Mexico and the USA : the Immigration issue

Résumé du document

In the 19th century, the approach of the United States to immigration control can be characterized as "laissez-faire" with almost no governmental interference in flows that were almost only labor flows. The issue of migration was already in the hands on United States through the role of its farmers and other employers who used to contract Mexicans. The Mass Repatriation Program of 1929-1935 was a turning point in the migration policies with the establishment of compulsory points along the border for the entry of non-citizens and the accusation of felony for previously deported people who would try to reenter the country. The obvious trigger element of such a program was the 1929 crisis which deeply affected the country. Therefore, in the six years following this legislation, hundreds of thousands of Mexican immigrants, and Americans of Mexican descent, were expelled from the country. As it occurs in such a context, the immigrants were often targeted and a strong and popular current of anti-Mexican sentiment spread in the United States.

Extraits

[...] military footprint in Mexico, the Mexican State. Besides, Mexico pledged to strengthen its capabilities to fight drug cartels and organized crime, and the U.S. promised to reduce demand for illegal drugs and to combat trafficking in weapons and bulk cash. The cost of the program is estimated to a $ 1.5 billion thus an amount far more important than the budget of the INCLE. Besides, the initiative clearly aims at targeting the Mexican cartels whereas so far the mutual counternarcotics efforts focused on the interdiction and eradication of drug shipments. [...]

[...] The government wanted to reach a deterrence level of an impossible 100 percent and has faced higher expectations for success from the civil society while, at the same time, it cannot use the same old convenient measures of progress any more. Terrorism does not work the same way as drug and immigration and thus old enforcement infrastructure has to be more than simply adapted, a strategy that was not followed by the government. The counter-terrorism policies have been based on traditional agencies INS, the U.S. Coast Guard and the U.S. [...]

[...] Mexico has always considered itself as a more advanced country and eminently part of the Northern continent. Nevertheless, it seems that the most likely scenario would be made of series of incremental, piecemeal initiatives, involving a mixture of enhanced cross-border security coordination and collaboration, partial and uneven policy convergence, and innovative new inspection methods and technologies that increasingly extend beyond the ports of entry (“smart (Ibid.). In such case, the United States would still be the only leading super power, backed by Canada whereas Mexico would remain the everlasting “follower”, more a follower than a real partner. [...]

[...] Migrant smuggling became a flourishing business in both sides of the border and more and more immigrants tragically die while attempting to cross the border. Besides, the intensified border control had only little effect on curbing drug flows. The drug dealers quickly adapted the new situation with for instance the multiplication of the narco tunnels all along the Western Border and the integration of more with legitimate cargo, using the NAFTA-encouraged boom in trade with thus closer ties between licit and illicit trade. [...]

[...] In Mexico, the deportees were sent back in the villages and regions by the Mexican government. It appeared that a substantial number of illegal immigrants were captured but the estimations are still undetermined. The Immigration Control Reform Act (IRCA) of 1986 was aimed at asserting control over inflows of Mexicans while attempting to meet the need for Mexican labor with the status of seasonal agricultural workers (SAW). It also includeda possible legalization of migrants who had been working in the USA prior to 1982 million seven hundred thousand migrants legalized their status under general amnesty–, as well as other dispositions favorable to immigrants. [...]