Subnational Migration States and the New Politics of Immigration
| Published date | 01 December 2020 |
| Author | Mireille Paquet |
| Date | 01 December 2020 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12649 |
Subnational Migration States and the New
Politics of Immigration
Mireille Paquet*
ABSTRACT
Using Catherine Dauvergne’sThe New Politics of Immigration and the End of Settler Society
(2016) as a starting point, this article explores subnational policy dynamics in Canada, Aus-
tralia and the United States. It considers whether the trends associated with legalization, two-
step programmes, rapid policy changes and economic discourses are present in Canadian pro-
vinces as well as in U.S. and Australian states. It shows that the forces described by Dau-
vergne contribute to a further rescaling of policymaking and to the emergence of subnational
migration states. However, this article also demonstrates that this common movement varies in
its consequences and identifies two central subnational policy responses typical of the new pol-
itics of immigration: 1) the “economic subnational migration state”(Canada and Australia) and
2) the “access subnational migration state”(United States). The models and the global trends
described in this article have implications for immigration policymaking in federations.
INTRODUCTION
Using as a starting point Catherine Dauvergne’sThe New Politics of Immigration and the End of
Settler Society (2016), this article explores subnational policy dynamics in Canada, Australia and
the United States. It considers whether the trends associated with legalization, two-step pro-
grammes, rapid policy changes and economic discourses are present in Canadian provinces as well
as in U.S. and Australian states. It shows that the forces described by Dauvergne contribute to a
further rescaling of policymaking and to the emergence of subnational migration states. However,
this article also demonstrates that this common movement varies in its consequences and identifies
two central subnational policy responses typical of the new politics of immigration: 1) the “eco-
nomic subnational migration state”(Canada and Australia) and 2) the “access subnational migration
state”(United States). The models and the global trends described in this article have implications
for immigration policymaking in federations.
In a work combining legal scholarship and migration studies, Catherine Dauvergne’s (2016) The
New Politics of Immigration and the End of Settler Society traces the establishment of a new global
politics surrounding immigration, marked by a convergence in terms of legislation, policy instru-
ments and political discourses. Central to this movement is the dismantling of the characteristics
that enabled researchers, policymakers and politicians to identify some states as immigration “set-
tler societies”or traditional immigration societies. These countries –Canada, the United States and
Australia –have generally been presented as states built through immigration and differentiated
from other countries, most notably Western European states. This difference was translated into
* Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec
doi: 10.1111/imig.12649
©2019 The Author
International Migration ©2019 IOM
International Migration Vol. 58 (6) 2020
ISSN 0020-7985Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
settler societies’immigration policies, which were presented as more generous and more open to
immigrants, providing means of permanent settlement for newcomers and giving them access to
membership by way of naturalization. What Dauvergne describes as the “new politics of immigra-
tion”erases this difference: settler societies slowly but surely grow less distinguishable from other
countries in terms of their treatment of immigration, and several “non-settler”states are transformed
into new migration societies (Dauvergne, 2016). The result is a politics that Dauvergne character-
izes as “mean-spirited”and in which immigration gathers unprecedented and, most often, negative
public attention. Globally, this trend is characterized by policy paralysis regarding the governance
of global immigration, as well as by policy convergence and competition amongst states.
While arguing that these changes represent overarching trends, Dauvergne focuses most of her
analysis on the main settler states: Canada, Australia and the United States. In these “nations built
through extensive migration”(Dauvergne, 2016: 4) she documents four policy trends at play since
the early years of the twenty-first century: an increased legalization of issues related to migration
and mobility; a rapid and constant evolution of immigration policies, laws and programmes; a
growth of temporary programmes and two-step migration policies; and the dominance of economic
discourses and rationales when it comes to immigration management.
If we are to recognize paradigmatic settler societies as “crucible[s] of our regulatory frameworks
and of our immigration typologies”(Dauvergne, 2016: 4), it is crucial to be as exhaustive as possi-
ble in our description of legal, political and institutional developments. In that regard, one trend is
surprisingly absent from Dauvergne’s account of the new politics: the emergence of a plethora of
new actors, beyond economic interest holders, in the governance of immigration. In the last two
decades, cities, private actors, universities, subnational and regional authorities, transnational gov-
ernments and corporations have become increasingly involved in novel ways when it comes to
immigration policymaking and implementation (e.g. Guiraudon and Lahav, 2000; Geiger and
P
ecoud, 2013; Boucher and Cerna, 2014; McCollum and Packwood, 2017).
Building on these trends, the focus of this article is on a central feature of the three quintessential
settler states –federalism –and the presence of subnational states that are sovereign within their own
federal architecture. In relation to subnational policy developments in the last 25 years, this article
asks two questions: 1) are subnational governments affected by the new politics of immigration and,
if so, how?; and 2) are the patterns of immigration politics and policy described by Dauvergne repro-
duced at the subnational scale in Canada, Australia and the United States? To answer these questions,
this article mobilizes Hollifield’s concept of the “immigration state”and Keating’s three-tiered analy-
sis of rescaling, as well as published research on immigration andfederalism in Canada, Australia
and the United States.
1
The goals of this article are to identify broad policy trends, to flesh conceptual
tools to further analyse contemporary subnational immigration politics and to identify implications
the role of federatedunits in immigration governance. It aims at furthering Dauvergne’swork,as
opposed to presenting a systematic review of the evidence on the topic or at exhaustively document-
ing the policies of all Canadian provinces and of all Australian or U.S. cases.
2
Considering whether subnational government is affected by the trends described by Dauvergne,
this article demonstrates that the new politics of immigration generate incentives that support the
rescaling of some portion of immigration politics and policymaking towards Canadian provinces as
well as Australian and American states. These incentives, it is argued, mesh and interact with other
forces that have allowed or forced subnational governments to become more involved in immigra-
tion in the past 25 years. As a result, I show that under the new politics, subnational governments
in these three federations complete their emergence as “migration states”(Hollifield, 2004): they
see immigration regulation, broadly conceived, as being something that is essential to their govern-
ing functions. As such, this article proposes that federated units are important and distinct actors in
the new politics of immigration.
This common movement, however, is variegated in its consequences. In response to the second
question, this article argues that in these three countries, subnational governments reproduce some
62 Paquet
©2019 The Author. International Migration ©2019 IOM
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