State-Building in Integration Policy as a Process of Mutual Adjustment: A Cross-National Comparison.

State-building scholarship understands the development of state administrative capacities as a reaction to political and social upheaval (Skowronek 1982: 4). I argue in previous work that the development of state capacity in immigration policy follows a similar pattern. As integration problems increase in salience and complexity, public officials start a policy making cycle that can grow in terms of geographic inclusion, the range of substantive policy fields affected, and the participatory functions open to immigrants and their organizations. The initial roles available to immigrants in this process are often passive, but public officials trying to address complex problems may encourage immigrant organizations to take on problem-solving roles that grant them greater de facto influence. Thus, integration policy is a process of mutual adjustment that changes the capacity of the state and the nature of citizenship. The paper proposed here applies this framework to compare successful immigrant organizations in the United States and Germany -- two countries with widely differing experiences in integration policy. I expect to argue that the cycle of mutual adaptation tends to expand state administrative capacity AND immigrant political empowerment in the United States, while in Germany it has served only to expand state capacity. An explanation for this discrepancy is sought in differences in political leadership recruitment, the organizational capacities of immigrant organizations, and the structure of interest groups in policy areas related to integration efforts. These findings have important implications for models of integration and assimilation in all democratic political systems. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]