Immigration as a phenomenon is changing, and though it has become a touch cliché to speak of globalization, its central role in reshaping immigration renders its mention inevitable. One effect of globalization is the increase of the wealth gap between countries, making the rich richer and the poor poorer. As wage differentials between the developed and the developing nations escalate, third world workers face ever greater incentives to leave their homes in search of better wages. If a metaphorical balance of some sort were able to weigh the pain and separation inherent in the process of diaspora against a pile of riches – a simplistic reduction of the American Dream – then globalization has been steadily dropping gold coins on the side of the latter.
The other facet of globalization is the shrinking of distances between countries. Advances in communication and transportation are enabling potential immigrants to make the leap between aspiration and reality. In sum, more people are now willing and able to join the stream of global migration, but this is not to say that globalization’s effect on immigration can be simplified into a single nostalgic image of a young fellow dreaming of riches while boarding a bus, suitcase in tow.
In the last decade or so, globalization was also responsible for the cohesion of some polities – most notably the European Union – and the breakdown of others – the Soviet Union comes to mind, though that seems to belong to another age altogether. The result is an almost constant making and erasing of political boundaries. A World Bank discussion paper, drafted in the early 1990s in the wake of the new EU and the fractured USSR, offered two predictions: immigration will become more volatile, and regional immigration patterns will develop[1]. The idea uniting both observations is their belief in the rise of multiple immigrant destinations, whose attraction is based on both geographical and cultural proximity. Once the U.S. ceases to be the main destination of interest, then characterizing the nature of global immigration becomes much more complicated.
Since the publication of that paper, immigrants’ reception in their countries of choice has been further complicated by September 11th. It has led America to toughen its approach to potential immigrants, particularly Muslim students, while Europe has witnessed a resurgence of the far-right, often based on ludicrously xenophobic premises. And all the while, the same question remains: what to do?
[1] Russell, S. S., & Teitelbaum, M. S. (1992). “International Migration and International Trade”. Washington D.C.: World Bank Discussion Papers, 160.
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