The State Strikes Back: Immigration Policy in the European Union

Playing Hard(er) to Get: The State, International Couples, and the Income Requirement

“…A related topic for future research is to examine whether the Netherlands will be successful in convincing other EU countries to tighten the EU directive on family reunification, which is now being proposed by some parliamentarians (cf. Schain, 2009 (especially when illiterate) and migrants with native tongues that are linguistically distant from the official language in the destination country. These dilemma"s will probably become more pressing when the integration exams abroad will be made more difficult in order to achieve a more substantial restrictive effect.…”

Migration and Rural Welfare: The Impact of Potential Policy Reforms in Europe

“…Moreover, what had been a pattern of immigration for work before the attempts to close the borders had now developed into a pattern in which family immigration for settlement was dominant. Policy outcomes thus appeared to be in direct contradiction to policy intentions (Schain, 2009).…”

Urban Multiculturalism beyond the ‘Backlash’: New Discourses and Different Practices in Immigrant Policies across European Cities

“…Amid globalization and the increasing circulation of capital, goods, information and cultural products, the mainstream response to greater human mobility has moved towards the reaffirmation of borders and national sovereignty (Wihtol de Wenden 2009). Governments, increasingly less able to control other global phenomena, are trying to regain legitimacy in the eyes of their citizens-voters by reaffirming their role as defenders of the borders against outsiders from poorer countries represented and perceived as threatening (for the European Union, see Schain 2009; and for Australia, see Opeskin 2012). Legally and symbolically, there is evidence of the 're-ethnicization of citizenship' (Bauböck et al 2006).…”