Immigration Matters: Movements, Visions, and Strategies for a Progressive Future

by Ruth Milkman (Editor), Deepak Bhargava (Editor), Penny Lewis (Editor)

Overview

A provocative, strategic plan for a humane immigration system from the nation’s leading immigration scholars and activists

During the past decade, right-wing nativists have stoked popular hostility to the nation’s foreign-born population, forcing the immigrant rights movement into a defensive posture. In the Trump years, preoccupied with crisis upon crisis, advocates had few opportunities to consider questions of long-term policy or future strategy. Now is the time for a reset.

Immigration Matters offers a new, actionable vision for immigration policy. It brings together key movement leaders and academics to share cutting-edge approaches to the urgent issues facing the immigrant community, along with fresh solutions to vexing questions of so-called “future flows” that have bedeviled policy makers for decades. The book also explores the contributions of immigrants to the nation’s identity, its economy, and progressive movements for social change. Immigration Matters delves into a variety of topics including new ways to frame immigration issues, fresh thinking on key aspects of policy, challenges of integration, workers’ rights, family reunification, legalization, paths to citizenship, and humane enforcement.

The perfect handbook for immigration activists, scholars, policy makers, and anyone who cares about one of the most contentious issues of our age, Immigration Matters makes accessible an immigration policy that both remediates the harm done to immigrant workers and communities under Trump and advances a bold new vision for the future.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781620976999
Publisher:	New Press, The
Publication date:	09/07/2021
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	1,058,588
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.40(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Ruth Milkman is Distinguished Professor of Sociology at the CUNY Graduate Center and the CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies. 
Deepak Bhargava has been a leader in justice movements for over thirty years. He is currently a distinguished lecturer at the CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies and senior fellow at the Roosevelt Institute. He is a co-founder of Leadership for Democracy and Social Justice and past president of Community Change. The co-editor (with Ruth Milkman and Penny Lewis) of Immigration Matters and co-author (with Stephanie Luce) of Practical Radicals (both published by The New Press), he lives in New York City.
Penny Lewis is an associate professor of labor studies at the CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies.

Table of Contents

Introduction Ruth Milkman Deepak Bhargava Penny Lewis 1

Part I Historical Perspectives

American Nativism, Past and Present Mae M. Ngai 39

History Shows That the Immigrant Threat Narrative Is Wrong Ruth Milkman 55

Stronger Together Immigrant Workers and the Labor Movement An Interview Eliseo Medina 72

From the Ground Up: The Growth of the U.S. Immigrant Rights Movement An Interview Angelica Salas 91

Part II Lessons of Organizing Campaigns

The Immigrant Youth Movement: Here to Dream and Here to Fight Cristina Jiménez Moreta 107

The Nevada Turnaround: Immigrant Workers Build Political Power An Interview D. Taylor 121

Taking on Corporate Complicity in the Trump Era: The "Corporate Backers of Hate" Campaign Javier H. Valdés Deborah Axt Daniel Altschuler Angeles Soils 133

Part III Future Immigration Policy

Five Freedoms: A Twenty-First-Century Policy Vision for Immigrant Rights Marielena Hincapié 151

When Democrats Are Not the Party of Ideas Justin Gest 166

Keep It Moving: A "Future Flow" Agenda for the Immigrant Rights Movement Amah a Kassa 187

Abolish ICE… and Then What? Peter L. Markowitz 205

Immigrants Are Essential: A Manifesto for the COVID-19 and Climate Change Era Saket Soni 221

Part IV Strategies for Change

The Progressive Path Forward on Immigration Policy Pramila Jayapal 235

The Border and Beyond Cecilia Munoz 253

"We Have Found the Enemy and It Is Not Each Other": Deep Canvassing to Change Hearts and Minds on Immigration in Rural and Small-Town America Mehrdad Azemun Adam Kruggel 271

The Statue of Liberty Plan: Vision and Strategy for the Immigrant Rights Movement in the Twenty-First Century Deepak Bhargava 287

Acknowledgments 308

Contributors 309

Editorial Reviews

02/15/2021

In this lucid and well-organized anthology, three scholars from the CUNY School of Labor and Union Studies bring together activists and academics to examine the forces that have shaped U.S. immigration policy and offer ideas for achieving “meaningful, lasting reforms.” Historian Mae M. Ngai analyzes how structural shifts in the economy and demagogic politicians have fueled nativist periods in American history when anti-immigration measures were passed. Cristina Jiménez Moreta, the founder of United We Dream, details the tactics and strategies that led to a 2012 executive order protecting the Dreamers from deportation, while labor activist D. Taylor discusses how immigrant leadership has reinvigorated labor groups in Nevada, helping to turn the state from red to blue. In the book’s final sections, contributors argue for significantly increasing the number of refugees and asylum seekers allowed into the U.S., share techniques for changing the minds of xenophobic voters, and discuss what a humanitarian immigration enforcement program would look like. Each essay is packed with useful information and based on decades of experience. Progressive lawmakers and immigration activists will find this to be a valuable resource. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

Praise for Immigration Matters:
“Lucid and well-organized. . . . Each essay is packed with useful information and based on decades of experience. Progressive lawmakers and immigration activists will find this to be a valuable resource.”
—Publishers Weekly

“For too long, politicians have stoked nativism and weaponized our immigration system to divide people. Democrats and progressives shouldn’t be afraid to put forward a bold, forward-thinking vision for immigration that is rooted in common sense and compassion, instead of cruelty. Immigration Matters helps illuminate that vision and provides a path forward for achieving it.”
—Julián Castro, former U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development

“Immigration Matters draws together the leading voices on immigration and immigrant rights to offer a cogent pathway to fix a tragically broken immigration system. The book offers great hope to those seeking to move beyond the ugliness of the current nativist moment and restore the honorable legacy of the United States as a just and fair nation of immigrants.”
—Douglas S. Massey, Henry G. Bryant Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs, Princeton University

“The pandemic helped us see many things we must never forget, such as the essential role of immigrants in every aspect of American life. Now that we see, we must act to ensure a future that is fully inclusive of immigrants. This wonderful book tells us how.”
—Ai-jen Poo, Director, National Domestic Workers Alliance and Caring Across Generations

“Donald Trump took a hammer to the U.S. immigration system, and in doing so exposed its inhumane and racist scaffolding. The Biden-Harris administration has an unprecedented opportunity to transform the system into one that reflects the best of American values. These thoughtful essays point them—and us—in the right direction.”
—Lorella Praeli, vice president, Community Change

“The future of the labor movement—and the country—depends significantly on immigrants and immigration. This crucial collection points the way to a convergence of social movements to achieve lasting power for working people.”
—Mary Kay Henry, president, Service Employees International Union

From the Publisher