LGLS 123B: IMMIGRATION AND HUMAN RIGHTS
T/Th 6:30-7:50
Brown 316
Spring 2014
Instructor: Doug Smith
Office: Brown 320 Office Hours:, 5-6 Tuesday or by arrangement
ext. 61235
phone 781-593-2468 (h)
781-254-8056 (c)
Learning objectives: This course provides an introduction to immigration systems and practices worldwide, the international treaties and institutions affecting migration and the history of immigration policy and rhetoric in the United States. Participants will also engage with current immigration controversies and proposals and develop critical skills in assessing policy proposals and rhetoric. Through practical exercises and projects in which students will learn advocacy skills applicable to many policy areas and develop an understanding of how the interactions of institutions, roles, stories, rules, norms and customs contribute to the creation of migration systems in the world today.
Materials: Roger Daniels, Guarding the golden door (2004).
All other materials to be distributed through the course web site, including international treaties and documents --such as the International Convention on the Treatment of Refugees, the Protocol Concerning the Treatment of Refugees--United States statutes and regulations implementing international obligations, reported cases, films, articles, and reports of the lived experience of migrants (see representative reading list below).
Methods: The course would be taught through a mix of lecture, discussion, student presentations and participatory exercises. Participatory exercises may incorporate materials for interviewing an immigrant and retelling her story, presenting claims to a government agency, followed by a hearing before an immigration judge, an appeal to a Board of Immigration Appeals, and advocacy letter to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and a private bill proposal to Congress or testimony on an immigration policy proposal.
Course Progression:
Note: The first class in this course is January 14, 2014.
There is no class on February 18 or February 20 (Midterm Recess)
There is no class on April 15, 17 or 22 (Passover Recess)
The last class in this course is April 29, 2014. Final Exam, if any, on a schedule to be announced. The final exam period ends May 9, 2014.
Unit One: Structures of Immigration After briefly introducing theories and conflicts animating migration policies, we will confront United States immigration policy and take a peek at current proposals for reform. From there, we will begin to closely examine the history of US immigration policies from colonial times to today:
First week: Policy making on an internal and relatively small scale: Practice building the objectives and policies for this course.
1. Migration in Global Perspective
See unit One Readings in Latte
Schattle, pp. 1- 26 (Handout)
Gans (on Latte)
Benhabib, The morality of migration (on Latte);
Portes, Immigration theory for a new century (on Latte);
Massey, Theories of migration (on Latte).
Types of Immigration Regimes
Closed borders
Open Borders
Limited migration based on race, religion, national origin, family ties, employment or chance
Points systems
Push and pull factors in emigration and immigration
“Brief Overview of US Immigration Policy” (on Latte)
2. Proposals for reform (Summary of Senate Bill on Latte)
Film: How Democracy Works Now Volume 12
3. History of Immigration Policies in US
Bellwood (on Latte)
Daniels, pp. 3-58;
Institutions and roles both affecting and constructing policies
The Following materials, referred to in Daniels, are available on Latte:
· Burlingame Treaty
· Chinese Exclusion Act
· Emergency Quota Act of 1921
· Immigration Act of 1924
4. United States Immigration History of Policies Part 2
Daniels, 57-112; 261-268
· McCarren-Walter Act
· Truman's Veto Statement on McCarren-Walter Act
· 1965 Immigration Act
· Convention on Treatment of Refugees
· 1990 Immigration Act
· DHS DACA Memo 2012
First written assignment, an interview or review of primary materials reporting an immigrant’s transition story due
Unit Two: Immigration In the United States Today: Discourse and Policies
5. The Rhetoric of Immigration and Human Rights.
Nationalism, Restrictionism, Zenophobia
Gender and race
Daniels, 113-144; 219-260
Schattle, 101-134 (Handout)
Schlag (on Latte)
Waston (on Latte)
6. Immigration Law and Policy debates in the U.S. Today: family, employment/economic, ethnic and humanitarian policies.
7. Economics of Immigration, including employment, crime, public assistance, social security, and diversity issues.
On Latte:
Card
Borjas
Bacon
Unit Three: Case Study: Refugees and Humanitarian-Based Immigration Systems
8. Particular emphasis on humanitarian basis of immigration: asylum, Torture Convention, Temporary Protected Status and other visa categories based in human rights.
On Latte:
Schlag
Johnson
Film: Well Founded Fear
· Senator Kennedy on History of Refugee Act
· Domestic Violence as persecution under international conventions: In Re R-A.
· Non-immigration treatment of domestic violence as a human rights issue Jessica Gonzales (Lenahan) case Materials
Secure Communities and 287(g) programs
9. Particular controversies on the intersection of immigration and human rights, for example, gender based asylum claims such as those based on domestic violence.
Unit Exercise: mock hearing, immigration court trial, Board of Immigration Board Appeals Brief (as a group project) or Advocacy letter to UNHCR.
Second Paper, a close examination of a piece of immigration-related rhetoric, due.
Unit 4: Immigrant Policies and Undocumented or Inadequately Documented Persons
Employment, Tax, Public Benefits, Crime, Health Care and Cultural Issues. Economic effects.
Refugee Resettlement
Insufficiently documented migrants
Films: Home Across Lands
Youville
Unit 5: Immigration Policy Debates and Directions for the Future
On Latte:
Tichenor
Trebilcock
10. Particular controversies on the intersection of immigration and human rights: worker’s rights.
Case Study: Italy’s black markets
Reading: Watts, Calavita (on Latte)
Case Study: Human Trafficking.
Immigration, crime and enforcement
Backlash, immigrant organizing and social movements
Tarrow
Film: Farmingville
Unit 6: Migrations and Human Rights in the 21 Century
Current controversies and proposals for change in immigration policies.dvocacy at the intersection of immigration and human rights: innovations and assessment.
Student presentations?
Readings: TBA
Unit Exercise: Symposium
Assessment: In addition to class participation, which will include two presentations and several exercises, as well as showing up, being present (including avoiding cell phone, tablet, or similar devices, email or the Google), and creating space for others to participate, there will be two short papers and one longer research paper with the possibility of transforming it into a group project depending on student interest and subject-matter compatibility. Part of the participation grade will include leading at least one in class discussion through the lens of a current events story; students may choose to work in teams to lead discussions. Alternative credit-bearing assignments will be available for students who have to miss a limited number of classes. A take home final examination would assess learning through application of course themes.
Class Participation: 20%
Presentations/ class exercises: 10%
Two short papers: 25%
One research paper and/or final exam: 45%
Representative Readings (Note as source for research ideas and optional readings)
Watson Bread and Roses: Mills, migrants and the struggle for the American dream (2006) and Not fit for our society: Nativism and immigration (2010), and:
Card, D. 1990. "The Impact of the Mariel Boatlift on the Miami Labor-
Market." Industrial & Labor Relations Review 43:245-257
Alba, R. and V. Nee. 1997. "Rethinking Assimilation Theory for a New
Era of Immigration." International Migration Review 31:826-874.
Allen, J. P. and E. Turner. 1996. "Spatial Patterns of Immigrant
Assimilation." Professional Geographer 48:140-155.
Turner. 1999. "The Latino Mortality Paradox: A Test of The "Salmon
Bias" And Healthy Migrant Hypotheses." American Journal of Public
Health 89:1543-48
George J. Borjas, Economic Theory and International Migration
International Migration Review, Vol. 23, No. 3, Special Silver Anniversary Issue: International Migration an Assessment for the 90's. (Autumn, 1989), pp. 457-485.
Timothy Hatton and Jeffrey G. Williamson, Global Migration and the World Economy: Two Centuries of Policy and Performance. Cambridge, MIT Press, 2005, pp. 51-62.
Borjas, George J. 1999. “Immigration and the Welfare State.” Pp. 105-26 in
Heaven’s Door: Immigration Policy and the American Economy. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press.
Espenshade, Thomas and Gregory A. Huber. 1999. “Fiscal Impacts of Immigrants
and the Shrinking Welfare State.” Pp. 360-370 in The Handbook of International
Migration edited by Charles Hirschman et al. New York, NY: Russell Sage
Foundation.
Singer, Audrey. 2004. “Welfare Reform and Immigrants: A Policy Review.” Pp.
21-34 in Immigrants, Welfare Reform, and the Poverty of Policy, edited by Philip
Kretsedemas and Ana Aparicio. Westport, CT: Praeger.
Nevins (2002) “The Ideological Roots of the ‘Illegal’: The ‘Other’ as Threat and the Rise of the Boundary as the Symbol of Protection.” Chapter 5 in Operation Gatekeeper. New York: Routledge.
Feagin (1997) “Old Poison in New Bottles: The Deep Roots of Modern Nativism.” Chapter 2 in Immigrants Out!, edited by Juan F. Perea. New York: New York University Press.
Chavez, L.R. (1997) “Immigration Reform and Nativism: The Nationalist Response to the Transnationalist Challenge.”
Arizona v United States, No. 1-182 (Supreme Court 2012).
Chamber of Commerce v Whiting, 563 US ___ (2011).
Hoffman Plastic Compounds v NLRB, 535 US 137 (2002).
8 U.S.C. 1304.
International materials would include International Convention on the Treatment of Refugees, the Protocol Concerning the Treatment of Refugees as well as the ICCPR, some ILO documents and some of the UNHCR comments and some United States statutes and regulations implementing international obligations. Matthew Price’s Rethinking Asylum (2009).
Matthew Gibney, “Liberal Democratic States and Responsibilities to Refugees,” American Political Science Review, 93: 169-181).
Irene Bloemraad, Becoming a Citizen: Incorporating Immigrants and Refugees in the United States and Canada, Berkeley: UC Press, 2006, Chapters 1 & 3.
Zucker, Norman L. and Naomi Flink Zucker. 1992. “From Immigration to Refugee
Redefinition: A History of Refugee and Asylum Policy in the United States.”
Journal of Policy History 4(1): 54-70.
Suhrke, Astri and Aristide R. Zolberg. 1999. “Issues in Contemporary Refugee
Policies.” Pp. 143-180 in Migration and Refugee Policies: An Overview, edited by
Ann Bernstein and Myron Weiner. New York, NY: Pinter.
Barnett, Don. 2002. “The Coming Conflict Over Asylum: Does America Need a
New Asylum Policy?” Washington, DC: Center for Immigration Studies.
Zucker, Norman L. 1983. “Refugee Resettlement in the United States: Policy and
Problems.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science
467:172-186.
Wright, Robert G. 1981. “Voluntary Agencies and the Resettlement of Refugees.”
International Migration Review 15(1/2): 157-174.
UNHCR Guidelines on International Protection of Gender Related Persecution within the Context of the 1956 Convention and the 1967 Protocol Regarding the Status of Refugees. UN Doc. HCR/GIP/02/08.
UNHCR Guidelines Regarding the Protection of Refugee Women, UN Doc. ES/SCP/67.
Declaration of the Elimination of Violence Against Women.
In Re R-A, 23 I & N Dec. 694 (2005).
Matter of Kasinga, (BIA 1996).
INS v Cardoza Consecu, 480 US 421 (1987).
INS v Aguirre-Aguirre, 526 US 415 (1992).
INS v Elias Zaccarius, 502 US 478 (1982).
Ministry of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs v Khesan, 76 ALRJ 667 (Australia 2002).
8 U.S.C. 1101.
Tichenor, Daniel J. 2002. “The Politics of Immigration Control: Understanding the
Rise and Fall of Policy Regimes.” Pp. 16-45 in Dividing Lines: The Politics of
Immigration Control in America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, and:
Carens, Joseph H. 1998. “Aliens and Citizens: The Case for Open Borders.” Pp.
365-387 in The Immigration Reader: America in a Multidisciplinary Perspective,
edited by David Jacobson. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers.
Walzer, Michael. 1998. “Membership.” Pp. 341-364 in The Immigration Reader:
America in a Multidisciplinary Perspective.
Zolberg, "Matters of State: Theorizing Immigration Policy," in C. Hirschman, et. al., The Handbook of International Migration, New York: Russell Sage, 2000;
Wayne Cornelius and Takeyuki Tsuda, “Controlling Immigration: The Limits of Government Intervention,” in Cornelius, Tsuda, Martin, and Hollifield, eds., Controlling Immigration: A Global Perspective, Stanford U Press, 2004: pp. 3-20
Mae Ngai, Impossible Subjects: Illegal Aliens and the Making of Modern America, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004, Chapters 1 & 7.
Miriam Feldblum, “Managing Migration: New Trends in Citizenship and Nationality Policy,” Chapter 15 in Aleinikoff and Klusmeyer, eds. From Migrants to Citizens, Washington: Carnegie Endowment: 2000.
William Rogers Brubaker (1989) “Membership Without Citizenship: The Economic and Social Rights of Noncitizens” in William Rogers Brubaker ed. Immigration and the Politics of Citizenship in Europe and North America (New York: University Press of America) pp. 145-163.
Peter Andreas, Border Games, Cornell, 2000, chapters 1, 7.
Wayne A. Cornelius, Death at the Border: Efficacy and Unintended Consequences of US Immigration Control Policy, Population and Development Review, Vol. 27, No. 4. (Dec., 2001), pp. 661-685.
Audrey Singer; Douglas S. Massey The Social Process of Undocumented Border Crossing among Mexican Migrants, International Migration Review, Vol. 32, No. 3. (Autumn, 1998), pp. 561-592.
Ellermann, Antje. 2005. "Coercive Capacity and the Politics of Implementation: Deportation in Germany and the United States" Comparative Political Studies, 38(10), 1219-1244
Dale, Michael D. (2006) “Pineros left without legal help.” in Smith, “Life Course, Generation, and Social Location as Factors Shaping Second-Generation Transnational Life.” Chapter 5
Kanstroom (1997) “Dangerous Undertones of the New Nativism: Peter Brimelow and the Decline of the West.” Chapter 16 in Immigrants Out!
Massey et al. (2003) “Repair Manual: U.S. Immigration Policies for a New Century.” In Beyond Smoke and Mirrors. Russell Sage Foundation.
Nevin, Joseph. (2002) “Conclusion: Searching for Security in an Age of Intensifying Globalization.”Chapter 8 in Operation Gatekeeper. New York: Routledge.
Tichenor, Daniel J. 2002. “The Rebirth of American Immigration: The Rights
Revolution, New Restrictionism, and Policy Deadlock.” Pp. 219-241 in Dividing
Lines: The Politics of Immigration Control in America.
Skerry, Peter. 2004. “‘This Was Our Riot, Too’: The Political Assimilation of
Today’s Immigrants.” Pp. 221-232 in Reinventing the Melting Pot: The New
Immigrants and What It Means To Be American, edited by Tamar Jacoby. New