citizenship

Originally published February 25, 2016

Most politicians and journalists discuss immigration laws and reforms – everything from comprehensive immigration reform to border fences – in ways that imply only individual immigrants are affected. But immigration laws that claim to target individuals in certain statuses – such as undocumented individuals – regularly have broader social consequences for families, neighborhoods, and work groups where, of course, immigrants and citizens are intertwined in daily life. This intermingling of citizens and immigrants is visible in all corners of American life, from university campuses to fast food restaurants and neighborhood parks. Immigration laws, especially punitive laws, affect those settings when co-workers and neighbors are deported or withdraw from social life in an attempt to avoid detection.

Nowhere are the reverberations of punitive immigration laws and policies more strongly felt than in family homes with immigrant parents, spouses, or children. Because families so often include people of different legal statuses, mixed-citizenship families provide a unique lens through which to study the true reach of laws regulating both citizenship and non-citizenship. Through these families’ experiences, we see the spectrum of immigration laws’ effects on families and communities. My research on mixed-citizenship couples allows me to explore the full range of direct and indirect effects of laws that appear to target only non-citizen immigrants but actually affect many citizens at the same time.Immigration laws regularly have broader social consequences for families, neighborhoods, and work groups where, of course, immigrants and citizens are intertwined in daily life. more...

One of the most important cases the Supreme Court reviewed this year was United States v. Texas, which ruled on challenges to two Obama administration initiatives – Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents and an expanded Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program – that would have affected up to five million people. In November 2014, President Obama announced Executive Actions that included additional temporary protections for immigrants who arrived as children (also referred to as “DREAMERS”) and a new program for parents of U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents. The programs would allow them to remain in the country and apply for work permits if they have been here for at least five years and have not committed felonies or repeated misdemeanors. These actions have been on hold since early 2015, when a district court issued a preliminary injunction in response to a challenge brought by Republican authorities in Texas and ultimately joined by 25 other states. The actual focus of the case was quite mundane: Texas argued that it would suffer significant financial damages if required to subsidize the cost of driver’s licenses to those qualifying for the s new programs. However, the larger context was an unwillingness to allow the President to enact policy change following years of blocked and failed efforts at immigration reform at other governmental levels.In November 2014, Obama announced Executive Actions that included temporary protections for immigrants who arrived as children and a new program for parents of U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents to apply for work permits. These actions have been on hold since early 2015.

The Supreme Court was unable to reach a decision in June. The case resulted in a 4-4 tie, an unusual but not unexpected result given the current makeup of the court following the death of Justice Antonin Scalia and reflecting the politically divisive nature of the case. This means that the decisions of the lower courts remain in place and the two initiatives are blocked, for now. more...

With sagging voter turnout, plummeting trust in government, and multi-billion dollar elections, U.S. democracy is marred by chasms between government and citizens. Gaps may be greatest at state and local levels, where voter turnout is especially low and citizens only rarely attend public meetings or contact local elected officials about policy decisions. Against this backdrop, communities across the country are experimenting with “participatory budgeting” – a reform that lets residents of cities, towns, and districts decide how to allocate taxpayer dollars.

By giving communities real decision-making power in a collaborative process, participatory budgeting can strengthen ties between citizens and officials. First implemented in Brazil in 1989, it has been employed by more than 1,500 cities worldwide and made its U.S. debut in Chicago in 2009. This reform has won support from the White House and officials of all political stripes, as well as from social justice coalitions like the Right to the City Alliance. more...

Latinos living in the United States comprise the largest number of immigrants of any racial or ethnic group – and for this reason, many Americans presume that immigration is the issue that matters most to Latino citizens and residents. But is that true? Do Latinos themselves view immigration as their top concern, and if not what other issues are high on their political agenda? My research tackles this question, which is important for understanding the potential political influence of the largest and fastest growing minority group in the United States. more...

Educators and political leaders exhort Americans to be more civically engaged. Across the country, high schools require community “service learning” projects in the hope that students will pick up good habits. Local newscasts regularly tell people how they can “make a difference” by volunteering – joining walks to end hunger, tutoring a child, or re-painting an elderly person’s home for free. Civic action seems to be accomplished outside of the constraints – and bad influences – of money and bureaucracy, a matter of volunteering a few hours a week serving others; and it is portrayed as a sure-fire way to weave connections and trusting ties among otherwise atomized citizens. But my co-author and I have reviewed many studies and done our own close-up research on housing advocacy, youth service networks, and a variety of other civic undertakings. We find the standard images to be quite misleading.

Forms of Civic Action

At its core, civic action means ordinary citizens working together to address public problems and help determine the fortunes of communities, nation, and the world. Yet in our time, “improving” can mean vastly different things – and the activities used to improve society vary considerably.

• Consider a parent club that raises money to fund after-school programs for disadvantaged kids, a protest vigil outside a clinic that provides abortions, or a citizen’s task force on toxic waste disposal. All involve citizens who volunteer for a shared project.
• But consider, also, housing professionals who devise complicated plans to develop affordable apartments that rent at below-market rates. They, too, aim to improve society.

As these examples show, participatory collective efforts to improve society may be more or less professionalized, paid or done for free, informally or bureaucratically organized. more...

Current debates about immigration reform focus on whether or not there will be a “path to citizenship” for the eleven million undocumented immigrants living and working in the United States – and, if so, how long the road will be. Citizenship brings new rights and opportunities for individuals and families, and the country as a whole also has a stake in drawing into full citizenship both legal and undocumented newcomers. Otherwise America may face growing gaps in life chances among groups with different immigration and citizenship statuses. Across many decades of U.S. history, grants of citizenship, or refusals, have been used to incorporate masses of newcomers from Europe and exclude others, such as those from many Asian countries. Today, citizenship status has again become an axis of inequality that exacerbates other disparities grounded in class and race. Denying undocumented immigrants, mostly from Mexico and Central America, opportunities to get on a path to citizenship is one obvious source of continuing inequality. In addition, my research shows that barriers to citizenship status also exist for many newcomers with legal permanent resident status – so-called “green card” holders. The difficulties these immigrants face magnify inequalities in American society as a whole.Citizenship brings new rights and opportunities for individuals and families, and the country as a whole also has a stake in drawing into full citizenship both legal and undocumented newcomers.

Access to Citizenship for Legal Residents

Citizenship can, in principle, be obtained by immigrants who already have “green cards,” or documents that demonstrate their legal permanent status in the United States and meet a range of criteria. Access to permanent legal residency itself is restricted. Most commonly, immigrants obtain green cards through close relatives who are already citizens or permanent residents. Many others do so through employment or by claiming refugee status. Residents of countries that are relatively underrepresented in the United States may be able to win green cards in a lottery. Once they gain permanent legal resident status, most immigrants must wait five years to apply for citizenship – and they then must pay hefty fees, fill out detailed applications, and undergo interviews and testing by immigration officials, all before, finally, attending a swearing-in ceremony that makes their newly gained citizenship official. Some legal residents have a slightly easier path. Those married to U.S. citizens wait three years instead of five, and members of the military may currently apply when they enlist. In response to anti-immigrant measures at national, state, and local levels, applications for citizen status have increased in recent years. Nevertheless, fewer than half of immigrants in the U.S. have become citizens, and the U.S. take-up rate is much lower than rates in sister immigration destinations such as Canada and Australia.

Who Gains Citizenship?

Commentators noting the low uptake of U.S. citizenship have raised concerns about the loyalty of new immigrants and difficulties in the naturalization process. In addition, uneven citizenship intersects with and exacerbates other dimensions of inequality in American society. In a study of data from the U.S. Census, I found that immigrants with less than high school education are increasingly less likely to be citizens compared to more educated immigrants. In 1970, the level of education did not make much difference for whether immigrants had become citizens, but by 2000 a large education gap had appeared. Immigrants with higher levels of income are also more likely to gain citizenship. In short, during an era when inequality has grown overall in the United States, citizenship status is being attained much more unequally by more and less privileged legal residents.Uneven citizenship intersects with and exacerbates other dimensions of inequality in American society.

Racial disparities are also growing. Hispanic immigrants, whether black or white, have the lowest levels of citizenship, while non-Hispanic blacks and whites, as well as Asians, all gain citizenship at about average rates. This finding cannot be explained away by the higher representation of Hispanic immigrants among the undocumented, who are not eligible for citizenship; even among legal Hispanic permanent residents, the uptake of citizenship for the largest group, Mexicans, is low. By countries of origin, the lowest proportions gaining citizenship are found among Guatemalan, Mexican, and Salvadoran immigrants, and the highest proportions occur among immigrants from Vietnam and the Philippines.

Why Uneven Access to Citizenship Matters

It is unfortunate that access to citizenship is increasingly paralleling other disparities in U.S. society, because citizenship status promises access to the full civil liberties and rights, making immigrants almost equal to native-born Americans. The right to vote and to run for most political offices is reserved for citizens. For individual immigrants, citizenship expands job opportunities across the economic spectrum – opening posts ranging from state-licensed cosmetician to police officer and making it possible to compete for government fellowships, grants, and contracts. Citizenship also allows newcomers to bring other family members through reunification rules, and eases connections between the United States and immigrant countries of origin. For the immigrants who may fall on hard times, citizenship status improves access to welfare benefits. Perhaps most important, citizenship provides a sense of security and permanency by fully protecting immigrants from threats of deportation.Everyone who cares about reducing socioeconomic and racial inequalities should support full access to citizenship for the undocumented.

Citizenship benefits not only newcomers and their families, but also communities and the nation as a whole. For example, because Hispanics are often not citizens, this minority group, now the largest in the United States, has much less political clout than its sheer numbers might suggest. Although legal resident noncitizens can and do engage in political activity, their inability to vote and run for office reduces their political efficacy; and along with undocumented immigrants, they are at risk for deportation. The estimated twenty-two million noncitizen immigrants add up to a troubling indicator for the health of American democracy, because these people live, work, raise families, and contribute to their communities, but are excluded from the innermost circle of membership in the nation. Hundreds of thousands of legal resident immigrants become eligible to apply for citizenship every year. And comprehensive immigration reform, if Congress acts, it could put many currently undocumented on the path to citizenship in the future. Everyone who cares about reducing socioeconomic and racial inequalities in the United States should want to address inequalities in citizenship acquisition by legal residents and support full access to citizenship for the undocumented.

For most Americans, protecting free expression means countering threats from government. Private corporations are not usually seen as threatening free speech. But as private technology companies increasingly mediate access to information and services, the distinction between governmental and private censorship becomes less clear. Concepts of free speech and freedom of expression may need to be revised and enlarged to take account of new threats in the age of digital communications—and policies to protect freedom of expression may need to counter threats, often subtle, from the private sector as well as government. more...

Democratic government depends on active, well-informed citizens. But why and how do citizens become more engaged with community and political life? This question has long interested social scientists—and the traditional research approach has been to look at how various individual characteristics either encourage or discourage participation in politics. Researchers have established, for instance, that people are more likely to vote if they have higher incomes, more years of education, and strong partisan preferences.

Another approach goes beyond individual traits to probe the role of social ties and contexts in shaping civic participation. Using innovative methods, I advance this agenda by asking whether civic engagement is increased by everyday discussions among friends, family members, and other acquaintances. Simply stated, the answer is yes. When people are exposed to discussions of politics in their immediate daily environment, they are likely to become more active civically. Talking about politics encourages people to become more active citizens. more...

As the debate over immigration reform heats up, a number of contentious issues are front and center – including competition over jobs, border security, and the very meaning of U.S. citizenship. Politicians and pundits have plenty to say about these topics, and no doubt there will also be fierce debates about which public benefits should be available to new citizens or people on a “path to citizenship.” At what point, if any, should formerly undocumented residents gain access to welfare benefits, unemployment insurance, or the new protections included in the recently enacted health reform law?

One important topic that may not get enough attention is how the basic health of immigrants themselves could be affected by reforms. Will reforms make it easier for all migrants to get timely and adequate health care, not just for sudden problems like injuries in an accident but also for chronic diseases? The answers matter not just for the wellbeing of newcomers themselves, but for the health and prosperity of all Americans, the neighbors and co-workers of immigrants. more...