[Dryerase] The Alarm!--Eye on the INS 10-18-02

[The Alarm!Newswire]

Eye on the INS
This is where we can start

By Michelle Stewart
The Alarm! Newspaper Collective

Each week I sit down with a list of story ideas and decide which one I 
should profile in the column. Occasionally, I will write a smaller 
sidebar about an incident that I didn’t cover in my column. However, 
whether it is a column and a sidebar or just the column, there is never 
enough space to cover everything. There is always another horrible 
situation left unmentioned. Such is the nature of immigration policy 
both in the US and across the globe. We, as a global society, just 
can’t seem to deal with migration.

This week I was all prepared to compare and contrast US and Canadian 
immigration policies. I was going to look at the fact that Canada is 
essentially begging for immigrants right now, while the US is 
reinforcing its border. As I was teasing out my angles and finding 
snippets of information about population stats and economic trends, I 
came across these two passages: In the first, Canada’s Federal 
Immigration Minister Denis Coderre stated, “We have problems of either 
concentration or retention and that’s why we need to focus on these 
issues.” In the second, US-Mexico ambassador nominee Tony Garza said, 
“[O]rderly, secured and legal [migration is needed that is] tied to our 
labor needs. It cannot be an amnesty program. It must be some sort of 
earned legalization.”

Coderre’s references to retention and concentration sound as if he is 
discussing water levels, not human beings. For Garza, it is clear that 
first and foremost those who enter the US are only to be here when the 
US wantsthem to satisfy US needs. Never have I found two passages that 
sit side-by-side so comfortably to illustrate what is at the core of 
immigration policy.

For whether you are examining immigration policy in the US or the EU, 
you will find that these nations share one common thought: migration is 
not people moving, but rather labor moving. The question is who will 
open their doors to this mobile labor pool.

At this historic moment, Canada is one of the only major economies 
opening its doors to labor. Not that Canada is displaying its 
altruistic side with its “open door” labor policy. Rather, Canada 
flings its doors wide open, because it hopes that, out of the 
thousands, perhaps just hundreds will suit its needs. Canada will be 
looking to bring in a target of 300,000 immigrants next year, not 
because it likes immigrants and craves diversity, but rather because it 
is desperate for skilled laborers. In fact, Canada is so desperate for 
skilled laborers that it is hoping to bring in even more people than 
last year, despite the fact that its three major urban centers are 
nearly buckling under pressure. Toronto alone assumes the burden of 
over 50% of the immigrants that arrive. After Toronto come Montreal and 
Vancouver.

What is missing in Canada’s bid to gather up foreign, “skilled” 
laborers and insert them into the Canadian economy is that once people 
arrive in Canada their professional credentials are often worthless. 
Flocking to urban centers, trained individuals find themselves employed 
with the unskilled because Canada has no system to “honor” credentials 
from other countries. And instead of doing something, directly, to 
address this matter, Canada has turned its attention to the notion of 
concentration and retention.

In response to the impacts felt in the major urban centers, Canada is 
contemplating a new program for immigrants wherby they must work for 
3–5 years in remote locations in the country in order to gain permanent 
residency. Coupled with this policy would be the understanding that if 
an immigrant broke the “contract” and left for the city,  they would be 
subject to deportation.

The combination of lack of respect for credentials, strange ideas in 
the immigration policy and other factors has led many immigrants to 
leave Canada just as quickly as they arrive. Canada identifies this 
problem as “retention.” Yet with no concrete solutions or innovative 
ideas, it plows forward with the intent to draw in the equivalent of 
one percent of its population (in immigrants) next year.

But what does this have to do with Garza’s comment?

Well, in Garza’s comment we see the common theme of labor. Garza speaks 
loudly to what many Americans seem preoccupied with, which is the 
notion of secure borders and legal migration. However, he points to the 
fact that the US is reliant on outside labor sources. This discussion 
is fairly well known, so I won’t elaborate as I did with the Canadian 
situation.

So, here we sit with two countries’ policies in front of us, and we 
find we have the classic case of wanting to have your cake and eat it 
too. Both of these nations are the first to admit they need outside 
labor—both skilled and unskilled whether each nation will admit it or 
not. However, they wish to dictate all of the parameters of how this 
outside labor force is allowed to operate.

In Canada, it may seem like an open door policy, but it has as many 
complications and series of manipulations as US policy. Indeed, both 
these nations treat migrating people as nothing more than components of 
a mega-machine (the economy). As such, they are interchangeable and 
without individuality and/or needs for consideration.

Which takes me back to the opening of this column, where I discussed 
the complicated matter of dealing with such a large subject in such a 
short space and deciding who to give attention to. In this case, I 
swayed towards the matter of US and Canadian immigration policy. 
However, this is just scraping snippets of information. The matter 
needs more space and consideration, as do all of the stories I do (or 
don’t) cover in this column. The stories need more space, the people 
involved need to be recognized as individuals not components and the 
overarching issues need to be fully considered.

For right now, the federal government is drafting and implementing a 
knee-jerk, reactionary policy and as a public we are responding (for 
those of us who respond) accordingly: we have knee-jerk reactions to 
individual situations and forget that the “individual situation” is not 
actually isolated but rather a symptom of the many flaws within the 
system.

We need to become more unified and try to understand the undertones and 
nuances of the matters at hand. It is no longer enough to say “that is 
unfair” or “that is a violation of human rights,” because the situation 
with which we are confronted with is actually global, not isolated. It 
has patterns and we must begin to recognize them as such.

The ways in which economy, labor and xenophobia intersect with 
immigration are tangible and we need to acquire a trained eye to 
recognize the trends. One way to do so is to become part of the growing 
movement of people who are training their eyes and using their voices.

I am often asked, “what do you want people to do?” I get put off by the 
question and often flip the discussion to avoid an answer. But today, I 
think I can say with certainty, that I want people to begin to mind 
these matters, to consider them with patience and start talking to 
other people, start becoming familiar with those who are working on 
these issues. For you might believe that immigration has nothing to do 
with you if you are not an immigrant. I disagree. For each person who 
dies entering the US, because of programs like Operation Gatekeeper, 
you are implicated. You are implicated because the economy in which you 
participate in is one of the chief culprits. You may not be a policy 
maker, but as a participant in capitalism you rely on migration, and 
though you may wish to turn a blind eye to the effects of this system 
on various people, your hands are soiled.

This is where we can start.

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