Contested Families, Contesting Neoliberalism: The Role of the Family in Canadian and U.S. Immigration Policies.

This paper explores the relationships among immigration policy, national identity and recent policy developments concerning family diversity in Canada and the United States. Drawing on Jacqueline Stevens' provocative argument that nation-states are kinship structures in which the rules of membership are determined by the rules of birth (1999) and using Canadian and U.S. immigration policy and family policy, the paper links domestic debates concerning family form with the family dimensions of its immigration policy. It then considers whether neoliberalism/neoliberal globalism can help us to understand recent immigration and family policy shifts and, in particular, to what extent 'national identity' may trump the market logic and personal autonomy dimensions of neoliberal ideology. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]