Dissertation Research in Political Science: The Political Economy of Mexico-US Migration: A View into the Sending Regions

政治学论文研究：墨西哥-美国移民的政治经济学：输出地区的视角

• 批准号: 0617583
• 负责人: Karen Remmer
• 金额: $ 1.17万
• 依托单位: Duke University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2006
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2006-08-01 至 2007-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0617583&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Dissertation; Research; Political; Science; Economy

Political scientists have devoted considerable time and attention to the study of cross-border movements of goods and financial capital - to their causes and, furthermore, to their consequences on both developed and developing countries. What is surprising, though, is the relative inattention of political scientists to the study of the cross-border flows of individuals, especially to the consequences of these movements for source (and less-developed), as opposed to host (and more developed), countries. This research gap is striking. As anyone familiar with the domestic politics of less-developed countries (from Mexico and El Salvador to India and Pakistan) can attest, matters such as remittances, emigre voting rights, more or less explicit initiatives to foster workers' migration abroad, and the establishment of emigrant institutions, have become increasingly salient over the last two decades. The main impetus behind the research is, precisely, to redress this imbalance by studying recent Mexican-U.S. migration.An empirical regularity is first documented: Mexicans who migrate into the U.S. are not a random sample of the Mexican population, but instead differ from their co-nationals along a number of dimensions - i.e., gender, age, education, income, attitude towards risk. This is not surprising, given the risks and costs associated with moving into the U.S., especially since the early 1990's. What is surprising, though, is that the migration-related literature (even that produced by political scientists) has consistently overlooked that all of these dimensions are powerful predictors of a wide range of political attitudes and behaviors in Mexico - including party identification and vote choice. Building upon this regularity, the research shows that migration has not been politically neutral, especially at the sub-national level. Given that those who leave differ in politically consequential ways from those who stay, international migration has reshaped the local milieu in which Mexican politicians operate and in which citizens interact with each other. By making connections between demography, political behavior, and political economy, and by combining several modes of analysis (i.e., quantitative and qualitative), this project will shed light upon questions such as the following: Has emigration brought about changes in the patterns of partisan competition for local office in Mexico? Have the massive migratory flows of Mexicans into the U.S. during the 1990's amounted to a reshaping of the electorate that actually slowed down the demise of the incumbent party's local hegemony? Has emigration altered the incentives for governmental responsiveness to citizens? Has emigration, and remittances in particular, strengthened or weakened the effects of political voice upon the disciplining of local governments? What have been the effects of migration, via highly lop-sided gender ratios in the sending communities, upon the dynamics of gender roles? Have females become more or less likely to participate in local politics?This research will thus show that the fact that Mexico-U.S. migration provides self-selected individuals with an exit option can have not only important economic and developmental consequences for the sending country, but also substantial political effects at the sub-national level. Despite not being a typical case of "brain drain", Mexico-U.S. migration shows that the flip side of increased "exit" might well be decreased "voice". That a considerable proportion of self-selected individuals (predominantly males, young, from around the middle of the income distribution in Mexico, and with about one more year of formal schooling than the typical Mexican) has migrated to the U.S. is a double-edged sword: on the one hand, it has led to an increase in remittances as a source of foreign exchange; on the other, though, it has decreased the pressures to alter the political and structural barriers that underpin the current low-quality equilibrium in which many Mexican localities are trapped.

政治科学家花了大量的时间和精力研究货物和金融资本的跨境流动--研究其原因以及对发达国家和发展中国家的影响。然而，令人惊讶的是，政治科学家对跨境人员流动的研究相对忽视，特别是对这些流动对来源国（和欠发达国家）而不是东道国（和较发达国家）的影响。这一研究差距是惊人的。任何熟悉欠发达国家（从墨西哥和萨尔瓦多到印度和巴基斯坦）国内政治的人都可以证明，过去20年来，汇款、移民投票权、或多或少促进工人向国外移民的明确倡议以及建立移民机构等问题变得越来越突出。这项研究背后的主要动力，正是通过研究最近的墨西哥-美国移民来纠正这种不平衡。首先记录了一个经验规律：移民到美国的墨西哥人不是墨西哥人口的随机样本，而是在许多方面与他们的同胞沿着不同-即，性别、年龄、教育程度、收入、风险态度。考虑到移居美国的风险和成本，这并不奇怪，特别是从90年代初开始。然而，令人惊讶的是，与移民相关的文献（甚至是政治学家的文献）一直忽视了所有这些维度都是墨西哥广泛的政治态度和行为的有力预测因素--包括政党认同和投票选择。根据这一规律，研究表明，移徙在政治上并不中立，特别是在国家以下一级。考虑到离开者与留下者在政治上的不同，国际移徙重塑了墨西哥政治家运作和公民相互交往的地方环境。通过在人口统计学、政治行为和政治经济学之间建立联系，并结合几种分析模式（即，本项目将通过对墨西哥地方政府的调查（定量和定性），阐明如下问题：移民是否改变了墨西哥地方政府的党派竞争格局？20世纪90年代墨西哥人大规模涌入美国，这是否意味着选民的重新塑造，实际上减缓了执政党地方霸权的消亡？移民是否改变了政府对公民作出反应的动机？移民，特别是汇款，是加强还是削弱了政治声音对地方政府纪律的影响？移民通过在输出社区中高度不平衡的性别比例对性别角色的动态产生了什么影响？女性参与地方政治的可能性增加了还是减少了？因此，这项研究将表明，墨西哥-美国移民为自我选择的个人提供了一个退出选择的事实，不仅对输出国产生了重要的经济和发展影响，而且在国家以下一级产生了重大的政治影响。尽管不是“人才外流”的典型案例，但墨西哥-美国移民表明，增加“退出”的另一面很可能是减少“发言权”。相当一部分自我选择的人（主要是男性，年轻人，来自墨西哥收入分配的中间位置，比典型的墨西哥人多接受一年正规教育）移民到美国是一把双刃剑：一方面，它导致汇款作为外汇来源的增加;但另一方面，它也减少了改变政治和结构性障碍的压力，这些障碍支撑着目前许多墨西哥地区陷入的低质量均衡。