Table of Contents
Introduction
On June 16, 2016 Donald Trump announced his bid for President of the United States at a rally in front of the eponymous Trump Tower in New York City. In a provocative and often crude 47 minutes Trump addressed issues such as Islamic terrorism, the national debt, and “theft” of American jobs by major international competitors. In the midst of all this contention, it was Trump’s comments on immigrants, specifically those from Mexico, that especially managed to elicit widespread criticism: “The U.S. has become a dumping ground for everybody else’s problems…When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best people…They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists…(1).”
This presentation of apparent racism and xenophobia demands a single question be answered: is this America? The United States has always prided itself on being a country that welcomed foreigners–however mislead that belief may be–, basing its ethnic identity on being a “nation of immigrants.” But with this administration’s hostile attitude toward new immigrants’ place in American society we have seemingly sullied that reputation. The United States has always existed in a “global context (2),” so this new negative perspective on immigration presents a jarring break in convention.
For the bulk of its existence, Ireland has enjoyed viability free from the complexities of welcoming newcomers to its own shores. Over the course of its history Ireland has generally been a country of emigration; their greatest export has been their people. However, in recent years the country has experienced an unprecedented demand for entry, and has been forced to implement measures to police this new wave of immigrants. Electing to maintain exclusivity, Ireland’s immigration policies prove to be notably more restrictive than those of the United States. So, why hasn’t this ignited the same outrage as America’s alleged increasingly intolerant policies?
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An influx of migrants into any one destination country is always cause for controversy. Despite the many benefits a new wave of immigrants may provide, there is always the requisite campaign of fear the sweeps throughout the nation, admonishing the breakdown of culture and tradition. The liberality of a country’s immigration policy is a determining factor in how welcoming and non-discriminatory a society is, but such flexibility also indicates a need for assimilation. How a nation regulates the lives of migrants after they have entered the country and how said migrants respond to those regulations heavily reflects the nature of political institutions in a particular country. In order to begin an examination of current circumstances and crises, we must first understand the context in which they developed.
History
The United States has experienced sequential waves of immigration for almost the entirety of its existence. Some of America’s earliest settlers migrated here in pursuit of religious freedom; between 1620 and 1640 groups of Pilgrims and Puritans established colonies on the country’s eastern coast in an effort to escape the persecution in their homeland. From 1790-1820 a larger portion of European immigrants made the trip to the United States in search of greater economic opportunities, with many arriving as indentured servants because they could not shoulder the price of transit.
The next significant wave of immigration came between 1820 and 1860; the majority of these newcomers had their origin in Northern and Western Europe, many of them being poor Irish citizens evading a famine in their native country. During this time, the U.S. also accepted multitudes of German immigrants, who established permanent farming residences in the midwest. By the mid-1800s the nation saw a massive increase in migrants emanating from Asia, enticed by the promise of gold in California. This inundation of new settlers sparked the launch of many anti-immigrants groups, such as the infamous Know-Nothings, who attempted to place constraints on the number of migrants given admittance, their stance based mostly on economic concerns. With the dawn of the industrial age in the 1880s, America experienced a period of rapid urbanization which attracted more than 20 million immigrants, most of these arrivals native to Central, Eastern, and Southern Europe. The sheer enormity of this number prompted Congress to impose new legislation that inaugurated mandatory literacy tests and quota systems– the latter which disproportionately favored immigrants from Western Europe.
The United States underwent a lull in immigration following the national depression and the emergence of World War II in the 1930s. After the war, Congress implemented legislation that allowed for refugees from the Soviet Union and Europe seeking political asylum to take up legal residence in the U.S. In 1965, the Immigration and Nationality Act was passed, which eliminated the quota system and authorized non-native Americans to sponsor family members from their countries of origin. Since the application of this legislation American immigration policy has stagnated, but the influx of immigrants has not– today, many new migrants pour in from Latin America and Asia.
For the last 5 decades United States immigration policy has aimed consistently at these four things: “the reunification of families, garnering workers with skills valuable to U.S. economics, protecting refugees, and promoting diversity.” These objectives provide several viable paths toward immigration: 1. Family based immigration; in order to qualify for this you must be an immediate relative of a citizen who is of a certain economic standing. 2. Employment-based immigration; you can receive a temporary visa if your opportunity for employment meets certain standards; permanent immigration is also possible through this path. 3. Refugees and Asylees; this applies to those fleeing their home-countries under extraordinary, life-threatening conditions. And 4. Diversity Visa; this describes a lottery that gives out visas to applicants from countries with low immigration rates to the U.S. The current administration insists that these standards are far too generous. Trump and his proponents are calling for the adoption of a more scrupulous vetting process and selective requirements for who we allow in the country, citing the “economic burden” of unskilled workers.
Ireland’s relationship with immigration is much younger than the United States’. For a considerable portion of its history Ireland received very few migrants and was generally associated with massive amounts of emigration. As late as the 1980s Ireland was still sacrificing enormous segments of its population to outward migration. And, prior to World War II, there was less 3,000 non-Irish residents inhabiting the country (3). An economic boom in the 1990s created an unprecedented amount of jobs and subsequent demand for labor, and by the early-2000s Ireland had a steady stream of immigrants hailing from outside the European Union; 1996 was the first time since the 1970s that the number of new immigrants exceeded the number of emigrants and by 2006 non-Irish residents made up a staggering ten percent of the overall population. Ireland has only recently become a “nation of immigrants (4).” Because immigration levels spiked so suddenly necessary policies were developed in a short interval of time on what amounted to a case-by-case basis.
The legislation that was developed in response to the tremendous influx of immigrants in the 1990s and early 2000s had three main focuses: granting asylum, granting citizenship, and acquiring labor. Legislation that was passed in order to confront these three main concerns was decidedly illiberal. The number of asylum seekers reached its peak between 2001 and 2004, and in order to decrease this inflow the Irish government established a list of “safe countries of origin” and began to prioritize applicants that didn’t come from the delineated territories. Legislators also struck down laws that allowed automatic citizenship to Irish-born children whose parents weren’t nationals, convoluting the path toward naturalization. In addition to these modifications, lawmakers did adopt a more progressive work permit system to meet Ireland’s low-skilled labor needs, but EU legal instruments still required there be skill-based quotas. When compared to most Western nations these policies seem fair, even lenient, but are exceedingly repressive when juxtaposed to those of the U.S.
Analysis of the Relationship of Immigration and Political Institutions
The relationship of immigration to political institutions is something that drives immigration. The more amenable and receptive to change a nation’s political institutions are the more they will allow for the easy acclimatization of new immigrants. This is why America has been such a popular destination for migrants. The ethos of the American dream is something that has always been very alluring to foreigners. The conception of a uniquely American way of life is made possible by the capitalist institutions that allow for the advancement of one’s social status. Immigrants come here and offer their skills and build their businesses, therefore making them indispensable members of society. And in America there is a special distinction between society and state. Neighborhoods and communities are created by immigrants, not the government. In the United States everyone is from somewhere else.
Ireland’s political institutions, which adhere to the traditional European model of state, are less than welcoming to newcomers. In Europe the citizenry is defined by blood. Instead of creating the very fabric of civilization, immigrants live outside of the larger populace in their own isolated enclaves. A person could never be considered Irish unless Ireland was the country where they and all their immediate family had originated. Irish society is not responsive to immigrants the same way American society is, but it has had no reason to be. Ireland was not built on the backs of outsiders, so we should it embrace outsiders?
