There is a deep irony about the current political moment. Though having an immigrant background is arguably a core feature of how most Americans understand themselves, the topic of immigration has in recent years risen to a fever pitch of political controversy and polarized views. Of course, the immigrant streams to the United States today differ substantially from those that characterized the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Instead of bringing in millions of South, Central, and Eastern Europeans looking for better opportunities than were available in their homelands, the current immigrant wave has drawn most heavily from those with Latin American and Asian origins. Concomitant to these changes in economic, cultural, and political context as well as in who constitute the new immigrants, are a series of deep questions about civic belonging, the social consequences of immigration, and what appropriate policy responses to recent immigration should be.

The dawn of the twenty-first century confronts Western democracies with a racialized class problem. The globalization of capitalism—mass geographic movement of peoples, capital, and markets on scales unprecedented since the Atlantic slave trade—has brought poor migrants into affluent nations. Migrants' descendants are replicating conditions associated with poor Blacks. Affluent Western democracies are hurtling toward biplural stratification defined by a multiracial underclass. Racialized class stratification stems from economic policies. Capitalist democracies' edifice of social policies—sanctioning expectations of rising prosperity, welfare “safety nets” for minimal consumption, low-wage migration policies—erroneously assumed that jobs and wages would continuously grow to absorb expanding populations. Overuse of low-wage migration policies commodified work relations in low-skilled jobs. Acculturated to demand affluent living standards and egalitarian human relations, educationally deprived descendants of migrants find commodified work regimens repellent. Despite large populations of jobless natives, some maintain that affluent democracies need more migrants to do the jobs that natives won't do. But jobless youth are alienated and prone to agency, as riots in England, the United States, and, more recently, France and other areas of Europe suggest. To avert the solidification of biplural societies, social policy must slow rates of migration from low living-standard economies, expand minimum wages and income transfers to working-citizen households, and provide documented immigrants clear avenues to citizenship. This agenda is more likely to succeed in the United States, where minority voting strength is gathering considerable momentum.

Are the predictors of anti-immigration attitudes consistent across countries with diverse immigration histories and policies? We hypothesize that the key predictors of opposition to immigration are indeed relatively consistent across industrial nations. We test this hypothesis with two surveys using probability samples of German citizens. We then compare our findings with those obtained in recent studies of immigration opinions in Europe generally, and in two of the world's leading immigration-receiving nations: Canada and the United States. Striking similarities emerge in the findings across structural, demographic, contact, economic, political, personality, and threat predictors. Opposition to immigration is routinely found strongest among the older and less-educated segments of the population who live in areas with anti-immigration norms and little contact with immigrants. Anti-immigration attitudes also correlate with political conservatism and alienation, economic deprivation, and especially with authoritarianism, social dominance orientation, and perceived collective threat.

The remarkable increase in immigration from Asia and Latin America requires a rethinking of multiracial analyses of neighborhood racial-composition preferences. This research addresses two interrelated questions: (1) since spatial mobility is so central to social mobility, how do recent Asian and Latino/a immigrants develop ideas about the racial and ethnic composition of the neighborhoods in which they want to live; and (2) what are the implications of processes of immigrant adaptation for the likely dynamics of race and ethnic relations in increasingly diverse communities? Guided by Massey's spatial assimilation model and previous studies of neighborhood racial-composition preferences, this research underscores the critical importance of immigration and assimilation as influences on preferences for same-race, White, and Black neighbors. Data are from the 1993–1994 Los Angeles Survey of Urban Inequality (N = 1921). Results point to the critical role of acculturation—the accumulation of time in the United States and English-language proficiency/use, as well as racial attitudes—in understanding what motivates preferences for these diverse groups, and to the complexities of accurately modeling preferences among largely foreign-born populations. Preferences for both same-race and White neighbors vary by the length of time that immigrants have accumulated in the United States and their ability to communicate effectively in English. English-language fluency is a particularly salient predictor of preferences among recent immigrants. Consistent with prior research on preferences, racial stereotypes stand out as particularly potent predictors of preferences; however, their influence is weakest among the most recent immigrants, coming to resemble those of the native-born with increasing years of U.S. residence.

As a result of urban immigration and White flight over the past three decades, the demography of U.S. cities has changed rather dramatically; approximately one-half of the largest hundred cities are now composed of minority majorities. Many urban scholars expected these demographic shifts to enhance the prospects for minority electoral alliances. In reality, however, few such alliances have emerged. This paper looks to explore the barriers to effective coalition building between native-born African Americans and their immigrant counterparts. In the first half of the paper, I explore the psychological barriers to mass coalitions, focusing on the negative stereotypes and perceived zero-sum conflict that exist between native-born African Americans and Latino immigrants. The second half of the paper argues that material and symbolic incentives fuel ongoing competition between Blacks and Latinos in the political sphere. The paper concludes with a discussion of how immigrant-induced diversity coupled with existing racial hierarchies work against future Black empowerment. Even when changing urban demography makes Whites a numerical minority, White voters often retain their status as urban power players through their ability to divide minority voters at the polls. Divisive electoral strategies that offer political rewards to one group at the expense of others threaten Black incorporation in the urban arena. Unless minority leadership changes the incentive structure embedded in the traditional modes of municipal governance, Whites will persist in their economic dominance, while disadvantaged immigrants and Blacks will continue to make political choices that yield small, short-term rewards at the expense of greater social and economic justice.

Dramatic demographic changes are occurring in the United States, and some of the most dramatic changes are occurring in the South from Latino immigration. Latinos, by and large, are an entirely new population in the region. How are Black southerners reacting to this new population? Using survey data gathered from a southern location, this article explores several questions related to whether Blacks see these new residents as friendly neighbors or economic competitors. Results suggest that Blacks and non-Blacks perceive a potential economic threat from continued Latino immigration, but Blacks are more concerned about the effects of Latino immigration than are Whites.

The federal government created America's historic 1964 Civil Rights Act during a period of low immigration. The primary goal was to create equal opportunities for African Americans by ending Jim Crow discrimination in the South. Focusing on the issue of employment discrimination, and specifically employer preferences for immigrants, this article shows how the current period of high immigration from Latin America and Asia has created new challenges and dilemmas for Title VII, the employment discrimination title of the Civil Rights Act. Specifically, sociological evidence indicates that U.S. businesses are engaging in race-conscious employment focused on the perceived value of racial skills (special abilities of certain racial groups at particular jobs) and racial symbolism (organizational benefits from displaying certain races on the work force). Businesses hire Asians and Latinos, and especially immigrant Asians and Latinos, because of the perceived racial skills of these groups at low-status jobs that require strong work ethics and obedient attitudes. Corporate employers seeking skilled workers do not necessarily prefer immigrants. Instead, they seek minorities for the symbolic value of their diversity, for their general racial skills at bringing new ideas to the workplace, and for their racial marketing skills for growing non-White markets. I assess these developments from a legal perspective, showing that a combination of a lack of litigation and some key court decisions have prevented Title VII from regulating racial skills and racial symbolism and/or from offering protection for immigrants themselves.

Contemporary immigration is affecting U.S. society in many ways, particularly with respect to racial dynamics. Three aspects of these dynamics stand out: the conceptualization of race, the meaning of assimilation, and racial relations between groups. Although contemporary immigration, being largely non-White, is challenging U.S. society's entrenched conceptualization of race as revolving around a Black/White framework, this framework is not being rapidly overturned. Instead, immigrants are increasing social complexity by both adapting to the Black/White dichotomy and seeking alternatives to it through multiculturalism. The conceptualization of race is pivotally important because it determines the shape of assimilation, and, consistent with growing immigration-driven complexity, no one model of assimilation dominates the society. Instead, Anglo-conformity and multiculturalism are competing for preeminence. Blacks, because of U.S. society's failure to completely absorb them, helped to originate multiculturalism, but immigration is strengthening the model's appeal. Blacks and immigrants are adapting to U.S. society by utilizing both Anglo-conformity and multiculturalism. Immigration, increasingly, is also influencing race relations because of its volume and character. Even though Black/White conflict remains unresolved, future race relations will go beyond this nexus to incorporate other groups in complex interactions, revolving around the formation of coalitions and conflict situations as groups pursue particular interests.

In discussions of political obligation, it is commonly assumed that duties follow from citizenship. However, the performance of a duty by aliens can lead to citizenship status in at least one critical case: service by noncitizen soldiers. While politicians and pundits recently have called citizenship a just reward for bearing arms and these “green card troops” another example of immigrant entrepreneurship in the United States, there is a good deal of ideological ambivalence about the policy. A clear discussion of its merits is crucial, particularly because in upending the traditionally accepted relationship between obligation and membership in a community, it gives new meaning to citizenship; it also forces a choice between our egalitarian and civic republican values. In this essay, I provide a theoretical framework for evaluating the policy normatively, as well as a political analysis of why—regardless of one's normative stance—the practice of granting citizenship for military service is likely to continue into the future.

As the new second generation comes of age in the twenty-first century, it is making an indelible imprint in cities across the country, compelling immigration scholars to turn their attention to this growing population. In this essay, we first review the extant literature on immigrant incorporation, with a particular focus on the mobility patterns of the new second generation. Second, we critically evaluate the existing assumptions about the definitions of and pathways to success and assimilation. We question the validity and reliability of key measures of social mobility, and also assess the discrepancy between the “objective” measures often used in social science research and the “subjective” measures presented by members of the second generation. Third, we examine the identity choices of the new second generation, focusing on how they choose to identify themselves, and the mechanisms that underlie their choice of identities. We illuminate our review with some preliminary findings from our ongoing qualitative study of 1.5- and second-generation Mexicans, Chinese, and Vietnamese in Los Angeles. In doing so, we attempt to dispel some myths about group-based cultures, stereotypes, and processes of assimilation.

We examine mainstream U.S. print news depictions of the 2006 immigration policy debate. Using critical discourse analysis informed by cognitive metaphor theory, we analyze a substantial sample of mainstream U.S. print news reports in May 2006, at the height of national attention on the “Great May Day” demonstrations across the country. We compare it to a second sample of print news media articles from October 2006, at the time of the passage of the 2006 Secure Fence Act. Mainstream print media represented immigrants with a noteworthy balance between human and nonhuman language during the time of the Great May Day marches. However, the media did not sustain a balanced representation of immigrants in the ensuing months. The conceptual metaphor immigrant as criminal is predominant during both periods. We explore the implication of the language used to frame the immigration policy debate.

As Latino and Asian immigrant populations in the United States continue to grow, controversies are cropping up over immigrant animal practices such as horse tripping in Mexican charreadas (rodeos) and the slaughter of animals in the live-animal markets of San Francisco's Chinatown. Immigrant advocates read these controversies through a multiculturalist interpretive framework that constructs animal advocates as agents of an ethnocentric and racist majority. In this article, I argue that this multiculturalist interpretation tends to “go imperial” by mischaracterizing the position(s) of animal advocates and invalidating and suppressing the other, potentially competitive, moral discourse at play: the discourse about cruelty toward animals. I explicate this suppressed discourse and then propose the development of a mutually challenging and potentially edifying moral dialogue in which majority and minority animal practices are simultaneously open to scrutiny and criticism. Clashes over customary practices can aggravate intergroup tensions, but they also have the potential to lead to meaningful moral dialogue between the majority and immigrant minorities.

In the first decade of the new millennium, a new cycle of public concern about the benefits and harms of immigration has erupted. The harsh spotlight on undocumented immigration and border controls has blinded us to many important facets of the problem. In this article, we focus on the experience and integration of the children of immigrants. These youth are the largest growing segment of the U.S. child population—now constituting 20% of our nation's children and projected by the year 2040 to make up one-third of our children. Immigrant-origin youth are extraordinarily diverse, and their experiences resist facile generalizations. The social and educational outcomes of immigrant youth will thus vary substantially depending upon the specific constellation of resources and the settlement context. Of critical importance is how immigrant youth fare academically, as this has long-term implications for their future, as well as our society's well-being. While some are successfully navigating the U.S. educational system, large numbers struggle academically, leaving school without having acquired the tools that will enable them to function in the highly competitive labor market and ever more complex society. Here we explore a variety of factors that shed light on the educational integration of the children of immigrants: educational background; poverty; segregation; undocumented status; English-language acquisition; promoting academic engagement; family relations; peer relationships; communities and community organizations; and mentoring relationships. We advocate a major new policy agenda to ease the transition of America's newest and littlest arrivals to their new home.