Navigating Globalization; Highly-Skilled Labor Migration and State Management: The Cases of Canada and Australia.

Two assumptions that have dominated sociological analyses of migration are (1) that it secures the necessary reserve army of labor for capital and (2) that the nation-state's status as a sovereign territorial unit and locus of social regulation is being eroded and displaced. This article seeks to correct and clarify these assumptions in a dual manner; first by re-embedding the state in explanations of the migratory process and second analyzing the nation-state's management of movement in order to demonstrate its continued importance and relational ties to globalization. The cases of Canada and Australia will be utilized as empirical reference points as the above assumptions fail to account for their experiences. With the end of the "long boom" of the post-war years both countries adopted extensive managerial policies in which state control over selection was expanded through the adoption of point systems slanted in favor of the highly-skilled and dedicated to evaluating and enumerating the human capital and economic suitability of migrants. These policies allow both countries to continue to engage in nation-building and social regulation through the management of the composition of its population and labor market. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]