tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/nativism-45473/articlesNativism – The Conversation2024-01-25T22:36:01Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2219382024-01-25T22:36:01Z2024-01-25T22:36:01ZIs Argentina’s new president, Javier Milei, a far-right leader? The answer is not simple<p>A shockwave has been rippling through Argentina <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/javier-milei-wins-argentina-presidential-elections-runoff/">since Javier Milei came to power in December</a>, prompting demonstrators to take to the streets in a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/24/argentina-strike-protest-javier-milei">general strike</a> on Wednesday.</p>
<p>With an ideology described as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/12/world/americas/argentina-javier-milei-cuts.html">“anarcho-capitalism,”</a> Milei promises major upheaval in a country with a long tradition of state control, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/argentina-presidential-election-1.7033471">which is now in the throes of a deep economic crisis</a>. </p>
<p>While the radical nature of his proposals won over many Argentines, it also alienated many, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentine-powerful-union-calls-january-strike-action-2023-12-28/">leading to calls for the general strike</a>. </p>
<p>Analysts have tried to understand the ideological links between Milei and the various far-right movements that have emerged over the last 20 years, particularly in Europe and the United States. </p>
<p>As a doctoral student in political science at Laval University, my research focuses on authoritarianism, particularly in Argentina. In the following, I explore the relationship between Milei and the far-right movement. </p>
<h2>Be careful about drawing quick conclusions</h2>
<p>Milei <a href="https://theglobalamericans.org/2023/12/javier-milei-and-the-populist-wave-in-argentina/">can be described as a populist</a>. The description is apt, even natural, if we consider the many references he makes in his speeches to far-right figures such as <a href="https://twitter.com/JMilei/status/1727501082560205296">Donald Trump</a>, Brazil’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/20/trump-bolsonaro-javier-milei-argentina-far-right">Jair Bolsonaro</a> and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/santiago-abascal-who-is-spains-far-right-leader-what-does-he-stand-2023-07-17/">Spain’s Santiago Abascal</a>, president of the Vox formation, <a href="https://thediplomatinspain.com/en/2023/11/milei-invites-abascal-to-his-inauguration-as-argentine-president/">whom he invited to his inauguration</a>.</p>
<p>Milei’s calls to fight “the left,” <a href="https://brusselssignal.eu/2024/01/argentinas-milei-berates-western-neo-marxists-at-world-economic-forum/">his criticism of “cultural Marxism,”</a> and his openly anti-system approach all reinforce this identity.</p>
<p>However, this rather simplistic comparison ignores significant differences in Milei’s program, particularly where his economic and migration policies are concerned. Despite similarities, there are significant differences, particularly in the way each movement understands the role of the state and its relationship to society as a whole. </p>
<p>Specifically, I would like to draw attention to a central difference, namely the role of nationalism, and to the innovations Milei has introduced in the context of the global rise of the right.</p>
<h2>Nativist nationalism at the heart of the far right</h2>
<p>In an article summarizing the far-right political parties in Europe, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-polisci-042814-012441">Matt Golder</a>, professor of political science at Pennsylvania State University, analyzes the scientific literature on them. He finds three elements that are increasingly characteristic of this movement: “nationalism,” “populism,” and “radicalism.”</p>
<p>The nationalism expounded by far-right parties can be described as “nativism.” According to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511492037">Cas Mudde</a>, professor of political science at the University of Georgia, “nativism” is understood as “nationalism plus xenophobia.” It is based on the idea of the existence of an imaginary “native” population <a href="https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-polisci-042814-012441">built on cultural or ethnic features</a>, whose homogeneity must be protected from any element that is foreign and external to it. </p>
<p>With its conception of a homogeneous community, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511492037">nativism is then added to nationalism, which is articulated as the congruence between state and nation</a>. This contributes the element of xenophobia mentioned by Mudde. In so doing, extreme right-wing movements put forward a radicalized preference for anything that can be defined as belonging to the “national community.”</p>
<p>This version of nationalism is well known, and it is easy to find European and American examples of it: <a href="https://gnet-research.org/2023/01/27/mainstreaming-far-right-conspiracies-eric-zemmours-discourse-as-a-case-study/">Éric Zemmour’s calls against the “Great Replacement,”</a> <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/the-snake-song-lyrics-trump-b2464914.html">Trump’s warnings about the danger of immigration</a>, or the Islamophobia of <a href="https://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/interview-with-frauke-petry-of-the-alternative-for-germany-a-1084493.html">the Alternative for Germany party</a>, are some examples. </p>
<p>This nativism on the part of far-right parties is becoming the foundation of their political projects, including their economic policies.</p>
<p>It is on this basis that the contemporary far right is putting forward clear protectionist projects. A large proportion of far-right movements share Euro-scepticism, nationalization and anti-globalization rhetoric. The root of their projects is a belief in a national community, defined either in ethnic or cultural terms, which must be protected from the influence of outside elements. </p>
<h2>Liberalizing the economy, Milei’s priority</h2>
<p>Although the list of promises of Milei’s party may come as a surprise due to their radical nature and breadth, the element of nativism is absent from his rhetoric.</p>
<p>Rather, the plans and platform of his party, La Libertad Avanza (LLA), represent a clear opposition to nativism, which is widespread in Argentina and represented by the Peronist movement. Accusations of his alleged anti-immigration ideology are also unfounded, at least so far.</p>
<p>Milei’s program mentions immigration only marginally. This is evident in LLA’s <a href="https://www.electoral.gob.ar/nuevo/paginas/pdf/plataformas/2023/PASO/JUJUY%2079%20PARTIDO%20RENOVADOR%20FEDERAL%20-PLATAFORMA%20LA%20LIBERTAD%20AVANZA.pdf">electoral platform</a>, where the subjects of “nation” and immigration are relatively absent. </p>
<p>Argentina has in fact received proportionally <a href="https://perspective.usherbrooke.ca/bilan/servlet/BMTendanceStatPays?langue=fr&codePays=ARG&codeTheme=1&codeStat=SM.POP.NETM">fewer immigrants than most European or North American countries in recent years</a>. The debate over immigration is more about the universality of the health and education services, thanks to which everyone, regardless of their migratory status, <a href="https://sherloc.unodc.org/cld/uploads/res/document/ley-de-migraciones-25871-english_html/Ley_de_Migraciones_25871_English.pdf">can benefit from the public health system (even tourists) and free education</a>. Milei is not exactly opposed to immigration (he has <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfNnAKnHxGo">even expressed support for</a> certain types of state spending associated with it).</p>
<p>On the other hand, liberalization has been, and continues to be the pillar of Milei’s program, which is perfectly embodied in the proposal to eliminate the central bank and introduce free monetary competition. <a href="https://www.electoral.gob.ar/nuevo/paginas/pdf/plataformas/2023/PASO/CABA%20501%20LA%20LIBERTAD%20AVANZA%20ADHIERE%20PLATAFORMA%20ON.pdf">His program</a> also includes dollarization, optimizing and reducing the size of the state, opening up to international trade, reforming the labour code, mental health laws and regulations on medical services.</p>
<h2>Wait before judging Milei’s political project</h2>
<p>In other words, in spite of his populist style and the radical nature of his proposals, Milei’s approach makes it difficult to immediately identify him with the European and American far right without further qualification.</p>
<p>This does not necessarily mean that the Milei phenomenon should not be considered part of the extended family of the far right. As <a href="https://www.bbc.com/mundo/articles/c983y398v0do">Cristóbal Rovira, Professor at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile states,</a> not all members of the far-right “family” embrace all its elements. However, it does force us to think twice before making quick and what could be simplistic associations. The fact that Milei has spoken in favour of Trump does not make him, by definition, “Trumpist.”</p>
<p>There are certainly individuals within his political party who are closer to the political projects of Trump or <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/santiago-abascal-who-is-spains-far-right-leader-what-does-he-stand-2023-07-17/">Santiago Abascal</a>. However, Milei’s personal positions largely define what we can expect from his government and the political project he is putting forward.</p>
<p>Although Milei, himself, affirms his ideological kinship with leaders often included in the large family of the contemporary far right, certain elements of his program and the core of his ideology show some distance from this movement. More broadly, in order to understand what is new about a political phenomenon and what this implies, it is important to put it into context.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/221938/count.gif" alt="La Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Federico Chaves Correa ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>Some aspects of Argentine President Javier Milei’s programme resemble the far right, but others do not. Without excluding him from this movement, we should recognize there are differences.Federico Chaves Correa, Doctorant en science politique, Université LavalLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2015472023-03-15T14:15:56Z2023-03-15T14:15:56ZPierre Poilievre is popular among union members. What’s it really all about?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/515160/original/file-20230314-3604-obbknl.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C153%2C6016%2C3845&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre speaks to the crowd gathered at a meet-and-greet in Stoney Creek, Ont., in March 2023. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Alex Lupul</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/pierre-poilievre-is-popular-among-union-members--what-s-it-really-all-about" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>According to a recent poll by Abacus Data, Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives <a href="https://springmag.ca/combatting-poilievres-appeal-to-union-members">are now the top choice of union members in Canada.</a></p>
<p>Overall support for the Conservatives among union members is only slightly lower than the support the party enjoys with the general population. Meanwhile, support for the New Democrats is actually lower among private sector union members than it is among the overall population.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1630651955491078144"}"></div></p>
<p>All of this represents a significant swing from <a href="https://www.ipolitics.ca/news/polls-theres-a-lot-of-tory-blue-on-union-workers-collars-siekierski">polling data collected in 2015</a>, during the last year of Stephen Harper’s Conservative government. </p>
<p>It suggests today’s NDP has failed to offer a credible alternative to the status quo of the governing Liberals. The <a href="https://www.lltjournal.ca/index.php/llt/article/view/5874/6734">increasingly transactional approach to party politics</a> across much of the labour movement is also a factor.</p>
<h2>Union members attracted to populists?</h2>
<p>The development is even more startling when read in the context of <a href="https://www.cgai.ca/northern_populism_causes_and_consequences_of_the_new_ordered_outlook">recent research</a> showing that working-class Canadians appear to be particularly susceptible to far-right populist overtures. </p>
<p>This is despite the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1515/for-2016-0025">well-documented anti-worker and anti-union animus</a> of right-wing populists.</p>
<p>Unions across Canada are formulating strategies for tackling right-wing populism in society and among their own members. </p>
<p>The United Steelworkers have made confronting populism <a href="https://usw.ca/steelworkers-talk-politics-engaging-hearts-and-minds-voter-engagement-and-our-union/">an explicit part of their electoral interventions</a>. It also appears as a central objective in <a href="https://www.unifor.org/sites/default/files/documents/Unifor_Action_Plan-2022%E2%80%932025%20web.pdf">Unifor’s 2022-25 Action Plan</a>.</p>
<p>But the trend also demands self-reflection on the part of the labour movement. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2022.2061866">Nativism, xenophobia and mistrust of global institutions are hallmarks of far-right populism</a>. The labour movement also has a long history of <a href="https://doi.org/10.7202/031148ar">trading on nationalist sentiments</a> to build broad support among their own members and in the wider community.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A woman with dark blonde hair and glasses laughs as people surround her." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/515181/original/file-20230314-3883-pgw6hr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/515181/original/file-20230314-3883-pgw6hr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515181/original/file-20230314-3883-pgw6hr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515181/original/file-20230314-3883-pgw6hr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515181/original/file-20230314-3883-pgw6hr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515181/original/file-20230314-3883-pgw6hr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515181/original/file-20230314-3883-pgw6hr.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Lana Payne celebrates with supporters after being elected as the new president of Unifor — the first woman to hold the position — in Toronto in August 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/ Tijana Martin</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Labour movement nationalism</h2>
<p>In practice, this nationalism has taken many forms, including <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/business/union-launches-i-shop-canada-campaign-to-counter-u-s-trade-moves-1.3992855">Buy Canadian campaigns</a>, <a href="https://canadianlabour.ca/news-news-archive-canadas-unions-unite-protest-over-tpp-trade-deal-announcement/">opposition to free trade</a> and suspicion of <a href="https://doi.org/10.15173/glj.v4i3.1139">U.S.-based international unions in Canada</a>. </p>
<p>Nationalism in the labour movement offered a justification for the heroic takeovers of many plants that were shutting down, including <a href="https://ourtimes.ca/article/everything-is-made-somewhere">Houdaille Bumper in Oshawa</a> in 1980 and <a href="https://www.canplastics.com/canplastics/ontario-auto-trim-plant-to-close/1000023759/#:%7E:text=which%20employ...-,Johnson%20Controls%20Inc.%20has%20announced%20plans%20to%20close%20its%20Stratford,not%20competitive%20with%20similar%20operations.">Johnson Controls</a> in Stratford, Ont., in 1999. However, nationalism in the labour movement has always been more complicated than these accomplishments.</p>
<p>The appearance of Japanese automakers in Ontario’s auto manufacturing industry in the 1980s fuelled <a href="https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10040">racist rhetoric among some local union leaders</a> who characterized it as an “<a href="https://archive.org/details/oshaworker-1986-06-19/page/6/mode/2up">invasion</a>” that threatened to “<a href="https://archive.org/details/oshaworker-1986-05-15/page/8/mode/2up">rape us of our Canadian standards</a>.” Today, those same manufacturers now emphasize their “made-in-Canada” status in their marketing. </p>
<p>In more recent fights with multinational employers, workers have used <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/wusa.12489">nativist language similar to that used by right-wing politicians</a> to characterize their employers’ treatment of the union, emphasizing concerns about “foreigners” exploiting Canadian resources and making off with the profits.</p>
<p>The renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement also <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/07078552.2019.1612163">unearthed concerning similarities</a> between the protectionism advanced by unions and the protectionism of white nationalists and other right-wing populists, especially regarding the threat of competition with Mexico.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1092821503660433408"}"></div></p>
<p>These Canada First politics have meant unions have struggled to establish solidarity with migrant workers. <a href="https://doi.org/10.7202/1025028ar">Their support is often precarious</a>, waning when one crisis or another puts the leadership under pressure to deliver for their members. </p>
<p>Canadian labour nationalism has also <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/030981689104300111">divided workers and their organizations in Québec and the rest of Canada</a>, especially with respect to the question of Québec sovereignty.</p>
<h2>Populism takes hold</h2>
<p>Part of the appeal of labour nationalism is that it cuts across party lines and turns the union’s message into something everyone can get behind. But doing so opens the door to strange bedfellows and provides fertile ground for the nativism of right-wing populism to take hold and spread. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/515184/original/file-20230314-599-xg2cm2.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A Black man tends to dozens of pints of strawberries." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/515184/original/file-20230314-599-xg2cm2.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/515184/original/file-20230314-599-xg2cm2.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515184/original/file-20230314-599-xg2cm2.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515184/original/file-20230314-599-xg2cm2.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515184/original/file-20230314-599-xg2cm2.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515184/original/file-20230314-599-xg2cm2.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/515184/original/file-20230314-599-xg2cm2.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A migrant worker arranges strawberries at a market in Barrie, Ont., in July 2022. Labour nationalism can cause populism to take root and spread.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Christopher Katsarov</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Canada First mentality that characterizes so much of the populist movement here also runs deep in some of the very unions that are the most concerned about the rise of far-right politics.</p>
<p>If unions are serious about understanding the appeal of Poilievre’s Conservatives and confronting the rise of right-wing populism within their own memberships, they also need to reckon with their long and ongoing history of reinforcing nationalism among their members.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/canadian-populism-got-shut-out-this-election-but-its-still-a-growing-movement-168133">Canadian populism got shut out this election — but it's still a growing movement</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>After all, how can unions frame their work as being primarily about defending Canadian interests without leaving their members vulnerable to appeals by populists about what those interests look like and how to advance them? </p>
<p>The goal of the labour movement is to advance the interests of workers everywhere. Simplistic narratives about defending Canada may be expedient in the short run, but in the long run they have likely done more harm than good.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201547/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Chris Fairweather does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The goal of the labour movement is to advance the interests of workers everywhere. Nativist narratives about defending Canada could explain Pierre Poilievre’s popularity among some union members.Chris Fairweather, PhD Candidate, School of Labour Studies, McMaster UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1923872022-11-29T13:35:04Z2022-11-29T13:35:04ZWhite landowners in Hawaii imported Russian workers in the early 1900s, to dilute the labor power of Asians in the islands<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/495424/original/file-20221115-10481-n96l4s.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2705%2C1773&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A newspaper headline and photo show the arrival of the Molokans in Hawaii.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn82015415/1906-03-16/ed-1/seq-5/">The Hawaiian Star via Library of Congress</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>On Feb. 19, 1906, the mail steamer China pulled into the harbor in Honolulu, Hawaii. It had made the voyage from San Pedro, California, many times before, but this trip made front-page news. Local newspapers heralded the arrival of “<a href="https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83025121/1906-02-20/ed-1/seq-1/">one hundred and ten white men, women and children</a>, the vanguard of what promises to be an influx of settlers for the Hawaiian Islands.” </p>
<p>A reporter from the Hawaiian Gazette recorded that they “<a href="https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83025121/1906-02-20/ed-1/seq-5/">looked to be a healthy, moral, God-fearing people</a>.” By contrast, in 1856, some of the first Chinese contract laborers to work in Hawaii had been <a href="http://hdl.handle.net/10524/131">described</a> as a “turbulent, stubborn, reckless class” in need of “influences tending to their improvement and conversion to Christianity” so that there might be “a blessing in store for the Chinese in the Sandwich islands,” a former name for Hawaii.</p>
<p>These white Christians were originally from central southern Russia and were part of a decadelong effort by the wealthy white men who owned Hawaii’s sugar plantations to find laborers who would work hard for little money. But as I have learned during my <a href="https://blogs.iu.edu/russianstudiesworkshop1/2020/08/17/americanization-russification-and-the-contradictory-promises-of-modernity-a-sectarian-groups-great-migration/">research into Russian migration</a> to the U.S. in the early 20th century, their racial background was key to their arrival in Hawaii: They were white immigrants whom the supporters could liken to American Colonial-era settlers and those expanding west across the Great Plains.</p>
<h2>Shifting power in the islands</h2>
<p>Since <a href="https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/from-king-cane-to-the-last-sugar-mill-agricultural-technology-and-the-making-of-hawaiis-premier-crop/">the 1830s</a>, white planters had run massive sugar plantations on the Hawaiian Islands. At first they employed Native Hawaiians. However, the demand for labor grew fast, and as some of the Native population died from European-introduced diseases, there were not enough workers for the industry. In addition, Hawaiians began to organize against meager pay and harsh working conditions <a href="https://www.hawaii.edu/uhwo/clear/home/HawaiiLaborHistory.html">as early as 1841</a>. Faced with a possibility of large-scale unrest, the planters started to recruit contract laborers from Asia in the thousands, especially from China.</p>
<p>White elites, like those who <a href="https://libcom.org/article/us-annexation-hawaii-1893">overthrew the Hawaiian monarchy in 1893</a>, wanted Hawaii to eventually become a state. But opponents, like Humphrey Desmond, editor of the Catholic Citizen newspaper, feared that the Asians living there would become U.S. citizens and “<a href="https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674951914">dilute the citizenship</a>” of the rest of the white-dominated U.S.</p>
<p>Since the 1880s, Hawaiian elites had tried bringing in workers from Portugal and Norway. They received much higher wages than the Asian laborers and were promoted to skilled occupations faster. A few white farmers also made it on their own to Hawaii, but most of them quickly gave up, their efforts defeated by the harsh tropical climate.</p>
<p>In 1898, the U.S. <a href="https://2001-2009.state.gov/r/pa/ho/time/gp/17661.htm">agreed to annex Hawaii</a>, whose population was just over one-fifth European or American in ethnic background. But that meant the plantations could no longer import Asian workers. They were banned under the <a href="https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/chinese-exclusion-act">Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882</a>, which now applied to Hawaii as a U.S. territory.</p>
<p>In addition, the planters now came under pressure from the growing power of the Asian workers already in the islands. In 1904 and 1905, Japanese laborers led strikes on several plantations across Hawaii, in some cases <a href="https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/pau-hana-plantation-life-and-labor-in-hawaii-1835-1920/">winning increased pay and other concessions such as firing of negligent overseers</a>.</p>
<p>Enter the Russians.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/495427/original/file-20221115-25-5qe958.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="People of varying ages look over the rails of a ship." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/495427/original/file-20221115-25-5qe958.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/495427/original/file-20221115-25-5qe958.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=458&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/495427/original/file-20221115-25-5qe958.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=458&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/495427/original/file-20221115-25-5qe958.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=458&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/495427/original/file-20221115-25-5qe958.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=576&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/495427/original/file-20221115-25-5qe958.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=576&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/495427/original/file-20221115-25-5qe958.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=576&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Molokans’ arrival was much hailed as an opportunity for Hawaii, as well as for them.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85047084/1906-02-21/ed-1/seq-6/">The Pacific Commercial Advertiser via Library of Congress</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Moving from the Caucasus</h2>
<p>The new arrivals to Hawaii were known as Molokans. A Christian group that had emerged in the 18th century in central southern Russia, they rejected the teachings of the Orthodox Church, which was closely tied to the Russian government.</p>
<p>Starting in the 1830s, they were <a href="https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9780801477461/heretics-and-colonizers/">exiled to the Caucasus region</a>, where Russia had been expanding its empire through conquest. Though they were considered dangerous heretics in Russia itself, in the Muslim-majority borderlands they became indispensable allies of the czar’s government.</p>
<p>Their rejection of alcohol, their strong work ethic and their considerable skill as farmers won the <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=AnhBAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA163#v=onepage&q&f=false">admiration</a> of officials, travelers and scholars. But in the 1880s they were subjected to a military draft for the first time. They objected and in 1900 began a campaign to leave for North America – where, again, they became viewed as ideal settlers, once they started arriving in 1904-1905. The Molokans found a temporary home in Los Angeles.</p>
<p>But then, as I have learned by studying contemporary press accounts and primary sources from the <a href="https://ags.hawaii.gov/archives/">Hawaii State Archives</a>, they caught the attention of the Hawaiian planters.</p>
<p>One of their champions, Peter Demens, a California lumber merchant with Russian roots, described their life in the Caucasus to Hawaiian planters and media audiences as one of unending triumph of industry over nature: “<a href="https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85047084/1905-11-26/ed-1/seq-1/">In every place they had to do the work of primitive pioneers</a>; to acclimatize themselves, to acquire the knowledge of local conditions, of local customs, usages, and agricultural methods. From the fertile black earth Steppes of central Russia they were moved into the dry, salty deserts of Crimea, which they quickly transformed into blooming gardens.”</p>
<p>Comparing them to European settlers in early America, Demens further highlighted their moral qualities, such as <a href="https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85047084/1905-11-26/ed-1/seq-3/">prohibitions on liquor, tobacco and divorce</a>. He exhorted them as “the only part of the masses who know how to think and who do think.”</p>
<p>In January 1906, the archives reveal, the territorial government and the Molokan leaders signed a land deal. It allowed the Molokans to come to Hawaii to work on a plantation in a land subdivision called Kapa'a on the island of Kauai, learning to cultivate sugar cane and bringing their relatives to join them. When the current plantation company’s lease expired in 1907, the deal pledged that the Molokans could take over, not as wage laborers but as settlers with their own lease rights to 5,000 acres on which to live and work.</p>
<h2>Starting to work the land</h2>
<p>Within a few hours of landing in Honolulu in February 1906, the advance party of 39 families of Molokan settlers set out for Kauai. Once there, they began building houses. The archives show the manager of the Kapa'a plantation was hopeful, calling their effort “a good augury.”</p>
<p>But once they began to learn to farm sugar cane, trouble followed. The hundreds of longtime Japanese, Hawaiian and Portuguese employees were angry that these strangers, fresh off the boat, were in line to receive a lease over the whole plantation. The longtime workers began to find employment elsewhere, leaving the plantation short of labor.</p>
<p>For the Japanese workers, in particular, being displaced by Russians stung: They had won the Russo-Japanese War <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1899-1913/portsmouth-treaty">just months before</a>. Some Japanese workers refused to work with the Russians, citing the recent conflict as the reason in conversations with the plantation manager. Others reported being the objects of Russian aggression, even saying they had been told, “You Japs drove us out of Manchuria, but we will now drive you out of Kapa’a.”</p>
<p>As indicated by plantation manager George Fairchild’s letters to the settlement’s chief supporter, James B. Castle, the Russian settlers then started to act as if they already owned the lease to the Kapa’a lands. They even told other laborers that the other laborers would soon be working for the Russians and tried to sublease local rice paddies to small farmers.</p>
<p>Making matters worse, the Molokans were used to the cool, arid mountains of the Caucasus, not the hot, humid slopes of Hawaii. Archival records show they also resented the strict labor discipline the sugar cane plantation managers required and refused to work more than 10 hours a day, <a href="https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn82015415/1906-03-28/ed-1/seq-3/#date1=03%2F25%2F1906&index=0&date2=03%2F28%2F1906&searchType=advanced&language=&sequence=0&lccn=sn82015415&words=Molokan+MOLOKAN+Molokans&proxdistance=5&rows=20&ortext=&proxtext=&phrasetext=&andtext=Molokans&dateFilterType=range&page=1">earning derision from the locals</a>, who were accustomed to 12-to-14-hour days. And they tried to plan for their eventual takeover of the lease, proposing to the manager that each family work a separate section of cane.</p>
<h2>A short-lived effort</h2>
<p>Having hoped for a peaceful and prosperous settlement, the Molokans faced open resentment by other plantation workers, who likely feared being displaced as more Molokans arrived, and constant complaints from managers about the quality of their work.</p>
<p>Most of them left Kauai, and even Hawaii altogether, by early July 1906 – less than six months after their much-heralded arrival. The failed experiment laid bare the flawed concept of Americanizing the islands by increasing the white population. While other labor migrants, such as Portuguese, earned a better reputation with the planters and remained in numbers sufficient to establish a significant cultural presence in the islands, the demographic makeup of the islands would change little in the coming decades.</p>
<p>The plantations went back to relying on the labor of people already in Hawaii, as well as people arriving from the Philippines, which had <a href="https://history.house.gov/Exhibitions-and-Publications/APA/Historical-Essays/Exclusion-and-Empire/The-Philippines/">recently become a U.S. colony</a>.</p>
<p>But for a brief moment, thanks to widely shared notions of white supremacy and colonization as a positive force, even people as different as the Russian Molokans could be likened to the Pilgrim fathers of American settler myth: people who simply by virtue of their looks and background symbolized civilization, progress and a powerful connection with an imagined past.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/192387/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stepan Serdiukov does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In a territory landowners wanted to become a state, white immigrants were less threatening to American nativists on the mainland.Stepan Serdiukov, Ph.D. Candidate in U.S. History, Indiana UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1814502022-04-21T12:18:35Z2022-04-21T12:18:35ZMany young French voters are approaching the presidential runoff with a shrug and vow to ‘vote blank’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/458944/original/file-20220420-56929-c01pkq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=7%2C23%2C2619%2C1583&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Decisions, decisions.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/woman-walks-past-official-campaign-posters-of-marine-le-pen-news-photo/1392521857?adppopup=true">Chesnot/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The race for the presidential post in France <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220406-the-12-candidates-standing-in-france-s-presidential-election">began with 12 candidates</a>. It will <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/16/europe/macron-le-pen-france-election-runoff-intl/index.html">conclude on April 24</a> with the same choice that confronted voters five years earlier: the centrist Emmanuel Macron or the far-right Marine Le Pen.</p>
<p>Sequels tend to be less inspiring, and the election as a whole has f<a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/poll-shows-gap-between-le-pen-macron-abstention-is-seen-historic-low-2022-04-12/">ailed to spark widespread enthusiasm</a> among <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/france-election-president-2022-abstention-what-if-nobody-came/">many disappointed and often apathetic voters</a>, despite the starkly different visions for France displayed by the candidates.</p>
<p>Before the field was narrowed on April 10, French voters had a quintet of front-runners from across the political spectrum to choose from: Le Pen was <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/france/20210913-%C3%A9ric-zemmour-the-far-right-pundit-who-threatens-to-outflank-le-pen">being outflanked on the far right</a>, and the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/26/world/europe/melenchon-france-election-left.html">far left was at one point surging</a>. Meanwhile, centrist candidates including Macron seemingly failed to get much traction, and the right-wing Valérie Pécresse, representing the once powerful but now divided Les Républicains, ran arguably <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/09/france-presidential-election-macron-v-le-pen">the least successful campaign</a>.</p>
<h2>Grand disillusions of <em>La Grande Nation</em></h2>
<p>The election process has not been without intrigue, not least over the polarized positions and debates between the far-left environmentalist <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/09/france-presidential-election-macron-v-le-pen">Jean-Luc Mélenchon and the far-right polemicist Éric Zemmour</a>. But even here, the two candidates eventually failed to capture enough enthusiasm to propel them into the runoff.</p>
<p>Mélenchon, who prioritized “<a href="https://www.france24.com/en/france/20220417-leftist-party-consultation-shows-majority-will-abstain-vote-blank-in-macron-le-pen-run-off">planification écologique</a>,” or “ecological planning,” which focuses on <a href="https://www.jacobinmag.com/2021/10/jean-luc-melenchon-france-insoumise-political-philosophy-climate-change-short-termism-long-time">sustainability</a>, became only partially popular among young voters, many of whom tend toward a global, pan-European viewpoint at odds with <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/france-presidential-election-2022-emmanuel-macron-marine-le-pen-young-euroskeptics/">Mélenchon’s Euro-scepticism</a> and overall critique of the European Union.</p>
<p>The ultra-right Zemmour <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/30/world/europe/eric-zemmour-france-president.html">captured global headlines</a> through his zealous anti-immigration rhetoric and policies aimed at protecting what he saw as a pure French identity. And he proved quite popular at the beginning of the campaign with a group of youth supporters, numbering around 10,000 members, who called themselves <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/video/20220215-generation-z-pro-zemmour-far-right-youth-group-masters-art-of-posts-posters">Generation Z</a>.</p>
<p>But that name – and the association – quickly became problematic when the letter “Z” became a symbol of <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/03/09/1085471200/the-letter-z-russia-ukraine">Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine</a>. Zemmour’s campaign also suffered from another Z–related faux pas that became known as <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/macron-campaign-problem-president-no-candidate/">Z chez ZZ/</a> or “Z at ZZ.” Zemmour was booted out of the soccer club set up by the great Zizou, as former French national player Zinedine Zidane is affectionately known, after turning up <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/03/french-far-right-politician-eric-zemmour-booted-out-of-zinedine-zidane-football-club">uninvited</a> as part of a publicity stunt. Zemmour’s anti-immigration policies apparently did not sit well with the French-Algerian Zidane.</p>
<p>With both extreme candidates’ campaigns faltering, and those of others failing to ignite, <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/politics/article/2022/04/10/2022-french-presidential-election-a-first-round-marked-by-seriousness-strategic-voting-and-low-turnout_5980223_5.html">one-quarter of French voters stayed away from the ballot</a> on April 10 – the lowest participation rate since 2002. </p>
<p>And <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/france/20220410-live-follow-the-results-of-the-first-round-of-france-s-presidential-election">neither of the two front-runners got even close to the 50%</a> of the vote needed to avoid a runoff – Macron secured just shy of 28%, with Le Pen second on 23%. But the list of candidates shrinking to just two has done little to inject enthusiasm into the race.</p>
<p>Macron has governed France, one of the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/13/france-lift-most-covid-controls-macron-rides-high-polls">most vaccinated nations in Europe</a>, through the COVID-19 crisis and may seem to outsiders as a sure bet – indeed he is thought likely to win the runoff with Le Pen <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/macrons-polling-lead-over-le-pen-widens-ahead-french-presidential-election-2022-04-19/">reasonably comfortably</a>. However, Macron is hardly being carried through on a wave of enthusiasm. His tenure as president to date has been marked by disappointment – with an approval rating that <a href="https://www.politico.eu/europe-poll-of-polls/france/">now hovers in the low 40s</a>.</p>
<p>His image was harmed by the <a href="https://www.npr.org/2018/12/03/672862353/who-are-frances-yellow-vest-protesters-and-what-do-they-want">Yellow Vests</a> movement – protesters who took to the street over the impact of a flat tax and an energy tax. Macron’s handling of the protest resulted in him being widely perceived as an <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/15/macron-finds-elitist-tag-hard-to-shake-but-he-has-the-upper-hand">arrogant representative of the French elite</a>.</p>
<p>Le Pen’s campaign has centered around making the far-right candidate appear more approachable than <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/macron-campaign-problem-president-no-candidate/">Macron</a> by attempting to soften her image – hitherto associated with racism and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/frances-le-pen-proposes-referendum-immigration-if-elected-president-2021-09-27/">anti-immigration sentiments</a>.</p>
<p>As the French newspaper Le Monde summarizes, the choice between Macron and Le Pen pits the “<a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/election-presidentielle-2022/article/2022/04/11/resultats-de-la-presidentielle-2022-le-premier-tour-bouleverse-le-paysage-politique-national_6121578_6059010.html">France of executives and retirees against France of employees and workers, cities against the periphery, European integration against national sovereignty …</a>” It is a choice not simply between the two very different candidates, but between two different futures.</p>
<h2><em>Déjà Vu</em>: Populist vs elitist</h2>
<p>But try as she might, Le Pen will find it hard to extinguish voters’ preexisting reservations concerning the far-right leader. In 2017, Le Pen’s Euro-scepticism, racism, xenophobia and Islamophobia <a href="https://www.natcom.org/communication-currents/france-en-marche-communicating-hope">stained her candidacy</a>. It may well keep many from voting for her this time around. Despite trying to soften her image – her <a href="https://unfccc.int/process-and-meetings/the-paris-agreement/the-paris-agreement">promise to not abandon</a> the <a href="https://unfccc.int/process-and-meetings/the-paris-agreement/the-paris-agreement">global climate agreement </a> and to take care of the French <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/macron-campaign-problem-president-no-candidate/">rural heartlands</a> have helped in this regard – Le Pen still espouses hard-right positions.</p>
<p>She insists on policies such as imposing fines on <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/marine-le-pen-headscarf-france-presidential-campaign-elections/">Muslim women who wear the veil</a> and advocates for Frexit – a French exit from the EU.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, as the war in Ukraine has shifted the focus of political debates, Le Pen has faced criticism over her <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/what-marine-le-pen-said-about-vladimir-putin-friend-admirer-1698984">apparent admiration for Russian president Vladimir Putin</a> and a <a href="https://www.thelocal.fr/20220420/latest-macron-and-le-pen-clash-on-household-finance-and-ukraine-in-live-debate/">previous loan to her party from a Russian bank</a>. Le Pen has had to walk a thin line between repairing her image while upholding her <a href="https://www.liberation.fr/politique/elections/cette-photo-le-pen-poutine-qui-gene-au-rn-20220301_D5PSTOFGCZE2VGQPI6ZWW44X3Q/?redirected=1">friendship with the Kremlin</a>.</p>
<p>The rapidly deteriorating image of Russia in France might well haunt Le Pen on election day.</p>
<p>Macron, meanwhile, has been trying to re-win voters’ hearts in multiple ways. He is openly <a href="https://www.rfi.fr/en/international/20220403-russia-must-answer-for-crimes-in-ukraine-says-france-s-macron-eu-atrocities-bucha">opposing the war in Ukraine</a> – to the extent that he has been accused of “<a href="https://www.indy100.com/news/emmanuel-macron-zelensky-outfit-pictures">cosplaying</a>” Volodymyr Zelenskyy by swapping his usual immaculate suits for the more casual hoodie and jeans preferred by the Ukrainian president. Such sartorial changes are aimed to put across an image of Macron as more approachable, as well as provide a visual juxtaposition to Le Pen’s sympathies for Russia.</p>
<p>Macron has also promised a renewal of his policies to make <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/france/20220417-leftist-party-consultation-shows-majority-will-abstain-vote-blank-in-macron-le-pen-run-off">France an environmental leader</a> of the world.</p>
<p>He aims to reboot the economy, even if that risks potentially unpopular measures, such as <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/03/24/macron-wants-to-push-back-frances-retirement-age-to-65-.html">pushing back the retirement age from 62 to 65</a> or tax increases that might lead to even more civil unrest.</p>
<p>It is a fine balance, though. Many families in France are suffering from the increase in the cost of living. Macron has failed to deliver an increase in <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/macron-knows-inflation-is-le-pens-best-weapon/2022/04/14/27daf744-bbbd-11ec-a92d-c763de818c21_story.html">purchasing power</a> for many voters and has been accused of being “<a href="https://www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/macron-called-president-of-the-rich-in-new-study/1725852">the president of the rich</a>.”</p>
<h2>Between plague and cholera, <em>ce sera blanc</em></h2>
<p>One thing appears likely: 2022 <a href="https://www.economist.com/europe/2022/04/16/the-race-to-be-the-next-president-of-france-enters-the-final-stretch?gclid=CjwKCAjwu_mSBhAYEiwA5BBmfzGia1K02azsdBHLRZr8GiVqds-j42z-nA2gEYSEy1W-b8iXlNLJVRoCdmwQAvD_BwE&amp;gclsrc=aw.ds">will not bring a landslide victory for Macron</a>, especially if the young voters, disappointed in both candidates, abstain. The apathy of the youth, <a href="https://www.france24.com/en/france/20220414-french-students-block-schools-to-protest-choice-between-macron-and-le-pen">disappointed in both candidates</a>, can significantly alter the election’s outcome.</p>
<p>Environmental issues, particularly important for this demographic, are perceived as being not sufficiently prioritized, as seen in the criticism of the candidates by Clément Sénéchal, spokesperson for Greenpeace France, who described Macron and Le Pen as a “<a href="https://information.tv5monde.com/video/presidentielle-2022-un-climato-cynique-et-une-climato-sceptique-denonce-greenpeace">climate cynic” and a “climate skeptic</a>,” respectively.</p>
<p>[<em>Over 150,000 readers rely on The Conversation’s newsletters to understand the world.</em> <a href="https://memberservices.theconversation.com/newsletters/?source=inline-150ksignup">Sign up today</a>.]</p>
<p>And Macron has also <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/macron-campaign-problem-president-no-candidate/">disappointed too many</a> of his young voters with a lack of social dialogue. Some claim that although Le Pen is still worse, it will be <a href="https://www.france24.com/fr/france/20220413-cette-fois-ci-cela-va-%C3%AAtre-humainement-impossible-de-voter-pour-macron">humanly impossible to vote for Macron</a> – as if the choice between the two is like the choice between plague and cholera.</p>
<p>Calls to boycott the upcoming election altogether have become louder in recent weeks. Many have vowed to abstain from the vote, claiming “<a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.fr/entry/ce-dessin-de-joann-sfar-resume-ce-que-beaucoup-de-francais-pensent_fr_6253ec83e4b0e97a3513e9c4">Pour moi ce sera blanc</a>” – “For me, it will be a blank vote.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/181450/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>French voters face a stark choice at the polls, but many are saying ‘non’ to both candidates.Julia Khrebtan-Hörhager, Associate Professor of Critical Cultural & International Studies, Colorado State UniversityEvgeniya Pyatovskaya, Ph.D. Candidate in Communication, University of South FloridaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1546852021-03-16T12:09:19Z2021-03-16T12:09:19ZWhen Americans recall their roots, they open up to immigration<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/388368/original/file-20210308-24-11nqa05.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=84%2C74%2C6090%2C3970&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Migrants pray at a March 2 demonstration at San Ysidro crossing port in Tijuana, Mexico, to demand clearer U.S. migration policies.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/yadiel-garcia-and-his-father-fabricio-from-honduras-kneel-news-photo/1231478713?adppopup=true">Guillermo Arias/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Which was the first generation in your family to arrive in America? Do you know why your family came to the United States? </p>
<p>Members of President Joe Biden’s administration – and key nominees – have answered these questions in their first days in office. </p>
<p>Upon his nomination as Biden’s secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas, a native of Cuba, <a href="https://twitter.com/AliMayorkas/status/1330937834908250115">tweeted</a>: “When I was very young, the United States provided my family and me a place of refuge.” </p>
<p><a href="https://www.state.gov/secretary-antony-j-blinken-with-wolf-blitzer-of-cnns-the-situation-room/">Secretary of State Antony Blinken</a>, Vice President <a href="http://nytimes.com/article/watch-kamala-harris-speech-video-transcript.html">Kamala Harris</a>, Attorney General <a href="https://thehill.com/changing-america/respect/equality/539941-attorney-general-nominee-merrick-garland-chokes-up-about">Merrick Garland</a> and <a href="https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-xavier-becerra-immigration-snap-20170118-story.html">Xavier Becerra</a>, nominee for Health and Human Services secretary, have conveyed similar messages about their immigrant roots.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the Biden administration has moved quickly to relax immigration restrictions, <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/02/02/fact-sheet-president-biden-outlines-steps-to-reform-our-immigration-system-by-keeping-families-together-addressing-the-root-causes-of-irregular-migration-and-streamlining-the-legal-immigration-syst/">issuing executive orders</a> to halt or reevaluate many of former President Donald Trump’s policies. </p>
<p>And Congress will soon consider the administration’s <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2021/02/11/house-democrats-biden-immigration-plan-468720">expansive immigration reform bill</a>. Polls suggest <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-biden-immigration-bill/bidens-bold-immigration-overhaul-may-face-a-republican-wall-in-congress-idUSKBN29R03L">60% of Americans</a> support some of its policies, such as a path to citizenship for immigrants in the country illegally. </p>
<p>But the legislation faces strong opposition from Republican lawmakers.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/american-political-science-review/article/family-matters-how-immigrant-histories-can-promote-inclusion/871DB7A02565D65FB0584FE89D7EF35D">Our research</a> suggests that reminding Americans of where they came from – such as the statements by Biden administration officials – creates empathy for immigrants, generating more favorable attitudes toward immigration.</p>
<h2>A history of migration – and xenophobia</h2>
<p>Migration is a key component of the American story. Successive waves of migrants have reshaped the U.S. socially and politically from the 16th century to the present. </p>
<p>Yet this history of migration has coexisted with xenophobia: a form of prejudice against people from other countries. This prejudice has fluctuated over time, sometimes acquiring significant <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/233150241700500111">political influence</a>.</p>
<p>U.S. immigration policies have often been highly restrictive as a result, particularly for nonwhite and non-Christian peoples. The <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/149437/echoes-chinese-exclusion">1882 Chinese Exclusion Act</a> and the <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/hispanic/2015/09/28/chapter-1-the-nations-immigration-laws-1920-to-today/">immigration quotas of the early 1920s</a> are just two instances.</p>
<p>Trump is the latest example of a political leader <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/trump-has-spread-more-hatred-of-immigrants-than-any-american-in-history/2019/11/07/7e253236-ff54-11e9-8bab-0fc209e065a8_story.html">leveraging anti-immigrant attitudes</a> to seek votes and limit migration into the country. </p>
<p>While Americans have become <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/08/20/key-findings-about-u-s-immigrants/ft_2020-08-20_immigrants_12/">more supportive</a> of immigration since the 1990s, including during Trump’s presidency, public opinion toward immigration has also <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2018/06/28/shifting-public-views-on-legal-immigration-into-the-u-s/">polarized</a> along partisan lines. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Immigrants hold up their hands." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/388369/original/file-20210308-13-daf8ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/388369/original/file-20210308-13-daf8ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388369/original/file-20210308-13-daf8ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388369/original/file-20210308-13-daf8ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388369/original/file-20210308-13-daf8ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388369/original/file-20210308-13-daf8ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388369/original/file-20210308-13-daf8ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Immigrants recite the Oath of Allegiance during a Feb. 24 naturalization ceremony in Los Angeles.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/russell-kwan-united-states-citizenship-and-immigration-news-photo/1231365949?adppopup=true">Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Using family histories to advocate for immigrants</h2>
<p>Biden administration officials are not the first political leaders to reference family migration histories when talking about immigration.</p>
<p>The narrative of America as a “melting pot” has a long history. </p>
<p>Educators have used <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/23413750?seq=1">radio programs</a>, school curricula and history textbooks to draw explicit links between America’s migration history and contemporary immigration issues.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.yesmagazine.org/social-justice/2020/01/09/history-teachers-immigration-policy/">Some curricula use structured exercises</a> to have students reflect on how their own families’ migration experiences relate to immigration issues.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/american-political-science-review/article/family-matters-how-immigrant-histories-can-promote-inclusion/871DB7A02565D65FB0584FE89D7EF35D">Our own research</a> shows that this narrative can shift U.S. public opinion to become more favorable toward immigrants. </p>
<p>Across three surveys conducted in 2018 and 2019, we asked 6,000 respondents to remember their family migration histories. We also asked them about their views on immigration.</p>
<p>Respondents – including both Democrats and Republicans – who were randomly assigned to think about their family history before telling us their immigration preferences expressed more favorable feelings toward immigrants. </p>
<p>They also showed a preference for more open immigration policies than respondents who were not asked to think about their family history first.</p>
<p>Our results suggest that thinking about family history had this effect because it creates more empathy for contemporary immigrants. </p>
<h2>Empathy and attitudes toward migration</h2>
<p>Our findings indicate that immigration advocates are pursuing an effective strategy when they remind Americans of their migrant heritage. </p>
<p>When the <a href="https://www.bushcenter.org/publications/resources-reports/reports/immigration.html">George W. Bush Presidential Center</a> emphasizes that the U.S. is “A Nation Built By Immigrants,” or the <a href="https://www.carnegie.org/interactives/immigration-reform/#!/">Carnegie Corp.</a> asserts that “America’s Story” is “An Immigrant Story,” Americans who hear these messages tend to reflect on their own connections to immigration. It also spurs them to empathize more with today’s immigrants.</p>
<p>Our research may also help explain why Americans are <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2019/03/14/around-the-world-more-say-immigrants-are-a-strength-than-a-burden/">more supportive</a> of immigration than citizens of many other countries, where immigration typically plays a smaller role in their self-perceptions.</p>
<p>Negativity toward migrants, stoked by <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/22/us/immigrants-arent-taking-americans-jobs-new-study-finds.html">factually inaccurate</a> threat narratives – that migrants steal jobs and overrun schools and hospitals – is the norm in many countries. But reminding people what they share with immigrants can help build support for more inclusive policies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/154685/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Research suggests that reminding Americans – Democrats and Republicans – of their family history creates empathy for immigrants and more favorable views toward immigration.Claire L. Adida, Associate Professor, Political Science, University of California, San DiegoAdeline Lo, Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Wisconsin-MadisonLauren Prather, Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of California, San DiegoMelina Platas, Assistant Professor of Political Science, New York UniversityScott Williamson, Postdoctoral Associate, Division of Social Science, New York UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1304122020-02-13T12:42:15Z2020-02-13T12:42:15ZWe expect cities to foster multiculturalism – but they are struggling<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314432/original/file-20200210-109916-5njvfc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C9%2C6190%2C4055&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/blurred-crowd-unrecognizable-street-1435893959">Shutterstock/Aleksandr Ozerov</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>During the past decade the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/14/multiculturalism-failed-substantial-minority-britons-integration-rivers-blood-enoch-powell">idea</a> that multiculturalism <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/dd122a8c-8720-11e7-8bb1-5ba57d47eff7">is a failed experiment</a> has spread across Europe. The introduction <a href="https://theconversation.com/hostile-environment-the-uk-governments-draconian-immigration-policy-explained-95460">of policies</a> that <a href="https://theconversation.com/as-eu-stresses-the-migration-crisis-is-over-italy-makes-hundreds-of-migrants-homeless-113137">target migrants</a> and people of <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/145600/emmanuel-macrons-anti-terror-law-throwback-bad-days-colonialism">migrant backgrounds</a> seem to suggest that the “multicultural moment” – if ever there was one – is truly over.</p>
<p>In this environment, many are looking to cities for fresh ideas about how to build a more <a href="http://www.oecd-inclusive.com/champion-mayors/about/">inclusive</a>, <a href="https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300209327/if-mayors-ruled-world">just</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/mayors-of-94-cities-are-taking-the-green-new-deal-global-as-states-fail-to-act-on-climate-crisis-125282">sustainable</a> multicultural society. According to city network <a href="https://www.100days.eurocities.eu/about">Eurocities</a>, “the future of Europe depends on its cities”.</p>
<p>However, <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0042098019884214">my research</a> shows that cities’ ability to foster ethnic and racial inclusion is being limited by austerity and the rise of beliefs that “native” cultures and people should come first.</p>
<h2>Great expectations</h2>
<p>The expectation that cities have the answer to how to make diversity work comes from the idea that they are natural locations for creativity and meetings between cultures. This overlooks the <a href="https://theconversation.com/inequality-is-being-built-into-cities-segregated-playgrounds-are-just-the-start-115676">inequality and segregation</a> also found in cities. </p>
<p>Nevertheless, many cities seem to have bought into the idea of their progressive potential. <a href="https://www.100days.eurocities.eu/">Eurocities</a> is marking the first 100 days of the new EU Commission with examples of cities that can inspire the EU through their innovative ways of tackling “European challenges”. </p>
<p>These include Bulgarian capital Sofia’s <a href="https://www.100days.eurocities.eu/article/Sandboxing-migration-">inclusive approach</a> to providing services to newcomers; Oslo’s <a href="https://www.100days.eurocities.eu/article/Go-extra-large">business incubator</a> for young people which includes migrants; and Berlin’s <a href="https://www.100days.eurocities.eu/article/No-place-like-home">Roma inclusion programme</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313676/original/file-20200205-149752-ydy4pq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313676/original/file-20200205-149752-ydy4pq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=207&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313676/original/file-20200205-149752-ydy4pq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=207&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313676/original/file-20200205-149752-ydy4pq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=207&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313676/original/file-20200205-149752-ydy4pq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=260&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313676/original/file-20200205-149752-ydy4pq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=260&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313676/original/file-20200205-149752-ydy4pq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=260&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The City of Tolerance mural, Lisbon, Portugal.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But do cities really hold the key to a more inclusive future? My <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0042098019884214">research</a> on <a href="http://www.multiculturalcities.com/">multicultural cities</a> shows that the answer to this question is a moving target: ideas about which policies cities should introduce to promote ethnic, racial and religious inclusion have shifted over time. </p>
<p>Austerity is one cause of this shift. Councils’ budgets have been slashed by central government cuts and reduced local tax revenues. At the same time, more social policies – like care for vulnerable residents, tackling homelessness and indeed <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/creating-the-conditions-for-a-more-integrated-society">integration</a> – are being passed down to local administrations to deal with. With the number of people at risk of poverty having increased <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/sources/docoffic/official/reports/interim8/interim8_en.pdf">twice as much in cities than in other areas</a>, cities increasingly <a href="https://www.centreforcities.org/reader/cities-outlook-2019/a-decade-of-austerity/">struggle to meet needs</a>. </p>
<p>An additional issue is the growth of nativism. This calls for policymakers to prioritise the needs of “native” people: think of “British jobs for British workers” or “<em>prima gli Italiani</em>” – “Italians first”.</p>
<p>This combination of austerity and nativism puts cities who commit to promoting ethnic and racial inclusion in a tight spot. They must do it with reduced budgets and in the face of growing hostility to spending limited resources on “non-natives”. This is changing the ways city officials think about inclusion.</p>
<h2>Targeting individuals</h2>
<p>One place to look for changes in cities’ approach to multiculturalism is in the documents produced by the transnational networks that cities join to exchange best practices and come up with common agendas. These include <a href="http://www.integratingcities.eu/">Eurocities</a> or the Council of Europe’s <a href="https://www.coe.int/en/web/interculturalcities">Intercultural Cities Programme</a>. Two broad shifts have taken place. </p>
<p>First, networks are increasingly promoting policies that target individuals rather than groups. These include <a href="http://www.integratingcities.eu/integrating-cities/projects/cities-grow">programmes</a> such as employability training, or start-up incubators aimed at improving the skills and life chances of individuals regardless of their ethnic background. These are preferred to policies that are specifically designed to include a particularly excluded ethnic group in – say – local decision-making. </p>
<p>The networks’ reasoning is that it is better to avoid as much as possible group-based policies that will create <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/12/14/angela-merkel-multiculturalism-is-a-sham/">parallel societies</a> – one of the main criticisms of multiculturalism. These policies focused on individuals are also considered to be a budget-saving measure, as they can often be delivered by adding inclusion into existing programmes – what is called “<a href="https://www.ingentaconnect.com/contentone/tpp/pap/2017/00000045/00000004/art00003">mainstreaming</a>” – rather than launching new expensive ones.</p>
<h2>A pragmatic approach</h2>
<p>At the same time, the networks are celebrating the way cities <a href="http://www.eurocities.eu/eurocities/news/-We-are-the-Pragma-Party-WSPO-BJHN6Z">are finding pragmatic solutions</a> to politically charged questions. They point to <a href="https://www.coe.int/en/web/interculturalcities/-/the-intercultural-week-of-portimao#33732787_25631098_True">best practices</a> that respond to cultural divisions with projects – like festivals, arts or theatre groups – that promote contact between cultures and improve “community cohesion”. Or <a href="https://www.uia-initiative.eu/en/uia-cities/birmingham">projects</a> that tackle poverty among migrants by helping them get into the job market or start a business.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314021/original/file-20200206-43123-1vngqyq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314021/original/file-20200206-43123-1vngqyq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=292&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314021/original/file-20200206-43123-1vngqyq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=292&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314021/original/file-20200206-43123-1vngqyq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=292&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314021/original/file-20200206-43123-1vngqyq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314021/original/file-20200206-43123-1vngqyq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314021/original/file-20200206-43123-1vngqyq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Street signs in English and Bengali in London, UK.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/brick-lane-street-sign-east-end-352739471">Shutterstock/S J Francis</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This approach presents highly charged issues in practical, problem-solving terms –in a way that focusing on rights, for example, does not. It is also a response to austerity. It can save money as community cohesion programmes are usually delivered through the charitable or voluntary sectors. And it can be “sold” as an investment that makes business sense for the city, since there is evidence that more diverse <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/4f4b3c8e-d521-11e3-9187-00144feabdc0">companies</a> and <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/news/culture-and-creativity-help-cities-thrive">places</a> do better financially.</p>
<p>But does this mean that austerity and the pressure to put “natives” first are influencing cities’ policies to such an extent that we shouldn’t expect anything truly innovative to come out of them? Or can we expect cities to challenge these pressures? The brief answer to these questions is a bit of both. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/mayors-of-94-cities-are-taking-the-green-new-deal-global-as-states-fail-to-act-on-climate-crisis-125282">Mayors of 94 cities are taking the Green New Deal global, as states fail to act on climate crisis</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The attempts by some cities in Europe and <a href="https://theconversation.com/debate-how-sanctuary-cities-in-the-us-stand-up-to-federal-immigration-enforcement-105180">beyond</a> to oppose anti-migrant legislation and <a href="https://cura.our.dmu.ac.uk/2018/07/02/municipal-what-reflections-on-municipalsocialism-in-the-21st-century/">challenge austerity</a> are cause for hope. For example, <a href="https://theconversation.com/centre-left-italian-mayors-are-refusing-to-implement-a-government-decree-targeting-migrants-109751">mayors in Italy</a> refused to comply with a government decree which limited the rights of migrants. However, the trends discussed above should also make us cautious. </p>
<p>The combination of austerity and nativism means that the ways we think about what an inclusive city can and should do are changing. This is not necessarily all bad. For example, making inclusion a part of all aspects of local policy-making could deliver better results than group-targeted programmes, provided it is not done simply to cut costs. </p>
<p>However, city governments are making these policy choices under strong pressures to work with fewer resources and to do it in ways that do not provoke a backlash from the “natives”. This shrinks their policy options. Cities might indeed be able to create a more inclusive future, but they face a great challenge in doing so.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/130412/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Licia Cianetti receives funding for the project "What Happened to the Multicultural City? Effects of Austerity and Nativism" from the Leverhulme Trust (grant no. ECF-2018-294). Initial funding for some of this research was provided by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, Portugal (grant no. SFRH/BPD/120310/2016).</span></em></p>Attempts by municipal councils to be inclusive towards their ethnic minorities are being hampered by austerity and rising nationalism.Licia Cianetti, Leverhulme Early Career Fellow, Royal Holloway University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1078722019-01-07T11:42:46Z2019-01-07T11:42:46ZWhite right? How demographics is changing US politics<p>When Donald Trump was campaigning to become the U.S. president, much of the discussion about his growing popularity focused on so-called “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jan/08/angry-white-men-love-donald-trump">angry white males</a>,” who had been struggling through years of declining economic opportunities. Their frustration led some of them to adopt and espouse <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/08/18/us/ordinary-white-supremacists/index.html">white supremacist ideology</a>.</p>
<p>In many media portrayals, these men, their anger and their sometimes extreme views on how to return to economic and political relevance were treated as a new phenomenon. </p>
<p>But as a <a href="https://sites.tufts.edu/css/about/monica-duffy-toft/">scholar of demography and civil war</a>, I can say definitively that none of this is actually new. Declining opportunities for white males and racist ideology have long been features of U.S. politics, from at least the 1930s until now. </p>
<p>So, the real question is, why are we seeing an upsurge of white nativism among white males now – a nativism which combines anger over lost status with a historically bankrupt white supremacist ideology?</p>
<h2>Lagging whites, growing minorities</h2>
<p>According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s data, all racial and ethnic minorities are growing faster than whites. Interestingly, one of the fastest growing groups in this country is “mixed race” (full disclosure: my children are such, being both Mexican- and Irish-American). </p>
<p><iframe id="qG0iI" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/qG0iI/2/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Still, at 198 million, non-Hispanic whites remained the largest group of Americans in 2014; followed by Hispanics at 55.4 million, and blacks or African-Americans at 42 million. Those who identified with two or more races <a href="https://www.census.gov//content/dam/Census/library/publications/2015/demo/p25-1143.pdf">stood at just under 8 million</a>. </p>
<p>The Census Bureau projects the crossover point at which the non-Hispanic white population will no longer be a majority will occur in 2044. In fact, no one group will comprise a majority. We will become a plural nation of different ethnic and racial groups.</p>
<h2>Demography and democracy</h2>
<p>That powerful shift in the makeup of the U.S. population has created ideal conditions for a political backlash against people of color, including Hispanics, blacks, Asians and especially immigrants of color. </p>
<p>One prominent example: President Trump’s lament that the U.S. was being <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/368576-trump-rips-protections-for-immigrants-from-shithole-countries-in">overwhelmed by immigrants from “s-hole countries,”</a> rather than from places like Norway. </p>
<p>The backlash also extends to the political leaders who support minorities’ right to be accepted and respected as Americans.</p>
<p>These communities of color remain in the minority. But already in some states, white voters as distinct from all whites are in the minority, and nationally, <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2016/07/01/484325664/babies-of-color-are-now-the-majority-census-says">whites are unlikely to remain in the majority for long</a>. </p>
<p>In California, for example, <a href="https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article25940218.html">non-white populations now make up 62 percent of the population</a>, with Hispanic and white populations at near parity at 38 percent each. </p>
<p>Texas, New Mexico and Arizona are among three southern states where the <a href="https://statisticalatlas.com/state/California/Race-and-Ethnicity">gap between Hispanic minorities and white majorities is closing</a>. Like Florida, these are also states with difficult-to-seal borders and with well-established immigrant communities.</p>
<h2>Politics and population shifts</h2>
<p>For two decades, I have been studying how population shifts across nation-states have led to their collapse. In some cases, those collapses have been violent, such as in <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-14649284">Lebanon in the 1970s</a> and <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1989-1992/collapse-soviet-union">the Soviet Union</a> in the 1990s. </p>
<p>Now, demographic dynamics we previously witnessed in “other” or “developing” states are happening in the U.S.</p>
<p>In places where white people have been a demographic majority, white nativism – characterized by the longing for a period when whites were dominant political and economically – arises when some of the majority white population fears for the loss of its stature relative to non-white populations. And in the U.S., <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2016/07/01/484325664/babies-of-color-are-now-the-majority-census-says">non-whites have higher birth rates and make up the bulk of new immigrants</a>. </p>
<p>As populations shift in democracies, the key question is which group challenges these changes, when – and how? Is it the expanding minority or the declining majority? Is it a combination of fear and desire for change emanating from both the declining majority and rising minority?</p>
<h2>Fighting for lost dominance</h2>
<p>My research reveals that it is the declining majority that tends to act aggressively, often imagining <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/03050620701449025">it must preempt a rising minority</a>. Simply put, declining majorities don’t want to yield their status or hegemony.</p>
<p>This turns demographic shifts into a struggle about power and dominance, with elements of the majority refusing to cede ground to emergent new pluralities and majorities that might displace them. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/252531/original/file-20190104-32145-zyx5qe.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/252531/original/file-20190104-32145-zyx5qe.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/252531/original/file-20190104-32145-zyx5qe.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/252531/original/file-20190104-32145-zyx5qe.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/252531/original/file-20190104-32145-zyx5qe.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/252531/original/file-20190104-32145-zyx5qe.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/252531/original/file-20190104-32145-zyx5qe.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">President Trump’s travel ban targeted Muslims.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2017-02-01/pdf/2017-02281.pdf">Government Publishing Office</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The result, historically, follows a general pattern: The declining majority resorts to various forms of apartheid, including changes to voting laws, voter suppression and new restrictions on immigrants, and requirements for citizenship. </p>
<p>Examples include Israel’s successive moves to <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2015/10/10/445343896/in-israel-a-new-battle-over-who-qualifies-as-jewish">tighten the definition of who is a Jew</a>; <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/world/europe/britain-european-union-brexit.html">Britain’s 2016 referendum on membership in the European Union</a> (for working-class Brits, the immigrants of “color” were Pakistanis and Poles); and the new <a href="https://www.politico.com/interactives/2018/trump-travel-ban-supreme-court-decision-countries-map/">U.S. ban on immigrants from seven predominately Muslim countries</a>.</p>
<p>Only rarely do a declining majority’s efforts to maintain dominance escalate to violence or state collapse, as was <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1991/12/26/world/end-of-the-soviet-union-the-soviet-state-born-of-a-dream-dies.html">the case with the Soviet Union</a>. </p>
<h2>From demographic to political decline</h2>
<p>Mirroring the decline in fortunes of the “angry white male” who supported President Trump is the declining fortunes of the Republican Party. </p>
<p>The current U.S. president leads a minority political party whose <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2018/03/20/1-trends-in-party-affiliation-among-demographic-groups/">membership has been in decline for over two decades</a>. </p>
<p>President Trump <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2016/12/21/politics/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-popular-vote-final-count/index.html">lost the general election by over 3 million votes</a>. The number of U.S. citizens of voting age <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2018/03/20/1-trends-in-party-affiliation-among-demographic-groups/">who identify as Republicans</a> has dropped steadily since 1994, compared to those who identify as Democrat or Independent.</p>
<p>The GOP has managed its decline in exactly the same way a declining white majority population might have done: It has resorted to extreme gerrymandering, voter suppression, calls for limits on immigration, and now citizenship restrictions. </p>
<p>The president’s angry rhetoric has arguably been responsible for fomenting a rise in overt bigotry, and in rare but an increasing number of cases, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/in-the-united-states-right-wing-violence-is-on-the-rise/2018/11/25/61f7f24a-deb4-11e8-85df-7a6b4d25cfbb_story.html?utm_term=.b5b3a3abe07e">violence against non-white immigrants, and ethnic, religious, disabled and LGBTQ minorities</a>. In one documented case, a 56 year-old Trump supporter named <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/26/nyregion/cnn-cory-booker-pipe-bombs-sent.html">Cesar Sayoc mailed a series of bombs to “Trump critics.”</a> His van, in which he had apparently been living, was covered with often violent imagery directed against people of color and political opponents of President Trump, including a sticker featuring then-Representative Nancy Pelosi with rifle-scope crosshairs superimposed.</p>
<p>The partisan divide is further fueled by the conflict over whether non-white immigration is a threat to U.S. security and prosperity.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/02/26/key-facts-about-u-s-immigration-policies-and-proposed-changes/">Immigration to the U.S.</a> has been fairly constant since 1990. </p>
<p>What has changed is the number of refugees fleeing civil wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia and Syria <a href="https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/us-accepted-refugees-2018/">who are coming to the U.S.</a> According to the United Nations Refugee Agency, there are 65.6 million forcibly displaced people in the world – a population greater than that of the U.K. – of which about <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/en-us/figures-at-a-glance.html">one-third, 25.4 million, are refugees</a>. </p>
<p>The numbers of refugees and asylum-seekers has been increasing since 2013. At the end of 2013, the U.S. hosted 348,005 people of concern – which includes refugees and asylum-seekers. By the end of 2017, that number rose to 929,850, with <a href="http://popstats.unhcr.org/en/overview#_ga=2.82367446.119990439.1544648438-1408415619.1544648438">asylum-seekers responsible for the significant increase</a>.</p>
<p>The research shows that immigrants are a net drain on national resources for the first few years they are here. But after those first years, the <a href="https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2018/jan/23/donald-trump/does-immigration-policy-impose-300-billion-annuall/">costs and benefits of their participation balance out</a>.</p>
<h2>White nativism: Why now?</h2>
<p>Though economic opportunity – and specifically the decline in blue-collar jobs capable of supporting a family – affects the popularity of white nativism, it does not explain its timing. </p>
<p>The “why now” of white nativism is due to decades of demographic decline for white Americans combined with <a href="https://theconversation.com/fight-for-federal-right-to-education-takes-a-new-turn-108322">a serious decline in public education standards</a> that leads to unwarranted nostalgia and openness to conspiracy theories. </p>
<p>Add to that the charismatic leadership of Donald J. Trump, who attached white majority fears of status loss with criminalizing immigrants of color. That has stoked the flames of an already smoking fire.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/107872/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Monica Duffy Toft does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In the US, non-whites have higher birth rates and make up the bulk of new immigrants. As white people lose their demographic majority, some will resist the accompanying political changes.Monica Duffy Toft, Director of the Center for Strategic Studies at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1080282018-12-11T22:19:25Z2018-12-11T22:19:25Z‘Divided we stand’: looking back to the 1920s to understand the United States today<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/249733/original/file-20181210-76977-w5ge3n.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C8%2C1197%2C734&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A 1903 drawing by Louis Dalrymple depicts European immigrants as "rats" (in the magazine _Judge_).</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">New York Public Library</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The day after the US midterm elections in 2018, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/08/opinion/midterms-senate-rural-urban.html">Paul Krugman wrote in the <em>New York Times</em></a> about the opposition between a “real America”, representing urban, diverse and educated in the House and a “Senate America,” mostly white, rural and uneducated. With this blunt remark, Krugman challenged the democratic nature of the the American legislative branch of government established by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_One_of_the_United_States_Constitution#Section_3:_Senate">article 1 of the US Constitution</a> 200 years ago. As the United States moves toward the 2020 presidential elections, to be held in November, the divide has only deepened.</p>
<p>This <a href="http://harvardlpr.com/online-articles/the-democratic-deficit-in-america/">democratic deficit</a> is nothing new but the deepening of the geographical racial, gender educational divisions has made it more acute, especially since the 2016 elections (<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/11/16/us/politics/the-two-americas-of-2016.html">here</a>, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/after-trumps-election-there-are-two-americas-now/2016/11/21/12fa26c8-acec-11e6-8b45-f8e493f06fcd_story.html?utm_term=.ec9f6f948f92">here</a>, <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/how-2016-election-exposed-america-s-racial-cultural-divides-n682306">here</a> or <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/la/book/9783319580937">here</a>). Regarding these divisions, today’s America is a lot like the <a href="http://americanhistory.oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780199329175.001.0001/acrefore-9780199329175-e-418">America of 1920s</a>. After all, the “roaring ‘20s” were also the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSV5_nzxo0s">“tribal '20s</a>.”</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/eSV5_nzxo0s?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>The fear of a foreign and threatening “Other”</h2>
<p>Back then, just like today, rapid change in society was a prime reason for the tension – the most critical change having to do with demography and ethnicity. These changes bring back to the surface <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2017-12-12/americas-original-sin">America’s original sin</a>: a nation defined exclusively in terms of <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/id/24714378/ns/us_news-gut_check/t/s-s-immigration-defining-whiteness/#.W-xBGZNKjUJ">whiteness</a>, which explains why immigration is such a hot divisive issue. Today, the fear of immigration focuses <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/01/us/politics/trump-immigration.html">on hispanics</a>. In the 1920s, it was centered on <a href="http://www.understandingrace.net/history/gov/eastern_southern_immigration.html">Southern and Eastern Europeans</a>.</p>
<p>In both cases, it is fed by a rhetoric of fear of invasion of an external “other” who might threaten the very existence of the national community – the bolsheviks and the anarchists in the 1920s (let’s not forget the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Red_Scare">first Red Scare</a> or the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palmer_Raids">Palmer Reds</a>); the gang member (<a href="https://theconversation.com/republican-ads-feature-ms-13-hoping-fear-will-motivate-voters-105474">MS13</a>) and <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2018/10/23/pence-caravan-middle-easterners-933657">the terrorist</a> today. Either way, immigrants are always depicted as criminals. In the 1920s, the Italians were <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2831353/">“blamed for driving up the crime rate”</a>. Today, it is the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/video_and_audio/headlines/37230916/drug-dealers-criminals-rapists-what-trump-thinks-of-mexicans">Mexicans</a> or <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/10/18/17994508/migrant-caravan-honduras-trump-tweet">Central Americans</a>. This type of rhetoric hits a raw nerve in homogeneous <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/in-rural-america-fewer-immigrants-and-less-tolerance/2017/06/16/7b448454-4d1d-11e7-bc1b-fddbd8359dee_story.html?utm_term=.b72c3390955d">communities who are less exposed to diversity and more easily fantasise about it</a>.</p>
<p>It is not without political consequences. In 1924, the most restrictive immigration law (the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_Act_of_1924">Johnson–Reed Act</a>) was signed by President Hoover. In 2018, the birthright citizenship guaranteed by the 14th amendment to the US Constitution is <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/30/us/politics/trump-birthright-citizenship.html">being challenged by the president</a> with the threat of an executive order. More than economics, immigration is the reason why <a href="https://www.collingwoodresearch.com/uploads/8/3/6/0/8360930/flipping-trump-immigration.pdf?fbclid=IwAR0HjpjNvzok1t5x1WDnpmm1tnjPgQMcuLMR-mslhI4e91ancwp8_PFfSB4">the white working class vote shifted</a> toward Trump.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YxZkg0rOWI4?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>The rise of racist rhetoric</h2>
<p>Similar to the 1920s, but thankfully to a lesser degree, this fear of immigration has fueled <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/13/us/hate-crimes-fbi-2017.html">the rise</a> of xenophobic, racist and anti-semite forms of expression.</p>
<p>The hundreds of White Supremacists who protested in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/11/us/white-nationalists-rally-charlottesville-virginia.html">Charlottesville in August, 2017</a> and again in Washington D.C. a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/washington-readies-for-todays-planned-white-supremacist-rally-near-white-house/2018/08/12/551720c4-9c28-11e8-8d5e-c6c594024954_story.html?utm_term=.63a32ca72dbc">year later</a> have been the most visible ones, even if they pale in comparison to the <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/12/second-klan/509468/">50,000 Ku Klux Klan demonstrator who paraded through the streets of Washington</a> in 1925. <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/146616/kkks-attempt-define-america">Yesterday’s KKK</a> and today’s <a href="http://time.com/5431089/trump-white-nationalism-bible/">white nationalists</a> have something in common: they both try to redefine what it means to be an American by using a rhetoric of exclusion while claiming ownership through patriotic symbols.</p>
<p>The 1920s were also characterised by the divide between <a href="https://takenol.weebly.com/traditionalism-vs-modernism.html">modernists and traditionalists</a> that presaged today’s <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/07/AR2008030702847.html">culture war</a>.</p>
<p>The hot button issues like the prohibition, evolution and sexual freedom are echoed in today’s debates over gun rights, climate change and the role of religion in society. Then, as now, <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/12/the-return-of-the-1920s/422163/">these issues demonstrate a similar tension</a> between a more conservative, whiter and more patriarchal society on the one hand, and the construction of a more open, diverse and progressive society on the other. So it is not surprising that in both eras, the tension also centers on the role of women, religion, minorities and the role of science. Those divisions seem to be neatly divided along the traditional geographic fault lines separating the rural from the urban areas, <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2018/04/21/how-cities-split-nation/Tuambz5XWFKPkriMqguXmK/story.html">today</a> as <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24446743?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">in the past</a>. Certainly from an economic standpoint, rapid change spurred by technological advances has had dire consequences on the more traditional sectors: <a href="https://eh.net/encyclopedia/the-u-s-economy-in-the-1920s/">the farming and mining industries</a> in the 1920s, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/nov/05/five-us-industry-sectors-decline-voters-trump">steel, textile, coal and manufacturing</a> today.</p>
<h2>A political decline</h2>
<p>The analogy with the 1920s also extends to politics. For instance, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1928">1928 elections</a>, just like the <a href="http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2017/04/the-urban-rural-divide-matters-more-than-red-vs-blue-state.html">2016</a> and <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/415441-americas-urban-rural-divide-deepens">2018</a> elections, were notable for the electoral divide between urban and rural areas. Also, there are a number of similarities between President Herbert Hoover and President Donald Trump:</p>
<p>Both have supported protectionist measures: Hoover raised tariffs on agricultural products (the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoot%E2%80%93Hawley_Tariff_Act">Hawley-Smoot Act</a>) despite the overall condemnation of <a href="https://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=11143&context=annals-of-iowa">economists and members of his own party</a>, while Trump took similar measures on metal tariffs, causing <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43290969">great consternation in his own party</a>. In the 1930s, the trade war with Europe that followed <a href="https://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/HooversEconomicPolicies.html">worsened the economic depression</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/246489/original/file-20181120-161644-v1kmx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/246489/original/file-20181120-161644-v1kmx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/246489/original/file-20181120-161644-v1kmx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/246489/original/file-20181120-161644-v1kmx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/246489/original/file-20181120-161644-v1kmx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/246489/original/file-20181120-161644-v1kmx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/246489/original/file-20181120-161644-v1kmx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">President Hoover.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_Hoover#/media/File:President_Hoover_portrait.jpg">Library of Congress/Wikimedia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Trump’s immigration rhetoric carries echoes of Hoover, as well. Hoover promised <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/08/13/the-time-a-president-deported-1-million-mexican-americans-for-stealing-u-s-jobs/?utm_term=.8b1a8d25b591">“American jobs for real Americans”</a> As a result, he implemented a program of <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/08/13/the-time-a-president-deported-1-million-mexican-americans-for-stealing-u-s-jobs/?utm_term=.8b1a8d25b591">“Repatriation of Persons of Mexican Ancestry”</a> that resulted in the deportation of almost 2 million people, many of whom were American-born.</p>
<p>Lastly, Trump and Hoover were both outsiders who have been the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/08/13/the-time-a-president-deported-1-million-mexican-americans-for-stealing-u-s-jobs/?utm_term=.8b1a8d25b591">“only career businessmen ever elected to the presidency”</a> They governed alone by sweeping away past doctrines, and shattering the ideological consensus. For political scientists <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674689374">Stephen Skowronek</a>, Hoover belongs to the category of presidents who signal the end of a political cycle. It is the failure of their presidency that makes room for the coming of a new kind of presidents who can reconstruct a new cycle by establishing new ideological foundations. Hoover did fail to manage the aftermath of the economic crash in 1929 and he was followed by Franklin Delano Roosevelt and 35 years of more or less consensus around New Deal policies. Similarly, President Jimmy Carter is remembered for his failed presidency. He was succeeded by Reagan and his conservative “revolution” that impacted his successors for the next 30 years. According to <a href="https://www.thenation.com/ARTICLE/WHAT-TIME-IS-IT-HERES-WHAT-THE-2016-ELECTION-TELLS-US-ABOUT-OBAMA-TRUMP-AND-WHAT-COMES-NEXT/">Stephen Skowronek</a>, Donald Trump is one of these failed presidents.</p>
<h2>A crisis to come?</h2>
<p>Some might object, maybe rightfully, that, from an economic perspective, Trump’s presidency is a success: the United States has strong growth and low unemployment. Yet some believe <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2018/10/22/despite-strong-economy-lets-prepare-disruption-column/1668945002/">“we should prepare for economic disruption”</a> partly because of the prospects of a trade war. Others, at <a href="http://fortune.com/2018/09/13/jpmorgan-next-financial-crisis/">J.P. Morgan</a> or <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/theworldpost/wp/2018/10/10/financial-crisis/?utm_term=.cee641f934a6">in the business world</a>, see the looming of an economic crisis, maybe even before the end of Donald Trump’s term. Thomas Piketty has shown that <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/pikettys-inequality-story-in-six-charts?fbclid=IwAR0zg3V_khBDBVI1zXj6IccCOomQ8Jv0bksfgVVhC1j7sasKpAyMtZTlaAg">inequality has reached levels not seen since the late 1920s</a>.</p>
<p>Recently, <a href="https://www.economist.com/leaders/2018/10/11/the-next-recession">The Economist</a> warned that “toxic politics and constrained central banks could make the next downturn hard to escape.” And the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/02/upshot/next-recession-three-most-likely-causes.html">New York Times</a> sees a recession as a “likely possibility.”</p>
<p>Some economists even believe the crisis <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/next-financial-crisis-has-begun-and-will-be-worse-than-2008-crash-economists-warn-11497433">has already begun and could be worse than 2008</a>. If that is the case, Trump’s inability to heed the advice of experts, especially in a context of trade wars, low interest rates and massive debt, will likely leave him <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/06/opinion/trump-financial-crisis.html">unable to properly respond</a>.</p>
<p>Trump may also willingly or unwillingly create another crisis of his own – constitutional, military, diplomatique or otherwise. His subversion of democratic norms may have serious enough consequences to bring forth a new political regime.</p>
<p>This doom-like scenario may not happen. Historical comparisons have their limits and history never repeats itself the same way. Today’s American society is more diversified and open than in the 1920s. The world is also more connected.</p>
<p>The only thing we can conclude for certain is that Donald Trump is more the symptom than the cause of the current political and societal tension (<a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/nafeez-mosaddeq-ahmed/donald-trump-is-not-problem-he-s-symptom">here</a>, <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/nafeez-mosaddeq-ahmed/donald-trump-is-not-problem-he-s-symptom">here</a>, <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/world/north-america/trump-is-not-the-cause-he-s-a-symptom-of-what-troubles-americans-20181030-p50ctm.html">here</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/aug/07/american-democracy-crisis-trump-supreme-court">here</a>). As <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kky0XDnBfFk">Barack Obama observed</a>, figures like Trump emerge in a context of deep change and swift transition toward a world whose shape remains obscure.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/108028/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jérôme Viala-Gaudefroy ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>The deepening geographic, racial, gender and educational divisions in America shows some striking parallels between the nation today and in the 1920s.Jérôme Viala-Gaudefroy, Assistant lecturer, CY Cergy Paris UniversitéLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/965202018-05-16T22:34:18Z2018-05-16T22:34:18ZMaple-glazed Trump? Doug Ford’s populism is Canadian-made<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219082/original/file-20180515-195308-14n90yv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Canadian and American flags fly as Doug Ford speaks during a campaign stop in Niagara Falls, Ont., on May 14, 2018. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Tara Walton</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In the wake of Donald Trump’s election to the U.S. presidency in November 2016, Canadian exceptionalism has enjoyed a healthy renaissance. </p>
<p>Trump’s nativist, misogynistic, xenophobic rhetoric leading up to his election, and the turbulence that has characterized his administration since, have served as the perfect opportunity for Canadians to reassert themselves as a progressive beacon of human rights, tolerance and diversity in the world. </p>
<p>But a lingering question has lurked in the background: Could a right-wing populist in Trump’s mould succeed nationally in Canada?</p>
<p>The candidacy of Doug Ford for premier of Ontario appears to represent in the eyes of many Canadians their very own “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/30/doug-ford-ontario-conservative-trump-comparison-canada">Trump moment</a>.” </p>
<p>Ford has been accused of being a vulgar, self-interested, dangerous populist by both <a href="http://lfpress.com/opinion/columnists/opinion-doug-ford-and-donald-trump-are-both-dangerous-tricksters-who-will-do-more-harm-than-good">media pundits</a> and <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/ontario-election-2018/ontario-premier-wynne-calls-ford-a-bully-says-he-s-just-like-trump-1.3890743">political opponents</a> alike. </p>
<p>Ford is the brother of the late Rob Ford, the equally populist onetime mayor of Toronto who infamously struggled with substance abuse issues. Ford family drama has shown no signs of dissipating as <a href="https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2018/06/04/rob-fords-widow-sues-doug-ford-alleging-he-has-deprived-them-of-millions.html">Rob Ford’s widow, Renata, recently launched a lawsuit</a> accusing her brother-in-law of cheating her and her children out of millions since the former mayor’s death.</p>
<p>Doug Ford’s style and rhetoric have drawn direct comparisons to the 45th American president as he’s been branded a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/22/opinion/doug-ford-populism-canada-trump.html">Northern tinpot Trump</a>. Implicit in these comparisons is the idea that Ford, like Conservatives Kellie Leitch and Kevin O’Leary before him, is merely mimicking Trump’s divisive style of politics in an effort to stir up the same type of populist resentment that swept across the United States in 2016 and propelled him to the Oval Office.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219084/original/file-20180515-195311-lsa83.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219084/original/file-20180515-195311-lsa83.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219084/original/file-20180515-195311-lsa83.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219084/original/file-20180515-195311-lsa83.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219084/original/file-20180515-195311-lsa83.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219084/original/file-20180515-195311-lsa83.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219084/original/file-20180515-195311-lsa83.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=569&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Kellie Leitch is seen at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont., in March 2017 as she ran unsuccessfully for the Conservative leadership.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Lars Hagberg</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Many have dismissed the comparison, downplaying Ford’s <a href="http://nationalpost.com/opinion/andrew-coyne-neither-a-conservative-nor-quite-a-populist-doug-ford-isnt-what-many-think">populist credentials</a> and <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/star-columnists/2018/04/21/doug-ford-is-brash-but-hes-no-donald-trump.html">similarities to Trump</a>. But for those Canadians who have watched Trump in horror, and perhaps with a bit of schadenfreude, Ford represents a threat that has swept up from the south to infiltrate their peaceful, progressive, multicultural utopia.</p>
<p>While it’s convenient and comforting to position Ford as a cheap imitation of Trump’s political ideology and rhetoric, historical trends and recent developments in Canada reveal this isn’t really the case.</p>
<p>Populism, on both the left and right sides of the political spectrum, has played a formative role in electoral politics at municipal, provincial and federal levels throughout Canadian history. </p>
<p>Furthermore, while many commentators and analysts have concluded that <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books-and-media/book-reviews/review-michael-adamss-could-it-happen-here-explores-whether-canada-is-safe-from-toxic-populism/article36431266/">Canadian values simply won’t allow for the rise of the types of right-wing populism observed elsewhere</a>, this only captures one piece of the populism puzzle that is troubling other countries around the world.</p>
<h2>Historical roots of Canadian populism</h2>
<p>At the heart of populism’s lure for politicians and citizens alike are appeals to a pure, mythic people against a corrupt, unresponsive political establishment. </p>
<p>Virtually all populist leaders seek to mobilize public disaffection with the political status quo by making visible some type of crisis that requires drastic, decisive action that only a populist leader can bring about. </p>
<p>The rhetoric of these appeals will vary from one context to the next based on the political, social and cultural milieu in which populism unfurls. </p>
<p><a href="https://books.google.ca/books/about/Populism_and_Democratic_Thought_in_the_C.html?id=IDQlAAAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y">Canada’s experiences with populism date back to the period between the First and Second World Wars</a>, when a large, well-organized agrarian populist movement sprung up across the Prairies. Opposed to the centralizing tendencies of the Ontario-based Liberal-Conservative coalition government, this movement eventually led to the formation of a number of highly successful political parties. </p>
<p>On the right, the socially conservative <a href="http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/social-credit/">Alberta Social Credit Party</a> would govern Alberta from 1935 to 1971, appealing to supporters with its opposition to the centralizing tendencies of the federal government and the creation of a federally administered welfare state. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219196/original/file-20180516-155579-1nna1vo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219196/original/file-20180516-155579-1nna1vo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=530&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219196/original/file-20180516-155579-1nna1vo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=530&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219196/original/file-20180516-155579-1nna1vo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=530&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219196/original/file-20180516-155579-1nna1vo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=666&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219196/original/file-20180516-155579-1nna1vo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=666&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219196/original/file-20180516-155579-1nna1vo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=666&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Former NDP leader Tommy Douglas poses in Ottawa in this October 1983 photo. Douglas, considered the father of Canadian medicare, was first elected to Parliament in 1935 as a member of the CCF.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Schwarz</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Populism also played an important historical role in the development of leftist parties. The <a href="http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/co-operative-commonwealth-federation/">Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF)</a>, eventually succeeded by the New Democratic Party, united labour activists, farmers and socialists to influence the trajectory of federal politics in Canada. </p>
<p>It led the movement for the development of a relatively strong and stable welfare state and socialist policies and programs. </p>
<h2>Right-wing populism in Canada</h2>
<p>While the left has drifted away from its populist roots, right-wing populism has continued to emerge periodically in recent Canadian political history. </p>
<p>A growing sense of western alienation and frustration with the Quebec sovereignty debate helped fuel the rise of the <a href="https://books.google.ca/books/about/The_New_Right_and_Democracy_in_Canada.html?id=iaOIAAAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y">Reform Party</a> in the late 1980s and early 1990s. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219085/original/file-20180515-195315-1h638rp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219085/original/file-20180515-195315-1h638rp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219085/original/file-20180515-195315-1h638rp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219085/original/file-20180515-195315-1h638rp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219085/original/file-20180515-195315-1h638rp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=590&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219085/original/file-20180515-195315-1h638rp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=590&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219085/original/file-20180515-195315-1h638rp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=590&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Reform leader Preston Manning holds a copy of his party’s alternative federal budget in Ottawa on February 1995.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">The Canadian Press/Tom Hanson</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Led by Preston Manning, Reform aimed to foster a divide between common, hard-working people and out-of-touch elites — in an effort to forge support for libertarian policy proposals designed to shrink the welfare state, oppose Quebec sovereignty, challenge multiculturalism, strengthen the jurisdiction of provinces and introduce greater direct democracy measures into political institutions. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/news2/background/conservativeparty/uniteright_timeline.html">amalgamation of right-wing parties into the Conservative Party of Canada in 2003</a> has tempered the expression of populism as Conservative politicians have adopted the brokerage style of politics perfected by the Liberal Party.</p>
<p>But even under the leadership of Stephen Harper — a politician not considered particularly populist — the Conservatives regularly used populist rhetoric and appeals to help pass key pieces of legislation. From the <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/canadian-journal-of-law-and-society-la-revue-canadienne-droit-et-societe/article/criminal-justice-policy-during-the-harper-era-private-members-bills-penal-populism-and-the-criminal-code-of-canada/1A808DE27A54302968B7E1E21495DE9F">introduction of mandatory minimum sentences</a> and the <a href="https://journals.library.ualberta.ca/cjs/index.php/cjs/article/viewFile/18222/14325">scrapping of the long-form census</a>, the Harper Conservatives framed many of their most controversial policy proposals as “common sense” and supported by the majority of Canadians. </p>
<h2>What’s it all say about Doug Ford?</h2>
<p>Examining Doug Ford’s campaign in light of the history of populism in Canada ought to provoke a rethinking of the labelling of Ford as “Trump Lite.” The brand of populism being practised by Ford in the Ontario provincial election campaign does not represent the importation of an American style of politics.</p>
<p>Instead, it’s better understood as an extension of populist strategies that have proven successful for Canadian right-wing politicians in the past. </p>
<p>Ford’s appeal to the common people based in promises to protect the hard-earned money of taxpayers, to clean up corruption and shrink government spending are more in line with the tradition of Canadian populism than they are with Donald Trump. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-doug-fords-campaign-defends-take-care-of-our-own-comment-on/">For the most part</a>, Ford has stayed away from the nativist rhetoric of Trump, avoiding the topic of immigration and cultural integration altogether, preferring instead to base his appeal on economic resentment as opposed to cultural.</p>
<p>None of this is to say that Canadians concerned with the possibility of extremist political ideologies reaching the political mainstream should not oppose Ford or be concerned. </p>
<p>But to dismiss or criticize Ford as merely a Trump imitator is to ignore the evidence of racial and cultural resentment in Canada and the connection between <a href="http://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/alexandre-bissonnette-inside-the-life-of-a-mass-murderer">recent hate crimes and acts of violence and right-wing extremist movements</a>.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/dear-white-people-wake-up-canada-is-racist-83124">Dear white people, wake up: Canada is racist</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>If recent examples from Canadian politics have told us anything, it’s that mimicking populists from other parts of the world — particularly the U.S. — will not translate into electoral success. </p>
<p>The reason that Doug Ford may succeed where others like Leitch and O’Leary failed is because he represents a homegrown style of populism that connects with the cultural and political values of some Canadians.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/96520/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (Doctoral Fellowship)</span></em></p>Branding Doug Ford as a Donald Trump impersonator obscures the history of populism in Canada.Brian Budd, Ph.D Candidate, University of GuelphLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/879822018-01-15T00:17:55Z2018-01-15T00:17:55ZDonald Trump doesn’t understand Haiti, immigration or American history<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/201801/original/file-20180112-101483-169uyt2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C5%2C597%2C438&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">After Haiti signed its Declaration of Independence from France, in 1804, the U.S. started a nearly 60-year political and economic embargo that hobbled the young nation's growth.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ad/Trait%C3%A9_France_Ha%C3%AFti_1825.jpg">Wikimedia</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Donald Trump’s <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/01/trump-shithole-remarks-spur-international-anger-180112084723204.html">denigrating comments about Haiti</a> during a recent congressional meeting <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2018/01/12/trump-shithole-comment-reaction-337926">shocked people around the globe</a>, but given his track record of <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2015/07/08/donald-trumps-false-comments-connecting-mexican-immigrants-and-crime/">disrespecting immigrants</a>, they were not actually that surprising. </p>
<p>Despite campaign promises that Trump would be Haiti’s “<a href="http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/election/donald-trump/article102349877.html">biggest champion</a>,” his administration had already demonstrated its disregard for people from this Caribbean island. In November 2017, the Department of Homeland Security announced it would <a href="https://www.dhs.gov/news/2017/11/20/acting-secretary-elaine-duke-announcement-temporary-protected-status-haiti">end the Temporary Protected Status</a> that had allowed 59,000 Haitians <a href="https://www.dhs.gov/news/2010/01/15/secretary-napolitano-temporary-protected-status-tps-haitian-nationals">to stay</a> in the U.S. after a calamitous <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/12/world/haiti-earthquake-fast-facts/index.html">Jan. 12, 2010 earthquake</a>. </p>
<p>Their TPS was extended after <a href="http://www.inured.org/uploads/2/5/2/6/25266591/reportonline__051117.pdf">Hurricane Matthew devastated Haiti again in 2016</a>. Without protected status, these Haitian migrants have until July 2019 to get a green card, leave voluntarily or be deported. </p>
<p>As a scholar and first-generation Haitan-American, I can attest that Trump’s statements and policies reflect not just disrespect for Haiti but also a profound ignorance about how migration occurs. </p>
<h2>Why history matters</h2>
<p>As shown in my recent book, <a href="https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/haiti-and-the-uses-of-america/9780813585192">“Haiti and the Uses of America,”</a> history shapes where immigrants choose to build their lives.</p>
<p>Outsiders head to the United States in times of crisis not at random but because historic ties point them in this direction. When <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/04/what-is-nativist-trump/521355/">nativists</a> like President Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/jeff-sessions-trumps-radical-attorney-general-w495995">refer to immigrants</a> as “criminal aliens” – perpetuating the idea that foreigners are “<a href="https://www.thenewamerican.com/reviews/opinion/item/18524-the-illegal-immigration-invasion">invading</a>” the country – they ignore this key fact. </p>
<p>Movement from Haiti to the U.S. has its roots in colonial times, when British, French and Spanish traders <a href="http://www.inmotionaame.org/migrations/landing.cfm?migration=5">exchanged coffee, cotton and mahogany between the two territories</a>. </p>
<p>In the 1790s, thousands of white and mixed-race residents sought refuge from a revolutionary war <a href="https://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/content/encountering-revolution">in colonial Haiti, which was then called Saint Domingue</a>. Fleeing an uprising by enslaved men and women of African descent, French colonists boarded ships following historic trade routes to U.S. port cities like New Orleans, Philadelphia and New York. Some brought with them the people they had enslaved. </p>
<p>An estimated <a href="https://www.lib.lsu.edu/sites/all/files/sc/exhibits/e-exhibits/creole/CreoleCity/creolecity.html">10,000 Saint Dominguan revolution-era refugees</a> eventually resettled in Louisiana, contributing to the distinct Creole <a href="http://www.haitilibre.com/en/news-11261-haiti-notice-exhibition-at-mupanah-of-the-works-of-ulrick-jean-pierre.html">history</a>
and <a href="http://wwno.org/post/home-away-home-haitian-exile-finds-new-orleans">culture that characterizes Gulf cities like New Orleans</a> today. </p>
<p>By 1804 the <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5309/willmaryquar.69.3.0541">island’s revolutionaries had driven out France to found Haiti</a>. The U.S., however, did not <a href="https://www.uncpress.org/book/9781469625621/haitian-connections-in-the-atlantic-world/">formally recognize Haitian independence until 1862</a>. </p>
<p>Born of a slave rebellion, Haiti <a href="https://liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/products/61067">challenged</a> the legitimacy of an American economy and society dependent on racial hierarchies. In 1806, the U.S. government <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/j.ctt18kcvjm.13.pdf">imposed an economic embargo on the island</a>. </p>
<p>But a <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=N39oAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA73&lpg=PA73&dq=illicit+trade+us+haiti+embargo+19th+century&source=bl&ots=5oGVY2kdo9&sig=oqEMByIUv6dFw2oFP3dJfhJFfU8&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiuiraxpdPYAhVhTd8KHZRiD08Q6AEIPjAE#v=onepage&q=illicit%20trade%20us%20haiti%20embargo%2019th%20century&f=false">vibrant illicit trade persisted</a>. In 1821, <a href="https://monthlyreview.org/product/haiti/">45 percent of Haitian imports</a> still came from the U.S. </p>
<p>As a result, migration between the two nations continued, too – and not just from Haiti to the U.S. In the 1820s, some <a href="https://nyupress.org/webchapters/fanning_intro.pdf">13,000 African-Americans sought refuge in Haiti</a>, seeking freedom from slavery, anti-black violence and lack of economic opportunity in the U.S. </p>
<p>From the 1820s to the 1870s, civic and religious leaders, notably <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=EAwUCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA262&lpg=PA262&dq=richard+allen+migration+to+haiti&source=bl&ots=JgviuJearR&sig=6xwlErfA_p21kjb_OORwwbAq2hk&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjLuP7EhtXYAhWpYt8KHWElCSwQ6AEISzAH#v=onepage&q=richard%20allen%20migration%20to%20haiti&f=false">Richard Allen of the African Methodist Episcopal Church</a> and <a href="http://www.blackpast.org/aah/theodore-james-holly-1829-1911">the Episcopalian Theodore James Holly</a>, enabled similar journeys by <a href="http://www.inmotionaame.org/migrations/topic.cfm;jsessionid=f830530881515802940484?migration=4&topic=5&bhcp=1">negotiating directly with Haitian heads of state</a>. </p>
<p>President Abraham Lincoln supported such <a href="http://www.inmotionaame.org/print.cfm?migration=4&bhcp=1">schemes to send African-Americans</a> abroad – not just to Haiti but also to Liberia, Central America and elsewhere. Even many abolitionists of the era <a href="https://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/10/abraham-lincoln-racist/">believed that blacks and whites could not co-exist as equals in the U.S.</a>. </p>
<p>Many of the African-Americans who went to Haiti later returned to the U.S., in part drawn by the <a href="https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/generic/CivilWarAmendments.htm">promise of new legal rights</a> after the Civil War.</p>
<h2>American meddling leads to migration</h2>
<p>By the time the American embargo of Haiti ended in 1862, the U.S. was openly striving for <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=u4GVKXN8SWYC&pg=PA7&dq=monroe+doctrine+imperialism+hemisphere&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiG7LbtqtPYAhVRdt8KHY8vC64Q6AEIODAD#v=onepage&q=monroe%20doctrine%20imperialism%20hemisphere&f=false">political and economic domination</a> of the Western Hemisphere, including in the Caribbean. </p>
<p>Starting with President Ulysses S. Grant, who <a href="https://www.loc.gov/resource/lcrbmrp.t2607/">wanted to annex Haiti</a>, American politicians <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/25102262.pdf">militarily pursued U.S. interests on the island nation</a>. Between 1862 and 1915, American warships were active in Haitian waters <a href="http://www.isreview.org/issues/35/haiti_under_siege.shtml">17 times</a>. </p>
<p>Powerful commercial lobbies with a business stake in Haiti – <a href="https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/haiti-and-united-states-inextricably/">particularly the financial and sugar industries</a> – also meddled in the island’s affairs. Foreign merchants and bankers in Haiti <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/165902?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">paid armed groups</a> known as cacos to overthrow standing presidents and empower leaders who would give them preferential terms of trade.</p>
<p>The political and economic instability that resulted helped perpetuate <a href="https://liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/products/61066">the racist perception of Haitians as incapable of self-rule</a>. </p>
<p>It also fueled emigration. <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/empires-guest-workers/0F2AE7339EB095A1D0E8157DAF275F00">New research</a> shows that in the first decades of the 20th century, some 200,000 rural Haitians left to work as guest laborers for American sugar companies in Cuba. They were among more than 1 million <a href="https://networks.h-net.org/node/11717/reviews/141155/neptune-putnam-radical-moves-caribbean-migrants-and-politics-race-jazz">Caribbeans who traveled across the Americas</a> between 1840 and 1940. Some of them eventually landed in the United States. </p>
<h2>A series of military interventions</h2>
<p>In 1915, President Woodrow Wilson <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=xkzoLWt_-NMC&q=4+the+intervention#v=snippet&q=4%20the%20intervention&f=false">invaded</a> Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. The occupation, which lasted until 1934, was the first in a series of U.S. military actions on the island.</p>
<p>The next interventions came in 1994 and 2004, under the <a href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2004/03/08/an-interview-with-robert-fatton/">auspices of the United Nations</a>. The impetus was the 1991 ouster of Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who’d been elected during Haiti’s <a href="http://digitalcommons.fiu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3954&context=etd">contested four-year transition from dictatorship to democracy</a>. Through an <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1993-2000/haiti">economic embargo</a> initiated by President George Bush and a <a href="http://www.un.org/Depts/DPKO/Missions/unmih_b.htm">military engagement</a> under President Bill Clinton, Aristide was restored to power in 1994.</p>
<p>When he was again forced out <a href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2004/03/08/an-interview-with-robert-fatton/">10 years later</a>, President George W. Bush ordered the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/29/international/americas/haitis-president-forced-out-marines-sent-to-keep.html">U.S. Marines back into Haiti</a>.</p>
<p>The actions preceding and during these interventions have <a href="https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/07/monroe-doctrine-1915-occupation-duvalier">destabilized Haiti</a>. In other words, for over a century, the U.S. has helped to <a href="https://nacla.org/article/disaster-capitalism-rescue-international-community-and-haiti-after-earthquake">perpetuate and exacerbate</a> the <a href="http://www.inured.org/uploads/2/5/2/6/25266591/women_in_haiti_after_jan_earthquake.pdf">political fragility and economic struggle</a> that leads Haitians to seek refuge on American shores.</p>
<p>Today, an estimated <a href="https://www.census.gov/prod/2010pubs/acsbr09-18.pdf">830,000 people of Haitian descent live in the U.S.</a>, primarily in Florida and New York. Approximately 40 percent of them were born in the U.S. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/201803/original/file-20180112-101511-1t66exr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/201803/original/file-20180112-101511-1t66exr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/201803/original/file-20180112-101511-1t66exr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/201803/original/file-20180112-101511-1t66exr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/201803/original/file-20180112-101511-1t66exr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/201803/original/file-20180112-101511-1t66exr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/201803/original/file-20180112-101511-1t66exr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">With their TPS status revoked, nearly 60,000 Haitians will face deportation from the U.S. starting in July 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lynne Sladky/Ap Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Few Haitian-Americans are wealthy – in 2009, census data shows, 1 in 5 households lived in poverty – but they are <a href="https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/haitian-immigrants-united-states#English_Proficiency">employed at higher rates than the general American public</a>. </p>
<p>The Haitian-American population is also <a href="https://www.census.gov/prod/2010pubs/acsbr09-18.pdf">growing</a>, more than tripling between 1990 and 2015. Within this group are the nearly 60,000 people granted Temporary Protected Status after the <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/12/world/haiti-earthquake-fast-facts/index.html">2010 earthquake</a>, who have now lived in the U.S. for an <a href="https://cdn.americanprogress.org/content/uploads/2017/10/19125633/101717_TPSFactsheet-USA.pdf">average of 13 years</a>. </p>
<p>In countless ways, Haiti is <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1988/02/20/opinion/l-haiti-s-unrequited-gifts-to-us-history-and-culture-429188.html">woven into the fabric of the United States</a>. Haitian-Americans have made their homes in South Florida, Brooklyn, and <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Geographies-of-the-Haitian-Diaspora/Jackson/p/book/9780415887083">Detroit</a>, among many other places. </p>
<p>The deep historic ties binding Haiti and the U.S. <a href="https://uncpressblog.com/2013/01/30/lara-putnam-families-and-the-cost-of-borders/">will persist</a> with or without Donald Trump. What the president’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/11/us/politics/trump-shithole-countries.html?_r=0">repugnant language</a> and short-sighted policy changes can do is spur <a href="https://nonprofitquarterly.org/2017/11/27/ending-temporary-protected-status-haitians-will-hurt-haitians-us/">new crises in both Haiti and the United States</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87982/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Chantalle F. Verna does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Trump’s anti-Haitian rhetoric ignores a long pattern of migration from Haiti to the U.S., often driven by American meddling in Haitian affairs. Today, the two nations are irrevocably bound by history.Chantalle F. Verna, Associate Professor of History and International Relations, Florida International UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/862002017-10-29T21:53:58Z2017-10-29T21:53:58ZThe link between Quebec’s niqab law and its sovereignty quest<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/192102/original/file-20171026-13340-1ld3umz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Warda Naili poses for a photograph at a park in Montreal in October. Naili, a convert to Islam, said she decided to cover her face out of a desire to practise her faith more authentically and to protect her modesty. Bill 62 forces women to remove their niqabs while using public services. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Having finished my PhD last year, I moved from Vancouver to Montreal in July to begin my postdoctoral research at McGill University. My topic: Religion and politics in Quebec. </p>
<p>As I began immersing myself in the literature (and a lot of poutine, the gooey Quebec dish that is catching on around the world), my new topic and province found themselves at the heart of a nationwide controversy. This time with Bill 62.</p>
<p>The personal introduction is to let you know that I’m not from Quebec. So you know that this isn’t an old-stock Quebecois telling the world how to feel about <em>la belle province</em>.</p>
<p>But I’m a historical sociologist, and it’s my job to make sense of this puzzle: Why is Quebec seeking to develop a tougher approach than the rest of Canada toward minority religions?</p>
<p>And my answer has to go beyond simply scorning the province as “shameful” and “nativist” like the <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorials/2017/10/17/quebecs-niqab-ban-is-a-shameful-sop-to-nativist-voters-editorial.html">Toronto Star</a> did.</p>
<p>The reality is indeed more complicated, and it’s closely related to this single line in the <a href="https://www.mce.gouv.qc.ca/publications/CCPARDC/rapport-final-integral-en.pdf">2008 Bouchard-Taylor Report</a>: “Quebecers of French-Canadian ancestry are still not at ease with their <em>twofold status as a majority in Quebec and a minority in Canada</em>.”</p>
<p>It’s this very twofold status that caused policy-making toward religions in Quebec to become another way of asserting sovereignty.</p>
<h2>Sovereignty by other means</h2>
<p>Sovereignty has three pillars: Economic, political and cultural. Since the Quiet Revolution of the 1960s, Quebecois identity has been built on this trio. Despite the province’s remarkable achievements to build a nation, the pillars received major blows over the years.</p>
<p>First went the idea of economic sovereignty. Prevalent in the 1960s and ‘70s, Quebec’s economic ideals of protectionism and state-led development caved in the face of globalization.</p>
<p>Second, political sovereignty did not bear fruit given the defeat of referendums in 1980 and 1995. In a <a href="http://angusreid.org/canada-values/">2016 survey</a>, three-quarters of Quebecers said the province should now remain within Canada.</p>
<p>The weakening of the first two pillars, however, has led to an over-emphasis on cultural sovereignty. Economic protectionism and political independence are no longer powerful mobilizers of Quebec identity. But cultural autonomy is. In a <a href="http://angusreid.org/quebecers-canadians-split-on-proposed-charter-of-values/">2013 survey</a>, 86 per cent of Quebecers stated that “Quebec culture needs protection.”</p>
<p>And along with the French language, secularism <em>and</em> Catholicism are core cultural values for Québec. Yes, both of them, as odd as that might sound.</p>
<h2>Understanding Catho-<em>laïcité</em></h2>
<p>As the title of a <em>Globe and Mail</em> <a href="https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/globe-debate/neither-practising-nor-believing-but-catholic-even-so/article4329828/">essay by Konrad Yakabuski</a> suggests, Quebecers are “neither practising nor believing, but Catholic even so.” Only six per cent attend mass, belief in God is the <a href="http://nationalpost.com/holy-post/religion-not-important-to-most-canadians-although-majority-believe-in-god-poll">lowest in Canada</a>, but 80 per cent declare themselves Catholic. Confused?</p>
<p>This Catho-<em>laïcité</em> (secularism with Catholic partialities) is due to a history of a love-hate relationship with the church.</p>
<p>On the one hand, nationalism since the 1960s developed in rejection of the church’s authority in public life. Secular skepticism of religion has thus been an essential Quebecois tradition.</p>
<p>On the other hand, Catholicism has always represented a distinctive cultural marker to hold on to against largely Protestant English Canada. And now, it’s a cultural marker in the face of newcomer religions.</p>
<p>Sociologist <a href="https://tif.ssrc.org/2016/10/13/building-secularity-via-religious-revival/">Geneviève Zubrzycki calls this phenomenon</a> the “patrimonialization” of Catholicism in Quebec, whereby its “symbols, artefacts, and practices are being secularized and re-sacralized as secular elements of the nation and its history.”</p>
<p>That explains why days after passing Bill 62 on religious neutrality, the government <a href="http://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/politique/politique-quebecoise/201710/24/01-5141100-le-gouvernement-liberal-refuse-de-retirer-le-crucifix-a-lassemblee-nationale.php">rejected a motion to remove the crucifix</a> hanging in the Quebec provincial legislature since 1936. The minister of culture said that the crucifix “is above all a patrimonial symbol … There’s a history behind it.”</p>
<p>But it’s not religious. God forbid.</p>
<h2>Where do we go from here?</h2>
<p>This complex history may help us understand Quebec’s niqab bill. By restricting the public visibility of minority religions, Quebec is in search of affirming its sovereignty. This time, it’s cultural.</p>
<p>And although recently complicated by Catholic “patrimonialization,” such affirmation is parallel with the province’s trajectory of religious skepticism. The <a href="http://angusreid.org/quebec-provincial-issues-sept/">87 per cent support for Bill 62</a> may rest on a combination of these historical factors.</p>
<p>None of this is to rationalize Bill 62. Personally, I’m against it. After 2014’s <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/charter-of-quebec-values-would-ban-religious-symbols-for-public-workers-1.1699315">Charter of Values</a> mess, the <em>Parti libéral du Québec</em> had a rare opportunity to bring the decade-long reasonable accommodation issue to a peaceful close. By unnecessarily targeting Muslim women, an already marginalized group in the province, Article 9 of Bill 62 has just done the opposite.</p>
<p>And it just opened a bigger can of worms.</p>
<p>The main opposition <em>Parti Québécois</em> declared that they’re retorting with a <a href="http://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/politique/politique-quebecoise/201710/25/01-5141188-laicite-le-pq-presentera-un-projet-de-loi-et-ses-sanctions.php">revamped Charter of Values</a> involving a complete ban on face-covering in public, and on religious symbols for public employees in positions of authority. The second opposition party <em>Coalition avenir Québec</em> said they would support these measures.</p>
<p>Less than a year before the provincial election of October 2018, one thing is certain: Tenser debates on Quebec’s cultural sovereignty are in order.</p>
<p>And I will be here trying to make sense of it all. While eating poutine.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86200/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr. Peker's postdoctoral research is funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. </span></em></p>Bill 62 is likely to trigger even tenser controversies on Quebecois identity before next year’s provincial election. A historical perspective helps us understand the connection to Quebec sovereignty.Efe Peker, SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow in Sociology, McGill UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.