The Politics of International Migration: How Can We “Bring the State Back In”?

The scholarly study of international migration has, over the past several decades, slowly entrenched itself in the mainstream of political science. From research that intersects migration and the study of racial and ethnic politics in order to understand the implications of changing democratic electorates, to work that examines how migration collides with the foundational principles of national security, sovereignty, and citizenship, migration is a cross cutting issue that touches the heart of political science. As the 2012 presidential election in the United States and the intricate way in which immigration was woven into the narrative of President Obama's reelection further demonstrate, answers to "why is migration relevant for political science" questions are becoming increasingly clear across the discipline (Hollifield 2010). Yet compared to the other social sciences - especially sociology, history and economics - political scientists came late to the study of migration. From the standpoint of intellectual history, it is interesting to ask why political scientists and scholars of international relations were so late to focus on the topic of international migration. This is especially surprising in a country like the U.S., where immigration has had such a big impact on politics and government.