Book contents
- Immigration and the American Ethos
- Cambridge Studies in Public Opinion and Political Psychology
- Immigration and the American Ethos
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Preface
- Prologue
- 1 What Do Americans Want from Immigration Policy, and Why?
- 2 Civic Fairness and Group-Centrism
- 3 Functional Assimilation, Humanitarianism, and Support for Legal Admissions
- 4 Civic Fairness and the Legal–Illegal Divide
- 5 Civic Fairness and Ethnic Stereotypes
- 6 Assimilation, Civic Fairness and the “Circle of We”
- 7 Conclusion
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
- Books in the series
1 - What Do Americans Want from Immigration Policy, and Why?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 January 2020
- Immigration and the American Ethos
- Cambridge Studies in Public Opinion and Political Psychology
- Immigration and the American Ethos
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Preface
- Prologue
- 1 What Do Americans Want from Immigration Policy, and Why?
- 2 Civic Fairness and Group-Centrism
- 3 Functional Assimilation, Humanitarianism, and Support for Legal Admissions
- 4 Civic Fairness and the Legal–Illegal Divide
- 5 Civic Fairness and Ethnic Stereotypes
- 6 Assimilation, Civic Fairness and the “Circle of We”
- 7 Conclusion
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
- Books in the series
Summary
What does a nation of immigrants want from its immigration policy, and why? The evidence from decades of public polling defies simple answers. Scholars and journalists reflexively label people as “pro-immigrant” or “anti-immigrant” and seek to situate them along a spectrum running between these two poles. But most Americans hold seemingly idiosyncratic mixes of “pro-” and “anti-immigrant” opinions across the range of controversies that make up contemporary immigration debates. Their opinions about specific policies routinely deviate from their more general feelings about immigrants and immigration and confound familiar explanations based on “economic” or “cultural” threat. Their views about different facets of immigration policy diverge to the point that the great majority of Americans at once endorse some policies that would greatly expand immigrant admissions and rights and others that would sharply curtail them.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Immigration and the American Ethos , pp. 1 - 24Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2020