Suchergebnisse

Voting is for citizens only, right? Not exactly. It is not widely known that immigrants, or noncitizens, currently vote in local elections in over a half dozen cities and towns in the U.S.; nor that campaigns to expand the franchise to noncitizens have been launched in at least a dozen other jurisdictions from coast to coast over the past decade. These practices have their roots in another little-known fact: for most of the country's history - from the founding until the 1920s - noncitizens voted in forty states and federal territories in local, state, and even federal elections, and also held

Migrants are omnipresent in cosmopolitan societies. Propelled from their homelands by poverty, violence, and environmental disasters—and the promise of better opportunities and security—migrants have found their way into metropolitan regions. At the same time, we see steep increases in economic inequality. These changes, which are intrinsically connected to the rise of neoliberal polices, have pushed immigration to the top of the political agenda for both the political right and left in many nations. The right seeks to erect walls, restrict immigration, and deport the undocumented. The left seeks amnesty, sanctuary policies and other measures to advance human rights in response to the migration crisis. Yet neither approach addresses the underlying causes of migration nor growing inequalities that together animate populist revolts on both the left and right across the globe.
In this paper, I employ a framework that foregrounds capitalist accumulation at the center of these processes. Focusing on urban areas in the US, I highlight the ways economic, social and political structures contribute to growing inequalities between immigrants and the native born -- as well as sharp inequalities within each group -- which, in turn, affect patterns of immigrant incorporation, politics and options for reform. The paper examines US immigration and immigrant policy, assessing their impacts on inequality and immigrant incorporation processes and outcomes. I conclude by pointing to contemporary social movements and evolving political alignments, which have the potential to achieve more egalitarian outcomes capable of sustaining social cohesion in metropolitan regions, as well as more stable and robust democratic systems across borders. Given that immigrants and their offspring comprise nearly one in four people in the U.S., addressing such inequalities is theoretically important and a pressing political concern.

Migrants are omnipresent in cosmopolitan societies. Propelled from their homelands by poverty, violence, and environmental disasters—and the promise of better opportunities and security—migrants have found their way into metropolitan regions. At the same time, we see steep increases in economic inequality. These changes, which are intrinsically connected to the rise of neoliberal polices, have pushed immigration to the top of the political agenda for both the political right and left in many nations. The right seeks to erect walls, restrict immigration, and deport the undocumented. The left seeks amnesty, sanctuary policies and other measures to advance human rights in response to the migration crisis. Yet neither approach addresses the underlying causes of migration nor growing inequalities that together animate populist revolts on both the left and right across the globe. In this paper, I employ a framework that foregrounds capitalist accumulation at the center of these processes. Focusing on urban areas in the US, I highlight the ways economic, social and political structures contribute to growing inequalities between immigrants and the native born -- as well as sharp inequalities within each group -- which, in turn, affect patterns of immigrant incorporation, politics and options for reform. The paper examines US immigration and immigrant policy, assessing their impacts on inequality and immigrant incorporation processes and outcomes. I conclude by pointing to contemporary social movements and evolving political alignments, which have the potential to achieve more egalitarian outcomes capable of sustaining social cohesion in metropolitan regions, as well as more stable and robust democratic systems across borders. Given that immigrants and their offspring comprise nearly one in four people in the U.S., addressing such inequalities is theoretically important and a pressing political concern.

A contribution to a roundtable on immigration & African Americans responding to Stephen Steinberg's "Immigration, African Americans and Race Discourse" (2005). It is contended that American progressives should strive to unify African Americans & immigrant groups to challenge the prevailing racial hierarchy within the contemporary US. After asserting that US society will successfully incorporate immigrant groups & that certain immigrant communities have been delineated as model minorities, Steinberg's contention that African Americans' socio-economic prospects have been damaged by immigration policy is backed. Rather than allow immigration policy to reinforce the existing racial hierarchy, it is stressed that American progressives should strive to establish multiethnic working-class alliances that would advocate African Americans' & immigrant groups' socio-economic advancement. It is concluded that such coalitions are needed to confront & ultimate defeat the established racial hierarchy in US society. J. W. Parker