Theoretical and Conceptual Considerations for the Study of Undocumented College Students

TERRY-ANN JONES

Introduction

Developing a model through which to understand the reasons for migration has long been central to the field of migration studies, and the scholarship that has emerged to better understand this common human activity has contributed to this effort. The movement of human beings across regions predates the establishment of political borders, yet scholars still struggle to understand the process through a comprehensive theoretical approach. Scholars of migration theory often lament that there is no single, comprehensive theory of international migration that reflects the myriad contemporary processes of migration. I would argue that there should not be a single, comprehensive theoretical approach to such diverse, dynamic processes in which both the players and their realities are so widely divergent, even if they hail from similar countries or regions. Instead, scholars have developed several varying and often complementary approaches that define, explain, and predict processes of international migration. This chapter reviews the major theoretical approaches to international migration and considers their use as a tool to explain the dynamics surrounding the migration processes, meanings of citizenship, race/ethnicity, racism, stigmatization, and other challenges that undocumented youth encounter in interacting with institutions, particularly in their pursuit of a tertiary-level education.

Classical Theories of International Migration

Although theories of international migration have evolved as scholars have debated the priorities and considerations that drive the migration process, Ravenstein's "laws of migration" is commonly cited as the starting point for the development of migration theory. Ravenstein developed a set of governing principles related to migration, among which he theorized that migration is primarily caused by economic factors.

Lee's concept of the push-pull theory of migration is similarly fundamental to the development of contemporary theories of migration that explain the decision-making process, as the decision to migrate involves consideration of the characteristics of the home country that individuals and families try to escape (push factors) and factors that are attractive in the receiving country (pull factors). About three-quarters of the undocumented population of the United States are Latinos, and the majority of undocumented students were born in Latin America, particularly Central America. Accordingly, the push factors that propel their families to the United States are likely to include poverty, political instability, and increasingly prevalent gang-motivated crime and violence, all of which are pervasive in the parts of Latin America that are the major sending countries of undocumented immigrants in the United States. That the five countries with the highest murder rates in the world are all in Latin America (Honduras, Venezuela, Belize, El Salvador, and Guatemala) is undoubtedly related to the urgency with which people emigrate from these countries, even without the documentation that they require for legal status. From the standpoint of the receiving country, the relative political and economic stability and the prospects for upward socioeconomic mobility serve as attractive pull factors, even when discerning migrants consider the risk of entering and living in the United States without legal immigration status. Further, the breakdown of immigration policy post 1986 in the United States combined with heightened security efforts post 9/11 has resulted in immigration policies and practices that are at best ambiguous and at worst conflictual, leaving individuals and families at the mercy of local sentiment and constantly changing pol itical power. It is on this basis of contemplating the risks and benefits associated with migration that the following theories of international migration are based.

Contemporary Theories of International Migration

Building on Lee's model of a decision-making process that weighs the potential benefits of migration against the potential costs, other theories of migration have emerged, many of which assume that an individual makes a rational decision based on her or his best interests, or perhaps the best interests of their children or other family members. Other models are based on macroeconomic factors and structural patterns that are beyond the control of individual migrants. The neoclassical economics approach is based on the assumption that transnational discrepancies in labor supply, demand, and wages serve as major motivating factors for migration. Migrants, according to this approach, leave countries with high unemployment, high labor supply, and low wages in favor of countries with lower unemployment, higher labor demand, and higher wages. The assumption that migration essentially serves to improve the economic conditions of migrants has, however, attracted much criticism, as it does not account for the myriad other factors that encourage people to leave their home countries, or the macroeconomic factors that individuals do not determine.

Both the world-systems approach and the dual labor market approach consider the macroeconomic and structural factors that influence migration decisions. According to the world-systems approach, migration is the result of inequities between states and as long as those inequities persist, the flow of people will continue from poor countries with limited global influence, or "periphery" countries, to the wealthy, dominant, "core" countries. In contrast to the world-systems analysis' emphasis on the power dynamics between countries, the dual or segmented labor market approach considers the conditions of the receiving country's domestic labor market. The duality or segmentation of the labor market refers to the tendency in migrant-receiving countries for some jobs to be relegated to a secondary status, marked by lower wages, lower skill level, and less security. For example in the United States, positions in agricultural labor, slaughterhouses and meat processing, landscaping, and domestic work are often stigmatized in this way. The consequence of the stigmatization of some segments of the labor market is that these "secondary" types of jobs become unattractive to the U.S.-born, which then limits the availability of labor, creating a demand for foreign labor....