Evaluating Immigrants
Culture isn’t a four-letter word
In the last two immigration articles I answered the questions “do we need immigration?” – yes – and “how much immigration is necessary?” – depends on the country, but hundreds of thousands or more is the likely answer. Today I will address the topic most likely to result in accusations of racism, “who should be welcomed?”
Does “who” matter?
I want you to consider two scenarios in which Canada must prioritize one immigrant family over another (remember, immigration is meant to serve the host country, and we do not intend to have open borders).
Scenario 1
Immigrant 1 - a 56-year-old man who doesn’t speak English or French and has spent his life as a shepherd. He has a wife who has taken care of the home her entire adult life.
Immigrant 2 – a 28-year-old female doctor who speaks English and French. She has a husband who’s an engineer and two kids under 10.
Scenario 1 presents us with an exaggerated situation and asks does an individual’s background/training/age matter when evaluating immigrants. Most of us would agree that Canada (or the UK or the US) should prioritize Immigrant #2 over Immigrant #1. Immigrant #1 will almost immediately need to pull from the social safety net, adding to the existing worker to retiree problem. Immigrant #2 will help with Canada’s doctor shortage while her husband should easily find a job as an engineer and her kids will one day become productive members of society helping with the demographic problem. Put simply, Scenario 1 tells us that, yes, “who” does matter.
Scenario 2
Immigrant 1 - a 28-year-old female doctor who speaks English and French. She has a husband who’s an engineer and two kids under 10. The family is from Denmark
Immigrant 2 – a 28-year-old female doctor who speaks English and French. She has a husband who’s an engineer and two kids under 10. The family is from Egypt
Scenario 2 presents us with what will be a more difficult question for some of us, do we care where the immigrant comes from? Put another way, does culture matter when evaluating potential immigrants?
How does immigration work today?
Canada has already decided that not all immigrants are equal and that some factors matter when evaluating potential immigrants. Canada's point-based immigration system, officially known as the Express Entry system, evaluates applicants using the Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS) and points are awarded based on several factors:
Age: Higher points for younger candidates, with a peak at 30 years old.
Education: More points for higher levels of education, especially from recognized institutions.
Official Languages (English/French): Proficiency in either or both languages, assessed by language tests like IELTS, CELPIP, or TEF.
Work Experience: Points for skilled work experience, with more points for longer experience.
Arranged Employment: Additional points if you have a job offer from a Canadian employer.
Adaptability: Factors like previous study or work in Canada, having relatives in Canada, or a spouse/partner's ability to speak English/French.
This system aims to select immigrants who are likely to succeed economically in Canada, contributing to its economy and society. The system does not however take culture directly into account, though the scoring on proficiency in English and/or French may indirectly have some effect.
The UK has its own Points-Based Immigration System, introduced since Brexit which seeks to attract skilled workers by prioritizing skills, talent, and potential economic contribution over nationality and which does allocate some points based on English language proficiency. The United States, however, does not have a comprehensive, exclusively merit-based immigration policy. While the US does have some employment merit-based immigration, the predominant pathway for legal immigration to the U.S. remains family-based, where U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents can sponsor certain family members for immigration. This system prioritizes family reunification over skills or economic contributions, which contrasts with a pure merit-based system.
Does culture matter?
Harken back to Scenario 2 in which we presented two hypothetical immigrant families whose only difference is their country of origin.
Scenario 2
Immigrant 1 - a 28-year-old female doctor who speaks English and French. She has a husband who’s an engineer and two kids under 10. The family is from Denmark
Immigrant 2 – a 28-year-old female doctor who speaks English and French. She has a husband who’s an engineer and two kids under 10. The family is from Egypt
Simply entertaining the possibility that this might matter will open one up to accusations of racism, islamophobia, or Western bias. But is this true or simply a means of shutting down debate?
The more extreme immigration supporters, as well as the open borders people, will be quick to point out the advantages of letting people of different cultures into the country. “Diversity is our strength” is the cry and while it is tempting to dismiss it as a moronic slogan (it is a moronic slogan, as are most slogans), there is some truth to it. Cultural diversity has its’ advantages. Immigration brings diverse cultural perspectives, traditions, and ideas, enriching the social fabric and fostering multiculturalism. Having grown up in the 70s I will be the first to admit that new cultures have vastly improved the variety of food available in grocery stores and restaurants. Exposure to different cultures can also lead to innovative ideas and solutions in various fields, including science, technology, and the arts. There are challenges, however. Some immigrants may face challenges integrating into the host society, driven by cultural differences and language barriers and differences in cultural practices and values can sometimes lead to tensions or misunderstandings. The greater the number of immigrants and the greater the difference between the immigrants’ culture and the host culture the greater the possibility that problems will arise.
Reread that last sentence, “…the greater the difference between the immigrants’ culture and…” Yes, it is not a simple matter of sorting immigrants into “our culture” and “not our culture,” there are some cultures that are more easily integrated than others. Values matter, and while many Canadians now support some form of values-testing of immigrants I do not believe this is an effective solution. Put simply, tests can be gamed, country of origin cannot. It would be relatively easy to study up on what a values-based test is looking for and provide the desired answers without actually buying into the values. Country of origin on the other hand, while not a perfect measure of values and ability to integrate, is a pretty good stand-in for culture.
It is beyond the scope of this simple post to analyze world cultures and provide a comprehensive theory but fortunately, something akin to his has been done and while it may not be a perfect solution it is illustrative of what I believe we need to do.
In 1996, Samuel Phillips Huntington, an American political scientist, adviser, and academic published The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order arguing that people's cultural and religious identities will be the primary source of conflict in the post–Cold War world. Huntington argued that the world consists of 9 major civilizations, Western, Latin American, Orthodox, Sinic, Japanese, Buddhist, Hindu, Islamic, and African (Sub-Saharan).
By en:en:User:Kyle Cronan and en:en:User:Olahus - imported from enwiki, GFDL, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=18187203
It should not be controversial to argue that migration between Western countries would present less of a cultural shock to an immigrant than say migration from a Western country to an Islamic one (or vise versa). However, as I previously mentioned, not all cultures are equal, and some are more different than others. How one would rank the cultures would present a challenge though. Huntington’s analysis of potential civilizational conflict might be a good start.
If Canada (or the UK or the USA) were to prioritize immigration using this figure, the rankings would look something like this:
Western Countries
Latin American Countries
African (Sub Saharan) Countries
Orthodox Countries
Hindu Countries
Japan
Sinic and Islam
There are however problems using Huntington’s analysis of civilization conflict; conflicts change over time which would require rankings to be updated periodically (probably a good thing), not all countries within a civilization necessarily deserve the same treatment (ex: China and South Korea) and he neglected to include the Buddhist countries for reasons that escape me. The point, however, is not to come up with the perfect system today but rather to demonstrate that culture matters and a relatively simple system for taking it into account is possible.
Conclusion
It is clear that immigration policy must factor in more than just economic need, it must also take into account how many immigrants the country can safely integrate. Integration itself can be a complex topic as it must consider infrastructure capacity (ex. housing) and social safety net costs (we’re trying to lessen the burden on these not increase them, remember?) as well as the ability of the immigrants to integrate into society. In other words, it must take the immigrants language and culture into account.
It is evident from the recent anti-immigrant protests in Ireland and the UK and from Germany’s recent decision to impose “tighter controls on all of the country’s land borders’ that many Western countries have been doing a poor job of judging their ability to integrate immigrants. Even if we were to accept the accusations that these issues are all caused by the far-right agitators (they aren’t) it takes fuel to start a fire and by treating immigration as strictly a numbers game these governments have spent years piling up the fuel just waiting for a spark.
Canada has also been doing a terrible job managing immigration. One need only look at two numbers to see this clearly. The first is housing. We are experiencing a housing crisis at the moment. Purchase prices as well as rents have been skyrocketing. This is, despite what the Liberal government and its NDP enablers would have us believe, a supply issue. Not enough houses are being built. Bringing in more people when we already lack housing capacity for the existing population demonstrates negligence, incompetence, or both. The second number is the unemployment rate. Canada’s unemployment rate is currently 6.6%, up from 6.4% in July. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate for newcomers to Canada is between 11.7% to 12.3%. Letting immigrants into the country who will immediately require unemployment insurance does not help economically.
If the gross mismanagement of Canada’s immigration isn’t obvious to the government, it is to the voters.
Not to be outdone, the US has taken things even further, holding an annual US Diversity Visa Lottery, officially known as the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program, in which the U.S. Department of State allows individuals from countries with low rates of immigration to the United States to apply for a chance to obtain a Green Card (lawful permanent residence). This is, in a word, ridiculous. As if the lack of immigrants from Fiji or Thailand is somehow harming the US economy (Side question: if culture doesn’t matter why does the US government care some countries are underrepresented?).
Canada, the UK, and the United States, not to mention every other country that takes in large numbers of immigrants, would be wise to implement some form of Points-Based Immigration that takes culture into account. Ranking cultures would not reduce the numbers of people being let into the country, nor would it exclude anyone based on culture, but it might reduce the tensions caused by cultural differences.
A little cultural diversity is a good thing. It brings in new ideas and new ways of looking at the world. It adds some flavor (if that’s what the locals want). Too much though and it can threaten to overwhelm the local culture and lead to increase tensions and violence. Culture matters, and a desire to preserve one’s culture is not only natural, it’s commendable. Even when that culture is Western.
I would think the easiest method to measure cultural similarity would be intermarriage rates. Immigrants from nations with high marriage rates with native-born citizens are very likely to have proximal cultures.
Great post. To people in favor of open borders, or no cultural restrictions on immigration, I like to propose a thought experiment: imagine we did not have global warming but global cooling. Two million native Britons move from the UK to Saudi Arabia, attracted by more bearable temperatures and abundant jobs. Does Saudi Arabia change as a result of this? And would you expect the native Saudis to be happy about those changes? And if you think the changes to Saudi society would be positive by your system of values - more rights for women - why would you imagine that the movement of two million Saudis (or other Arabs) to the UK would produce equally positive changes in our world?