From nations of immigrants to states of transience: Temporary migration in Canada and Australia

Abstract

Spanish

French

This article analyzes temporary migration schemes in Canada and Australia. Unlike the bulk of affluent states, both countries eschewed guestworker programs for most of the twentieth century, embracing migrants as permanent settlers and future citizens. Acting within neoliberal templates of government, political officials have recently promoted temporary migration as a mechanism of labor market regulation. While valorized workers are extended opportunities to transition to permanent status, for less-skilled workers state-imposed legal categories and regulations are being employed to attenuate attachment to the receiving society and heighten their flexibility and tractability. This research argues such trends embody and extend transformations concerning the restructuring and globalization of labor markets, the regulatory profile of states, and nature and significance of citizenship.

Keywords

Australia Canada globalization immigration neoliberalism

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Access Economics (2002) The Impact of Sponsored Temporary Business Residents on Australia’s Living Standards. Canberra: DIMA.

Albrow

(1996) Global Age. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

Arendt

(1973) The Origins of Totalitarianism. London: Harcourt.

Barrow

(2005) The return of the state. New Political Science 27(2): 123–145.

Basok

(2002) Tortillas and Tomatoes. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.

Bauder

(2006) Labor Movement. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Bauman

(1998) Globalization: The Human Consequences. Cambridge: Polity.

Bell

(2006) Beyond Liberal Democracy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Bissett

Landau

(2008) Australia’s 457 visa scheme. Alternative Law Journal 33(3): 142–146.

10.

Bloemraad

(2012) Understanding ‘Canadian exceptionalism’ in immigration and pluralism policy. Migration Policy Institute, July.

11.

Bosniak

(2008) The Citizen and the Alien. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

12.

Brickner

Straehle

(2010) Gender, immigration policy and the Live-in Caregiver Program in Canada. Policy and Society 29(4): 309–320.

13.

Brodie

(1996) New state forms, new political spaces. In: Boyer

Drache

(eds) States Against Markets. London: Routledge, pp. 383–398.

14.

Brubaker

(1992) Citizenship and Nationhood in France and Germany. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

15.

Burawoy

(1976) The functions and reproduction of migrant labor. American Journal of Sociology 81(5): 1050–1087.

16.

Castles

Kosack

(1985) Immigrant Workers and Class Structure in Western Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

17.

CIC (Citizenship and Immigration Canada) (2008a) Annual Report to Parliament. Ottawa: CIC.

18.

CIC (Citizenship and Immigration Canada) (2008b) Canada’s Government to Help Temporary Foreign Workers and Foreign Student Graduates Become Permanent Residents. Ottawa: CIC.

19.

CIC (Citizenship and Immigration Canada) (2010) Annual Report to Parliament. Ottawa: CIC.

20.

CIC (Citizenship and Immigration Canada) (2012) Annual Report to Parliament. Ottawa: CIC.

21.

CIC (Citizenship and Immigration Canada) (2013) Facts and Figures 2012. Ottawa: CIC.

22.

CIC (Citizenship and Immigration Canada) (2014) Temporary Foreign Worker Guidelines. Ottawa: CIC.

23.

Cohen

(2006) Migration and its Enemies. Aldershot: Ashgate.

24.

Collins

(2013) Rethinking Australian immigration and immigrant settlement policy. Journal of Intercultural Studies 34(2): 160–177.

25.

Cunningham

(2004) Nation rebound? Crossing border in a gated globe. Identities 11(3): 329–350.

26.

Dauvergne

(2008) Making People Illegal. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

27.

DFC (Department of Finance Canada) (2006) Advantage Canada: Building a Strong Economy for Canadians. Ottawa: DFC.

28.

DIAC (Department of Immigration and Citizenship) (2009) Evaluation of Australia’s Working Holiday Maker Program. Canberra: DIAC.

29.

DIAC (Department of Immigration and Citizenship) (2013) Australia’s Migration Trends. Canberra: DIAC.

30.

DIMA (Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) (1999) Review of the Independent and Skilled-Australian Linked Categories. Canberra: DIMA.

31.

DIMA (Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) (2002) Working Holiday Maker Scheme and the Australian Labor Market. Canberra: DIMA.

32.

DOE (Department of Employment) (2013) Seasonal worker program factsheet. Canberra: DOE. Available at: www.docs.employment.gov.au/system/files/doc/other/horticulture_factsheet_2.pdf

33.

Elgersma

(2007) Temporary Foreign Workers. Ottawa: Parliamentary Information and Research Service.

34.

Foster

(2012) Making temporary permanent. Just Labour: A Canadian Journal of Work and Society 19: 22–46.

35.

Fudge

MacPhail

(2009) The temporary foreign worker program in Canada. Comparative Labor Law and Policy Journal 31: 101–139.

36.

Fuller

Vosko

(2008) Temporary employment and social inequality in Canada. Social Indicators Research 88(1): 31–50.

37.

GCIM (Global Commission for International Migration) (2005) Migration in an Interconnected World. Geneva: GCIM.

38.

Gilbert

(2002) Transformation of the Welfare State. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

39.

Goldring

Landolt

(2013) Producing and Negotiating Non-citizenship. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

40.

Goldring

Berinstein

Bernhard

(2009) Institutionalizing precarious migratory status in Canada. Citizenship Studies 13(3): 239–265.

41.

Guo

(2005) Difference, deficiency, and devaluation. Canadian Journal for the Study of Adult Education 22(1): 124–130.

42.

Hanson

Bell

(2007) Harvest trails in Australia: Patterns of seasonal migration in the fruit and vegetable industry. Journal of Rural Studies 23(1): 101–117.

43.

Hawthorne

(2010) How valuable is ‘two-step migration’? Labor market outcomes for international student migrants to Australia. Asian Pacific Migration Journal 19(1): 5–36.

44.

Hollifield

(2004) The emerging migration state. International Migration Review 38(3): 885–912.

45.

Hugo

(2004) A New Paradigm of International Migration. Canberra: Department of the Parliamentary Library.

46.

Iacovetta

Quinlan

Radforth

(1996) Immigration and labour: Australia and Canada compared. Labour 71: 90–115.

47.

Immigration Minister (2005) 2005–06 migration (non-humanitarian) program. Ministerial Press Statement 052/2005, 14 April.

48.

IOM (International Organization for Migration) (2008) World Migration 2008: Managing Labour Mobility in the Evolving Global Economy. Geneva: IOM.

49.

Jordens

(1997) Alien to Citizen. Sydney: Allen and Unwin.

50.

Kelly

(1992) The End of Certainty. Sydney: Allen and Unwin.

51.

Lever-Tracy

Quinlan

(1988) A Divided Working Class. London: Routledge and Kegan-Paul.

52.

Levitt

Glick-Schiller

(2004) Conceptualizing simultaneity. International Migration Review 38(3): 1002–1039.

53.

MacDermott

Opeskin

(2010) Regulating Pacific seasonal labour in Australia. Pacific Affairs 83(3): 283–305.

54.

McMichael

(2011) Development and Social Change. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press.

55.

Mares

(2009) The permanent shift to temporary migration. Inside Story, 17 June.

56.

Mares

(2012) Temporary Migration and its Implications for Australia. Canberra: Papers on Parliament.

57.

Markus

Jupp

McDonald

(2009) Australia’s Immigration Revolution. Sydney: Allen and Unwin.

58.

Martin

Abella

Kuptsch

(2006) Managing Labor Migration in the Twenty-first Century. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

59.

Mayer

(2005) Guestworkers and exploitation. Review of Politics 61: 311–334.

60.

MCA (Migration Council Australia) (2013) More than Temporary: Australia’s 457 Visa. Canberra: MCA.

61.

Miles

(1987) Capitalism and Unfree Labour. London: Tavistock.

62.

Nakache

Kinoshita

(2010) The Canadian Temporary Foreign Worker Program. Montreal: Institute for Research on Public Policy.

63.

Nyland

Forbes-Mewett

Marginson

. (2009) International student-works in Australia: A new vulnerable workforce. Journal of Education and Work 22(1): 1–14.

64.

Ong

(1999) Flexible Citizenship. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

65.

Ong

(2006) Neoliberalism as Exception. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

66.

Opeskin

MacDermott

(2009) Resources, population and migration in the Pacific. Asia Pacific Viewpoint 50: 353–373.

67.

Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (2008) Temporary Labour Migration. Paris: OECD.

68.

Papastergiadis

(2000) The Turbulence of Migration. Cambridge: Polity Press.

69.

Piore

(1979) Birds of Passage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

70.

Potts

(1990) The World Labour Market. London: Zed Books.

71.

Pratt

(2005) Abandoned women and spaces of the exception. Antipode 37(5): 1052–1078.

72.

Preibisch

(2010) Pick-your-own labor: Migrant workers and flexibility in Canadian agriculture. International Migration Review 44(2): 404–441.

73.

Reitz

(2004) Canada: Immigration and nation-building and the transition to a knowledge economy. In: Cornelius

. (eds) Controlling Immigration. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, pp. 97–133.

74.

Roach

(1995) Business Temporary Entry: Future Directions. Canberra: AGPS.

75.

Robertson

(2011) Cash cows, backdoor migrants, or activist citizens? Ethnic and Racial Studies 34(12): 2192–2211.

76.

Ruhs

(2013) The Price of Rights. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

77.

Ruhs

Martin

(2008) Number vs. rights: Trade-offs and migrant worker programs. International Migration Review 42(1): 249–265.

78.

Sassen

(1996) Losing Control? Sovereignty in an Age of Globalization. New York: Columbia University Press.

79.

Sassen

(2001) The Global City. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

80.

Satzewich

(1988) The Canadian state and the racialization of Caribbean migrant farm labour, 1947–1966. Ethnic and Racial Studies 11(3): 282–304.

81.

Schierup

Hansen

Castles

(2006) Migration, Citizenship, and the European Welfare State. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

82.

Shachar

(2006) Race for talent. NYU Law Review 81(1): 148.

83.

Shamir

(2005) Without borders? Sociological Theory 23(2): 197–217.

84.

Simmel

(1950) The Sociology of Georg Simmel. New York: Simon and Schuster.

85.

Soysal

(1994) Limits of Citizenship. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

86.

Stasiulis

Bakan

(2005) Negotiating Citizenship: Migrant Women in Canada and the Global System. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

87.

Stasiulis

Jhappan

(1995) The fractious politics of a settler society: Canada. In: Stasiulis

Yuval-Davis

(eds) Unsettling Settler Societies. London: Sage, pp. 95–131.

88.

Tan

Lester

(2012) Labour market and economic impacts of international working holiday temporary migrants to Australia. Population, Space and Place 18(3): 359–383.

89.

Thomas

(2010) Foreign National Working Temporarily in Canada. Ottawa: Statistics Canada.

90.

Troper

(1992) Canada’s immigration policy since 1945. International Journal 48(2): 255–281.

91.

Turner

(2007) The enclave society. European Journal of Social Theory 10(2): 287–304.

92.

UN (2006) International Migration and Development. New York: United Nations.

93.

UN (2012) International Migration Report 2011. New York: United Nations.

94.

Varghese

Brett

(2011) International Student Barometer Project 2010: National report. Universities Australia. Available at: www.universitiesaustralia.edu.au/575/817.pdf

95.

Vertovec

(2007) Is circular migration the way forward in global policy? Around the Globe 3(2): 38–43

96.

Walia

(2010) Transient servitude: Migrant labour in Canada and the apartheid of citizenship. Race and Class 52(1): 71–84.

97.

Walsh

(2011) Quantifying citizens: Neoliberal restructuring and immigrant selection in Canada and Australia. Citizenship Studies 15(6–7): 861–879.

98.

Walsh

(2012) Mass migration and the mass society: Fordism, immigration policy and the post-war long boom in Canada and Australia, 1947–1970. Journal of Historical Sociology 25(3): 352–385.

99.

Walzer

(1983) Spheres of Justice. New York: Basic Books.

100.

Weiss

(1998) The Myth of the Powerless State. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

101.

Wright

(2011) Policy legacies and the politics of labour immigration selection and control. PhD Thesis, Cambridge University.

102.

Zolberg

(1999) Matters of state: Theorizing immigration policy. In: Hirschman

. (eds) The Handbook of International Migration. New York: Russell Sage, pp. 71–93.