TY - JOUR
T1 - For love or money? Welfare reform and immigrant naturalization
AU - Van Hook, Jennifer
AU - Brown, Susan K.
AU - Bean, Frank D.
N1 - Funding Information:
Earlier versions of this paper were presented at the annual meetings of the American Sociological Association, San Francisco, California, Aug. 14-17, 2004, and at a Conference on "Welfare Transitions," Institute for Labor Studies, Bonn, Germany, October 7-8, 2000. Special thanks and gratitude are extended to Gordon E De long, who provided us with state-level measures of attitudes towards immigrants. The research was supported by grants from the National Institute of Child Health and Development (ROI-39075) and the Hewlett Foundation. Infrastructural assistance from the Center for Research on Immigration, Population and Public Policy at the University of California, Irvine and the Center for Family and Demographic Research at Bowling Green State University (R21-HD-42831-01) is also gratefully acknowledged. The authors' names are listed in reverse alphabetical order to reflect equal contributions. Direct correspondence to Frank D. Bean, Department of Sociology, University of California—Irvine. E-mail: [email protected].
PY - 2006/12
Y1 - 2006/12
N2 - The Welfare Reform Act of 1996 generally restricted immigrants' eligibility for welfare to those who had naturalized. By increasing the salience of naturalization, the law provides a unique opportunity to examine how social and economic contexts of reception influence immigrants' pursuit of citizenship. This paper summarizes instrumental-legal (IL) and social-contextual (SC) theoretical perspectives on the foundations of citizenship and develops hypotheses on how social and economic contexts of immigrant reception after welfare reform influence naturalization behavior. Using General Social Survey (GSS) data and longitudinal data from the Survey of Program Dynamics (SPD) for 1988-2002, the research finds that hypotheses about the influence of the social context of reception, as reflected in state-level favorability of attitudes toward immigrants, are most consistently supported in the data. The results hold important implications for both theories of immigrant incorporation and ideas about what constitutes the most effective policy instruments to enhance the social and economic status of immigrants.
AB - The Welfare Reform Act of 1996 generally restricted immigrants' eligibility for welfare to those who had naturalized. By increasing the salience of naturalization, the law provides a unique opportunity to examine how social and economic contexts of reception influence immigrants' pursuit of citizenship. This paper summarizes instrumental-legal (IL) and social-contextual (SC) theoretical perspectives on the foundations of citizenship and develops hypotheses on how social and economic contexts of immigrant reception after welfare reform influence naturalization behavior. Using General Social Survey (GSS) data and longitudinal data from the Survey of Program Dynamics (SPD) for 1988-2002, the research finds that hypotheses about the influence of the social context of reception, as reflected in state-level favorability of attitudes toward immigrants, are most consistently supported in the data. The results hold important implications for both theories of immigrant incorporation and ideas about what constitutes the most effective policy instruments to enhance the social and economic status of immigrants.
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U2 - 10.1353/sof.2007.0029
DO - 10.1353/sof.2007.0029
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:33846165434
SN - 0037-7732
VL - 85
SP - 643
EP - 666
JO - Social Forces
JF - Social Forces
IS - 2
ER -