Migration and inequality: A structural approach

Abstract

Migrants are omnipresent in cosmopolitan societies. So 96oo are steep increases in economic inequality. These changes have pushed immigration to the top of the political agenda in the U.S and many other cosmopolitan societies. In response to the migrant crisis in the U.S., conservatives seek to erect walls, restrict immigration and deport the undocumented, while liberals seek amnesty, sanctuary policies and other measures to advance human rights. Both sets of policies, however, primarily address consequences rather than underlying causes of external drivers of migration and internal dynamics of inequalities that animate populist revolts on both the left and right. In this paper, I employ an analytic framework that highlights structural factors that contribute to immigration patterns and growing inequities in the U.S. The paper examines how U.S. immigration and immigrant policy interacts with the political economy in ways that shape unequal immigrant incorporation processes and outcomes. I conclude by pointing to contemporary social movements that promote policies aimed at producing more egalitarian outcomes for migrants and citizens alike. Given that immigrants and their offspring comprise nearly one in four people in the U.S., addressing such inequities is theoretically important and a pressing political concern.