DC!

I am currently in our nation's capital, meeting with President-elect Barack Obama...


...and eating tacos with him. Mmm, delicious tacos.

No, I kid, although President-elect Obama is never far from my mind, because I'm a "cock-eyed optimist," in the immortal words of Rogers and Hammerstein, and I go all weak in the knees over the prospect of a president whose policies aren't a slap in the face to all I hold dear. Hurray!

Actually, I'm in DC for the JASC fall meeting awesome amazing great so cool!

Because of various transportation difficulties (from hell's heart I stab at thee, Delta Airlines!!!), I arrived a full sixteen hours later than I should have. While this was enormously terrible in every way and a huge waste of time for me and others, it had the advantage of allowing my favorite pastime--clueless Rachel wandering!

But Rachel, most of your time is spent in clueless wandering! How is this any different?

I will tell you!

I am sessile. I am a deeply rooted plant. I walk the same paths every day; I stay in my room, my building, and my city. This is partly by choice and partly by habit, but either way, I end up spending most of my time in one place. This feeds my (usually unfulfilled) wanderlust.

So when I arrived in DC, without a map, without even the vaguest knowledge of the layout of the city or its subway, I was filled with totally childish glee. I loved figuring out how the ticket machines in the metro worked--and the metro stations in DC are so gorgeous and modernist and freaky--wandering around and figuring out the layout of the streets--tracking down some wifi to make this post--awesome, all of it.

Here's to a weekend of adventure!

Incompetence and sisterhood

I was reading an editorial about Sarah Palin today (because, despite my better instincts, I can't stop making fun of her). But this editorial happened to contain some quotes that speak to, oddly enough, our friendship:

You don’t have to be perennially pretty in pink — and ditsy and cutesy and kinda maybe stupid — to have an inner Elle Woods. Many women do. I think of Elle every time I dress up my insecurities in a nice suit. So many of us today — balancing work and family, treading water financially — feel as if we’re in over our heads, getting by on appearances while quaking inside in anticipation of utter failure. Chick lit — think of Bridget Jones, always fumbling, never quite who she should be — and in particular the newer subgenre of mom lit are filled with this kind of sentiment.

You don’t have to be female to suffer from Impostor Syndrome either — I learned the phrase only recently from a male friend, who puts a darned good face forward. But I think that women today — and perhaps in particular those who once thought they could not only do it all but do it perfectly, with virtuosity — are unique in the extent to which they bond over their sense of imposture.

[...]

Real life is different, of course, from Hollywood fantasy. Incompetence has consequences, political and personal. Glorifying or glamorizing the sense of just not being up to the tasks of life has consequences, too. It means that any woman who exudes competence will necessarily be excluded from the circle of sisterhood. We can’t afford any more of that.

--Judith Warner

Are we bonding over being impostors, Nancy? Are we excluding competent women from our sisterhood?

HA, need I even ask these questions! Of course we are!

Immigration: Just What Do National Borders Mean?

Immigration is contentious because identity politics taps into so many of our primal fears -- the breakdown of political boundaries seems to imply the breakdown of cultural identity. I remember writing a book review on The Inheritance of Loss, which is part of an entire genre of diaspora narratives, and it seems to approach the immigrant experience as one would approach exile: lost, incomplete, and restored only when reunited with the homeland.

The context in which I wrote the following, however, is far less abstract though no less contentious. In the summer after my freshman year, I spent some time putting together a literature review for an economics professor then working on the relationship between immigration and trade. Many of the articles I read are referenced in the subsequent article, published in Harvard Economics Review in the spring of 2007. Due to the length of the article, this post will appear in five parts -- apologies!

Stealing jobs, dodging taxes, on the brink of religious extremism or political terrorism: even as negative images associated with immigrants fracture and multiply, developed nations must confront the challenges and opportunities presented by immigration.

Though immigration has made quite a place for itself in the political forum, the responses it elicits tend to be overwhelmingly one-sided. It might be acceptable – even commonplace – for American political leaders to argue for the free movement of goods under the banner of free trade, but far fewer dare apply the same liberalization to the movement of people.

Those few reckless enough to adopt such a stance do so at the risk of voter backlash. Former Democratic Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle unexpectedly lost the November 2004 election, in part due to his perceived “pro-immigration” tendencies. In the same election, Republican Representative David Drier suffered at the polls after radio shows attacked his apparent laxity on immigration – in response, he wisely reformed and sponsored legislation that punishes the hiring of illegal aliens[1]. The European debate on immigration, on the other hand, occurs at the margins of politics, though it is no less heated than its American counterpart and is often accompanied by back-and-forth accusations of racism.

For all the uproar it causes, immigration essentially stems from the same root causes as trade: inequalities in the wages of labor. This is quite clear in the case of non-skilled labor or cheaply produced goods, both of which arrive in first world nations in droves. At the same time, it also holds true for skilled-labor -- thus the phenomenon of "brain drain" -- and the products and services generated by it. In the end, both goods and labor will, quite naturally, gravitate toward places where they command higher relative prices. So, if trade and immigration are fundamentally similar, it leads us to the sensitive question why the former is overwhelmingly preferred over the latter.

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[1] “Dreaming of the Other Side of the Wire”. The Economist (March) 2005.

“Who would want to kill the town idiot?”

That people in developed countries find immigration distasteful is hardly a matter of question. Most Europeans answer that immigration is an “important” or “extremely important threat”[1]. This attitude can be attributed to many factors: xenophobia, certainly, but also worries about unemployment, terrorism and the apparent failure of multiculturalism.

The last reason is particularly relevant to the Netherlands, where the debate on immigration has become much more public since the murder of Theo van Gogh, a controversial filmmaker and a critic of multiculturalism. In 2004, he directed the short film Submission, which heavily condemned Islam’s treatment of women. He reportedly dismissed friends’ concern for his safety after the film’s release with the words, “Who would want to kill the town idiot?”

Theo van Gogh

Well, Mohammed Bouyeri, a 26-year-old, well-educated and, to all appearances, well-integrated Dutch citizen, did and succeeded. He was quickly apprehended by the Dutch police, but this incident reverberated with surprising intensity. Van Gogh had always generated controversy – while he saw political Islam as a threat to Western liberalization, he was an equal opportunity critic and provoked politicians, actors, writers and Jews alike with his vitriol and obscenities. His death, though, turned him into a martyr and fueled the heretofore hidden worry whether the assimilation of immigrants is truly possible.

This concern is echoed in the more academic voice of Samuel Huntington, whose position on immigration is essentially that the larger the immigrant community, the less likely the immigrants are to truly become integrated into their destination society. Indeed, popular psychology literature argues that second generation immigrants, even as they assert autonomy in adolescence, are quite content to remain embedded within their immigrant community[2]. And, as the case of Mohammed Bouyeri proves, Western education does not entirely sever this sense of connection to the parent culture.

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[1] “Talking of Immigrants”. The Economist (June) 2006.

[2] Kagitçibasi, C. (2003). “Autonomy, Embeddedness and Adaptability in Immigration Contest”. Human Development 46, 145–150.

And the real loser of immigration is…

Extant fears that immigration will lead to a breakdown of civil society into racial enclaves are also accompanied by the more economically tangible worries that immigrants are taking away jobs from native workers. Europe has traditionally struggled with much higher unemployment rates than the U.S., and this, according to Kathleen Newland of the Migration Policy Institute in Washington, DC, is the biggest difference in how Europe and America look at immigration: “America protects its welfare system from immigrants but leaves it labor market open, while the EU protects its labor markets and leaves its welfare system open.” This distinction seems more contrived than real. There are just as many protests over immigrants’ share of domestic jobs in the U.S. as there are complaints that immigrants are exploiting the generous welfare system in Europe. In either case, the developed countries ought to be aware that immigrants take highly unappealing jobs, and Europe, with its aging population, cannot do without immigrants, who often arrive when they are young and healthy. As for financial burdens, the President’s Council of Economic Advisors estimated in 2002 that immigrants in fact generate benefits of up to $14 billion a year.

The Trojan Horse: the EU and Turkey

This is just the surface, however. Dig even a little deeper and the issue becomes even more clouded. The argument that immigrants take jobs away from natives or depress natives’ wages, though often overblown, holds some truth for unskilled labor. Over time, American incomes have become less equally distributed, and the wages of the least skilled may even have fallen in real terms. Immigrants are an easy target for blame as recent arrivals tend to be disproportionately less skilled: the 2000 census shows that immigrants make up a little over 10% of America’s labor force but close to 30% of workers without high-school education.

On the other hand, a more theoretical framework has yielded the suggestion that immigrant labor actually protects native workers from the business cycle by allowing employers to hire immigrants when the economy is in the upswing and lay them off when the economy sours[1]. In any case, an influx of unskilled labor should at least increase the marginal return of capital, so employers might be more tempted to open new factories or purchase new machinery, which would require more workers to run and so restore wages to the original level.

If this analysis has only managed to further obscure the debate over the ultimate lowers of immigration, there is no need to panic -- the author is similarly flummoxed. Perhaps ambiguity should be the ultimate take-away of this discussion, but even though economists have not reached a consensus, the population at large has. Regardless of the sentiments that underlie wealthy nations' reluctance to accept more immigrants, the reality -- that global immigration is on the rise -- compels a response.

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[1] Ethier, W. J. (1985). “International Trade and Labor Migration”. The American Economic Review, 75, 4, 691-707.

How globalization – and its discontents – changed immigration

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 11^th. 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?

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[1] Russell, S. S., & Teitelbaum, M. S. (1992). “International Migration and International Trade”. Washington D.C.: World Bank Discussion Papers, 160.

Full-circle: peddling free trade as a cure-all, or not

If optimism could rule the day, there is in fact a very straightforward solution. Eli Heckscher and Bertil Ohlin, two economists from Stockholm, developed a model of free trade in the 1930s and subsequently lent their names to it. One of the conclusions resulting from the Heckscher-Ohlin model is the factor-price equalization theorem, which suggests that free trade by itself is enough to allow for the convergence of wages between two countries[1]. The rationale assumes that the unimpeded movement of goods is equivalent to a similarly free movement in the factors of production, including labor. Once wages are equalized across countries, there would no longer be an incentive for immigrants to cross borders in search of higher earning potentials. As aesthetically simple as this theorem is, it is also the part of the model over which there is the least agreement.

The lack of consensus is certainly nothing new in economics, but a more realistic approach to the model predicts that immigration would spike for a period immediately following the opening up of trade before slowly tapering down. A study specific to NAFTA and its impact on Mexican immigration to the United States reaches the same conclusion and add that the “migration hump” is likely to last between 10 and 15 years[2]. If this is indeed the case, the developed nations are left to struggle through the pressures of immigration without the relief of an immediate cure.

The European Union provides a fair sample of possible responses. Of the countries that opted for leniency, Spain and Italy are among the foremost. They favor amnesties and grant them liberally[3]. In 2005, Spain announced that illegal immigrants may stay if they had worked at least six months, hardly a grueling standard. On the other end of the gamut, France has become decidedly cold toward immigrants. Last year, 500 illegal immigrants from Africa were evicted out of an abandoned dormitory in a Parisian university.

While closing one’s border – or erecting a behemoth of a fence, as some Republican stalwarts have suggested – may seem tempting for nations besieged by immigrants, it is hardly realistic or politically viable. Ideally, such countries would refrain from acting unilaterally and condescend to negotiate with the immigrants’ source countries. A financial fee has been suggested in exchange for entrance into the country of choice. This may sound superficial and even heartless, but given how much illegal immigrants are willing to pay for a passage into the golden land, a nominal fee for a temporary visa effectively legalizes a practice previously in the purview of the black market. The proceeds from these visas can then be used to subsidize healthcare costs for immigrants. Finally, the immigrant does not have to stay permanently in order to reap the gains from immigration, so destination countries could focus on developing better short-term work programs.

Before policy decisions can even be considered, the first thing that developed nations must realize is that immigration is not a zero-sum game. Demonizing it simply to wrangle an advantage at the polls is shortsighted in the extreme and liable to exacerbate the strains immigration places on all those involved. A recommended program: meditate, clear the mind, recognize that it is possible for immigration to be mutually beneficial and start over.

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[1] Horiba, Y. (2000). “U.S. Interregional Migration and Trade”. Preliminary Draft, Tulane University.

[2] Robertson, R. (2005). “Has NAFTA Increased Labor Market Integration between the United States and Mexico?”. World Bank Economic Review 2005, 19, 425-448.

[3] “Migration Migraine”. The Economist (September) 2006.

Women and Peace

I've read some essays by Jeanette Rankin, the first woman elected to U.S. Congress, and the only member of Congress to vote against entry into World War II.  She was more a dedicated pacifist than a feminist, and some of her writings on both women and peace strike me as problematic.

The peace problem is a woman's problem.  Disarmament will not be won without their aid.  So long as they shirk, and so long as the High Commissions exclude them, something will be radically wanting in the peace activities of the public and the state.  I would like to suggest to those offering peace awards that they appoint an investigating commission, composed of experts on human conduct, and send this commission out to explore the history of a people which already has a practical working program of peace, namely, the people known as women.

Half of the human race does not fight, and has never fought.  We know a little, though not nearly enough, about why men fight, but we know nothing at all about why women do not fight.  No, I am not forgetting about the Amazons and the Battalion of Death and Joan of Arc and all the rest.  In fact, I see in them a ray of hope.  If women could take on so thoroughly the behavior of the fighting male, why should not men learn something in their turn from the non-fighting female.  I am aware that men are disposed to look down on the temperamental pacifism of women (which in spite of all the exceptions is a psychological fact) as something which the manly man would scorn to imitate.  However, there is no other way that I can see in which peace can be realized except through forbearance from fighting on the part of men as well as women.

--"Peace and the Disarmament Conference," Jeanette Rankin

What strikes me about her argument, in this essay and others, is that the source of war is a desire to fight (on the part of men).  She speaks eloquently about "war habits" and "peace habits" and how to instill "peace habits" in children through education, all of which I think is admirable.

(Lysistrata made a similar point; the women dismiss the war that the men are fighting as born of masculine bluster and desire for money.  Again, there's the idea that men are predisposed to want to go to war simply because they like war, but women are devoid of such martial desires.)

Rankin had plenty of extremely powerful arguments against war and justifying voting against entering WWII, some of which seem quite before her time.  (She had a more sophisticated understanding of the subtleties of the conflict between Japan and the US in 1958 than the average American has today, I would wager.)  I think most of her arguments against war hold even today.  But she never even addressed what to me is the central question: how can you refrain from war when the consequence of your pacifism is murder of innocents on an unthinkable scale and the destruction of an entire people?

I'm disappointed and also slightly baffled.  How could she be so involved in global politics and so passionate about her pacifist cause while seemingly not even considering what to me is the obvious concern of militarism vs. pacifism?  Part of me can't help but think that perhaps the reason she didn't seem concerned about the victims of WWII in the European and Asian theatres is that the people being gassed and raped were Jews and Koreans.  I can't tell if I'm not giving her enough credit, but I just can't think of an explanation for this gaping hole in her logic.