What the future of immigration will hold in the United States remains unknown, however it is certain that the movement of people across boundaries is increasing rapidly.

Therefore we must consider how to deal with this effectively.  In Citizenship and Migration, Castles and Davidson provide an evaluation of American immigration policies that suggests an inability to adequately deal with the large influxes of people into the country in the future.  Reimers’ analysis in Unwelcome Strangers allows us to see general trends in immigration policies in the United States in order that we might see difficulties in the policies that are currently in place and determine what the situation of immigration will be in the future.  In looking at the historical context Reimers provides, and based upon the view of the future provided by Castles and Davidson, the United States will be likely to have to deal with an immigration policy crisis in the future.

Castles and Davidson present a future world faced with complex issues due to the movement of people globally.  Certainly the world is already very global, and this is expected to increase and continue.  Global movements in the labor force will logically impact states and ways need to be found to reconcile the current policies regarding immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers.  Castles and Davidson give a good look at how regions around the world have addressed the pressures of the new movement of people as of yet.  It is clear from this analysis that there are varying degrees of acceptance and accommodation for people across regions.

As the European Union has developed, analysis of the regional citizenship has been emphasized.  It provided some hope for a possible small-scale model for how the world might eventually develop in order to deal with future stresses created by mass movements.  According to Castles’ and Davidson’s analysis the citizenship created out of the EU is limited and would not be a desirable model for a global method of citizenship.

Perhaps it is effective for Europe, but cannot be applied elsewhere.  As Castles notes, “An important reason for the limitations of EU citizenship appears to lie in the origins of the EU as an economic community concerned, as Dahrendorf puts it, with ‘provisions rather than entitlements’” (Castles, 98).  Therefore, Castles’ point ends up being the concern for development of a global citizenship that would be naturally initiated out of an economic community rather than political.

The Asia Pacific region remains virtually closed according to Castles and Davidson.  The reason stems mainly from historical practices and experiences of these countries.  The region has become more open economically, but immigration is almost nonexistent.  Citizenship is a European notion and Castles states that “It is the combination of exclusionary rules with the absence of citizen rights in Asia and the Pacific that really renders the notion of the citizen problematic in the region that is expected to be dominant in the world in the twenty-first century” (Castles, 194-5).

Therefore, until some changes occur, a global notion of citizenship in the region is almost impossible.

What these two examples of responses to global pressures show for the context of American immigration policies, is the fact that there does not appear to be the possibility of a developing global citizenship.  This means that sovereign nation-states will be faced with the problem of dealing with mass movements of people in the foreseeable future.

As Castles and Davidson point out, methods of approaching citizenship vary from region to region.  The United States, like many other nation-states, have combined jus soli and jus sanguinis approach to citizenship.  In examining the immigration difficulties the United States will face in the future, it is useful to look at how it has responded in the past.  Reimers provides an analysis of U.S. immigration policy throughout history.  Certainly there have been trends that we can see even today.

Currently we area faced with very tight immigration controls due to the terrorist attacks and the new “war on terrorism,” however it is unclear how long this will last.  The fears of terrorism will likely subside over time and we will then be faced again with large numbers of people entering the country.  Even now there are large numbers of people entering and exiting the U.S. every day, despite heightened security.