Sydney Stahl Weinberg

Book Review: American Refugee Policy and European Jewry, 1933–1945American Refugee Policy and European Jewry, 1933–1945. By BreitmanRichard and KrautAlan M.Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987. Pp. 310.

tionships and situations where helplessness and dependency are rewarded. Local hosts are defined as ineligible for relief, even though their absolute poverty is welcomed by the refugee influx and their relative poverty visibly accentuated by imported relief. Host agencies (governmental and private) are defined as corrupt and unreliable, or are ignored, and their capabilities to cope with this and future crises diminished by their loss ofinfluence. Lamentably, all too often relief becomes the second disaster inflicted on the refugees and their hosts.

Book Review: Galveston: Ellis Island of the WestGalveston: Ellis Island of the West. By MarinbachBernard. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1983. Pp. 240.

norms and values of the formal and informal organizations in which one takes part, etcetera? And if a Dutchman wants the minorities to emancipate, at what public fields and under what conditions-if any-does he want this? In the second part of the book VanAmersfoort describes the assimilation processes of the Indonesian Dutch, the Moluccans, the Surinamese and the guestworkers from Mediterranean countries. The analyses of the positions of these immigrant groups are quite good, though the last category of guestworkers is described very briefly. According to Van Amersfoort the Moluccans did develop into an ethnic minority, but the Indonesian Dutch did not (judging from the current ethnic revival among the Indo-Dutch, however, it seems that their assimilation was not as complete as Van Amersfoort supposes). With the Surinamese and the guestworkers there is a tendency of ethnic stratification. Van Amersfoort expects that perhaps the Surinamese, but certainly the guestworkers, will become ethnic minorities in the Netherlands. Many researchers have adopted this minority label, though currently some point at the necessity of a differentiated approach towards immigrants. There is much merit in writing a comprehensive study with only limited material available as was the case in the early seventies. Of course Van Amersfoorts study is dated now. But, those willing to place this book in the right context of time get an interesting picture of the affairs in the 1970s.

Book Review: The Ethnic Myth: Race, Ethnicity, and Class in AmericaThe Ethnic Myth: Race, Ethnicity, and Class in America. SteinbergStephen. New York: Atheneum Press, 1981. Pp. 277.

trend. Wittmann aims at both a theoretical model for the analysis of migration (labor emigration from rural areas) and the construction of specific criteria for the evaluation of the effects of this migration on rural development. Turkey serves as an example to demonstrate the applicability of the theoretical and evaluative models. Individual migration, the subjective decisions of inhabitants of less developed rural areas, is the unit of analysis in which Wittmann is interested. Since this migration, apparently, involves an act ofdecision-making, on the part ofthe migrants, theories of decision making Wittman concludes should serve as a theoretical base for the analysis of migration. Despite critical statements regarding the relevance of general theories of behavior for the understanding of migration-l would agree with-the author seems to overlook that his own effort to rely on and sion-rnaking, methodologically is confronted with the same problems as the approach critized. After a very broad and mostly informative review of decision-making theories or theoretical approaches used in different disciplines (economics, psychology, sociology, among others) and in existing migration research Wittmann develops a causal model of the individual decision process which takes needs, available resources, means aspired to and anticipated gains as its major categories. If this model with its highly abstract, almost void general categories should be of any value for a theory construction for example, this would have to be demonstrated by transforming the general categories into categories of migration behavior and testing these empirically. However, the general model of decision-making is where the author stops in his theoretical efforts. After reading more than half of the book the reader had heard a lot about general theories of decision making, but little on migration and very little on rural Turkey. Chapter 5 intends to demonstrate the applicability of the model to migration from rural areas in Turkey. What follows, however, is a subsumption of some phenomena of migration under the categorial headings of the general decision-making model; for example, it is argued that needs and anticipated gains could mean needs of participating in prosperity and expected income gained as an emigrant laborer, respectively; interpretations are also offered as to what resources could mean in the case of a Turkish villager. An explicit theory or single hypotheses using such categories closer to the real word of migration, unfortunately, are not formulated. For the student of migration and rural development the remaining part of the book (Chapter 6) is of greater value. This section develops criteria for the evaluation of emigration and possible re-migration from rural areas and its effect on the development of these areas. It also conveys the value judgements underlying the evaluation process and contains a lot of useful empirical information on rural Turkey. It seems to me, however, that most of the policy recommendations of this chapter are based on a very questionable assumption about the nature of the migration process: Wittmann always implies that labor migration is temporary and that migrants eventually will return to their home country. Many indicators regarding the present development and historical comparisons support the view that return migration is only part of the picture and that the majority of migrants must be regarded as permanent emigrants who will not return to their villages. Wittmanns book is a very scholarly and carefully written work, relying however on a highly questionable methodological base which as yet has to demonstrate its theoretical usefulness in migration research (and other fields of sociological inquiry). The evaluative parts of Wittmanns book, usually separate from the analytical chapters, are useful reading for the student of migration and rural development.