Tagged: immigrants

Sociology of Culture / Sociology of Law, Crime and Deviance

Immigrants and Crime: The Importance of Destination?

Crime is a global phenomenon. From the most highly developed states to the least developed ones, crime represents a significant threat to social well-being. And because of its ubiquity, unsavoriness, and harmful qualities, criminal activity has the distinction of being a social event that is often blamed on the individuals who live on the fringes of a society. For immigrants, this tendency to place the blame of crime on the less well-off members of a society is particularly dangerous since...

Class & Stratification / Political & Economic Sociology / Race & Ethnicity Studies / Sociology of Culture / Sociology of Media & Communication / Sociology of Organizations & Work

Immigration Reform: Misplaced Responsibility

The concept of immigration reform, like welfare reform focuses on symptoms and not the causes.  Many of the policies involved in immigration reform are band-aids, temporary solutions rather than systemic alternatives.  The New York Times recently reported on the failure of the Obama Administration to introduce a comprehensive bill designed to target immigration generally and immigrants specifically (see article below). According to sociologist and immigration activist Grace Change, such reform bills reproduce/overlook three themes.  First, the goal of ‘reform’ efforts...