I’ve gone from being a rah-rah enthusiast for mass immigration to one who is more skeptical of its virtues. That’s because I think the melting and fusing of different ethnic groups is essential to building a more cohesive and humane society, and that slowing down immigration would help this process along.
I am sympathetic to his concern that immigrants may be assimilating too slowly. I am not convinced that his solution of slowing the pace of immigration is aligned with the problem.
He makes a sensible point, but where is the evidence? My belief has long been that it is in the best interest of immigrants to assimilate if they want to be successful (and especially for their kids). For example, learning English. He might argue that some pockets of immigrants are not being “rational”–some sort of “cultural capital” argument–which prevents them from assimilating and also limits their opportunities for success and climbing up the ladder. But again, I’d like to see evidence.
Do you have any intuitions regarding a model of the factors that account for the speed of immigrant assimilation? I’d guess you imagine something like social insistence on newcomer conformity vs. the prevalence of an ideology of accommodative multiculturalism.
I think that’s very important, but not so important that it makes immigration rates have a relatively negligible impact in comparison.
For me, the pace of immigration, perhaps better alternatively represented as “percent foreign born (PFB)”, seems to have an intuitive relationship to existence of the kinds social pressures and likelihood of exposure to various influences that impact assimilation. And by ‘foreignness’ I mean something like more like the opposite of “preexisting cultural similarity and compatibility” than mere national citizenship. Immigrating from Canada is different than immigrating from South Sudan. This conversation should focus more on the South Sudan scenario.
Consider two extreme cases: Case A: Barely any foreign immigration, (PFB < 1%), and Case B: An influx which numerically overwhelms the native-born-population (say PFB 80%).say PFB 80%). In Case A - a newcomer will probably not be able to live most of his life interacting with those of similar origin in some enclave. He will not be able to use such an enclave as a kind of crutch that insulates him from the ordeal of change, learning, and adaptation. In order to succeed and survive, he will have to learn the language quickly, send his children to schools in which they are surrounded by the children of the native-born and majority culture. In order to win the favor of all his various social counter-parties, he is going to have little choice but to conform his behavior to the prevailing norms and expectations of the native culture and there is going to be some strong correlation between his willingness and ability to 'fit in' and his overall life outcome. In Case B, those pressures are either absent or much less intense. Either there is no dominant majority culture to which it clear to a newcomer than he should try to align, or if the new immigrants are fairly homogenous and become politically and economically dominant, it may be the natives who feel pressured to conform to the newcomers (as occurred during colonialism) A good example of an non-assimilationist enclave is a U.S. military base overseas. You see DoD civilians deployed in a particular location for many years, and some are even very eager and expend major effort into trying to learn the local language, fit in, and integrate successfully in the native culture - which is usually overwhelming on a numerical basis. But the 'social crutch' of base-life makes it too easy to remain in little-America, and most of even highly motivated people will never end up stepping very far away from their comfort zone if they don't absolutely have to. The bottom line is that there is question of which is the proper presumption or null hypothesis and on which side of the argument the burden of proof should be placed. I think the default should be that 'pace matters' and that I remain unconvinced that it doesn't, because of human nature and personal observations. To flip the burden should require some argument that Cases A and B are probably equivalent with regards to assimilation pace, which seems pretty far-fetched to me.
Good point. I don’t see a way around it.
I’ll put it this way: pace of immigration clearly relates to the intensity of social pressures that provide an incentive for greater assimilation speed.
It seems to be that a good core intellectual rule for economic reasoning skills be a default presumption that any claim that incentives don’t seem to matter in a particular case ought to be regarded with extreme skepticism.
For instance, the guardian said that a recent report in the UK indicates that prosecuting drug crimes doesn’t affect the amount of drug use. Well, in life with the above rule, I was skeptical and after reviewing the report I remain unconvinced. I think I was justified in this skepticism.
But in this case, our host seems to be favoring the incentive-impotent presumption in terms of the burden of persuasion, though I may be misinterpreting him. He is saying that immigration pace should not be presumed to have an effect on assimilation speed without a strong evidentiary showing. That’s fair, but it seems inconsistent with the rule, in which the position that there wouldn’t be an effect should bear the burden of proof.
Ha, your first comment said it much better and more succinctly.
To put it explicitly, won’t people assimilate more quickly if they are actually put together?
Regarding evidence, this study is suggestive:
http://www.hudson.org/research/9569-new-hudson-study-america-s-patriotic-assimilation-system-is-broken
Close down the borders! My bishops, who I love and respect, don’t know what the heck they are talking about when they open their mouths on this subject.
In zero-welfare times, immigrants had to buy into the estblished system, or starve, or go-home. Helping immigrants meant creating institutions that would help them assimilate.
Now, in welfare times, they don’t have to assimilate if they don’t want to. Add in a political class that controls the welfare apparatus and needs a resentful and anxious base …
Compare working class Mexican Americans in Texas vs California. In Texas they assimilate and strive. In California they have formed a new permanent undreclass.