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For forced migrants who lack unqualified state protection, citizenship acquisition serves as the only secure way to graduate from legally precarious conditions. However, despite the seemingly obvious upside, the decision to naturalise is not necessarily automatic and for those who do choose to move forward, the process is rarely straightforward. Based on 30 interviews with Syrian forced migrants in Berlin, we address why some applicants who are eligible to naturalise choose not to apply and why eligibility 'on paper' does not necessarily translate to ability to naturalise 'in practice'. By combining literature on migrants' experiences with street-level bureaucracy and individual-level determinants of naturalisation, the primary objective of this article is to advance our understanding of how citizenship and non-citizenship decisions are made. In order to do so, we build upon the two-step intention-ability framework and in particular introduce 'bureaucratic trajectory' as a significant determinant of one's intention to apply and practical ability to acquire citizenship beyond eligibility. We demonstrate how perceived discretionary implementation and red tape not only constrain but also entice migrants to develop strategies to 'enable' access to citizenship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes how agents such as agricultural migrants, agricultural employers and local community representatives apply the dual frame of reference (DFR) to naturalize, rationalize and justify the presence of exploitative labor practices for agricultural migrants. The paper gives a qualitative account of social dynamics in two agricultural-dependent communities located in Northern California and South-Eastern Norway. Qualitative one-on-one interviews with agricultural migrant workers (n = 11), employers (n = 10) and community representatives (n = 12) were conducted in English and Spanish. Our findings demonstrate how DFR is utilized by employers to justify labor strategies that rely on migrant workers, employees to rationalize their participation in exploitive work, and by local community representatives to naturalize the exploitative labor practices of migrant workers in their community. Our research findings further add to the analysis by suggesting that the frames of reference are dynamic based on changes of material conditions in the home country. Lastly, we find a third frame of reference focused on the future of the agricultural worker and the hopes for future generations. Combined, these perspectives add to the understanding of the disempowerment of workers, lack of successful changes and overall, upkeeping of exploitative migrant labor systems in the agricultural industries and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article highlights the importance of Migration to another country, which evolves around the process of shifting to another state legally permanently, and the impediments faced by the applicants due to the unlimited processing period. The World Population Review's survey reveals that the United States of America has the highest number of migrations globally is 50.6 million just in 2020 (Review, 2024). This paper will discuss the immigration procedure, complexities, and approval ratio of different visa categories specifically the United States of America's Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) ( U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, 2019). There is a need to curtail the unnecessary and hectic processing time of immigration petitions for the easement of applicants, due to unpredictable and lengthy processing time, many of the applicants expire or get demotivated to adapt to a new phase of life at later ages, while other opt for illegal migration by adopting a death trap route. Furthermore, in Pakistan, there is an enormous need for a well-equipped and widespread knowledge of migration procedures and inclusion of immigration laws at an academic level that evolves around the paramount changes in national curriculums to make it a subject leading to curtail the illegal emigration flow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article delves into the experiences of immigrants in Greece who have been residing in the country for an extended period but face difficulties in obtaining Greek citizenship. This study is based on in-depth interviews conducted with 10 immigrants whose applications for Greek citizenship were rejected in the summer of 2022. Through these interviews, the research investigates the motivations that drive immigrants to seek citizenship and their perceptions of the new, more restrictive naturalization law in Greece. The findings offer significant insights into the personal struggles and perspectives of these individuals, providing a clearer understanding of their desires to integrate into Greek society. The participants' viewpoints reveal a complex picture of naturalization, influenced by a combination of pragmatic considerations, such as access to rights and economic opportunities, and deep emotional connections to Greek culture and society. Moreover, this research sheds light on the implications of the new citizenship law, which emphasizes economic criteria, on immigrants' aspirations for obtaining citizenship. By comprehending the participants' attitudes and aspirations, this study can contribute to the development of more inclusive approaches to future naturalization legislation in Greece. Additionally, it offers valuable insights into immigrant identity and political engagement within the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the Interwar period, József Reményi (1891–1956) and Áron Tamási (1897–1966) wrote fiction about the experience of Hungarian immigrants in the USA. Reményi immigrated before WWI and made his residence permanent after his naturalization, whereas Tamási moved to the USA in 1923 but returned to his homeland in 1926. The paper contrasts their personal experiences as immigrants in America, discusses their descriptions of Hungarian immigrant life in general, and analyzes their representation strategies. In their representations of the immigrant experience, family relationships, cultural community, language, race, and the motivation to undergo a spiritual quest are all central. Their narrative techniques are somewhat innovative and characterized by discontinuity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the early 1990s, Italy, along with other countries situated at Europe's periphery, has become an attractive destination for migrants due to its lax regulation of migration and its job market. Despite its restrictive naturalisation laws, an increasing number of migrants are becoming eligible for Italian citizenship, which has led to a growing number of naturalisations in recent years. Existing research exploring naturalisation and its determinants has found migrants' ability to attain citizenship strongly depends on their interest in becoming a member of the host state, requirements (as defined by the host country), and their capacity to overcome various constraints such as the costs involved in the naturalisation process. However, few empirical studies have focused on immigrants' interest in naturalisation. To fill this gap, we analyse migrants' interest in naturalisation and how it correlates to their eligibility. This paper relies on the most recent data on interest in naturalisation from the 2018 and 2019 waves of the Regional Observatory for Integration and Multiethnicity of Lombardy (Italy). The results show that not all migrants are interested in naturalisation after assessing its perceived costs and benefits, thus confirming an instrumental approach to citizenship. Interest is mostly related to the legislation and conditions in the country of origin. Moreover, the relationship between eligibility and interest is highly dependent on civil stratification, and eligibility is not directly associated with interest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article delves into the experiences of immigrants in Greece who have been residing in the country for an extended period but face difficulties in obtaining Greek citizenship. This study is based on in-depth interviews conducted with 10 immigrants whose applications for Greek citizenship were rejected in the summer of 2022. Through these interviews, the research investigates the motivations that drive immigrants to seek citizenship and their perceptions of the new, more restrictive naturalization law in Greece. The findings offer significant insights into the personal struggles and perspectives of these individuals, providing a clearer understanding of their desires to integrate into Greek society. The participants’ viewpoints reveal a complex picture of naturalization, influenced by a combination of pragmatic considerations, such as access to rights and economic opportunities, and deep emotional connections to Greek culture and society. Moreover, this research sheds light on the implications of the new citizenship law, which emphasizes economic criteria, on immigrants’ aspirations for obtaining citizenship. By comprehending the participants’ attitudes and aspirations, this study can contribute to the development of more inclusive approaches to future naturalization legislation in Greece. Additionally, it offers valuable insights into immigrant identity and political engagement within the country.

The subject of naturalisation among intra-EU migrants has only recently drawn the attention of social science scholars. Empirical evidence from quantitative studies shows an increase in citizenship applications among this new wave of mobile people, indicating a strategic use of naturalisation. However, there is not a great deal of micro-level research, especially as to the subjective meanings attached to citizenship take-up in a new EU member state. Drawing on 68 in-depth interviews conducted with Italians and Spaniards living in London and Berlin, we argue that an individual's understanding of naturalisation within the EU context is based on two aspects: on one hand, a strictly pragmatic evaluation of the pros and cons of the new status; on the other, a new sense of belonging as well as new cultural and territorial identifications that intra-EU migrants are not often willing to experience. Therefore, this article suggests that EU migrants that strongly identify with their country of origin and the EU see national and EU identities as conflicting with naturalisation, thus setting aside instrumental considerations. This constitutes a critique to theoretical approaches claiming the diminishing importance of a nation's cultural self-understanding. Our paper also sheds light on the possible effect of the UK's departure from the EU on young Southern European migrants choosing to apply for British citizenship, highlighting that it is mostly the implementation of the formal exit process and the actual abrogation of EU citizenship rights that reconfigure patterns in naturalisation, rather than the uncertainty and fears about the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the under-participation of ethnic minorities in the electoral field is frequently observed, the nuances of their political engagement remain relatively unexplored by scholars. Particularly, little empirical analysis has attempted to identify the barriers faced by first-generation immigrants to adopt a party preference in their host country. Drawing on a unique survey data with a large sample of first-generation immigrants (N= 2,648) in a new migration country (Spain), this article explores the relevance of different set of factors (cultural proximity vs immigration status) in explaining the acquisition of a party preference among this minority population. We find that cultural proximity (as defined by the country of origin: Latin-American vs the rest) is a strong predictor for the acquisition of a party preference. Additionally, our results suggest that the predictive strength of this factor is reinforced through a naturalization regime that facilitates full political rights to culturally closer immigrants, thus reinforcing their a priori better conditions for political integration. Finally, the results also suggest that permissive (rather than restrictive) naturalization policies might work better to secure the political integration of migrant minorities.

Via naturalization procedures, immigrants have the opportunity to acquire rights and duties limited to nationals. Yet little is known about acculturative contexts and naturalization motives underlying immigrants' naturalization intentions. Employing a large sample of first‐generation immigrants in Switzerland (N = 3928) and a multilevel approach, we articulated individual acculturation strategies and cantonal integration policies to explain naturalization intentions and underlying motives. Results at the individual level showed that assimilated immigrants report the highest intentions to naturalize, followed by integrated, and lastly by separated immigrants. Motives underlying naturalization intentions also differed as a function of acculturation strategies. Whereas integrated and assimilated immigrants reported higher symbolic motives than separated immigrants, the latter reported the highest level of instrumental motives. A cross‐level interaction qualified results at the individual level. Indeed, the gap between integrated and separated immigrants was more pronounced under inclusive integration policies. Accordingly, integrated immigrants' naturalization intentions increased the more integration policies were inclusive, whereas this was not the case among assimilated and separated immigrants. Overall, our findings cast a positive light on inclusive integration policies as contextual affordances to overcome barriers to naturalization and encourage migration scholars to consider the broader political context in which immigrant acculturation is embedded. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This contribution to the Special Issues situates citizenship tests, which satisfy language requirements, as 'raciolinguistic borders'. This is because such tests cannot be confined to education but function as tools within a wider socio-political apparatus. They have an impact on racialising language so that those with the most proximity to the national linguistic community encounter the tests at lower stakes or closer to their own language(s). Thus, tests are bordering techniques which can be retracted to exclude or expanded to externalise legal and linguistic borders. They are both fluid in their remit and hard in their materiality in the lives of migrants. At the heart of the rationale behind these borders is the fundamental question about whether they are unjust or not. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How do immigrant-origin residents claim membership in the United States? Chinese, Vietnamese and Mexican-origin parents and their citizen teenagers were asked what it means to be a good citizen and to be American. In discussing good citizenship, respondents underscored legal, moral, civic, and economic actions over ascriptive characteristics or political values. Their emphasis on citizenship acts illuminates how noncitizens, including undocumented residents, can claim membership through behaviours, even as inclusion may be contingent on being law-abiding, hard-working, or a good person. The term "American" is more ambiguous legally, but also more racially and economically fraught, including for citizens, as racialized tropes of illegality or cultural otherness affect those of Mexican or Asian origins, respectively. Membership markers are thus not simply about categorical placement inside or outside a boundary of "citizen" or "American". Rather, national membership can be felt as partial and gradient, positioned closer or further from multiple ideals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The share of British naturalization applications by EU citizens increased in the aftermath of the 2016 EU referendum. This article offers unique insights into the range of motivations informing decisions to become British or not among EU families from new and old EU member states. It contributes to scholarship on migrants' lived experiences of naturalization by adopting a family-centred approach to explore intergenerational and intersectional dynamics in citizenship decision making. Naturalization involves personal and collective reckoning with a sense of loss of status and imagined future. We argue that rather than a "premium", naturalization is framed by many EU citizens as a response to a perceived loss of status (defensive narrative) and threat (protective narrative). This process is mediated and negotiated within the household, and the narratives of naturalization are embedded in participants' social positioning and shaped by their social statuses and senses of entitlement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we explore Mexican and Central American migrants' decisions to refuse public benefits in response to the Trump administration's proposed change in the enforceability priorities of the "public charge" section of the Immigration and Naturalization Act. Based on interviews with migrants who have experienced undocumented status and who are now in the process of becoming lawful permanent residents, we argue that decisions to pre-emptively forego public welfare benefits beginning in 2018 were not simply based on an impulsive fear-based reaction, but rather on thoughtful considerations around the human impact of immigration policies. We conceptualize migrant refusals of public benefits through the framework of what we call cultivated intuition because while these refusals are visceral responses, they are also educated inferences about how the fundamental logics of conditional citizenship within the US immigration system work to regulate migrant mobility and behaviour both at the border and within the nation-state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In April 1787, the New York State Legislature naturalized Spanish ship captain Pablo Vidal under unusual circumstances. Vidal's naturalization was temporary, retroactive, and requested by a third party, New York City merchant Dominick Lynch. The atypical conditions surrounding Vidal's naturalization reveal the existence of an Atlantic-spanning buyer's market for migrants after the American Revolution. With peace came a growing demand for immigrants, causing individual states to compete against one another to offer the most desirable terms to attract opportunistic newcomers. The stories of Pablo Vidal, Dominick Lynch, and many other migrants to Confederation New York detail how the state recognized its position within this broader Atlantic market, how it sought to capitalize on its strengths, and how it attempted to bind these once transient migrants to New York's future. Amid the stories of this scramble for migrants lie the tensions that led to the diminishment of the buyer's market after Congress centralized naturalization standards in 1790. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What are the long-term differences in the propensity of immigrants to acquire destination country citizenship under different institutional contexts and how do these vary between migrant groups? This article draws on micro-level longitudinal data from administrative registers in Denmark, the Netherlands, and Sweden—three countries with widely different and changing requirements for the acquisition of citizenship—to track the naturalization propensity of eight complete migrant cohorts (1994–2001) up to 21 years after migration. We find that after two decades in the destination country, cumulative naturalization rates vary remarkably with over 80 per cent of migrants in Sweden, two-thirds in the Netherlands, and only around a third in Denmark having acquired citizenship. We observe lower rates and delayed naturalization for migrants, especially among those with lower levels of education, after language requirements and integration tests were introduced in Denmark and the Netherlands. Dual citizenship acceptance in the Netherlands and Sweden, by contrast, is associated with durably higher citizenship acquisition rates, especially, among migrants from EU and highly developed countries. These findings highlight the long-term but conditional relevance of citizenship policy for immigrant naturalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The naturalization rate of immigrants is jointly affected by immigrant characteristics, economic, and political circumstances in the source country and government policies in the destination country. This article focuses on the effect of altering government policies in the destination country, using legislative and regulatory changes introduced in Canada over the 2006–16 period as a test case. We hypothesize that the least advantaged immigrants would be most affected by more restrictive policies. The observed large decline in the naturalization rate among immigrants with low family income, low proficiency in official languages, and low educational levels is consistent with significant policy impacts. Furthermore, the general decline started before the introduction of the new policies, and the decline was particularly large among immigrants from Eastern Asia. This suggests that other factors such as globalization and changes in the socioeconomic environment of some source countries also played a role. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Modern Turkish History Studies / Cumhuriyet Tarihi Araştırmaları Dergisi (CTAD) is the property of Ataturk Institute for Modern Turkish History and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The Republican Congress in 1870 joined an international effort to redefine laws of citizenship, resulting in the Naturalization Act. While previous histories of the act focus on the domestic origins of the law, this article places the Naturalization Act in a global context, seeing it as a response to international and domestic disputes sparked by global migration. The success of US-backed treaties guaranteeing freedom of movement and the right to change one's citizenship (i.e., the right of expatriation) triggered new concern about the allegiances of immigrants and fueled Republican calls for greater federal control over the naturalization process. The bills that ultimately resulted in the Naturalization Act of 1870 sparked bitter debate as policymakers, diplomats, and foreign-born Americans negotiated the racial, ethnic, and political boundaries of American citizenship. Targeted by Republican naturalization reforms, European immigrants and their allies shifted legislators' attention to Chinese immigrants to reinforce the racial borders of citizenship and deflect Republican attacks on their own loyalty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Who is a member of the political community? What barriers to inclusion do immigrants face as outsiders to this political community? This Essay describes seueral barriers facing immigrants and naturalized citizens that impede their political belonging. It critiques these barriers on the basis of immigrants and foreign-born uoters having rights of semi-citizenship. By placing-naturalization backlogs, voting restrictions, and reapportionment battles in the historical context of uoter suppression, it provides a descriptive and normatiue account of the political misrepresentation of immigrants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper compares the naturalisation regimes for migrants in East Asia (China, Japan, Korea, and Taiwan) and Southeast Asia (Malaysia and Singapore), examining how these states have reconfigured their boundaries of citizenship based on 'desirability' since the early 20th century. There are some attributes of desirability for which naturalisation regimes privilege some groups of migrants over others. The hierarchy of desirability in the East and Southeast Asian naturalisation regimes since the late 20th century has been constructed based on class differences. At the top of the hierarchy of desirability, skilled professionals constitute a selective group of desired migrants, whereas marriage migrants and low-skilled migrants are at the bottom of the hierarchy. Naturalisation regimes give less weight to the social contribution of migrant spouses and the economic contribution of unskilled migrant workers than to that of skilled workers. The lower weighting is the reason for their exclusion, regardless of their territorial presence in the state. Coming into the 21st century, East and Southeast Asian naturalisation regimes show a similar pattern of convergence based on economic desirability when these states engage in what Shachar has called 'talent-for-citizenship exchange'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Migraciones is the property of Universidad Pontificia Comillas, Instituto Universitario de Estudios sobre Migraciones and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

What does it mean to be a 'good American'? Immigrants to the United States have obtained civic knowledge in a variety of ways, including federal textbooks and independent learning, and in different contexts over time, from employer-organised classes to handbooks written by civil society groups. This paper analyses citizenship manuals from one such group – the Daughters of the American Revolution ('D.A.R.') – to trace continuities and changes in definitions of American citizenship over the twentieth century. This paper is the first to make use of these manual archives, which contain over 30 different citizenship manuals, printed between 1921 and 1996. To compare and analyse the corpus of manuals, the paper employs both computer-assisted content analysis through topic modelling and textual interpretation. This approach provides rich descriptive evidence of how American citizenship norms change over a century, the influence of scarcity and war on that identity, as well as the changing role for organisations like the D.A.R. in the civic education of immigrants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discussions within political theory on naturalisation tend to focus on whether or not it is reasonable and fair to make naturalisation conditional on meeting integration requirements. Those who emphasise the right of long-term immigrants to be included as equal citizens argue that automatic naturalisation is preferable, while those who put emphasis on the state's legitimate interest in promoting the conditions for a reasonably just society tend to argue that conditional naturalisation is normatively preferable. However, most participating in this debate seem to agree that naturalisation rules must balance these different concerns. In this paper, we argue that the conflicting views on each side of the automatic-conditional divide can be reconciled by introducing the model of discounting-conditional naturalisation. We suggest that a practice in which integration requirements are gradually relaxed over time can in fact sufficiently accommodate those normative considerations that are in conflict under the current practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The German citizenship law underwent a paradigmatic amendment in 2000. One often overlooked change of this reform was the abolishment of the domestic clause (“Inlandsklausel”) that implied a substantial restriction to de facto dual citizenship acceptance. Combining data from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (waves 1993–2006) with original data on origin country policies on dual citizenship and citizenship reacquisition, we analyse the impact of the abolishment of the domestic clause on naturalization rates. We apply a difference-in-difference design to investigate the causal impact of this element of the reform which has remained under-studied. We do not find an impact of the abolishment of the domestic clause on naturalization rates, neither among the general migrant population, nor among Turkish migrants who are alleged to be targeted specifically by this reform. These results suggest that a more restrictive approach to dual citizenship did not dissuade migrants from acquiring German citizenship after 2000.

Little is known about the outcomes of integration policies on immigrants, and even less so at the subnational level. This paper scrutinizes immigrants' responses to regional integration policies, focusing on their naturalization intentions. Multilevel analyses of Swiss cantons' integration policy indices and a survey of immigrants indicate that inclusive integration policies are positively associated with European Union/European Free Trade Agreement (EFTA) nationals' naturalization intentions and amplify time's positive effect on the same outcome for immigrants from less-developed countries. The findings contribute to the territorial politics literature, with their focus on subnational policies, and to the citizenship literature, given the importance of integration policies in the naturalization process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The literature on citizenship policies is flourishing, yet we know little of which naturalisation requirements majorities and minorities find reasonable, and how they view existing citizenship regimes. Drawing on original survey data with young adults in Norway (N = 3535), comprising immigrants and descendants with origins from Iraq, Pakistan, Poland, Somalia and Turkey, as well as a non-immigrant majority group, this article examines whether perceptions of ideal citizenship criteria and assessments of Norway's current rules differ between groups. In terms of ideal citizenship criteria, we find a striking similarity across groups when looking at six different dimensions of citizenship policy. When merged into an index and estimated in a multivariate regression model, we find that both immigrants and descendants are significantly more liberal than natives are, yet the differences are small. When assessing the semi-strict citizenship regime in Norway, we find that immigrants are significantly more positive towards the current rules than natives. The results lend little support to recent work on 'strategic' and 'instrumental' citizenship and point instead to a close to universal conception of the terms of membership acquisition in Norway. This suggests that states may operate with moderate integration requirements while maintaining the legitimacy of the citizenship institution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article pioneers in investigating a citizenship premium for homeownership of first-generation immigrants, using Dutch register data from Statistics Netherlands (N = 106,187). I hypothesize that naturalization favourably influences the risk-calculation of lenders through positive signalling among employed migrants, who are likely to meet the basic financial criteria for credit. Results confirm that, all else constant, employed immigrants who have naturalized are 26% more likely to be homeowner. Additional analyses specifically designed to isolate endogeneity bias show that the effect is smaller, but still reveal an increase in the probability of homeownership after naturalization. Citizenship acquisition matters less for migrants with a native-born partner, suggesting that legal status discrimination may be an underlying mechanism. I find no evidence that the relevance of citizenship is conditioned by cultural distance of the origin country or the post-2008 economic crisis. I conclude that naturalization matters in the housing market, but that its relevance cannot be generalized to all migrant groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: The present research examines U.S. lawful permanent residents' (LPRs) motivations to apply for U.S. citizenship (i.e., naturalize).Method: Study 1 (N = 180; 61% male) LPRs have a mean age of M = 30.78, SD = 8.25. Participants completed a survey. Sixty-seven participants indicated their country of birth as a Central/South American or Caribbean country, 40 as a European country, 44 as an Asian country, 16 as a Southeast Asian or Middle Eastern country, and 13 as an African country. Study 2 (N = 218; 56% male) LPRs have a mean age of M = 30.33, SD = 8.37. Participants completed an experiment. Eighty-three participants indicated their country of birth as a Central/South American or Caribbean country, 55 as a European country, 37 as a Southeast Asian or Middle Eastern country, 31 as an Asian country, and 12 as an African country.Results: Study 1 demonstrates that identity concerns, above and beyond perceived realistic concerns, are significantly related to motivation to naturalize. In particular, perception of belonging to the U.S. is positively related to a motivation to naturalize. Moreover, we test a theory-driven model such that higher perceptions of subgroup respect are positively related to a sense of U.S. belonging which, in turn, predicts a motivation to naturalize. Study 2 extends the previous study by manipulating subgroup respect and demonstrating that this affects a sense of belonging to the U.S. which, in turn, predicts a stronger motivation to naturalize.Conclusions: We discuss the implications of the present work for theory and the social issue of naturalization and citizenship. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The immigration system is in crisis. Long lines of asylum seekers at the border and immigrants in the interior spend years waiting for their day in immigration court. This is true in the agencies that process applications for immigration benefits from legal immigrants as well. Since 2016, delays in naturalization have increased to historic proportions. The problem is even worse for military naturalizations, where delays are accompanied by denials and overall declines in military naturalizations. It is the latest front in the battle on legal migration and citizenship. These impediments to citizenship demonstrate an extreme form of policies collectively dubbed the "second wall." These policies are animated by mistrust of foreigners and immigrant restrictionism, bureaucratic bungling and institutional neglect for service members, and overreliance on national security justifications. These changes affront civil and voting rights for immigrants, diminish military enlistment, and undermine the institutions of citizenship and democracy. This Article documents barriers to citizenship. More specifically, it analyzes the causes and consequences of citizenship denials in general and military naturalization. It offers solutions that bolster immigrants, the military, and the meaning of citizenship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The notion that naturalisation matters for the economic integration of immigrants is well established in the literature, but why and to whom that is, remains surprisingly ambiguous. The citizenship premium is traditionally assumed to result from increased labour market access and positive signalling towards employers, but these mechanisms fail to explain increased earnings derived from paid employment, which has been the predominant focus in most studies. We argue that naturalisation needs to be understood in the context of the life course, as immigrants anticipate rewards and opportunities of citizenship acquisition by investing in their human capital development. Insofar as naturalisation subsequently leads to higher earnings, we expect that the citizenship premium mostly reflects better employment opportunities rather than access to better paying jobs. To test these assumptions, we use high-quality register data from Statistics Netherlands, covering the period 1999–2011. These data contain almost all registered foreign-born individuals in The Netherlands (N = 74,531) and allow us to track immigrant cohorts over time. Results show that naturalisation confers a one-time boost in earnings after naturalisation, but particularly for migrants from economically less developed countries and unemployed migrants. Furthermore, earnings develop faster leading up to naturalisation than afterwards, consistent with the notion of anticipation. The relevance of citizenship for employed immigrants in part results from an increase in working hours, but is not explained by variation in labour market sectors. We conclude that citizenship matters in terms of earnings from labour, but that its impact is not universal and manifests predominantly leading up to naturalisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

"I am learning to be a naturalized Englishman," announces the Anglo-Belgian manufacturer Robert Gérard Moore in Charlotte Brontë's Shirley (1849). In this essay, I read Shirley as an engagement with the complexities of naturalization, the process by which a foreigner becomes like a native. As I suggest, the novel both comments on the ideologies underlying the Aliens Act (1844), which facilitated legal naturalization, and explores the possibilities of extralegal, domestically based processes in incorporating foreigners into English society, testing whether the conventions of the Bildungsroman can accommodate a story of adult transformation. Ultimately, Shirley 's fable-like ending, which presents Robert's recovery from a gunshot wound as an English rebirth, draws into question whether "naturalized" Englishmen can fit into traditional national narratives. At the same time, Shirley 's last pages offer a different possibility for naturalization: that naturalization is not about blending into the landscape, but about reshaping it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores whether differences in the implementation of nationality laws explain gaps between nationality laws and nationality acquisition across Europe. Previous research confirms that nationality acquisition among the foreign‐born in Western European countries is largely determined by the inclusiveness of nationality policies and the characteristics of the immigrant population. Drawing on recent data on nationality procedures across Europe, this article argues that, regardless of the nationality laws in place, nationality procedures create major obstacles for different types of immigrants. This article uses data from the European Social Survey to conduct multi‐level analysis of nationality acquisition in 17 European countries among long‐settled foreign‐born adult arrivals, controlling for their individual, origin and destination country characteristics. The analysis finds that nationality procedures are as important as nationality laws for nationality acquisition among most immigrants living in Europe today, especially for immigrants who are most likely to benefit and apply: immigrants from developing countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using unique longitudinal microdata linking administrative records from Sweden and Finland, we study how immigrant naturalization relates to cultural proximity. We analyze how Swedish citizenship acquisition depends on mother tongue by comparing Swedish-speaking and Finnish-speaking immigrants from Finland, who arrived in Sweden in 1988–2004, and contrast with other Nordic-born immigrants. We treat return migration and naturalization as two elements in the decision process of immigrants, being the first to estimate competing risks models for naturalization and return migration for the same study group of persons. The setting of free mobility in the Nordic countries, together with economic, political and social similarities, implies that the direct benefits of naturalization are modest and the same for all Nordic-born immigrants in Sweden. Thus, we assess naturalization in an analytical framework where many confounding factors are circumvented and in which the study groups have grown up in the similar institutional setting. Swedish-speaking Finns are found to have an approximately 30 percent higher standardized risk of naturalization than Finnish-speaking Finns, and a 2.5 times higher risk as compared to people from the other Nordic countries. We argue that these differentials reflect the degree to which the groups broadly differ in affinity with Sweden. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The existing assimilation literature shows that having a U.S.-born spouse, relative to a foreign-born spouse, is associated with a higher probability of becoming a U.S. citizen (naturalization). However, the foreign-born spouses are a heterogeneous group. I disaggregate them by identifying their citizenship status in the U.S. and document that it plays a larger role than simply their place of birth. The relative hazard of naturalization among immigrants with a citizen spouse, U.S.-born or foreign-born, is more than double the hazard of immigrants married to a noncitizen spouse. In fact, the largest increase in the naturalization hazard among immigrants in the U.S. is associated with foreign-born citizen spouses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on interviews with 21 immigrants in Norway, including both naturalized citizens and 'denizens', this article addresses immigrant meanings of citizenship and naturalization. The findings show that the interviewees attributed three meanings to citizenship. First, Norwegian citizenship served as a powerful means of spatial mobility, thereby facilitating transnational connections. Second, citizenship signified a legal stability that may guard precarious immigrants against 'liminal legality', i.e. enduring legal uncertainty. Third, citizenship was conceptualized as a formal recognition of equality and belonging, although 'race' and ethnicity persisted as salient markers of inequality and alienage. The article contributes empirically to the growing literature on the experiencing side of citizenship and naturalization by delineating what citizenship means to different groups, and to whom it matters the most. Theoretically, it contributes by demonstrating that citizenship acquisition may not only be strategic, but also rooted in needs of symbolic sanctioning of equality and belonging, particularly important to individuals debarred from naturalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is an attempt to unpack how the Citizenship Amendment Bill 2016 that proposed citizenship on the basis of religious affiliation trace its past from narrative rooted in partition and idea of religious identity in determination of citizenship status in India. The act proposes, persons belonging to minority community namely Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Parsi and Christians from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan who have either entered into India without valid travel documents or the validity of their documents have expired are eligible to apply for Indian citizenship by naturalisation in 7 years instead of existing 12 years. Building on existing scholarship, field experience and media reports this article argues proposed citizenship amendment bill that favours citizenship status for persecuted minorities defined primarily as Hindus leaving Muslims is not an attempt to redefine citizenship but reinforce logic that favours narrative of India for Hindus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A FUNDAMENTAL ISSUE IN THE TRAJECTORY OF IMMIGRATION IS THE ACT OF ESTABLISHING A MORAL AND LEGAL BOND OF THE INDIVIDUAL WITH HIS NEW SOCIETY, THROUGH THE PROCESS OF NATURALIZATION. THIS PAPER AIMS TO IDENTIFY AND ANALYZE TWO PARTICULAR NATIONALITY LEGISLATION MODELS OF TWO HISTORICALLY DIFFERENT, YET SIMILAR CULTURAL SPHERES: ROMANIA AND FRANCE. SIGNIFICANT IMPORTANCE IS GIVEN TO THE CULTURAL MEANING OF THE TRADITIONAL EUROPEAN LEGAL PRINCIPLE OF "JUS SANGUINIS", OPPOSED TO THE AMERICAN BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP ("JUS SOLI"), PARTLY PRESENT IN THE FRENCH LEGISLATION CONCERNING CITIZENSHIP. ALONG WITH THE HISTORICAL TRENDS, THE OUTCOME OF THE LEGISLATION'S EVOLUTION WILL BE PRESENTED FROM A LEGAL POINT OF VIEW, WITH REFERENCES TO THEORETICAL MODELS AND JURISTIC OPINIONS. THE ROLE OF THIS ARTICLE IS TO DETAIL THE CULTURAL PECULIARITIES THAT SHAPED THE ROMANIAN AND FRENCH NATIONALITY LAWS AND ALSO DEMONSTRATE THEIR INTERCONNECTEDNESS AS PART OF A UNIFIED EUROPEAN CONTINENTAL NATIONALITY TRADITION. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Citizenship can accelerate immigrant integration and result in benefits for both local communities and the foreign-born themselves. Yet the majority of naturalization-eligible immigrants in the United States do not apply for citizenship, and we lack systematic evidence on policies specifically designed to encourage take-up. In this study, we analyze the impact of the standardization of the fee-waiver process in 2010 by the US Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS). This reform allowed low-income immigrants eligible for citizenship to use a standardized form to have their application fee waived. We employ a difference-in-differences methodology, comparing naturalization behavior among eligible and ineligible immigrants before and after the policy change. We find that the fee-waiver reform increased the naturalization rate by 1.5 percentage points. This amounts to about 73,000 immigrants per year gaining citizenship who otherwise would not have applied. In contrast to previous research on the take-up of federal benefits programs, we find that the positive effect of the fee-waiver reform was concentrated among the subgroups of immigrants with lower incomes, language skills, and education levels, who typically face the steepest barriers to naturalization. Further evidence suggests that this pattern is driven by immigration service providers, who are well-positioned to help the most needy immigrants file their fee-waiver requests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of my paper is to consider a set of policies concerning flows adjustment and naturalization of immigrants. The starting point of my analysis is the Naturalization Act of 1790, the first immigration law of the US government, which inspired the subsequent ones. I have conducted a more detailed investigation into federal measures since 1882, the year of Chinese Exclusion Act, passing through the legislation of the period between 1920 and 1930, influenced by a marked protectionism, to arrive to the acts of 1965, which dismantled the system of national quotas. The goal of my work is to highlight the relationship between the laws and the debate that has been created around them, which involves congress, public opinion, trade unions and associations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on ethnographical observations made in the Naturalization Office of a prefecture of the Paris region, and on interviews carried out with bureaucrats and French citizens who have been naturalized, this article examines both the institutional process of granting citizenship as well as its impact on subjectivities. It investigates the assumptions and broad judgments that underlie the granting of French citizenship to see how norms and values linked to this procedure circulate between bureaucrats and applicants. It focuses on the idea of "deservingness," linked to the act of being granted French citizenship, to determine how bureaucrats from the Naturalization Office and French naturalized citizens differently appropriate this notion. By addressing the articulated difference between bureaucratic practice and lived experience, this article aims to highlight the political, moral, and ethical dimensions at stake in the procedure of making foreigners into French citizens. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Naturalization may be a relevant policy instrument affecting immigrant integration in host‐country labor markets. We study the effect of naturalization on labor market outcomes of immigrants in Germany. We apply recent survey data and exploit a reform of naturalization rules in an instrumental variable estimation. In our sample of recent immigrants, linear regression yields positive correlations between naturalization and beneficial labor market outcomes. Once we account for the endogeneity of naturalization, most coefficients decline in magnitude and lose statistical significance: male immigrants' labor market outcomes do not benefit significantly from naturalization. Naturalization reduces the risks of unemployment and welfare dependence for female immigrants. For males and females, the propensity to hold a permanent contract increases as a consequence of naturalization. The results are robust to modifications of samples and the instrument. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the early 2000s several European countries have introduced language and citizenship tests as new requirements for access to long‐term residence or naturalization. The content of citizenship tests has been often presented as exclusionary in nature, in particular as it is based on the idea that access to citizenship has to be 'deserved'. In this paper, we aim to explore the citizenship tests 'from below', through the focus on the experience of migrants who prepare and take the 'Life in the UK' test, and with particular reference to how they relate to the idea of 'deservingness'. Through a set of in‐depth interviews with migrants in two different cities (Leicester and London), we show that many of them use narratives in which they distinguish between the 'deserving citizens' and the 'undeserving Others' when they reflect upon their experience of becoming citizens. In so doing, they negotiate new hierarchies of inclusion into and exclusion from citizenship, which reflect broader neo‐liberal and ethos‐based conceptions of citizenship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The object of this article is to analyse the development of ethnic Italian schools in Rio Grande do Sul during the years of colonisation in the nineteenth century (1875-1900), during which time Italian immigrants were put under a double process of nationalisation. On the one side, commencing with Imperial Brazil, and then more specifically in Republican Brazil under the new Constitution, which introduced naturalisation processes for foreign immigrants; and on the other side, the Italian government's attempts to defend ethnic identity as a means of resistance against assimilation. Within these processes, a significantly important role in the affirmation of identity-building processes was played by Italian ethnic schools in rural and urban areas of the most southern state in Brazil, which had as their main goals, literacy and the nurturing of Italian cultural traits. The methodological basis is that of historical document analysis of archival and printed materials, most of which were unpublished, such as consular reports, acts by mutual aid associations, correspondence and press in search of ample traces, clues, and relative recurrences connected with the object of investigation. This article intends to verify the role and function of Italian ethnic schools as a space of building identities by the memory practices and specifically by celebrating patriotic anniversaries and other school commemorative events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spain has followed the lead of other Western countries by establishing new citizenship requirements for immigrants. In 2015, the Real Decreto 1004/2015 was passed, making both knowledge of culture and history of Spain and knowledge of Spanish language a requisite for immigrants wishing to become citizens. In order to fulfill this legal requirement, immigrants need to take two exams: the Conocimientos Constitucionales y Socioculturales de España and the Diplomas de Español como Lengua Extranjera (DELE), which are both administered by the Instituto Cervantes. This paper analyses some of the discourses that surrounded the introduction of the new testing regime. Given the complex socio-political and historical context of Spain, establishing a requirement in Spanish for new citizens reinforces the subordination of other co-official languages such as Galician, Basque and Catalan. Beyond the ideological forces at play, we also highlight the monetization of compulsory tests and its benefits for test administrators. Furthermore, we bring attention to the fact that the DELE, a language test that was originally designed for other purposes and pre-dates the new citizenship legislation, is now being employed for high-stakes immigration, subverting the original purpose of the test. We highlight the problems this causes in terms of test effect, validity and ethics. Finally, we caution that greater reflection is required regarding the need for such tests, including more research on individuals experiencing the new naturalization process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]