The comparative politics of immigration: policy choices in Germany, Canada, Switzerland and the USA

Author(s):  
Derek Hawes
Author(s):  
Frederik Juhl Jørgensen ◽  
Mathias Osmundsen

Abstract Can corrective information change citizens’ misperceptions about immigrants and subsequently lead to favorable immigration opinions? While prior studies from the USA document how corrections about the size of minority populations fail to change citizens’ immigration-related opinions, they do not examine how other facts that speak to immigrants’ cultural or economic dependency rates can influence immigration policy opinions. To extend earlier work, we conducted a large-scale survey experiment fielded to a nationally representative sample of Danes. We randomly expose participants to information about non-Western immigrants’ (1) welfare dependency rate, (2) crime rate, and (3) proportion of the total population. We find that participants update their factual beliefs in light of correct information, but reinterpret the information in a highly selective fashion, ultimately failing to change their policy preferences.


2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 367-385 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick McEachern

The cross-national comparative politics literature on authoritarian regimes has advanced rapidly in recent years, providing fresh insights into regime longevity, potential for successful democratization, and derivative policy choices. The study of North Korea’s politics has likewise advanced, albeit largely without reference to this budding literature. Given the paucity of data on North Korea, this article reviews and leverages the budding comparative literature to bring new perspectives on perennial debates on North Korean regime stability. The article argues the comparative literature fails to capture evolution in authoritarian regimes, including North Korea, suggesting areas for theoretical improvement. It documents political evolution in Kim Jong Un’s North Korea and draws upon cross-national findings to show how and why the one-party political structure, personalist elements, and hereditary succession identified in this analysis are stabilizing elements for the regime.


Author(s):  
Vidya Nadkarni ◽  
J. Michael Williams

Both the political science fields of International Relations (IR) and Comparative Politics (CP) developed around a scholarly concern with the nature of the state. IR focused on the nature, sources, and dynamics of inter-state interaction, while CP delved into the structure, functioning, and development of the state itself. The natural synergies between these two lines of scholarly inquiry found expression in the works of classical and neo-classical realists, liberals, and Marxists, all of whom, to varying degrees and in varied ways, recognized that the line dividing domestic and international politics was not hermetically sealed. As processes of economic globalization, on the one hand, and the globalization of the state system, on the other, have expanded the realm of political and economic interaction, the need for greater cross-fertilization between IR and CP has become even more evident. The global expansion of the interstate system has incorporated non-European societies into world politics and increased the salience of cultural and religious variables. These dynamics suggest that a study of cultures, religions, and histories, which shape the world views of states and peoples, is therefore necessary before assessments can be made about how individual states may respond to varied global pressures in their domestic and foreign policy choices.


2005 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 69-85
Author(s):  
Luca Murrau

Abstract This work presents an overview of the literature on political process formation and the role of institutions in economic development. The first category refers to works describing models of citizen candidacy and candidate choice in which different scenarios of equilibrium under plurality rule elections are examinated. The second category includes the main empirical works studying the chain existing between political institutional features and different paths of economic development. Finally, I describe a model of comparative politics. Specifically, I compare two different political regimes, congressional-presidential regime and parliamentary regime, giving insights on policy choices and economic outcomes.


2013 ◽  
pp. 375-405
Author(s):  
Örn B. Bodvarsson ◽  
Hendrik Van den Berg
Keyword(s):  

2011 ◽  
Vol 37 (6) ◽  
pp. 739-761 ◽  
Author(s):  
John L. Hammond

US immigration policy as defined during the administration of George W. Bush was the result of a moral panic against two categories of immigrants: Latin Americans who cross the Mexican border clandestinely in search of work and Muslims and Arabs whom the administration defines as potential terrorists. The policy harms both groups and threatens national security. Antiterrorist measures are counterproductive because they create sympathy to terrorism in law-abiding Muslim and Arab immigrants; border control measures are counterproductive because, far from deterring illegal immigration, they encourage longer stays, family migration, and dispersion throughout the USA, and endanger the lives of those entering the country through inaccessible and dangerous border areas.


2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 879-901 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joel Blit ◽  
Mikal Skuterud ◽  
Jue Zhang

Abstract We examine the effect of changes in skilled-immigrant population shares in 98 Canadian cities on per capita patents. The Canadian case is of interest because its ‘points system’ is viewed as a model of skilled immigration policy. Our estimates suggest that the impact of increasing the university-educated immigrant share on patenting rates is modest at best and unambiguously smaller than the impact of skilled immigrants in the USA. We find larger effects of Canadian science, engineering, technology or mathematics (STEM)-educated immigrants employed in STEM jobs, but this impact is limited because only one-third of Canadian STEM-educated immigrants are employed in STEM jobs, compared with two-fifths of native-born Canadians and one-half of US immigrants. Our findings suggest that for most countries, skilled immigration is unlikely to be a panacea for sluggish innovation and that the US experience may be exceptional.


Author(s):  
Oleh Kozachuk

The conclusions of the research «National Question in the U.S. and Canada’s Domestic Politics: Comparative Analysis» are proposed for consideration here. For the first time in Ukrainian political science, a cross-national comparison of the USA and Canada in the context of the analysis of the national question was carried out. Namely, its essence was clarified, the peculiarities of multicultural practices in the USA and Canada (cultural pluralism and multiculturalism) were analyzed, and an analysis of ethno-racial discrimination and ethnic mobilization was conducted. The research methodologically conceptualized and developed a comparative political study of interethnic interactions with the use of a research strategy for comparing most similar systems (for example, the USA and Canada). The case study method has been substantiated and applied, involving the method of structural and focused comparison as a tool of cross-national research (for example, the USA and Canada), and also proved that the method can be effective in comparative political science. In the research, the indexation of immigration policy was conceptualized, and a scientific apparatus (a logical sequence of conceptualization, measurement and aggregation) for further cross-national studies in which the object is the national question in general and the migration policy in particular was developed. The theoretical results of the research can be used for the further design of models of binary implicit comparison of similar states. The case study method has not yet been properly applied in Ukrainian political science; therefore, the method proposed by the author for a structured and focused comparison of cases can be useful for both scholars and practitioners when comparing phenomena and processes. The author proposed the concept and design of a study of the already forgotten issues of the national question, which has been proven not to be outdated even in such advanced polyethnic states as the USA and Canada. The scientific results obtained by the author can be used by subjects of internal policy, first of all  in the practice of public authorities. The proposed method of indexing immigration policy can serve scholars, legislators, government officials, and employees of the executive authorities to carry out cross-national and/or cross-temporal comparisons. Keywords: national question, new institutionalism, case study, structural and focused comparison, immigration, ethno-racial discrimination.


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