Want to see the extent to which migration has shaped our world and the countries in it? Check out this amazing interactive visualization from the International Organization for Migration, which reveals each country's sources and destinations of migratory flows.
As the UK's Labour party leadership contest enters the final stretch and speculation escalates about a victory for Jeremy Corbyn, a backbencher on the party's left-wing, some students might be interested to read some political commentary of the event.
The former German chancellor points (auf Deutsch) to a problematic rock in Germany's current hard place: it needs a modern, coherent immigration system - and immigrants! - to sustain its economy and welfare state. An easy case for him to make from his current position, without an easy political fix, but nonetheless true. An English summary can be found here.
Schengen, the agreement that eliminated Europe's internal borders and permits passport-free travel, is arguably the most impressive, beloved, and certainly symbolic achievement of European integration. However, operating Schengen requires extensive cooperation and effective burden-sharing on a number of fronts in order to overcome what is otherwise a sizable collective action problem. Yet issues such as relocating refugees and combating international terrorism alter state incentives regarding burden-sharing, rendering cooperation politically difficult to achieve. For details, check out these reports by the BBC and Economist.
It's of course not simply those on the political left that defend birthright citizenship (jus soli) as integral to our immigration system, despite what the media suggests. These two articles present a politically conservative case for birthright citizenship. The first offers a detailed legal-constitutional analysis of the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The second from The Federalist appeals more straightforwardly to the values and principles of constitutional conservatism as a basis for rejecting calls for ending birthright citizenship. As the author argues, "nothing is more 'conservative' than birthright citizenship." Indeed.
While this article is primarily about fact-checking Donald Trump's newly released policy proposal for immigration, I think it is more instructive as a reality-check for anyone interested in what the data actually say about immigration in this country.
As the political discussions heat up over Britain's proposed exit from the EU, or Brexit, many proponents of a Brexit will cite immigration as a reason for leaving. As this op-ed points out though, while immigration is a serious issue to be addressed, exiting the EU won't actually resolve it.
This article really captures much of the political dilemma facing a country like Germany. On the one hand, the country desperately needs immigrants - and especially in small towns like Goslar whose populations and economies are shrinking rapidly. On the other hand, the settlement and integration of immigrants is highly controversial politically - and again, especially in small towns like Goslar whose populations aren't accustomed to the multicultural diversity that immigration brings. You might expect this kind of political rhetoric from the SPD or Greens, but it's all the more noteworthy because this case is being made by a CDU politician.
This is a timely op-ed regarding the cynical proposals from some politicians to "secure the border" as a prerequisite to addressing comprehensive immigration reform. Sadly, the 'enforcement first' strategy has been the same plan touted for nearly three decades by some politicians that prefer more status quo over resolving the unauthorized immigrant problem. And as Cornelius notes, its this tacit support of the status quo that has in fact made the problem worse: walls also tend to keep people in too, remember?
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AboutThis serves mostly as a curated collection of articles on topics I find politically relevant to my research interests and to the courses I teach. Archives
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