Temporary migration and middle class nation building in Canada

ABSTRACT

This article explores the relationship between temporary labor migration programs (TLMPs) in the post-war era and middle-class nation-building. The analysis centers on Canada, an exemplary case of balancing the rights of foreign workers and national concerns. By examining two eras of Canadian TLMPs – one Keynesian and the other neoliberal – I foreground how and why temporariness has reemerged as a norm in (im)migration policy. Relative to TLMPs before 1990, contemporary ones emphasize merit, skill, and private actors with implications for how countries like Canada imagine political belonging. In the neoliberal era, the normative emphasis on permanence is challenged by a more transactional view of people’s standing in a political jurisdiction. If this is a global shift, this analysis raises questions about whether we are now experiencing a doubling down on the market logics of migration and national membership, a backlash against it, or something different.

KEYWORDS:

• Migration
• temporary labor
• middle-class integration
• Canada
• citizenship

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to Elke Winter and members of the Harvard Weatherhead collective on middle-class nation building through immigration for thoughtful comments, to Valentina Serrano Salomon for research assistance, and to anonymous reviewers for insightful comments and questions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 In this manuscript, I use ‘credentialed’ to describe foreign workers who check off formal boxes in the list of official requirements for ‘skilled’ labor even when workers who lack such credentials have their own set of skills (cf. Hagan, Hernández-León and Demonsant 2015, 8-9).

2 For an official overview, see: https://bit.ly/3QuzAFL and https://bit.ly/3QXCOmZ.

3 For the long view on temporary labor migration schemes, see Cook-Martín (n.d.)

4 The recent UAE ‘Golden Visa’ offers longer stays for non-Emiratis considered desirable by the government, but this does not provide an open-ended stay nor a pathway to citizenship (https://u.ae/en/information-and-services/visa-and-emirates-id/residence-visas/golden-visa).

5 For foundational scholarship on Canadian migration, see Vosko, Preston, and Latham (2014) including Abu-Laban’s chapter on rethinking Canadian citizenship. Recent overviews include Chartrand and Vosko (2021) and Vosko (2022)

6 P.C. 86 of Jan. 18, 1962

7 Immigration Act, S.C. 1976, c. 52, Part I 3.f. See FitzGerald and Cook-Martín (2014) for a full account.

8 On migration industry actors and migration infrastructures more broadly, see Hernández-León (2020) and Xiang and Lindquist (2014)

9 In this instance, the Mexican experience with the bracero agreements shaped the negotiations and resulted in contracts that the Mexican government considered more equitable than those it had signed with the United States (Vézina 2019).

10 On the persistence of these power differentials, see Ramón et al. 2022.

11 Regulations Respecting Admission and Removal from Canada of Persons Who Are Not Canadian Citizens, SOR/78-172.

12 It is a common misperception that neoliberal states – which vary significantly in practices – do not intervene in markets (Harvey 2005, Chapter 3). They may intervene aggressively to create favorable conditions for capitalists including laws and practices to recruit desired labor.

13 Canada Immigration Levels Plan: 2020–2022 (https://bit.ly/3e94jmZ).

14 For more on the complexities and empirical realities of migrants admitted as students, see Schinnerl and Ellerman (2023) and Statistics Canada (2022).

15 Shouldn't this "source" note appear at the foot of the Figure?

16 Guatemala now has an agreement with Canada. For more granular details on the current state of agricultural programs, see Ramón et al. 2022, 5.

17 For first-hand information about these programs, see https://farmsontario.ca/ and https://www.fermequebec.ca/main-doeuvre-agricole-etrangere/.

18 Not all jobs require an LMIA, but agricultural jobs do. Work in Canada for a mission, international organization or foreign government do not require an LMIA see https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/services/work-canada/permit/temporary/work-permit-types/apply-foreign-mission-government-organization.html. As noted earlier the International Mobility Program also offers exceptions to the LMIA requirement.

19 This does not mean that workers don’t pay brokerage fees on the other side of the border.

20 See: https://www.jobbank.gc.ca/temporary-foreign-workers

21 See FARMS site: https://bit.ly/3CZy4CN

22 See Ramón et al. 2022.

23 To be clear, Mexican and Caribbean workers in Canada have greater formal protections than temporary workers in most other countries. The labor contracts Mexican workers receive, for example, are regulated by a bilaterally monitored Memorandum of Understanding and Program Guidelines (Carrillo 2011) and which offers the same “rights to Mexican workers as given to Canadian workers”. Regulation and oversight, however, are lax and the experience of workers differs significantly from formal provisions.

24 https://bit.ly/3QXCOmZ

25 Government of Canada 2019a: https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/corporate/publications-manuals/annual-report-parliament-immigration-2020.html#annex3

26 Munck et al. (2011) and Dauvergne and Marsden (2014) have also described a post-global shift.

27 P.C. 785 of May 24, 1956

28 P.C. 86 of Jan. 18, 1962

29 Preibisch and Binford (2007).

30 Sharma (2000).

31 Sharma (2000).

32 Sharma (2000); Valiani et al. (2013).

33 Vézina (2019).

34 André (1990), 258

35 Immigration Act, S.C. 1976, c.52, Part I 3.f

36 Regulations Respecting Admission and Removal from Canada of Persons Who Are Not Canadian Citizens, SOR/78-172.

37 Canadian Union of Public Employees (2013). Hennebry and Preibisch (2010).

38 Canadian Union of Public Employees (2013).

39 See discussion by Hennebry (2021).

40 Shouldn't this "source" note appear at the foot of the Figure?