations isthrough the temporary entry of workerswhose access to the labor market of thehost country is allowed in part to facil-itate international commerce or fallsunder the terms of a trade agreement.One general model for these entries isthe schedule of commitments madeunder the World Trade Organization’sGeneral Agreement on Trade inServices (GATS). Provisions madeunder regional and bilateral tradeagreements often follow the frameworkset by the GATS, with the exceptionof NAFTA, which narrowly preceded— and in some ways may have servedas a model for — GATS. The GATSstructure leaves a large scope for coun-tries to set their “commitments” in thisregard, and most have been far lessaggressive in pursuing openings on themovement of people than they haveother trade topics.

The movements of intracompanytransferees and personnel transferredby a firm based in a foreign country to perform contract work in anothercountry are widely accepted, butalmost all developed countries retainsignificant restrictions on such work-ers, including the right to require avisa for entry, minimum requirementson how long intracompany transfereesmust have worked for their employer,and limits on the length of stay, quali-fications, and eligible occupations.With few exceptions, such workersmust be highly skilled and/or have



firm-specific experience. Developedcountries remain highly reluctant togive individuals access to their labormarkets under trade agreements (with the creation and expansion ofthe European Union and EuropeanEconomic Area being the most radicalexceptions and NAFTA also breakingnew ground through the movements ofprofessionals in designated occupations).They also vary on whether temporarystatus can be converted into perma-nent status in employment categoriesnegotiated under trade agreements.

Intracompany transfer entries can besignificant (in the case of the UnitedKingdom, for example, 30 percent ofgeneral temporary work permits go tointracompany transferees) but are per-haps not best thought of as an immi-grant recruitment tool. The decisionto proactively admit immigrants gen-erally leads to admissions policies thatare more generous in terms of eligibleoccupations and length of stay thanthose arrived at via trade agreements.Furthermore, few developed countriesare eager to enshrine immigrationpolicy in international treaties.However, there are perhaps a few les-sons to be drawn from such admis-sions: In many cases the administrativeprocedure for admitting “treatymigrants” is faster and less cumber-some than that for admitting othermigrants. While some might chargethat this opens a “back door” forimmigration, others would argue thatit shows the administrative ease andefficiency that can be achieved whenmigration policy is responsive tobroader economic objectives.

Student Admissions

The education of foreign nationals has now become an important waythat advanced industrial nationsrecruit immigrants and a significantindustry in its own right (Table 8).Hence the recruitment of studentsdeserves discussion that goes beyondthe brief comments made under the“transition” systems above. The “funnel” that draws foreigners in as students and then allows them to stayas temporary workers or permanent settlers is particularly attractive fromthe receiving country’s perspectivebecause education in a domesticinstitution is a “known” for bothemployers and bureaucrats — andbecause it may promote better on-the-job and language skills andintegration outcomes.

Countries have several policy levers that guide this recruitmentmechanism. First, and most obviousamong these, is the initial admission of students. Decisions about the quantity of student visas issued and the administrative ease of admittingforeign students, as well as (in countrieswhere the university system is state-controlled) the policies of educationalinstitutions towards foreign students, all establish the “pool” from whichfuture workers will be drawn. Evenseemingly unrelated policies, such asthe United States’ 2002 decision torequire nationals of certain MiddleEastern and Asian countries to registerwith authorities, may lead students toseek out less intimidating environ-ments in other developed nations.


Table 7. Preference System for Permanent Empoyment-

based Immigration — United States

CanadaPreference System, first introduced in 1952. Legal Cap 2004 actual

admissions1

Total Employment-based Immigration 140,000 179,195First preference (28.6 percent): “Priority workers,” including persons of “extraordinary ability”; outstanding professors and researchers; and executives and managers of US multinationals. offer of employment is required for persons in this category, except those regarded to be of “extraordinary ability.” 40,000 41,801Second preference (28.6 percent): Professionals with “exceptional ability” in the sciences, the arts, or business. Requires both an offer of US employment and a labor certification. The employment requirement can be waived in special circumstances. 40,000 42,620Third preference (28.6 percent): Skilled workers (in occupations that require at least two years formal training); professionals (must have Bachelor’s degrees or appropriate licenses); and “other workers” (unskilled workers). Number of visas issued to “other workers” is limited to 10,000 per year. Requires a labor certification. 40,000 86,058Fourth preference (7.1 percent): Ministers of religion and employeesof religious organizations, foreign medical school graduates, employeesof the US government abroad, and employees of international organizations defined as “special immigrants.” 10,000 8,523Fifth preference (7.1 percent): Employment-creation (investor) visas 10,000 193

1 Includes both adjustments and new arrivals.

Sources: Kramer, 2001; Papademetriou, 1994: 87-88; US Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) world wideweb pages (http://www.ins.gov/graphics/aboutins/statistics/IMM00yrbk/IMM2000list.htm;http://www.ins.usdoj.gov/graphics/aboutins/history/2.pdf; http://www.ins.gov/graphics/services/residency/employment.htm);US Department of State world wide web pages (http://travel.state.gov/visa;employ-based.html).

Table 8. Student Visas, Permits, and Admissions — Selected

Countries Years 1998-2003

1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003United States 564, 683 567,146 659,081 698,595 646,016 624,917Canada1 40,996 51,035 62,016 72,317 68,024 61,293Australia 110,915 119,103 146,565 151,855 162,575New Zealand2 22,470 27,396 34,544 55,694 91,745 114,977Japan 28,000 33,900 41,900 47,300 50,700France 23,500 25,100 36,100 40,000 55,500

1 Canada’s admissions figures only include students who enter Canada for the first time in that year.

2 Numbers based on fiscal year

Sources: Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC), Facts and Figures 2003: Immigration Overview: TemporaryResidents; Australian Department of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA), Population Flows,2001, and Immigration Update, 2003; New Zealand Information Service world wide web pages, http://www.immigra-tion.govt.nz/NR/rdonlyres/F3073A08-D1BF-43EF-88AE-5DD1608FB627/0/S1.xls; Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development: Trends in International Migration 2004; United States Citizenship and ImmigrationServices Statistical Yearbook 2003;


As with temporary work visas, whetheror not a migrant is allowed to transitionfrom a student visa directly to a perma-nent or temporary work visa withoutleaving the country is a critical factor.If this is permitted and administrativelyhappens in a timely fashion, a studentcan make a seamless transition towork. This transition can be furtherfacilitated by allowing students toundertake employment not directlyrelated to their studies, either concur-rent with their studies, during schoolbreaks, or after their studies.Employment under the terms of a student visa allows employers to gathermore information about prospectivestudents and students to learn moreabout the labor market and workplace.Work or residency permission relatedto a student visa can also serve as a“bridge” that allows a job search totake place or bypasses problems causedby administrative delays. In theUnited States, for example, it is notuncommon for a recent graduate tobegin work under the terms of a stu-dent visa while her application for anemployer-sponsored visa is processed.

Finally, the qualifications required for participation in labor migrationprograms also determine whether students will be able to stay (or return)to work after completing their studies.Requirements that applicants for laborimmigration have work experience, forexample, put recent graduates at a disadvantage and may force them toreturn to their home country. Australia,New Zealand, and Canada rewardexperience heavily in their points system, but compensate young graduates

by also granting points to those whohave studied at domestic universities.France takes another approach by grant-ing graduates of national universitieswith degrees in high-demand fields(such as information technology) near-automatic work permits.

Conclusions

In immigration, as much as in anyfield of public policy, a government’sbest strategy is to do only that which it can and does do well or that whichno other entity can do, and leave therest to private actors. The evolution ofpolicies for the admission of immigrantsfor economic purposes gives some indi-cation of where this principle shouldlead. For immigration that is chieflydesigned to satisfy immediate laborneeds or skills shortages, the selectionof immigrants has been largely turnedover to employers, with growing effortsto make that process as predictableand smooth as possible for employerswho “play by the rules.” The bureau-cracy retains a powerful role (as in thepoint systems) where the goals of theprogram are broader and criteria forselecting immigrants have been keptappropriately general, with longer-termeconomic and integration prospects inmind. Increasingly, governments arewisely resisting the temptation to iden-tify skill shortages themselves andmicro-manage admissions. Nevertheless,some occupations to which advancedindustrial nations give admissions priority serve social goals as much as economic ones (doctors, nurses, and other health care workers,

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for example) and are thus rightly thedomain of government.

Experimentation and the willingnessto make necessary adjustments to programs are the hallmarks of successfulimmigrant admissions systems. In thepast two decades, experimentation,particularly in the TCIs, has led to thedevelopment of immigrant admissionsstrategies based not exclusively on aspecific job, or purely on human-capitalcharacteristics, but on a hybrid ofselection strategies and methodologies.The development of temporary-to-per-manent transition visas is one of thebest examples of such a hybrid.Although it raises new challenges, theaddition of the “transition visa” to theimmigration policy lexicon gives poli-cymakers an important new tool. Thebimodal policy categories of “temporary”and “permanent” have never adequatelyaccommodated the actual desires andbehavior of migrants or their employers.The transition visa may be a next stepin making immigration policy workwith, rather than against, labor markets and human nature; but theconcept needs to continue to be testedand refined as it is applied.

Coherence and balance are also impor-tant factors in the effective managementof economic migration. If properly“joined” by opportunities to convertstatus, student, temporary work, andpermanent-settlement immigrationprograms can allow the efficient andjust allocation of immigration rightsand make all three programs easier toadminister without creating populationsof “long-term temporary” immigrants

or placing would-be permanent immigrants in potentially exploitativesituations. Coherence across programsis also necessary to balance the pressure to satisfy immediate skillsshortages and labor needs with thegoal of admitting immigrants who will be successful workers and citizensover the long term. Australia andGreat Britain, for example, attempt toachieve this balance by mixing admis-sions based on points systems withemployer-driven admissions.

Another method of achieving betterdiversity and balance in the allocationof immigrant visas is by allowing localand provincial governments to partici-pate in the selection of immigrants.Canada allows its territories to select asmall (in 2002, almost 1 percent) portion of its permanent immigrants,and the province of Quebec takes special responsibility for selecting allimmigrants intending to settle there.Australia allows provincial and terri-torial governments to sponsor migrantsand has a streamlined admissionsprocess for businesses in rural and low-population-growth areas that wishto sponsor skilled immigrants.

Selecting immigrants is only one partof the recruitment process. Thereappears to be emerging competition forskilled migrant workers. Countries thathave long accepted such workers, particularly Anglophone ones, have an advantage here, but it is not insur-mountable. Policymakers should consider the overall package their policiespresent to perspective migrants (as wellas to their employers). For instance,



if the competition for skilled workersheats up, the immigration policies andprocesses offered by a country maybecome an advantage or disadvantagefor employers. There are anecdotes tothe effect that some of the highly qualified migrants coming to Germanyunder its green card program are stayingonly long enough to cultivate a joboffer in the United States. This wouldimply that the German program isserving as a stepping stone to—andlosing sought-after migrants from—theUS H-1B program. There is no evi-dence to suggest that any sort of“migration competition” is occurringin this case (if these anecdotes amountto anything, it probably has more to dowith the relative economic conditionsand the size of the conational immi-grant community in each country) buta comparison of the two programsoffers an illustration of the potentialfor such competition. The Germanprogram offers migrants a temporarystay of up to five years with littleprospect of permanent immigration.The United States program, on theother hand, offers a six-year stay with a high probability of permanent immi-gration. Widening the advantage forthe United States is the fact that theGerman program asks candidates tostay temporarily in a country whererefining their language skills may be asignificant (yet nonportable) invest-ment and that exacts relatively heavytaxes and social contributions, the fullbenefits of which the migrant will notbe able to reap.

Finally, if the actual selection of specific immigrants is an area where

the government’s strengths are rela-tively limited, then enforcement of an immigration program’s terms andconditions is an area where only thegovernment has competence. Forcountries that choose to use migrationas an economic tool, investments inprotecting the system from fraud andabuse and in verifying the compensa-tion and working conditions of admittedimmigrants are both a necessary cost of doing business in the immigrationrealm and a way to build public confi-dence in immigration in general. Goodenforcement requires setting up realisticregulations that minimize perverseincentives and power dynamics;choosing intelligent and efficient ways to back up those regulations; and finally, dedicating adequate resources.

Enforcement of program terms andworking conditions is thus as critical apoint for the success of an immigrantrecruitment program as is creating asensible framework for admittingimmigrants. After all, in the admissionof immigrants, government will findmany allies and facilitators in the private sector. The greater task, how-ever, may be in demonstrating thatrecruited immigrants are a net publicbenefit and in distinguishing labormigration programs in the public mindfrom irregular migration flows and theoft-maligned asylum system. In thisproject, there can be no more importanttask than keeping labor immigrationprograms honest.

Recommendations

� Enforcement of the terms of economic immigration need not

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be costly — to the government,immigrants, or workers. One wayto maximize efficiency in enforce-ment is to put resources into verifying the terms of employmentafter the fact: site visits and auditsof employers who have not yetdeveloped a track record of behav-ior on the issue, as well as themore rigorous enforcement of general labor laws in sectors andcompanies that employ large num-bers of migrants, as well as less burdensome and more effectiveways to maintain the system’sintegrity than erecting bureaucraticbarriers prior to the admission ofan immigrant. Enforcement is particularly important for programsthat are more likely to inviteabuse. Those based on short-term,low-skill labor migration in whicha worker’s work permission is tiedto the job, or programs that are inproblem-ridden employment sectors (e.g., agriculture or domesticservices) where workers have fewother options, need more scrutinythan do high-skill or permanentmigration programs. Thus, programscan be “triaged” and resourcesdirected to those most in need of supervision.

� Enforcement of the recruitment,working, and wage conditions ofemployer-driven temporary-workprograms, in particular, is a criti-cally important investment ingood governance. Practices suchas employing a worker abroadchiefly for the prospect of allowinghim or her to enter a country as

an intracompany transferee should be vigorously guardedagainst. Similarly, the practice ofsponsoring temporary immigrantswhose services will merely be subcontracted to another firmmust be both better understoodand regulated more intelligently.Ultimately, the integrity of programs that are politically controversial is the best guaranteethat they can survive and continueto offer the returns they aredesigned to yield.

� The efficiency of the processthrough which migrants areadmitted is critical to the successof economic immigration programs.Long processing times and unnec-essary documentation requirementscan destroy much of the benefit oflabor immigration — particularlymigration intended to relieve skillshortages or meet peak labordemand. To reduce inefficiencies,governments can start by adoptinginnovations such as acceleratedprocessing of high-priority applicants and fewer proceduresfor “low risk” sectors, that is, sectors in which shortages areendemic. They can also consideremploying alternatives to case-by-case processing and labor-markettests, such as “attestations,” and/orcharging a fee for the privilege ofemploying a foreign national.Migrants entering for work in professional occupations mightalso be asked to pay a modest feebefore entry or after they havesecured employment.



� Countries should continue to berealistic about their ability toidentify “skills shortages” quicklyand accurately enough to justifygovernment activism in selectingimmigrants. In addition, theadvantages and disadvantages ofimposing numerical caps on par-ticular migration programs mustbe weighed carefully. While politi-cally expedient, such caps (partic-ularly if set by legislative action)may force migration admissions totrail cyclical changes in the econ-omy and demand for skill sets by awide margin.

� A willingness to experiment willalso pay dividends in how best toengage local, provincial, and state governments in the selectionof immigrants. Allowing thesegovernments to select a small pro-portion of immigrants adds diver-sity to the stream of immigrantsand puts selection in the hands ofthose best able to assess a localcommunity’s needs. However,these selection mechanisms willneed to be adapted over time.Immigrants, like the native-born,follow job opportunities, most ofwhich are in or near certain largerand medium-sized cities. The lesseconomically and demographicallydynamic regions and cities thatmight most appreciate the contributions of migrants may beleast able to attract them. Withexperience, these jurisdictionsmay be able to use the ability toselect “their own” immigrants toidentify and attract those most

likely to settle permanently intheir localities and to fit theireconomic and social needs.

� Transparency to immigrants,employers, and the public is a crucial factor. Easily accessibleinformation on the applicationprocess and waiting times, andclear, simple regulations reducethe costs and risks to employersand migrants and fight public misconceptions. Canada,Australia, and New Zealand,which have extensive on-lineinformation about their point systems and other migration categories, provide examples of good first steps here.

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References

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Bauer, T. and K. Zimmerman. “Immigration Policyin Integrated National Economies.” IZA Discussion Paper Number 170. Bonn: Institutefor the Study of Labor (IZA), 2000.

Carzaniga, A. “GATS, Mode 4, and the Pattern ofCommitments.” Paper presented at the Conference on Movement of Natural PersonsUnder the GATS held by the World Trade Organization. Geneva, April 11-12, 2002.

Citizenship and Immigration Canada. Citizenshipand Immigration Canada Website. http://www.cic.gc.ca. Ottawa: CIC, 2004.

Department of Immigration and MulticulturalAffairs. Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs Website.http://www.immi.gov.au/. Belconnen,Australian Capital Territory: DIMA, 2004.

Fotakis, C. and G. Coomans. “Demographic ageing, migration and the challenge for growth and labour market sustainability.” Paper presented at the Joint Conference on the Economic and Social Aspects of Migration,Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development and the European Commission.Brussels, January 21-22, 2003.

Greenhill, D. “Managed Migration Best Practicesand Public Policy: The Canadian Experience.” Paper presented at the Workshopon Best Practices Related to Migrant Workers, International Organization forMigration. Santiago, Chile, June 2000.

International Organization for Migration. WorldMigration 2003. Geneva: IOM, 2003.

Jupp, B. “The local security challenge: Can wedevise policies that are compatible with peaceful co-existence?” Presentation at theInvitational Conference on People Flow in its Wider Context: A Comprehensive Exploration,Tilburg University, Netherlands, November25-26, 2003.

New Zealand Immigration Service. New ZealandImmigration Service Website. http://www.immigration.govt.nz/. Wellington:NZIS, 2004.

Niessen, J. and Y. Schibel, eds. EU and USapproaches to the management of immigration: Comparative perspectives. Brussels: MigrationPolicy Group, 2003.

Office of Immigration Statistics. StatisticalYearbook. Washington, DC: US Department of Homeland Security, Office of ImmigrationStatistics, various years.

Organisation for Economic Cooperation andDevelopment. Maintaining Prosperity in anAgeing Society. Paris: OECD, 1998.

Organisation for Economic Cooperation andDevelopment. International Mobility of theHighly Skilled. Paris: OECD, 2002.

Organisation for Economic Cooperation andDevelopment. Trends in InternationalMigration. Paris: OECD, 2003.

Rollason, N. “Labour Recruitment for SkillShortages in the United Kingdom.” InMigration for Employment: Bilateral Agreementsat a Crossroads. Paris: OECD, 2004.


About the Authors

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T. Alexander Aleinikoff is the Dean ofthe Georgetown University Law Centerand the Executive Vice President forLaw Center Affairs. He is a member ofthe Board of Trustees of the MigrationPolicy Institute and was a SeniorAssociate in the InternationalMigration Policy Program at theCarnegie Endowment for InternationalPeace. In 2001-2002, he was a VisitingFellow at the Institut Universitaire desHaut Etudes Internationales, Geneva.

From 1994-1997, Mr. Aleinikoff servedas the General Counsel and thenExecutive Associate Commissioner forPrograms of the Immigration andNaturalization Service (INS). Prior tojoining the Clinton administration, hewas a full Professor of Law at theUniversity of Michigan Law School.After receiving his law degree, Mr.Aleinikoff served as a law clerk to theHonorable Edward Weinfeld, USDistrict Judge. He has published numer-ous articles in the areas of immigration,race, statutory interpretation, and con-stitutional law, and he is also the authorof the principal text and casebooks onUS immigration. His most recent schol-arship includes: co-editor (with DouglasKlusmeyer) of Citizenship Today: GlobalPerspectives and Practices; co-author(with Douglas Klusmeyer) of FromMigrants to Citizens: Membership in aChanging World; co-author (with DavidMartin and Hiroshi Motomura) ofImmigration: Process and Policy; and co-author (with John Garvey) ofModern Constitutional Theory: A Reader.His book Citizenship Policies for an Ageof Migration was published in May 2002.He holds a JD from Yale University anda BA from Swarthmore College.

Grete Brochmann is ResearchDirector at the Institute for SocialResearch in Oslo as well as a Professorof Sociology at the University of Oslo.Currently, Dr. Brochmann is workingon welfare state dilemmas in a Nordiccomparative perspective, as well ascontinuing her work on the history ofimmigration to Norway 900-2000, inwhich she has focused on 1975-2000.This comprehensive history workreceived the Brage prize for 2003. Dr. Brochmann has been a member ofseveral commissions in the NorwegianResearch Council and has held a num-ber of board positions at institutesincluding PRIO, ARENA, and theHistory Department at the Universityof Oslo. She has also been member oftwo governmental commissions, and has held positions or board membership with the Council ofEurope, COST, the Danish researchprogram AMID, and the SwedishPower and Integration Investigation.

Grete Brochmann received her PhD in Sociology from the University ofOslo in 1990. She has published severalbooks and articles on internationalmigration; sending and receivingcountry perspectives; EU policies; welfare state dilemmas; and historicalstudies of immigration. She has alsobeen involved in a number of international research projects andevaluations. She has lectured internationally for many years, and hasserved as a visiting scholar at theUniversité Catholique de Louvain inBrussels and at the University ofCalifornia — Berkeley. In 2002, sheheld a visiting professorship in honorof Willy Brandt in Malmo, Sweden.


About the Authors 259

Jon Erik Dölvik is Research Directorat the Fafo Institute for Labour andSocial Research in Oslo. He is a soci-ologist by training and his main fieldof research is comparative employmentrelations in the Nordic and Europeancontext. He has published extensivelyon issues related to Europeanizationand globalization of labor markets andemployment relations. Dr. Dölvik hasserved as a visiting scholar atWissenschaftzentrum Berlin, theEuropean Trade Union Institute inBrussels, the Institute of IndustrialRelations at the University ofCalifornia — Berkeley, and as aresearch fellow at the ARENA Centrefor Advanced Research on theEuropeanisation of the Nation-State,University of Oslo. He is currentlyengaged in studies of the labor marketimplications of EU enlargement. Dr.Dölvik is a member of the EditorialPanel of the European Journal ofIndustrial Relations and of the EditorialCommittee of Transfer - EuropeanReview of Labour and Research.

Maria Lucinda Fonseca has been anAssociate Professor in the Departmentof Geography of the University ofLisbon since 1993. Her main scientificareas of research include InternationalMigration, Social and EconomicGeography, and Urban and RegionalDevelopment and Planning. Currently,she is a member of the InternationalMigration, Integration and SocialCohesion in Europe Network ofExcellence (IMISCOE), co-leader ofthe IMISCOE research cluster onsocial integration and mobility, andthe research coordinator of Reinventing

Portuguese Metropolises: migrants andurban governance and Deprivation andSocial Exclusion in Metro Lisbon.

Dr. Fonseca received her PhD inHuman Geography from the Universityof Lisbon in 1989. Some of her most recent publications includeReunificação familiar e Imigração emPortugal (Family reunification andimmigration in Portugal) (co-authorand coordinator); New waves: Migrationfrom Eastern to Southern Europe(co-editor with Maria I. Baganha);“Migration in the MediterraneanBasin: bridges and margins,” Finisterra(Revista Portuguesa de Geografia)(geography journal) (co-editor withRussell King); Immigrants in Lisbon:routes of integration (co-author);Immigration and Place in MediterraneanMetropolis, (co-editor).

Jorge Gaspar is a Professor in theDepartment of Geography at theUniversity of Lisbon and Director of theCentro de Estudos e DesenvolvimentoRegional e Urbano, Lda (CEDRU).Currently he serves as coordinator ofthe Portuguese National Program forSpatial Planning Policies within theMinistry of Environment, Cities, andRegional Development. Jorge Gaspar isa member of several organizations,including Academia Europaea, theLisbon Academy of Sciences, theAssociation of Portuguese Geographers,the Association of AmericanGeographers, Società GeograficaItaliana, Società Italiana di StudiElettorali, the Portuguese Associationfor Regional Development, and thePortuguese Society of Urban Planners.

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Dr. Gaspar received his PhD inHuman Geography from theUniversity of Lisbon in 1972. He haspublished fifteen books and more thanone hundred articles and researchreports focusing on topics such asurban studies, land management andplanning, electoral studies, economicgeography, regional and urban devel-opment, and Portugal.

Charalambos Kasimis is a Professor of Rural Sociology at the Departmentof Agricultural Economics and RuralDevelopment at the AgriculturalUniversity of Athens. His work has focused on questions of rural transformation and development inGreece and the Balkans and specifi-cally on family farming, employment,and rural community change.Migration and, more particularly,migration to rural regions has becomeone of his main research priorities in the past few years when he coordinated the project: TheImplications of the Settlement andEmployment of Migrant Labour in RuralGreece. His current research projectsinclude: A Cognitive Approach to RuralSustainable Development: The Dynamicsof Expert and Lay Knowledge (financedby the EU), and The MultifunctionalRole of Migrants in Rural Greece andRural Southern Europe (financed byThe John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation).

Dr. Kasimis has recently co-authoredmigration-related articles including:“The Multifunctional Role of Migrantsin the Greek Countryside:Implications for the Rural Economy

and Society” in the Journal of Ethnicand Migration Studies; “Greece: AHistory of Migration” and “Migrants inthe Rural Economies of Greece andSouthern Europe” on the MigrationInformation Source; and “Migrants inRural Greece: a Qualitative Analysisof Empirical Findings” in SociologiaRuralis. He received his PhD from theUniversity of Bradford, UK in 1983.

Wolfgang Lutz is Director of theVienna Institute of Demography of theAustrian Academy of Sciences andLeader of the World PopulationProgram at the International Institutefor Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA).He is an Affiliated Professor at theCollege of Population Studies atChulalongkorn University (Bangkok)and Adjunct Professor for Demographyand Social Statistics at the Universityof Vienna. He served as a SecretaryGeneral for the International Unionfor the Scientific Study of Population(IUSSP) from 1998 to 2001. His mainresearch interests are in populationforecasting, fertility, and the analysis ofhuman capital formation. He was alsoinvolved in the coordination of theEuropean Observatory on the SocialSituation, Demography and the Family.

Dr. Lutz studied philosophy, mathemat-ics, and statistics at the Universities of Munich, Vienna, Helsinki andPennsylvania. In 1983, he received his PhD in Demography from theUniversity of Pennsylvania and in1998 a second doctorate (Habilitation)from the University of Vienna. He haswritten or edited nineteen books andmore than 120 scientific articles and



book chapters (including contributionsto Science and Nature, as well as lead-ing journals in the field of population).His most recent books include:Frontiers of Population Forecasting;Population and Climate Change;Population and Environment: Methods ofAnalysis; and The End of WorldPopulation Growth in the 21st Century:New Challenges for Human CapitalFormation and Sustainable Development.

Rainer Münz is Head of Research atErste Bank in Vienna and a SeniorFellow at the Hamburg Institute ofInternational Economics (HWWI;Migration Research Group). He is anexpert on population and migration,including labor migration and migration policy. Between 1992 and2003, Dr. Münz was head of theDepartment of Demography atHumboldt University, Berlin. Prior tothat, he was Director of the Institute ofDemography at the Austrian Academyof Science. Rainer Münz is a memberof several boards and advisory boards,including the InternationalOrganization for Migration (Geneva);the Center for Migration, Integrationand Citizenship at Oxford University;the International Metropolis Project(Ottawa — Amsterdam); theAssociation of German Pension Insurers (Frankfurt-Berlin, Germany); SOTAccountants (Vienna-Graz-Munich);VBV Pension Insurance (Vienna); andOBV-HTP Publishers (Vienna).

Dr. Münz studied at ViennaUniversity, where he earned his PhDin 1978. His recent books and editedvolumes include: Challenges and

Opportunities of International Migrationfor the EU, Its Member States,Neighboring Countries and Regions (withRobert Holzmann; Migrationsreport2004 (Migration Report 2004) (withKlaus Bade and Michael Bommes);Diasporas and Ethnic Migrants.Germany, Israel and Post-SovietSuccessor States in ComparativePerspective (with Rainer Ohliger); andDas Schweizer Bürgerrecht (The SwissCitizenship Law) (with Ralf Ulrich).

Rinus Penninx is a Professor of EthnicStudies at the University of Amsterdamand served as Director of the Institutefor Migration and Ethnic Studies(IMES) at the university from 1993 to 2005. He has been co-chair ofInternational Metropolis since 1999. InApril 2004, he became Coordinator ofthe International Migration, Integrationand Social Cohesion in Europe Networkof Excellence (IMISCOE).

Dr. Penninx has written for manyyears on migration, minorities’ policies, and ethnic studies. His reportEthnic Minorities (1979) for the DutchScientific Council for GovernmentPolicy (WRR) served as the startingpoint for integration policies in theNetherlands. From 1978 to 1988, heworked as a senior researcher in theResearch and DevelopmentDepartment of the Ministry ofWelfare, Public Health and Culture,with the focus of his research beingmigration and integration of immigrants in the Netherlands.Professor Penninx received his PhD in 1988 from the University ofAmsterdam. Much of his present

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research work relates to two topics:migration and integration policies atthe EU-level and the functions ofimmigrant organizations.

Sergei Scherbov has been Leader of the research group on PopulationDynamics and Forecasting at theVienna Institute of Demography,Austrian Academy of Sciences since2002. He is also a Senior ResearchScholar at the International Institutefor Applied Systems Analysis(IIASA). Previously he served asresearcher and lecturer for thePopulation Research Centre at theUniversity of Groningen, TheNetherlands, and as head of the World Health OrganizationCollaborating Centre for design andapplication of models of chronic non-communicable diseases for modeling morbidity and mortality.

Dr. Scherbov received his PhD inTheory Systems, Control Theory, andSystems Analysis from the All-UnionResearch Institute for Systems Studiesof the USSR Academy of Sciences in1983. His research interests includedemographic modeling and softwaredevelopment, data processing, popula-tion projections, applications of multi-state demography, Soviet and Russiandemographic studies, and population-environment interactions. He has co-edited several books including,most recently, The End of WorldPopulation Growth in the 21st Century:New Challenges for Human CapitalFormation and Sustainable Development.Dr. Scherbov has also published a largenumber of articles in international

scientific journals, and recently co-authored “Europe’s population at aturning” in Science, as well as “TheEnd of World Population Growth” and “Average Remaining LifetimesCan Increase as Human PopulationsAge” in Nature. Additionally, he co-authored several papers inPopulation and Development Review.

Sarah Spencer is Associate Director atthe Centre on Migration, Policy andSociety (COMPAS) at the Universityof Oxford and directs its ManagedMigration Programme. She is also aCommissioner at the Commission forRacial Equality, Chair of the Equalityand Diversity Forum, and a VisitingProfessor at the Human Rights Centre,University of Essex. She was formerlyDirector of the Citizenship andGovernance Programme at theInstitute for Public Policy Researchand is a former General Secretary ofthe National Council for CivilLiberties. Sarah Spencer has twicebeen seconded into the Cabinet Officeto contribute to policy research onmigration, was a member of the government’s Taskforce on the HumanRights Act, and on the proposedCommission on Equality and HumanRights. She contributes to the work ofthe European Policy Centre in Brusselsand to the MPI’s Athens MigrationPolicy Initiative.

Her current projects include: Changingstatus, changing lives? The socio-economicimpact of EU accession on low wagemigrant labour in the UK; The impact of the migration NGO sector on thedevelopment of migration policy: Ireland


as a case study; and Muslims andCommunity Cohesion in Britain. Herrecent publications are available atwww.compas.ox.ac.uk.

Thomas Straubhaar is President of theHamburg Institute of InternationalEconomics (HWWI) and a Professorof Economics at the University ofHamburg, both positions which he hasheld since 1999. He is a foundingmember of the IZA Policy FellowsGroup and in 2004, Dr. Straubhaarreceived the Ludwig-Erhard Prize forhis publications on economics.

Dr. Straubhaar worked as an external adviser to the Swiss bankUBS between 1992 and 1995, andserved as an advisor to the EuropeanCommission for Issues of Migrationand Labor Market Problems between1986 and 1987.


About the Editor


Demetrios G. Papademetriou is thePresident of the Migration PolicyInstitute (MPI), a Washington-basedthink tank dedicated exclusively tothe study of international migration. He is also the convener of the AthensMigration Policy Initiative (AMPI), atask force of mostly European seniorimmigration experts that advises EUMembers States on immigration andasylum issues, and the Co-Founder and International Chair Emeritus of“Metropolis: An International Forumfor Research and Policy on Migrationand Cities.”

Dr. Papademetriou holds a PhD inComparative Public Policy andInternational Relations (1976) and hastaught at the universities of Maryland,Duke, American, and New School forSocial Research. He has held a widerange of senior positions that include:Chair of the Migration Committee ofthe Paris-based Organisation forEconomic Cooperation andDevelopment (OECD); Director forImmigration Policy and Research atthe US Department of Labor andChair of the Secretary of Labor’sImmigration Policy Task Force; andExecutive Editor of the InternationalMigration Review. Dr. Papademetriouhas published more than 200 books,articles, monographs and researchreports on migration topics and advisessenior government and political party officials in more than twentycountries. His most recent publicationsinclude Secure Borders, Open Doors:Visa Procedures in the Post-September 11Era (2005, co-author), NAFTA’sPromise and Reality (2003, co-author),

America’s Challenge: Domestic Security,Civil Liberties, and National Unity afterSeptember 11 (2003, co-author), and Caught in the Middle: BorderCommunities in an Era of Globalization(2001, senior editor and co-author).


About the Luso-American

Foundation


The Luso-American Foundation(FLAD) was created by the Governmentof Portugal in May 1985 as a private,independent grantmaking foundationwith the mission of assisting Portugalin its development, mainly by buildingstrong ties with the United States.FLAD’s priority program areas are:Education, Science and Technology;Culture; Environment; Civil Society and Innovation; InternationalCooperation; and Public Administration.From its inception FLAD was also recognized as a 501(c) 4 foundation in the United States. Twenty yearslater, the Foundation has become recognized as a leading Portugueseactor in transatlantic relations, withan active program linking Portugal’sinstitutions with partners in theUnited States as well as in otherEuropean Union (EU) countries.

FLAD has been an active supporter ofresearch projects, conferences andpublications in all aspects of migrationstudies. Since 1996 FLAD has support-ed many research projects at threePortuguese universities – University ofLisbon (Center of GeographicStudies), the New University ofLisbon (Socinova), and the Universityof Coimbra (Social Studies Center).Projects supported by FLAD includedresearch on immigration legislation,family reunification laws, immigrantlabor market entry, and integrationbest practices, among others.

With FLAD’s financial support, these universities and their researchteams joined the preeminent interna-tional migration research and policy

project, METROPOLIS INTERNA-TIONAL, based in the United States,Canada, and Europe. FLAD continuesto fund research, and policy analysismeetings joining US and EU partnersin strategic planning in this crucial,social/political area. In October 2006,FLAD and its partners will host the XI International MetropolisConference in Lisbon.

FLAD has published, either alone or with other organizations, the following books on migration andcitizenship:

Metropolis International Workshop1998, 1999Conference proceedings, with aForeword by Charles Buchanan andJosé Leitão

Metropolis Portugal: AnInternational Comparative Researchand Policy Project for MigrationCities and Minorities, Booklet, 1999

Is an Ethclass Emerging in Europe?The Portuguese Case, 2000By Maria Ioannis Baganha, José CarlosMarques, and Graça Fonseca

Immigration and Place inMediterranean Metropolises, 2002Chief Editor, Lucinda Fonseca, with aForeword by Charles Buchanan

New Waves: Migration from Easternto Southern Europe, 2003Edited by Maria Ioannis Baganha andMaria Lucinda Fonseca

About FLAD 269

From Migrants to CitizensEdited by T. Alexander Aleinikoff and Douglas KlusmeyerCarnegie Endowment for InternationalPeace, Washington, DC, 2000

Citizenship Today, GlobalPerspectives and PracticesEdited by T. Alexander Aleinikoff andDouglas KlusmeyerCarnegie Endowment for InternationalPeace, Washington, DC, 2001

Citizenship Policies for an Age of MigrationBy T. Alexander Aleinikoff andDouglas KlusmeyerCarnegie Endowment for InternationalPeace and Migration Policy Institute,Washington, DC, 2002

For more information about FLADprograms and projects, publications,and events, please visit www.flad.pt

About the Migration

Policy Institute

The Migration Policy Institute (MPI) isan independent, nonpartisan, nonprofitthink tank dedicated to the study of themovement of people worldwide. MPIprovides analysis, development, andevaluation of migration and refugeepolicies at the local, national, and international levels. It aims to meet therising demand for pragmatic andthoughtful responses to the challengesand opportunities that large-scale migra-tion, whether voluntary or forced, presents to communities and institutionsin an increasingly integrated world.

The Migration Information Source,MPI’s award-winning online resourcefor timely and accurate migration dataand analysis, features articles by lead-ing thinkers in the field of migration,resource pages for more than fiftycountries, and easy-to-access data onmigration to countries around theworld. Source Special Issues have provided in-depth analyses onMigration and Human Rights, US-Mexico Migration, Integration andImmigrants, Africa, Women andMigration, and Development andMigration. The Migration InformationSource is available online atwww.migrationinformation.org.

MPI publications provide timely independent, nonpartisan analysis onthe issues of migration management,national security and civil liberties,refugee protection and internationalhumanitarian response, NorthAmerican borders, and immigrant settlement and integration. Recenttitles from the Migration PolicyInstitute include:

Countering Terrorist Mobility:Shaping an Operational StrategyBy MPI Nonresident Fellow SusanGinsburg, former Senior Counsel andTeam Leader, National Commissionon Terrorist Attacks Upon the UnitedStates (9/11 Commission)

Managing Integration: The EuropeanUnion’s Responsibilities TowardsImmigrantsEdited by Rita Süssmuth and WernerWeidenfeld, Bertelsmann Foundation Published by the BertelsmannFoundation and the Migration PolicyInstitute

The United States RefugeeAdmissions Program: Reforms for aNew Era of Refugee ResettlementBy MPI Nonresident Fellow David A.Martin, University of Virginia

Leaving Too Much to Chance: A Roundtable on ImmigrantIntegration PolicyBy Michael Fix, Demetrios G.Papademetriou, and Betsy Cooper

One Face at the Border: Behind the Slogan By Deborah Meyers

Real Challenges for Virtual Borders:The Implementation of US-VISITBy Rey Koslowski, Rutgers University-Newark

Secure Borders, Open Doors: VisaProcedures in the Post-September 11 EraBy Stephen Yale-Loehr, Demetrios G.Papademetriou, and Betsy Cooper


About MPI 273

Independent Task Force onImmigration and America’s Future:The RoadmapBy Michael Fix, Doris Meissner, andDemetrios G. Papademetriou

For more information about theMigration Policy Institute’s experts,policy research, publications, and events, please visit www.migrationpolicy.org.

Acknowledgements

This book project was made possiblethrough the generous support of theLuso-American Foundation (FLAD)in Lisbon, Portugal, and especiallyFLAD’s President of the ExecutiveCouncil, Rui Machete, and ExecutiveCouncil Member Charles (Buck)Buchanan and his team. For moreinformation about the foundation,please visit http://www.flad.pt/.

The Editor would like to expresssincere thanks to each of theauthors for sharing their insightsabout the evolution of Europeanimmigration and immigrant integration policies and the massive challenges EU MemberStates and the Union’s central insti-tutions face. The variety and depthof the questions and policy solu-tions posed provide an essential,fact-based framework for local,national, and European policies thatcan increase immigration’s benefitsfor communities, sending countries,and migrants themselves.

A heartfelt thanks also goes to former EU CommissionersAntonio Vitorino and AnnaDiamandopoulou, Dutch Ministerfor Immigration and Integration RitaVerdonk, Alex Rondos, GiorgosGlynos, Jean Louis de Brouwer,Sandra Pratt, Antonis Kastrissianakis,Kostas Fotakis, Rob Visser, AlexSorel, Marilyn Haime, Ali Rabarisonand Chavi Nana. These individualswere critical in offering generousguidance to MPI throughout thiswork. By affording the MPI teamprivileged access to information

and their insights, they made the papers included in this volume farbetter than they might have beenotherwise. Thanks also to the manyother supporters of MPI’s Europeanwork, particularly the Niarchos andKing Baudouin foundations.

The final thanks are reserved for mycolleagues. Jonathan Pattee played acrucial role in editing and helpingto bring this volume to fruition.Thanks also to my superbly talentedand mission-driven colleaguesGregory Maniatis, Colleen Coffey,Julia Gelatt, Kirin Kalia, and AaronErlich for their editorial and production assistance, as well astheir good humor. Finally, PatriciaHord Graphik Design did theirusual superb job with publicationlayout and design.




Europe and

Its Immigrants in

the 21st Century

A New Deal

or a Continuing



Europe is at a crossroads. Demography, labor market realities, andalready overwhelmed social protection systems mean that immigrationwill play a larger role in Europe in the decades ahead. The policy challenge is this: How can the European Union absorb new flows ofimmigrants when the 35 to 40 million foreign-born people already inits midst continue to face difficulties in becoming a full part of the economic, cultural, social, and political lives of their adopted societies?

In this volume, the Migration Policy Institute has gathered some of the finest thinkers to offer insightful counsel and, wherever possible, solutions to Europe’s immigration challenges. They piecetogether the puzzle of a well-managed, comprehensive migrationregime, tackling issues ranging from immigration’s economic costsand benefits, to effective selection systems, citizenship, the welfarestate, and integration policies that work.

This volume marks another milestone in MPI’s deep commitment to European policy and transatlantic cooperation on immigration policy. In addition to working closely with the European Commission,Member State governments, and other EU institutions, MPI collaborates on several long-term research and policy initiatives with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Developmentand other international institutions. This work is generously supportedby the Luso-American Foundation in Portugal, the Stavros S. NiarchosFoundation, and the King Baudouin Foundation, among others.

Price: $24.95

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Europe and Its Immigrants in the 21st Century...regime, tackling issues ranging from immigration’s...

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