Impacts of Border Enforcement on Mexican Migration The View from Sending Communities

Summary: This important new book reveals how the stricter US border-control activities of the past decade have affected the behavior of migrants and potential migrants in rural Mexico.The authors establish direct links between changes in immigration-control policies and changes in the decision to migrate, choice of destination, mode of entry, and inclination to participate in a temporary worker program. They also point to the... unintended consequences of new control measures: e.g., the increasing rate of settlement among illegal migrants, higher fees paid to professional people-smugglers, increased injury and fatality rates due to clandestine entry, and changing composition of migrant flows. Collectively, they present detailed and direct evidence of the failure of post-1993 US strategy to deter unauthorized entry across the US-Mexico border, and the reasons for this failure.Wayne A. Cornelius is Director of the Center for Comparative Immigration Studies, Distinguished Professor of Political Science, and Gildred Professor of U.S.-Mexican Relations at the University of California, San Diego. Jessa M. Lewis a graduate of the M.A. program in Latin American Studies with Specialization in International Migration, at the University of California, San Diego. Her research has included a study of the links between migration and alternative market development in coffee-producing communities of Oaxaca and work on the private and social profitability of coffee production systems in Costa Rica's central valley.CONTENTS: Introduction?W. A. Cornelius. Profiles of the Research Communities? Y. Barajas, J. Besada, E. Valdez-Suiter, and C. White. The Contemporary Migration Process?S. Gaytan, E. Lucio, F. Shaiq, and A. Urdanivia. Impacts of U.S . Immigration Policies on Migration Behavior?J. Fuentes, H. L?Esperance, R. Perez, and C. White. Settlement in the United States?H. Lopez, R. Oliphant, and E. Tejeda. Gender Differences in Migration? N. Rosas-Lopez, N. Pagaza , and E. Valdez-Suiter. Generational Differences in Migration?S. Aguilar, M. Cornejo, and L. M. Henriquez. Migration and Local Development?B. Cantu, F. Shaiq, and A. Urdanivia. Migration and Political Involvement?W. Chiu and M. Gutierrez. [read more]