Patricia Landolt

The study of transnationalism: pitfalls and promise of an emergent research field

This introductory article defines the concept of transnationalism, provides a typology of this heterogeneous set of activities, and reviews some of the pitfalls in establishing and validating the topic as a novel research field. A set of guidelines to orient research in this field is presented and justified. Instances of immigrant political and economic transnationalism have existed in the past. We review some of the most prominent examples, but point to the distinct features that make the contemporary emergence of these activities across multiple national borders worthy of attention. The contents of this Special Issue and their bearing on the present understanding of this phenomenon and its practical implications are summarized.

Social Capital: Promise and Pitfalls of its Role in Development

The purpose of this commentary is threefold. First, to review the origins and definitions of the concept of social capital as it has developed in the recent literature. Second, to examine the limitations of this concept when interpreted as a causal force able to transform communities and nations. Third, to present several relevant examples from the recent empirical literature on Latin American urbanisation and migration. These examples point to the significance of social networks and community monitoring in the viability of grass-roots economic initiatives and the simultaneous difficulty of institutionalising such forces. Current interest in the concept of social capital in the field of national development stems from the limitations of an exclusively economic approach toward the achievement of the basic developmental goals: sustained growth, equity, and democracy. The record of application of neoliberal adjustment policies in less developed nations is decidedly mixed, even when evaluated by strict economic criteria. Orthodox adjustment policies have led to low inflation and sustained growth in some countries, while in others they have failed spectacularly, leading to currency crises, devaluations, and political instability. The ‘one-size-fits- all’ package of economic policies foisted by the International Monetary Fund and the US Treasury on countries at very different levels of development have led to a series of contradictory outcomes that orthodox economic theory itself is incapable of explaining.

The transnational dimensions of identity formation: Adult children of immigrants in Miami

Abstract This article draws on the insights of research on transnational migration to reconsider the process of identity formation among children of immigrants and the patterns of acculturation associated with different trajectories of segmented assimilation. Extending the research on segmented assimilation and identity formation among children of immigrants in early adulthood, the article uses the third wave of the Miami CILS sample to examine the relationship between segmented assimilation outcomes, nationality, and behaviours and attitudes associated with transnationalism. Key findings include evidence associating selective acculturation with greater transnational involvement, but also some limited evidence of downward assimilation associated with higher rates of sending remittances among some nationalities. Rather than contradicting each other, these findings suggest a diversity of transnational patterns that are both stratified by class and contoured by nationality and ethnicity. We conclude by outlining some of the questionnaire items and aspects of research design we would like to see implemented in future studies of transnationalism and its relationship with segmented assimilation.

The Transnational Geographies of Immigrant Politics: Insights from a Comparative Study of Migrant Grassroots Organizing

Greater global interconnectedness produces a transformation in the ways in which groups constitute and interpret the boundaries of community formation and political practice. This article considers the ways in which a group engages (or not) with the possibilities for transnational identity formation and border-crossing politics granted by the changing structures of the global order. A comparative analysis identifies similarities and differences in the patterns of community formation and political engagement of Salvadoran migrants settled across different urban centers of North America. Variations in the territorial orientation and scales of immigrant political practice are explained by the national and city-level contexts of immigrant reception, the institutional opportunity structure in which migrant groups are embedded, and the nature of relations between migrants and their migrant and nonmigrant institutional interlocutors in places of settlement and their country of origin.

Immigrant political socialization as bridging and boundary work: mapping the multi-layered incorporation of Latin American immigrants in Toronto

Abstract We present a longitudinal map of three overlapping organizational trajectories developed by Latin American immigrants in the city of Toronto. We propose the concept of bridging and boundary work to specify how new (1) intersectional political identities and organizational agendas are constituted by Latin American feminist women and artists in the interstice of (2) country-of-origin and (3) mainstream pan-ethnic organizations. Boundary work occurs as activists with intersectional priorities carve out a distinct political agenda; the ‘out-group’ relations based on a shared sectoral focus constitute bridging work. Tracing changes in the local and transnational political opportunity structures, we consider how negotiations over resources, representation and agendas between these three Latin American organizational forms generate multi-directional political learning and socialization and the coexistence of different Latin American political cultures. We define political socialization as in-group and out-group encounters between political cultures understood as civic toolkits or ways of doing politics.

Assembling noncitizenship through the work of conditionality

Abstract We develop a framework for understanding noncitizenship that combines attention to systemic processes with interest in contingency and indeterminacy in the production and substantive practices associated with noncitizen legal status categories and trajectories. We argue that noncitizenship is a dynamic, multi-scalar assemblage that brings together disparate elements in patterned and changing ways. Individuals and institutions generate the formal and substantive systems that confer or deny noncitizens the formal and substantive right to be present in a country and/or to access entitlements. Noncitizens exercise agency in choosing to make claims (or choosing to not make claims) to substantive rights, and the individuals and institutions with which they interact may facilitate or hinder such claims-making. In this process, social actors are enacting conditionality; they are working to meet the conditions required to maintain presence and access. Discretion, migrant agency, unequal social interactions, and social learning unfold over time and can generate a range of experiences of noncitizenship and legal status trajectories. These do not necessarily conform to expected pathways and timelines, and may combine access to various resources and public goods in variable and contingent ways. We illustrate the framework with data from research conducted in Toronto.

Agenda Setting and Immigrant Politics The Case of Latin Americans in Toronto

The authors identify and analyze patterns of community organizing among Latin Americans in Toronto for the period from the 1970s to the 2000s as part of a broader analysis of Latin American immigrant politics. They draw on the concept of social fields to map Latin American community politics and to capture a wide range of relevant organizations, events, and strategic moments that feed into the constitution of more visible and formal organizations. Five distinct waves of Latin American migration to Toronto produce three types of community organizations: ethno-national, intersectional panethnic, and mainstream panethnic groupings. This migration pattern also leads to a layering process as established organizations evolve and new migrant groups with specific priorities and ways of organizing emerge. The authors present a case study of the development and agenda-setting process of the Centre for Spanish Speaking People, a mainstream, multiservice, panethnic organization. Agenda setting is defined as the process of defining the vision and mission of an organization or cluster of organizations. The case study captures how a mainstream panethnic organization mediates between diverse in-group agendas of Latin American immigrants and out-group, specifically, state-generated, agendas, and how this agenda-setting process changes over time in tune with shifts in the political opportunity structure. The authors propose, however, that agenda setting is a dialogic social process that involves more than navigating the existing political opportunity structure. Agenda setting involves in-group and out-group dialogues embedded within a complex organizational field. It is an instance of political learning. The analysis of these dialogues over time for a specific group and organization captures immigrant politics in practice.

Transnational Migration and the Reformulation of Analytical Categories: Unpacking Latin American Refugee Dynamics in Toronto

This chapter contributes to comparative research on migration and incorporation. It offers a reconceptualization of analytical categories of research in Toronto into migrants from four Latin American countries whose migration is characterized as forced. The authors’ initial research challenged assumptions about particular populations, similar contexts of departure, discreteness of contexts of arrival and the primacy of nationality. During fieldwork and subsequent analysis, the analytical categories were reformulated ‘on the go’. The chapter documents the reformulation of refugeeship, unpacks the contexts of departure and reception, and identifies the socio-temporal interrelationships of arrival contexts. Drawing on dynamic approaches to culture, the centrality of national differences was reframed and activist dialogues were formulated as a category for interpreting variable patterns of incorporation and transnational engagements. The chapter contributes to comparative migration studies by offering a strategy for addressing some of the challenges of methodological nationalism, while also considering the specificity of history and culture.

Commentary on the study of transnationalism: pitfalls and promise of an emergent research field

Commentary on the study of transnationalism: pitfalls and promise of an emergent research field Alejandro Portes, Luis Eduardo Guarnizo c and Patricia Landolt Department of Sociology, Princeton University, Princeton, USA; University of Miami School of Law, Coral Gables, USA; Department of Human Ecology, University of California-Davis, Davis, USA; Department of Sociology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada

Francis Peddie, Young, well-educated and adaptable: Chilean exiles in Ontario and Quebec, 1973–2010

compromise that in practice breeds inefficiency and is unsustainable” (252). Their emphasis is on the need for quick structural action to raise production, increase exports, and generate prosperity. In criticizing the Cuban government’s gradual reform process, they point to disagreements within the Communist party over how much market activity to allow, blaming this factor more than any other conviction on the part of government officials regarding the advantages of gradualism. No doubt a struggle over ideology is taking place. But certainly gradual reform has its appeal, for it is doubtful that, with the example of Mikhail Gorbachev before him, Castro would rush the implementation of this Cuban perestroika. The ultimate results of these reforms remain to be seen, especially in light of both Castro’s intention to transfer power to a younger leader and Barack Obama’s diplomatic and economic opening to Havana. For those interested in these changes, Cuba under Raúl Castro will stand as the best starting point for quite some time.