Skip to main content
×
×
Home

Making Immigration Work: How Britain and Europe Can Cope with their Immigration Crises (The Government and Opposition/Leonard Schapiro Lecture, 2015)

  • Randall Hansen
Abstract

This article provides a review of the economic, demographic and welfare effects of immigration in contemporary Europe. It argues that the economic benefits of migration are small but positive, its welfare effects minimal if not non-existent, and its demographic effects modest but real. It then provides a series of recommendations for governing migration policy in Europe: keeping the borders open but controlled; keeping employment high and income support low, and keeping speech free but fair. The most important policy recommendation centres on work: immigration policy will only work when immigrants work.

  • View HTML
    • Send article to Kindle

      To send this article to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about sending to your Kindle. Find out more about sending to your Kindle.

      Note you can select to send to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be sent to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

      Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

      Making Immigration Work: How Britain and Europe Can Cope with their Immigration Crises (The Government and Opposition/Leonard Schapiro Lecture, 2015)
      Available formats
      ×
      Send article to Dropbox

      To send this article to your Dropbox account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your <service> account. Find out more about sending content to Dropbox.

      Making Immigration Work: How Britain and Europe Can Cope with their Immigration Crises (The Government and Opposition/Leonard Schapiro Lecture, 2015)
      Available formats
      ×
      Send article to Google Drive

      To send this article to your Google Drive account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your <service> account. Find out more about sending content to Google Drive.

      Making Immigration Work: How Britain and Europe Can Cope with their Immigration Crises (The Government and Opposition/Leonard Schapiro Lecture, 2015)
      Available formats
      ×
Copyright
Footnotes
Hide All
*

Randall Hansen is Director of the Centre for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Toronto. Contact email: r.hansen@utoronto.ca.

Footnotes
References
Hide All
Alesina, A. and Glaeser, E.L. (2004), Fighting Poverty in the U.S. and Europe: A World of Difference (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
Allport, G.W. (1979), The Nature of Prejudice (Reading, MA: Addison Wesley Publishing Company).
Brubaker, R. (1995), ‘Aftermaths of Empire and the Unmixing of Peoples: Historical and Comparative Perspectives’, Ethnic and Racial Studies, 18(2): 189218.
Camarota, S.A. and Zeigler, K. (2015), ‘The Declining Fertility of Immigrants and Natives’, Center for Immigration Studies, Washington, DC, http://cis.org/declining-fertility.
Carens, J. (2006), ‘Free Speech and Democratic Norms in the Danish Cartoon Controversy’, International Migration, 44(5): 3442.
Chambers, S. (2015), ‘Free Speech and Civility in Pluralist Societies’, in E.M. Iacobucci and S.J. Toope, After the Paris Attacks: Responses in Canada, Europe, and around the Globe (Toronto: University of Toronto Press): 1321.
Clemens, M.A. (2011), ‘A World without Borders Makes Economic Sense’, The Guardian, 5 September.
Collier, P. (2013), Exodus: How Migration is Changing our World (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
Crepaz, M. (2006), “If you Are my Brother, I May Give you a Dime!” Public Opinion on Multiculturalism, Trust, and the Welfare State’, in K. Banting and W. Kymlicka (eds), Multiculturalism and the Welfare State (New York: Oxford University Press): 92117.
Dobbs, C. (2006), Patterns of Pay: Results of the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 1997 to 2005 (London: Office of National Statistics).
Dustmann, C. and Frattini, T. (2013), The Fiscal Effects of Immigration to the UK, CREAM Discussion Paper 22/13 (London).
Dustmann, C.Frattini, T. and Preston, I.P. (2013), ‘The Effect of Immigration along the Distribution of Wages’, Review of Economic Studies, 80: 145173.
The Economist (2014), ‘A Billion Shades of Grey,’ 26 April.
Eurostat (2015a), ‘Population on 1 January by Five Year Age Group, Sex and Citizenship’, http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/en/web/products-datasets/-/MIGR_POP1CTZ.
Eurostat (2015b), ‘Immigration by Five Year Age Group, Sex and Citizenship’, http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/en/web/products-datasets/-/MIGR_IMM1CTZ.
Evans, G. (2006), ‘Is Multiculturalism Eroding Support for Welfare Provision?’, in K. Banting and W. Kymlicka (eds), Multiculturalism and the Welfare State (New York: Oxford University Press): 152176.
Fadel, M. (2015), ‘A Tale of Two Massacres: Charlie Hebdo and Utoya Island’, in E.M. Iacobucci and S.J. Toope (eds), After the Paris Attacks: Responses in Canada, Europe, and Around the Globe (Toronto: University of Toronto Press): 2942.
Favell, A. (2014), ‘The Fourth Freedom: Theories of Migration and Mobilities in “Neo-liberal” Europe’, European Journal of Social Theory, 17(3): 275289.
Faye, O. (2014), ‘Sarcelles sous le choc des violences antisémites’, Le Monde, 22 July, www.lemonde.fr/societe/article/2014/07/22/sarcelles-sous-le-choc-des-violences-antisemites_4461039_3224.html.
Freeman, G.P. (1997), ‘Immigration as a Source of Political Discontent and Frustration in Western Democracies’, Studies in Comparative International Development, 32(3): 4264.
Freeman, G.P., Hansen, R. and Leal, D. (2012), Immigration and Public Opinion in Europe and North America (with D. Leal and G.P. Freeman) (New York: Routledge).
Goodhart, D. (2004), ‘Too Diverse?: Is Britain Becoming Too Diverse to Sustain the Mutual Obligations behind a Good Society and the Welfare State?’, Prospect, 20 February.
Goodhart, D. (2013), The British Dream: Successes and Failures of Post-war Immigration (London: Atlantic Books).
Gutman, A. and Taylor, C. (1994), Multiculturalism (Princeton: Princeton University Press).
Hansen, R. (2000), Citizenship and Immigration in Postwar Britain (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
Hansen, R. (2006), ‘The Danish Cartoon Controversy: A Defence of Liberal Freedom’, International Migration, 44(5): 716.
Hansen, R. and Gordon, J. (2014), ‘Deficits, Democracy, and Demographics: Europe’s Three Crises’, West European Politics, 37(6): 11991222.
Hero, R.E. and Preuhs, R.R. (2006), ‘Multiculturalism and Welfare Policies in the USA: A State-level Comparative Analysis’, in K. Banting and W. Kymlicka (eds), Multiculturalism and the Welfare State (New York: Oxford University Press): 121151.
Hollifield, J.F., Martin, P.L. and Orrenius, P.M. (2014) (eds), Controlling Immigration: A Global Perspective, 3rd edn (Stanford: Stanford University Press).
IOM (2015), ‘How the World Views Migration’, International Organization for Migration, Geneva, www.iom.int/files/live/sites/iom/files/pbn/docs/How-the-World-Views-Migration-Gallup-flyer.pdf.
Jones, O. (2015), ‘Charlie Hebdo: Norway Didn’t Give into Anti-Semitism, nor Should France’, The Guardian, 8 January, www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/08/charlie-hebdo-norway-islamophobia-france-anders-breivik.
Joppke, C. (1998), Immigration and the Nation State: The United States, Germany, and Britain (Oxford: Clarendon).
Joppke, C. (2010), Citizenship and Immigration (Cambridge: Polity).
Kymlicka, W. (2009), ‘The Multicultural Welfare State?’, in P.A. Hall and M. Lamont (eds), Successful Societies: How Institutions and Culture Affect Health (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press): 226253.
Marrus, M. (1985), The Unwanted (New York: Oxford University Press).
Marshall, R. (2015), ‘The (In)Secure Citizen: Islamophobia and the Natives of the Republic after Paris’, in E.M. Iacobucci and S.J. Toope (eds), After the Paris Attacks: Responses in Canada, Europe, and Around the Globe (Toronto: University of Toronto Press): 4353.
Martin, P. (2015), ‘Economic Aspects of Migration’, in C.B. Brettell and J.F. Hollifield (eds), Migration Theory: Talking across Disciplines (New York: Routledge): 90109.
Miller, D. (2004), ‘Immigrants, Nations, and Citizenship’, unpublished paper presented to CRASSH conference, ‘Migrants, Nations, and Citizenship’, New Hall, Cambridge, 5–6 July.
Miller, D. (2005), ‘Immigration: The Case for Limits’, in A. Cohen and C. Wellman (eds), Contemporary Debates in Applied Ethics (Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing): 193206.
Miller, D. (2008), ‘Immigrants, Nations, and Citizenship’, Journal of Political Philosophy, 16(4): 371390.
Modood, T. (2006), ‘The Liberal Dilemma: Integration or Vilification’, Open Democracy website, 8 February, www.opendemocracy.net/faith-terrorism/liberal_dilemma_3249.jsp.
Modood, T. (2015), ‘In Remembering the Charlie Hebdo Attack we Must Not Forget the Responsibility that Goes With Free Speech’, LSE Comment, blog, 12 January, http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2015/01/12/in-remembering-the-charlie-hebdo-attack-we-must-not-forget-the-responsibility-that-goes-with-free-speech.
O’Leary, B. (2006), ‘Liberalism, Multiculturalism, Danish Cartoons, Islamist Fraud, and the Rights of the Ungodly’, International Migration, 44(5): 2233.
O’Neil, B. (2015), ‘Islamophobia is a Myth’, National Review, 9 January, www.nationalreview.com/article/411371/islamophobia-myth-brendan-oneill.
OECD (2014), ‘Is Migration Good for the Economy?’, OECD, Paris, May, www.oecd.org/migration/mig/OECD%20Migration%20Policy%20Debates%20Numero%202.pdf.
Putnam, R.D. (2007), ‘E Pluribus Unum: Diversity and Community in the Twenty-First Century; the 2006 Johan Skytte Prize Lecture’, Scandinavian Political Studies, 30: 137174.
Sarrazin, T. (2012), Deutschland Schafft Sich ab: Wie Wir Unser Land aufs Spiel Setzen (Munich: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt).
Schain, M. (2012), The Politics of Immigration in France, Britain and the United States: A Comparative Study, 2nd edn (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan).
Smith, J.P. and Edmonston, B. (1997), The New Americans: Economic, Demographic, and Fiscal Effects of Immigration (Washington, DC: National Academies Press).
UNHCR (2014), ‘UNHCR Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2014’, www.unhcr.org/556725e69.html.
UN Population Division (2001), Replacement Migration: Is it a Solution to Declining and Ageing Populations? (New York: United Nations Secretariat).
Woldemicael, G. and Roderic, B. (2010), ‘Fertility Behavior of Immigrants in Canada: British Trends’, PSC Discussion Paper Series, 24(5): 130.
YouGov (2015), ‘Health Overtakes Immigration as an Issue for Voters’, YouGov, 15 April, https://yougov.co.uk/news/2015/04/15/health-tops-immigration-second-most-important-issu.
Zong, J. and Batalova, J. (2015), Frequently Requested Statistics on Immigrants and Immigration in the United States (Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute).
Recommend this journal

Email your librarian or administrator to recommend adding this journal to your organisation's collection.

Government and Opposition
  • ISSN: 0017-257X
  • EISSN: 1477-7053
  • URL: /core/journals/government-and-opposition
Please enter your name
Please enter a valid email address
Who would you like to send this to? *
×

Keywords:

Metrics

Altmetric attention score

Full text views

Total number of HTML views: 139
Total number of PDF views: 595 *
Loading metrics...

Abstract views

Total abstract views: 1221 *
Loading metrics...

* Views captured on Cambridge Core between September 2016 - 12th June 2018. This data will be updated every 24 hours.