The state

While the concept of the state has always been central to political discourse and political analysis, until the 1990s theories of international migration paid little attention to the role of the state in this domain (see Zolberg 1999). Since the central focus has been on the forces driving migration flows (why people migrate), theories of international migration have mainly referred to: 1) the structural forces in developing societies that promote emigration; 2) the structural forces in developed societies that attract immigration; 3) the motivations and goals of migrants themselves; and 4) the social and economic structures that connect emigration and immigration areas (Massey 1999: 304-305). However, in the wake of Zolberg's claims, a body of literature has developed since the late 1990s to examine the role of the state in international migration flows. One of the key questions underlying these studies has been: what accounts for state choices with regard to migration policies?

From a society-centred perspective, immigration policies have been analysed as the outcome of a political process characterised by competition between different interest groups within the bureaucratic, legislative, judicial and public arenas (ibid.: 307). By positing the causal primacy and political dominance of forces in civil society, this approach confines the role of the state to that of the simple broker passively reacting to the claims of different interest groups or to merely finding some utility-maximising compromise between organised interests (Boswell 2007: 79). Classic examples of this approach are seen in Shughart, Tollison and Kimenyi (1986) and Freeman (1995). In the former study, three key interest groups are identified in the political competition to formulate immigration policy: while local workers would struggle to limit the supply of labour, capitalists would favour expanding it to reduce wages and keep labour markets flexible, and landowners would join them in this effort as a means of increasing their rent revenues. In a similar vein, Freeman (1995) argues that the migration policymaking process is primarily determined by those groups that champion a liberal immigration policy (mainly, employers and immigrant groups) and, to a lesser degree, by those who oppose it (the local workforce and people living in neighbourhoods where immigrants settle).