Traditionally, migrants have been viewed as people seeking a permanent life in another, usually more developed nation. Only by “failing” are these people forced to return to their homeland. This view is incorrect. The vast majority of migrants expect to return. Studies have shown that intended and actual times of stay (even of migration within countries) are usually quite short – the most decisive factor dictating their time of stay is their ability to freely move across borders.
The temporary character of migrants allows them to add value to industry by filling gaps in the economy of their host country without many problems. There does seem to be, however, an ever-growing nucleus of seemingly permanent migrants. This transition (from temporary migrants to permanent settlers) is the main source of problems associated with migrants.
Jobs serve two main purposes for people. They define relationships and identities within communities, and they provide workers with income. Most economic theory assumes that work only serves to raise our income and that we will always seek a job that will pay us the highest amount of money. There are obvious limits to what one will do for money, however. Personal and individual tastes and choice will shape one’s willingness to pursue a given career, as will imposed communal and social expectations and stigmas. It is widely accepted that these personal and social constraints invalidate the purely economic incentives viewed within the labor market.
This is not so with temporary migrant labor. In such cases, jobs are merely means to an end – to send money back to their places of origin, where their social identity is truly located. By deliberately separating their social identity from their work, migrants can eliminate the personal choice, social constraints, and community inhibitions of their home environment and can focus solely on making money. The aim of this money is to maintain or advance their social status at home. In this sense, the migrant is truly an economic man.
The historical existence of other groups of migrants who have been much more permanent and have resisted poor working conditions do not contradict this view of temporary migration. In most cases (such as Jews and Irish last century, and Cubans more recently) these groups were forced out of extreme political and economical upheavals at home. While they initially accepted low level jobs (such as temporary migrants do now) they were aware of their permanence and fought for better status.
Another important point, which describes the migrants we are focusing on, is their origin. Most migrants come from rural, agricultural areas and therefore tend to be less educated and literate than the natives of their host country. They also tend to be naïve to urban settings, with notable cultural and language barriers. Two factors stemming from this point are of importance. First of all, there is usually a notable income differential, but this is not the main reason for migration, as there are ample examples of people who migrate despite home country wages that are at or even above the ones they seek in other countries.
Another factor of interest, which does seem to be a motivation for migration, is the fact that there is an overlapping of the hierarchical status within the countries of interest. Basically put, the menial jobs in the developed countries are at a higher social level than the menial jobs in largely agricultural societies. The move to a more modern society is seen as upward mobility by the migrants, despite the fact that they now lie at the lowest level of the labor hierarchy in the developed country. They accept jobs that are refused by natives of the richer countries.
This chapter relies on the idea that a migrant’s successful function within developed economies is dependent upon his temporary status. This temporary status is of a transitory nature, however. Over time, temporary migration turns into permanent settlements; many of the social problems associated with migration stem form this transition.
As previously noted, some people view settlement as the “success” of a given migrant. This is not the case, but it is equally incorrect to simply view it as a “failure.” The underlying process in settlement is one in which a “permanent, stable community develops among the migrants in a developed country.” To simply view it as a success or failure reduces a very complex and human process to mere economics.
While a temporary migrant worker might attempt to be the perfect “economic man,” the idea of such a man is not realistic. It may be a plan, but it is not possible to totally disassociate work from social and community ties. Gradually, a community will be developed among groups of migrant workers – at the expense of the purely “economic man.” Through social interactions, migrants will start to consume more in their host nations, and will consequently send less to their native lands. When this happens, they will inevitably require more time to send back their economic goals. This in turn forces them to continue their cycle of assimilation into a community atmosphere, where they no longer just live and work together, but also rely on each other in a number of practical and personal ways. Through the development of relationships, a community develops itself.
Most migrant workers have important people back home (girlfriends, wives, fiancés, and children) that they are sending their earnings back to. However, it is a common occurrence that intimate relationships form while away from home, forging stronger bonds to the developed countries, in many cases even through the creation of second families. As migration continues, people start to anticipate the difficulties involved in attempting a purely ascetic life and start to bring along their wives and children, adding to the growing bonds of a more or less permanent community. It is much harder to return to their home countries when they have a settled family in the developed countries, this is true even in cases of unemployment. With that in mind, migrants start to see the attraction of other job benefits and job security, and are thus less likely to settle for menial jobs and more likely to compete for jobs with natives – leading to a point of much contention
Despite the fact that problems are starting to brew, the process of settling is still not complete, and the workers are still not completely settled. They are called first generation, still considering their country of origin as their true country, and are not truly assimilated yet. The major step in settlement comes with the emergence of the second generation, where they are considered native for all practical purposes, and where they have a native outlook on the labor market.
The First and Second
Generations:
Some Qualifications and
Problems
When speaking of first and second generations of migrants, it is important to first realize that on an individual scale, the dividing line between being first and second generation is not based on place of birth, but on where the individuals spend their adolescence. This seems to be the divisive factor for cultural identity.
It is more important, however, to not view the generational distinction on an individual scale at all. It is less dependent on the individual, and more so on the community. Permanent second generation migrant communities change the migrant landscape forever. With such a community in place, newcomers can readily assimilate into the population and view the labor market like those who already live there. The migrant’s job can no longer be viewed as an “asocial, purely instrumental character of life,” and is instead now constrained by social norms, expectations and stigmas – it is now much harder to “just make money.”
The preceding model of community development cannot be substantiated with any studies over time – it is merely a hypothesis. There are, however, studies of “ethnic” and poor communities. These communities are mostly made up of migrants, or are derived from migration and are therefore a useful point of comparison to the migrant hypothesis. The different studies bring two main alternatives to the hypothesis of an inevitable permanent structure creating value structures at odds with the native population. These alternatives are the culture of poverty and unassimilated settlements.
The central notion [of the “culture of poverty”] is that there is a whole cultural pattern that is typified by unstable and volatile social arrangements. That pattern is reflected in labor market behavior by continual job turnover, a weak and mercurial attachment to the labor market… It is also reflected in personal relationships, which often result in unstable unions between men and women
While such a pattern can indeed fit the secondary labor market and substitute for continued labor migration, there is no reason to believe that it is independent of the migration process. First we must remember that the people in the studies were mostly migrants and the traits described by such studies were probably manifestations of the temporal quality of the migrants. It is also important to keep in mind that a community with a large transient population would likely breed such behaviors as seen in the studies of poverty to all residents, even the permanent ones.
In the United States, the conventional view of immigration is based on the idea of the “melting pot.” Through the transition of the melting pot, migrants are assimilated into the larger “American” culture through contact and absorb its values and attitudes. The transition involved in settlement is independent of contact with the larger cultural environment and creates an autonomous culture within the migrant community.
In studies of such autonomous settlements, the antagonism experienced between the larger “American” culture and the independent migrant culture is not viable in the long run and leads to “the destruction of the community itself through an urban renewal process that the community cannot stop because it cannot comprehend.”