The Political Economy of Immigration in America : an analysis of immigration reforms' failures in the United States, 1994-2010
type: Dataset
description: This PhD dissertation deals with the inability of the United States government to adopt an overhaul of its immigration policy. We show that the main factor accounting for this situation is institutional: the structure of the political economy of immigration explains why reforms attempts fail, and therefore helps to stabilize the regulation of immigrant admissions in the United States. To demonstrate this proposal, we firstly review the roots of the immigration crisis and then analyze why it is not overcome. The immigration crisis in the United States is produced by a set of trends. Some of them are structural. As a fact, the immigration system in the United States is deeply dysfunctional for two reasons. It is firstly very inefficient at properly organizing legal immigration by balancing an increasing demand for immigration visas with an offer bound through quotas. It is secondly unable to dissuade the settlement of a growing undocumented immigrant population. Still, the perception of this immigration crisis and the demand for reform are linked to cyclical factors. Nativist demands for a tightening of immigration legislation are notably greater during times of economic recession. We then explain the absence of immigration restriction in the United States through the demonstration of two complementary factors. Firstly, the political process through which immigration reform is defined give more influence to organized interest groups (such as immigrant communities, employers, unions and nativists) than to public opinion. Secondly, these groups are unable to cooperate for an immigration reform compromise, due to their competing preferences. In another words, the current statu quo prevailing in immigration reform may be suboptimal in terms of regulation of immigrant admissions. It is nevertheless stable, because it allows losses which would inevitably result from a successful immigration reform.
identifier: NNT: 2012GRENE003
issued: 2026-05-11T08:26:09.989501
language: fr
modified: 2026-05-11T08:26:09.989505
contact point: Organization
  fn: CCSD
keyword: analyse-de-votes
keyword: economie-politique
keyword: etats-unis
keyword: immigration-policy
keyword: infoeu-reposemanticsdoctoralthesis
keyword: international-migration
keyword: migrations-internationales
keyword: political-economy
keyword: politique-dimmigration
keyword: roll-call-votes-analysis
keyword: shsecohumanities-and-social-scienceseconomics-and-finance
keyword: shsscipohumanities-and-social-sciencespolitical-science
keyword: theses
keyword: united-states
landing page: https://theses.hal.science/tel-00817199

The Political Economy of Immigration in America : an analysis of immigration reforms' failures in the United States, 1994-2010
type: Distribution
format: HTML
issued: 2026-05-11T08:26:09.991734
modified: 2026-05-11T08:26:09.970003
access URL: https://theses.hal.science/tel-00817199

test_moissonnage_selune
type: Agent