From MPI Europe
How Free Is Free Movement? Dynamics and Drivers of Mobility within the European Union
By Meghan Benton and Milica Petrovic
While free movement is at the heart of the European project, the merits and impacts of intra-EU mobility have come under significant scrutiny recently amid public anxiety about competition for jobs and exploitation of welfare systems. This report provides a detailed assessment of free movement, motivations for migration, and challenges countries may need to address as intra-EU mobility enters its next phase.
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From MPI Europe
Facing 2020: Developing a New European Agenda for Immigration and Asylum Policy
By Elizabeth Collett
As the European Commission looks ahead to the next strategic program for immigration in 2014, this policy brief sketches the challenges in developing a strategic, long-term agenda on migration at a time when Europe remains beset by fiscal uncertainty and a jobs crisis that is particularly acute for the young. Against such a backdrop, few governments are willing to have a serious conversation about anything but skilled immigration.
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French National Identity and Integration: Who Belongs to the National Community?
By Patrick Simon
Since the mid-1980s, France has faced a contentious debate of crucial importance for immigrants and their descendents — defining what it means to be French. Though countries with rich histories of immigration have long accepted “dual belonging,” this concept has been criticized and perceived as at odds with a person’s commitment to French identity. A recent survey of French immigrants, however, shows that multiple allegiances are not an impediment to integration; it is possible to “feel French” and maintain links with a country of origin. However, because of external perceptions, native French citizens are far less likely to accept this adoption of French identity.
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The Relationship Between Immigration and Nativism in Europe and North America
By Cas Mudde
Far-right parties across Europe are gaining momentum, as witnessed by their recent successes at the ballot box in Greece, France, and elsewhere. While immigration is thought to be a major factor fueling the parties’ rise, this report finds that although there is clearly a relationship, the connection is not as straightforward as is often assumed. The report examines the electoral performance of far-right parties in Europe and North America since 1980, finding that high levels of immigration do not automatically lead to more votes for radical-right parties.
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Shared Challenges and Opportunities for EU and US Immigration Policymakers
By Philippe Fargues, Demetrios G. Papademetriou, Giambattista Salinari, and Madeleine Sumption
This final report summarizes and reflects upon the key findings of the Improving EU and US Immigration Systems: Learning from Experience comparative research project undertaken by the Migration Policy Institute and the European University Institute through a grant from the European Commission.  The project focused on developments in Europe and the United States in eight key areas – employment, economic growth, human rights, security, immigrant integration, demographics, development, and cooperation with immigrant-sending countries. This final report highlights the lessons to be learned from both similar and divergent experiences on either side of the Atlantic, sketching opportunities for future reform, as well as ways in which the European Union and the United States could improve their cooperative relationship.
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Scientists, Managers, and Tourists: The Changing Shape of European Migration to the United States
By Madeleine Sumption and Xiaochu Hu
Once the dominant immigrant stream into the United States, European migration to the country has fallen sharply since World War II, a result of economic, demographic, and policy trends across the Atlantic. Today’s migration from European Union Member States is characterized by highly skilled immigrants who are more educated, earn better wages, have greater English proficiency, and are more strongly represented as scientists,  professionals, and businesspeople than other immigrant groups. European migration has maintained a relatively low profile in immigration policy debates, however the Europe-favoring Visa Waiver Program has figured prominently into the  immigration policy arena because of its relation to enhanced border security.
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The Role of Civil Society in EU Migration Policy: Perspectives on the European Union’s Engagement in its Neighborhood
By Natalia Banulescu-Bogdan
Civil society provides a crucial link between governments and the communities they represent — infusing policy processes with grassroots knowledge to which governments may not otherwise have access and lending legitimacy to government actions. But thus far, civil-society organizations have had a limited role in European policy debates.  As the European Union seeks to reach out to developing regions in its “neighborhood” of nearby countries, it has emphasized the importance of involving civil society in both agenda-setting and implementation. Yet EU policymakers have not clearly articulated how this engagement might be structured. In effect, the question is not whether to engage, but how to do so.
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Opportunities for Transatlantic Cooperation on International Migration
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou and Madeleine Sumption
The transatlantic relationship is among the most significant partnerships between wealthy nations in immigration policy. While cooperation between the European Union and United States is, of course, far surpassed by the intra-EU or US-Canada relationships, the sheer size of the North Atlantic economic space and the number of workers and travelers who circulate within it make dialogue on migration both necessary and inevitable. This policy memo explores opportunities for cooperation regarding travel and border security, labor mobility, and other areas.
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Emerging Transatlantic Security Dilemmas in Border Management
By Elizabeth Collett
The sheer volume of global travel, which has risen exponentially since the 1960s, puts border management systems under constant pressure. Beyond that growth, border management systems have had to contend with additional risks associated with these movements. Mass-casualty terrorist attacks, rising illegal immigration, and human trafficking have exposed weaknesses in states’ ability to manage their borders effectively. This policy memo examines the infrastructure and policy developments – and challenges – that have occurred in recent years on both sides of the Atlantic, discussing the differing nature and prioritization of those policy challenges.
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Rethinking Points Systems and Employer-Selected Immigration
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou and Madeleine Sumption
Advanced industrialized economies typically have used one of two competing models for selecting economic-stream immigrants: Points-based or employer-led selection. Increasingly, however, they are creating hybrid selection systems, implement the best ideas from each model. The result: Selection systems that have much of the flexibility of points systems while also prioritizing employer demand.
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Pay-to-Go Schemes and Other Noncoercive Return Programs: Is Scale Possible?
By Richard Black, Michael Collyer, and Will Somerville
For decades, some immigrant-receiving countries have experimented with policies designed to encourage unauthorized immigrants to leave without the cost, legal barriers, and political obstacles that result from removals or forced returns. These initiatives – known as pay-to-go, noncoercive, voluntary, assisted voluntary, or nonforced returns — generally offer paid travel and/or a financial incentive in order to persuade target populations to cooperate with immigration authorities. The authors examine the programs’ long history of failure on the ground, but conclude that such initiatives could be an important part of the policy toolkit to reduce illegal immigration with proper experimentation and evaluation.
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A New Architecture for Border Management
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou and Elizabeth Collett
This report commissioned to inform the work of MPI’s Transatlantic Council on Migration for its meeting on “Restoring Trust in the Management of Migration and Borders” examines the emergence of a new border architecture resulting from the explosion in global travel and the dawning of the age of risk. This new border architecture must respond effectively to the seemingly competing demands of facilitating mobility while better managing the risks associated with cross-border travel (e.g. terrorism, the entry of unwanted migrants, and organized crime). The report examines the information-sharing agreements, technology innovations, and multilateral partnerships that have emerged as key components of the new architecture for border management, and discusses challenges and considerations for the future.
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Transatlantic Cooperation on Travelers’ Data Processing: From Sorting Countries to Sorting Individuals
This report, the second in a joint project of MPI and the European University Institute examining US and European immigration systems, details the post-9/11 programs and agreements implemented by US and European governments to identify terrorists and serious transnational criminals through the collection and processing of increasing quantities of traveler data. The report analyzes how governments, which once focused their screening primarily on a traveler’s nationality (“sorting countries”), increasingly are examining personal characteristics (“sorting individuals”).
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The Evolution of Border Controls as a Mechanism to Prevent Illegal Immigration
By Rey Koslowski
This paper, the first in a joint project of the Migration Policy Institute and European University Institute examining US and European immigration systems, analyzes how the challenges in achieving effective US border control have increased dramatically within recent decades and particularly since the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The author examines the programmatic and funding responses US policymakers have put in place — including the Secure Border Initiative, the Visa Waiver Program, US-VISIT, and registered-traveler programs — and traces their evolution and effectiveness.
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Securing Human Mobility in the Age of Risk: New Challenges for Travel, Migration, and Borders
This new book makes the case that the nation's post-9/11 approach to immigration and border security is off-kilter and not keeping pace with the scope and complexity of people's movement around the world, nor with expectations regarding freedom of movement. Author Susan Ginsburg, who served as senior counsel and team leader on the staff of the 9/11 Commission, proposes a new paradigm that seeks to secure mobility and promote the rule of law in global migration channels while moving away from a system that too often conflates border and immigration enforcement with counterterrorism.
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Transatlantic Information Sharing: At a Crossroads
By Hiroyuki Tanaka, Rocco Bellanova, Susan Ginsburg, and Paul De Hert
The attempted Christmas Day attack on a US airliner has refocused interest on the data collected by governments on international travelers, and how information sharing can be used to prevent terrorism and secure travel if properly shared and analyzed. In the wake of 9/11, the United States and European Union worked out agreements to expand the sharing of personal information about international travelers as a means to prevent acts of terrorism and fight international crime. However, as this report explores, negotiations on a binding US-EU agreement that will govern the sharing of personal information for law enforcement purposes – while high on the transatlantic policy agenda – face significant challenges.
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Immigration Policy in the Federal Republic of Germany
By Douglas B. Klusmeyer and Demetrios G. Papademetriou
This book, co-authored by MPI President Demetrios Papademetriou, examines the crossroads at which German migration policy finds itself, caught between a 50-year history of missed opportunities and serious new challenges. The authors offer a comprehensive and critical examination of the history of German migration law and policy from the Federal Republic's inception in 1949 to the present, focusing on the challenges confronting policymakers.
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Talent, Competitiveness and Migration
This second book of the Transatlantic Council on Migration, published by the Bertelsmann Stiftung, maps how profound demographic change is likely to affect the size and character of global migration flows; and how governments can shape immigration policy in a world increasingly attuned to the hunt for talent.
To order a copy, click here.

Learning by Doing: Experiences of Circular Migration
By Kathleen Newland, Dovelyn Rannveig Agunias, and Aaron Terrazas
Increasingly, policymakers are considering whether circular migration could improve the likelihood that global mobility gains will be shared by migrant-origin and destination countries alike — as well as by migrants themselves. This MPI Insight examines the record of circular migration, both where it has arisen naturally and where governments have taken action to encourage it.
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Europe’s Disappearing Internal Borders
By Hiroyuki Tanaka and Trinidad Macias
Fact Sheet No. 20, December 2007
The Schengen Area allows European Union citizens and third-country nationals in 15 Schengen Member States to, in almost all cases, travel freely to another Schengen Member State. On December 21, 2007, the Schengen Area will enlarge to include nine of the 10 countries that entered the European Union in 2004. This MPI fact sheet provides 10 key facts about the expanding Schengen Area.
Fact Sheet | Press Release

Hybrid Immigrant-Selection Systems: The Next Generation of Economic Migration Schemes
Demetrios G. Papademetriou, Will Somerville, Hiroyuki Tanaka
As governments think more seriously about attracting and selecting immigrants for their education, skills, and, increasingly, their ability to plug specific holes in the labor market, the authors discuss the emergence of hybrid systems that combine ideas drawn from points systems with other, more demand-driven and employer-led methods of selection.
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Talent in the 21st Century Economy
Transatlantic Council on Migration Convenor and MPI President Demetrios G. Papademetriou, Will Somerville, and Hiroyuki Tanaka examine how for a growing number of countries, attracting the "right" talent is at the top of the policy toolkit for increasing economic competitiveness. They outline how governments and employers view and access highly skilled talent and detail the decision-making factors weighed by highly skilled individuals as they decide where to migrate.
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The Growing Global Demand for Students as Skilled Migrants
International student education is a large, growing, and lucrative industry in many developed countries. Students not only help to maintain domestic institutions' competitiveness, they also represent a valuable pool of skilled immigrants for governments wishing to recruit "tried and tested" individuals into their labor forces. As Lesleyanne Hawthorne details in this paper, it is not surprising, therefore, that Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries are innovating widely with policies to attract and retain international students.
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Soft, Scarce, and Super Skills: Sourcing the Next Generation of Migrant Workers in Europe
Elizabeth Collett and Fabian Zuleeg examine how the selection criteria that developed-country immigration systems widely use (particularly points systems and occupational "shortage lists") fail to capture three important skill groups: soft, scarce, and super. In this paper, the authors discuss key policy recommendations to improve governments' skilled-immigrant recruitment strategies.
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Gaining from Migration: Towards a New Mobility System
Lead written by Demetrios G. Papademetriou and Gregory A. Maniatis
OECD Report, September 2007
A functioning migration system in Europe must treat sending and transit countries as genuine partners. The report recommends that EU policymakers forego restrictive rhetoric and instead create more legal channels and flexible options for immigrants’ entry and stay to attract workers in industries that most need them. At the same time, and in recognition of the fact that immigration cannot succeed unless immigrants integrate successfully, European countries must become more flexible in giving immigrants access to their labor markets and political systems. 
Full Report | Executive Summary | Press Release

Where Migration Policy is Made: Starting to expose the labyrinth of national institutional settings for migration policymaking and implementation
By Joanne van Selm
Global Migration Perspectives, Global Commission on International Migration
July 2005

Europe and Its Immigrants in the 21st Century: A New Deal or a Continuing Dialogue of the Deaf?
Edited by Demetrios G. Papademetriou
MPI and the Luso-American Foundation, March 2006

In this volume, the Migration Policy Institute has gathered some of the leading European thinkers to offer insightful counsel and, wherever possible, solutions to Europe’s immigration challenges. The book’s contributors piece together the puzzle of a well-managed, comprehensive immigration regime, tackling issues ranging from immigration’s economic costs and benefits, to effective selection systems, citizenship, the welfare state, and integration policies that work.
More information

Immigration Is Becoming a Key Issue for Europe’s Future
By Joanne van Selm
Cover Story, European Affairs,
Summer 2005

The Enlargement of an 'Area of Freedom, Security and Justice': Managing Migration in a European Union of 25 Members
By Joanne van Selm and Eleni Tsolakis
MPI Policy Brief No. 4, May 2004
In this policy brief, the authors shed light on the newly enlarged European Union's efforts to create common immigration and asylum policies. They discuss issues including: challenges to EU citizenship presented by accession; the exclusion of eight new Member States' nationals from 14 of 15 labor market and welfare systems; the current status of policy negotiations; and opportunities and challenges for the next five years.

Cities of Promise & Cities of Success: Migration, Cities and Urban Policy
By Jorge Gaspar
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Managing Rapid and Deep Change in the Newest Age of Migration
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Citizenship
By T. Alexander Aleinikoff
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

The Integration Needs of Mobile EU Citizens: Impediments and Opportunities
By Elizabeth Collett
The right to free movement granted to all European Union citizens represents a unique experiment in the contemporary history of global migration systems. To date, however, the integration of mobile EU citizens as a specific target group has not been widely discussed, either at EU or national levels, and EU-level integration policies focus on the integration of legally residing third-country nationals. This report investigates the broad range of integration needs that exist in Europe and the role different actors can play in meeting them.
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Multiculturalism: Success, Failure, and the Future
By Will Kymlicka
Despite substantial evidence to the contrary, a chorus of political leaders in Europe has declared multiculturalism policies a failure – in effect mischaracterizing the multiculturalism experiment, its future prospects, and its progress over the past three decades. This report challenges the recent rhetoric and addresses the advancement of policy areas for countries, examining factors that impede or facilitate successful the implementation of multiculturalism.
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Improving Immigrants’ Employment Prospects through Work-Focused Language Instruction
By Margie McHugh and A. E. Challinor
Immigrants’ employment prospects depend on their underlying levels of education and technical skills as well as their ability to communicate as needed in the host-country language. Since basic language courses do not impart the host-country language skills necessary for success in the workplace, many governments on both sides of the Atlantic are eager to expand work-focused language training. Yet implementing effective employment-focused language systems is difficult, as policymakers must find ways to design cost-effective programs that are sufficiently tailored to the needs of a wide range of occupations and that take account of immigrants’ underlying literacy skills and their financial and family circumstances. This policy memo explores the different approaches to providing work-focused language training that have developed in Europe and the United States.
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Immigrant Integration in a Time of Austerity
By Elizabeth Collett
With austerity at the forefront of European government policy debates and rising debt levels sure to catalyze additional difficult public spending decisions, immigrant integration programs have been an early place for budget cuts in some countries. In this report, MPI European Policy Fellow Elizabeth Collett offers fresh analysis of how immigrant integration programs are faring in a number of EU countries: the Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. While the economic and political climate offer some explanation for governments’ response, the report details how those factors alone are insufficient to explain countries’ differing approaches to immigrant integration programs.
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Delivering Citizenship
This book, published by the Bertelsmann Stiftung, is the first major product of the Transatlantic Council on Migration. It offers insights into key aspects of the citizenship debate from a policy perspective, and is a result of the Council’s deliberations and thinking.
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The Social Mobility of Immigrants and Their Children
Transatlantic Council Convenor and MPI President Demetrios G. Papademetriou, Will Somerville, and Madeleine Sumption examine social mobility, which is essential to immigrant integration. First-generation immigrants in Europe and the United States typically experience downward mobility largely because of four factors: language barriers, differences in educational attainment, difficulties obtaining recognition for credentials and experience gained abroad, and problems accessing opportunities through social networks and other recruitment channels. The second generation improves substantially on its parents’ generation. This improvement is insufficient, however, to allow all groups to catch up with the children of natives. This paper examines some immigration and educational policy interventions that could improve integration.

The Second Generation in Europe: Education and the Transition to the Labor Market
In this report, authors Maurice Crul and Jens Schneider examine the findings of The Integration of the European Second Generation (TIES) survey with respect to educational and labor market outcomes for second-generation Turks across 13 cities in seven European countries. Among the survey’s findings: There is a direct relationship between the educational attainment of children of immigrants and the years they are able to spend with peers who have native-born parents.

Education, Diversity, and the Second Generation: A Discussion Guide
The discussion guide, written by Michael Fix and Margie McHugh, Co-Directors of MPI’s National Center on Immigrant Integration Policy, offers a brief demographic and statistical profile of the immigrant student population in the United States, with comparison points drawn to Germany where the data permit. The guide sketches broad policy implications of the demographic data and offers up for discussion a set of policy and practice issues in two areas: early childhood care and education, and secondary instruction of first- and second-generation students, with a focus on those whose proficiency in English or German lags.

Language Policies and Practices for Helping Immigrants and Second-Generation Students Succeed
By Gayle Christensen, Urban Institute, and Petra Stanat, Free University of Berlin
Transatlantic Task Force on Immigration and Integration Report, September 2007

Drs. Christensen and Stanat draw on the results of a unique survey of school language policies and practices to close the achievement gap in 14 immigrant-receiving countries. The authors find that countries where immigrant and second-generation students succeed tend to have long-standing language support programs, for both primary and secondary students, with clearly defined goals and standards. The authors highlight Sweden; Victoria, Australia; and British Columbia, Canada, as places with smaller achievement gaps between native-born and immigrant students. These programs’ common strategies include centrally developed curricula, high program standards, time-intensive programs, support in both primary and secondary school, second-language teachers who have received specialized training, and cooperation between language and other teachers.

The Netherlands: From National Identity to Plural Identifications
By Monique Kremer
National identity has become a highly politicized issue in the Netherlands in the past decade, with many public figures voicing different opinions on what it means to be “Dutch.” Both right-wing and mainstream parties have adopted political rhetoric that appeals to the public’s growing anxiety about immigrants and their effect on local communities, and many have proposed policies designed to mitigate these fears. This new dialogue has marked a turn away from multiculturalism and a turn toward “culturalized citizenship” — the idea that being Dutch means adhering to a certain set of cultural and social norms and practices.
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Immigration and National Identity in Norway
By Thomas Hylland Eriksen
The number of immigrants and their descendants in Norway almost tripled between 1995 and 2011, resulting in increased debates about integration, immigration policy, multiculturalism, and national identity in recent years. The atrocities of July 2011 revealed an active, militantly anti-immigrant (particularly anti-Muslim) fringe that sees government’s acceptance of cultural pluralism as treacherous. This report assesses the connection between the recent rise of resentment against immigration and broader trends in Norwegian nationalism, and proposes a few policy recommendations with the aim of minimizing this rift in Norwegian society.
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Identity and (Muslim) Integration in Germany
By Naika Foroutan
Germany has become a country of immigration in recent decades, with one-fifth of its population comprised of immigrants and their children. Yet a dominant perception in public discourse and media is that of a homogenous German society in which those with a migration background cannot fully belong. This country case study explores how immigration influences national identity in Germany and the reciprocal influence that German national identity has on immigrants.
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Exceptional in Europe? Spain’s Experience with Immigration and Integration
By Joaquín Arango
Spain’s immigrant population increased from less than 4 percent of the country’s overall population to almost 14 percent in the span of one short decade. Unlike other European countries, however, Spain has not experienced a significant backlash against immigration, even amid an economic crisis that has hit the country hard and led to high levels of unemployment. This country case study from MPI’s Transatlantic Council on Migration explains Spain’s enduring openness to immigration and immigrants.
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Hometown Associations: An Untapped Resource for Immigrant Integration?
By Will Somerville, Jamie Durana, and Aaron Matteo Terrazas
Hometown associations, the organizations that immigrants create for social, economic development, and political empowerment, play an important – and underexamined – role in immigrant integration. Though policymakers focus chiefly on the associations’ development potential, this Insight recommends cooperative interventions to strengthen their immigrant integration capacity.
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Early Education for Immigrant Children
By Paul Leseman, Utrecht University
Transatlantic Task Force on Immigration and Integration Report, September 2007

Dr. Leseman looks at factors that create educational disadvantages among children of immigrants, including socioeconomic and psychological risks and lack of cognitive stimulation at home. He finds that while early education can improve the educational and socioeconomic position of low-income and minority communities, the program’s design is fundamental to its success. He recommends that policymakers focus on providing center-based care, with programs grounded in teaching children the host language and with strong outreach to minorities that includes additional help for parents. He also recommends that governments directly subsidize early-education programs rather than providing parents with vouchers, which can be confusing and are underused.

Pathways to Success for the Children of Immigrants
By Maurice Crul, University of Amsterdam
Transatlantic Task Force on Immigration and Integration Report, September 2007

Dr. Crul looks at how the children of Turkish immigrants, the largest immigrant group in Europe, are faring across the continent. He finds disparities across countries in the age at which children start school, the number who drop out of secondary school, and the number of youth who are unemployed. He notes that, because immigrant students tend to start school at a linguistic and cultural disadvantage, compelling them to choose either an academic or vocational education “track” too early may relegate them to a less enriching education. Dr. Crul suggests a range of policy tools to avoid this outcome, such as establishing strong apprenticeship programs and allowing vocational students to switch back to academic schools if they show the potential to succeed.

Managing Integration: The European Union's Responsibilities towards Immigrants
Rita Sussmuth and Werner Weidenfeld, Editors
Published by the Bertelsmann Foundation and the Migration Policy Institute, Fall 2005

Managing immigration and integration is one of the most vital and challenging tasks that the European Union is facing today. Since the Union's enlargement to include 25 members, the issue has become even more pressing. This book analyzes approaches, strategies, and best practices from EU Member States that could contribute to a sustainable integration policy. It thus provides European, national, regional, and local decision-makers with instruments they can draw on in establishing a European framework for integration.
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Immigration Without Integration: A Recipe for Disaster
By Rinus Penninx
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

The Policy Challenges of Intervention in Local & Private Integration Processes
By Brian Ray
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

The Challenges of Integration for the European Union
By Sarah Spencer
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Migration Information Source
SPECIAL ISSUE ON INTEGRATION
October 2003
Articles include:

Policy Considerations for Immigrant Integration
Demetrios G. Papademetriou maps out the policy issues involved in balancing the interests of immigrants with those of the host society during the process of integration.

Local Integration: The Forgotten Solution
Karen Jacobsen of Tufts University examines local integration as an alternative to "warehousing" refugees in camps.

The Challenges of Integration for the EU
The EU can use several unique levers to promote integration policy, according to Sarah Spencer of the University of Oxford.

The Role of Cities in Immigrant Integration
Brian Ray takes an in-depth look at the importance of cities in the process of immigrant integration.

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Migration and the Great Recession: The Transatlantic Experience
Edited by Demetrios G. Papademetriou, Madeleine Sumption, and Aaron Terrazas
This edited volume addresses the impact of the economic crisis in seven major immigrant-receiving countries: the United States, Germany, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. The Great Recession marked a sudden and dramatic interruption in international migration trends, bringing the growth of foreign-born populations to a virtual standstill in Europe and North America and pushing many policymakers to reevaluate their approach towards immigration. The crisis has had a disproportionate impact on immigrant workers, especially young immigrants and members of disadvantaged minority groups — impacts which, in some countries, show little sign of receding. Meanwhile, stringent deficit-reduction plans, especially in some of the worst affected European Member States, have created an inhospitable environment for addressing these impacts through investments in immigrant integration.
Purchase a Copy | Press Release

Eight Policies to Boost the Economic Contribution of Employment-Based Immigration
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou and Madeleine Sumption
Immigration can be a powerful tool for supporting a country’s economic growth and prosperity, but its success in accomplishing that objective depends on well-designed and carefully implemented immigration policies that deliberately and strategically facilitate immigration’s economic contribution. This policy memo, drawing on experiences from Asia, Europe, North America, and the Pacific region, presents eight strategies to create effective and efficient economic-stream immigration systems.
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Migration and Immigrants Two Years after the Financial Collapse: Where Do We Stand?
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou, Madeleine Sumption, and Aaron Terrazas with Carola Burkert, Stephen Loyal, and Ruth Ferrero-Turrión
Immigrants, particularly men and youth, have been disproportionately hit by the global economic crisis that began in fall 2008 and now confront a reality of dwindling budgets for public services and immigrant integration programs, this report for BBC World Service reveals. The report, which has a particular focus on five North Atlantic countries -- Germany, Ireland, Spain, the United Kingdom and United States – finds that the unemployment gap between immigrant and native workers has widened in many places. It offers analysis of a number of trends, including the fact that some immigrant-destination countries that historically have been countries of emigration, such as Ireland, Greece, and Portugal, may be reverting to earlier trends.
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The UK's New Europeans: Progress and Challenges Five Years After Accession
The enlargement of the European Union has fundamentally changed migration patterns to the United Kingdom. An estimated 1.5 million workers have come to the United Kingdom from new EU Member States since May 2004, accounting for about half of all labor migration during that period. Though employment rates for these new European citizens are high, areas of concern remain because their wages are low and the workers, often despite significant education, are concentrated in unskilled labor sectors. This report, commissioned by the UK Equality and Human Rights Commission, also concludes that the influx of workers may be having a slight negative impact on the wages of the lowest-paid British workers.
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Talent, Competitiveness and Migration
This second book of the Transatlantic Council on Migration, published by the Bertelsmann Stiftung, maps how profound demographic change is likely to affect the size and character of global migration flows; and how governments can shape immigration policy in a world increasingly attuned to the hunt for talent.
To order a copy, click here.

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Migration and the Economic Downturn: What to Expect in the European Union
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou, Madeleine Sumption, and Will Somerville
January 2009

Immigration in the United Kingdom: The Recession and Beyond
By Will Somerville and Madeleine Sumption
March 2009

Immigration and the Labor Market: Theory, Evidence, and Policy
By Will Somerville and Madeleine Sumption
March 2009

Charting the Demographic Course across the Mediterranean
By Philippe Fargues
November 2008

Eastern Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa: The Most Demographically Extreme Regions
By Wolfgang Lutz, Warren Sanderson, Sergei Scherbov, and Samir K.C.
November 2008 Efficient Practices for the Selection of Economic Migrants
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou and Kevin O'Neil
Prepared for the European Commission, DG Employment and Social Affairs
July 2004

Observations on Regularization and the Labor Market Performance of Unauthorized and Regularized Immigrants
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou, Kevin O'Neil and Maia Jachimowicz
Prepared for the European Commission, DG Employment and Social Affairs
July 2004

Migration Versus Trade: The Enlargement of the EU to Central & Eastern Europe
By Gudrun Biffl
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Immigration & the European Economy
By Guido Bolaffi
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Is Immigration a Threat to the Traditional Welfare States of Western Europe?
By Grete Brochman
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

How Europe Selects Immigrants Today
By Heaven Crawley
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Europe's Demographic Future: Labor Markets & Immigrants
By Constantinos Fotakis
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Immigrants & EU Labor Markets
By Louka T. Katseli
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Innovation in the Selection of Highly Skilled Immigrants
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Regularizations in the European Union: The Contentious Policy Tool
By Kate Brick
Though contentious, regularization (typically referred to in the US context as legalization) remains a frequently utilized policy tool to address the European Union’s unauthorized immigrant population. Since 1996, over 5 million people have been regularized through a variety of methods, which this Insight details. This work informed the Transatlantic Council on Migration meeting, “Restoring Trust in the Management of Migration and Borders.” The resulting Council Statement, authored by MPI President Demetrios G. Papademetriou, offers a menu of policy options and actions governments can take to build a “whole-of-system” approach to controlling illegal immigration while also creating the political space necessary for reforms of their immigration systems.
Download Report | Read Council Statement

Combating Illegal Immigration: From Tampere Via Seville
By Adrian Fortescue
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Dealing With Unlawfully Resident Immigrants: Regularizations & Beyond
By Jean-Pierre Garson
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

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Irregular Migration in Europe
By Christal Morehouse and Michael Blomfield
While irregular migration frequently makes headlines and policymakers are under increasing pressure to reduce illegal immigration, the estimated population of unauthorized immigrants in EU-15 countries has declined on average for almost a decade since 2002. European governments are collaborating extensively on the management of their external borders, as this report details, discussing the detected and estimated scope of irregular migration in the European Union. This work informed the Transatlantic Council on Migration meeting, “Restoring Trust in the Management of Migration and Borders.” The resulting Council Statement, authored by MPI President Demetrios G. Papademetriou, offers a menu of policy options and actions governments can take to build a “whole-of-system” approach to controlling illegal immigration while also creating the political space necessary for reforms of their immigration systems.
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Responding to Illegal Immigration: The Need for a Comprehensive Policy Package
By Demetrios G. Papademetriou
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

European Refugee Policy: Is There Such a Thing?
By Joanne van Selm
UNHCR Working Paper No. 115, May 2005

Study on the Transfer of Protection Status in the EU
By Nina M. Lassen with Leise Egesberg, Joanne van Selm with Eleni Tsolakis, and Jeroen Doomernik
June 25, 2004

The EU as a Global Player in the Refuge Protection Regime
From the AMID Working Paper Series 35/2004

Rediscovering Resettlement
A Transatlantic Comparison of Refugee Protection
By Gregor Noll and Joanne van Selm
Insight No. 3, December 2003
Could increasing the numbers of refugees who have access to resettlement help resolve some of the refugee protection challenges faced by the European Union and the United States?

Study of the Feasibility of Resettlement Schemes in EU States or at the EU Level
By Joanne van Selm, Tamara Woroby, Erin Patrick and Monica Matts
2003

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Excluding Terrorists from Refugee Protection
By Monette Zard
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Asylum & Its Discontents: Challenges of Refugee Protection in Europe
By Kathleen Newland
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

New Ideas for Addressing Asylum Problems in Europe: From the Current EU Track to the UK's New Vision
By Gerry Van Kessler
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Refugee Resettlement in the European Union
By Joanne van Selm
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Immigration and Asylum or Foreign Policy: The EU's Approach to Migrants
By Joanne van Selm
Migration and the Externalities of European Integration
(Lexington Books, 2002)

Comparative Perspectives on Migration Management

Talent, Competitiveness and Migration
This second book of the Transatlantic Council on Migration, published by the Bertelsmann Stiftung, maps how profound demographic change is likely to affect the size and character of global migration flows; and how governments can shape immigration policy in a world increasingly attuned to the hunt for talent.
To order a copy, click here.

Learning by Doing: Experiences of Circular Migration
By Kathleen Newland, Dovelyn Rannveig Agunias, and Aaron Terrazas
September 2008

Room for Progress: Reinventing Euro-Atlantic Borders for a New Strategic Environment
By Deborah W. Meyers, Rey Koslowski, and Susan Ginsburg, October 2007

Emulating Canada's Immigration Program: The Quest for Tolerance
By Meyer Burstein
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

The Global Migration Picture
By Joseph Chamie
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Tried & True, Tried & Failed: North American Experiences with Illegal Immigration Controls
By Doris Meissner
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Immigratiebeleid VS (Immigration in the United States) (Written in Dutch)
By Joanne van Selm

Building a British Model of Integration in an Era of Immigration: Policy Lessons for Government
By Shamit Saggar and Will Somerville
Despite experiencing large-scale immigration flows and settlement over the past half century, the United Kingdom has not developed a formal integration program. Few public policies have specifically sought to advance immigrant integration, and the political debates surrounding immigrant integration have often been fraught and destabilizing, reflecting deep-seated ambivalence in British society about immigrants and immigration. The authors offer a menu of policy options and actions the government should consider to achieve a well-thought-out approach.
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Migration Information Source European Country Profiles

Albania: Looking Beyond Borders
By Barjaba Kosta
August 2004

Austria: A Country of Immigration?
By Michael Jandl and Albert Kraler
International Centre for Migration Policy Development
March 2003

Germany: Immigration in Transition
By Veysel Oezcan
Social Science Centre Berlin
July 2004

Greece: A History of Migration
By Charalambos Kasimis and Chryssa Kassimi
June 2004

Migration Information Source European Country Profiles

The Netherlands: Death of a Filmmaker Shakes a Nation
By Joanne van Selm
Migration Policy Institute
October 2005

Norway: Migrant Quality, Not Quantity
Betsy Cooper
May 2005

EU Membership Highlights Poland's Migration Challenges
By Krystyna Iglicka
Center for International Relations, Warsaw
Magdalena Ziolek-Skrzypczak, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich
September 2010

Portugal Seeks Balance of Emigration, Immigration
By Jorge Malheiros
Centro de Estudos Geográficos - Universidade de Lisboa
Metropolis Portugal Team
December 2002

Migration Dilemmas Haunt Post-Soviet Russia
By Timothy Heleniak
October 2002

Spain: Forging an Immigration Policy
By Nieves Ortega Pérez
Universidad de Granada
February 2003
(Haga clic para leer el artículo en español.)

Sweden: Restrictive Immigration Policy and Multiculturalism
By Charles Westin
Centre for Research in International Migration and Ethnic Relations
Stockholm University
June 2006

Switzerland Faces Common European Challenges
By Denise Efionayi, Josef Martin Niederberger, and Philippe Wanner
Swiss Forum for Migration and Population Studies, Neuchatel
February 2005

Caught Between East and West, Ukraine Struggles with Its Migration Policy
By Olena Malynovska
National Institute for International Security Problems, Kyiv
January 2006

United Kingdom: A Reluctant Country of Immigration
By Will Somerville, Migration Policy Institute Dhananjayan Sriskandarajah, Royal Commonwealth Society Maria Latorre, Institute for Public Policy Research
July 2009

Analysis of Migration in Select Countries

Tony Blair's Legacy on Immigration: The Migration Information Source Takes a First Look at a Ten-Year Transformation
By William Somerville
Migration Information Source, May 2007
British Prime Minister Tony Blair's will be leaving behind a fundamentally reshaped immigration system. In fact, the number of immigration-related laws and policies instituted during his ten-year tenure surpasses that of every other social policy area. MPI Senior Policy Analyst William Somerville provides a timeline of these legislative changes and a first analysis of their significance.

Immigration and the 2007 French Elections
By Hiroyuki Tanaka
MPI Backgrounder, May 2007
As Nicolas Sarkozy takes office as the president of France, this backgrounder examines the French immigration system, Sarkozy's influence on recent legislation, and how his stance on immigration has differed from that of Ségolène Royal.

France's New Law:
Control Immigration Flows, Court the Highly Skilled
By Kara Murphy
Backgrounder, November 2006

Migrants in Rural Southern Europe: The Case of Greece
By C. Babis Kasimis
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003

Focus on Germany: Labor Market Realities & Migration in the Context of High Unemployment
By Klaus Zimmerman
AMPI Policy Brief, May 2003