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One theme of the Democratic debates is collective furor — at whom or what is not always clear, other than at Americans who voted for Trump. Or perhaps at America itself for failing the expectations of our moral betters? To complete the subscription process, please click the link in the email we just sent you. About Pew Research Center Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. It conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, media content analysis and other empirical social science research.
Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. It is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts. Home U. For many years, migrants from Mexico were mostly content to acquire just permanent residency status and did not strive to become U. However, since the mids, citizenship applications from Mexican-Americans have kept rising, reaching , naturalizations of people of Mexican origin in Questions in the naturalization test specifically mention loyalty to the United States as one of the promises of the new citizen.
The naturalization ceremony is in fact an elaborate modern ritual, where the new subjects swear allegiance and loyalty and obedience to the new country and thus political master. We know that Hispanics in general have higher incarceration rates than non-Hispanic whites. Some Nativists thus cling to the essentially racist argument that more Hispanics in the U.
Moreover, African Americans have even higher incarceration rates than Hispanics do. Nativist advocates therefore resort to highlighting prominent cases where an illegal immigrant is the perpetrator, thus sidelining the statistical evidence. Yet this is an unfair argument in the sense that it is connected to their status as illegals in the first place, and it does not in any way reflect actions or attitudes of the alleged "criminals".
Massive demonstrations in May against restrictive immigration legislation, in which many immigrants took part, were peaceful and non-violent even though they were supposed to convey a strong political message and numerous illegal immigrants openly participated in the protests as well. During the L. Chicano radical nationalist groups modeled after the Black Panthers like the Brown Berets were active in the late s and early s, but since then most political activism is far less extreme and focused primarily on better conditions in local communities or the general advance of Hispanics in U.
How can we explain this apparent paradox and what can we learn from it? Even though Nativism has always been present, as long as newcomers proved loyal to the U. As long as the immigrant demonstrated enough deference to political authority and accepted the political system, he or she could preserve his or her customs and habits.
Over time, ties to the new country evolved into loyalty as well as acceptance of U. This open model, based on the primacy of the political process over divisive cultural or national backgrounds, proved to be successful as it allowed for the inclusion of diverse groups.
The case of exclusion of migrants from China, however, demonstrated that cultural and ethnic prejudice could override the emphasis on political loyalty as a precondition for acceptance. By many standards, the immigrants are quite loyal especially in the sense of respecting the political order, and yet they still become targets of modern-day Nativist suspicion or even wrath. From the Nativist point of view, the immigrants from Mexico represent not a political, but rather a cultural threat.
Their perceived lack of loyalty is not to the political institutions, but to the predominant U.
The persisting cultural loyalty meaning in this case primarily emotional ties of Mexican immigrants towards Mexico explains the Mexican flags at sporting events, which so disturb some of the Nativists. As long as immigrants remain complacent, accepting the social status designed for them by the majority, the issue of loyalty does not arise. However, once they start demanding rights, they may easily be cast as ungrateful troublemakers disloyal to the generous accepting country. This notion is based on the flawed assumption that political loyalty should be based on unquestioning obedience to the authorities currently in power.
However, forced loyalty oaths at universities in the s or frequent accusations of disloyalty against civil rights leaders like Marin Luther King demonstrated that the concept could too easily be employed to suppress unwelcome statements. As conceptualized by Hirschman, the protesting immigrants might be just exercising the "voice" option, which can be consistent with the notion of loyalty.
These are indeed meant to bring attention to the fact that Mexican immigrants have been part of the territory now under U. However, the symbolism is applied defensively as a reaction to stricter measures pushed by Nativists and their political allies. Restrictive legislation like the Secure Fence Act of , which mandated the construction of hi-tech fence on the U.
Additional demands for both cultural loyalty and obedience get included as well. This development undermines the idea of the assimilation process, according to which anybody could come to the U. As long as expansive notions of loyalty, including also cultural and emotional affinity and unquestioning obedience, are demanded as well, they are bound to antagonize the significant immigrant population that would be unable to comply. Respect for constitutional order and institutions such as that demonstrated by most immigrants from Mexico should be sufficient to dispel allegations of disloyalty to the country.
The fact that a person has ties to two countries does not disqualify him or her from meaningful political participation in either country. On the contrary, such people might play a positive role in fostering valuable trans-border cooperation.
Main article: Culture of Mexico. PRD emerged after what has now been proven was a stolen election in , [] and has won numerous state and local elections since then. When dining out with friends or acquaintances, Mexicans very rarely split the bill. The earliest human artifacts in Mexico are chips of stone tools found near campfire remains in the Valley of Mexico and radiocarbon-dated to circa 10, years ago. Retrieved on March 22, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan.
The repressive attitude of the state can undermine the loyal behavior of these residents and disrupt them from developing positive attitudes towards the country. Especially with long-term illegal immigrants, who are politically loyal to the country, the state should at least recognize this loyalty and show basic respect for these individuals in return.
The concept of political loyalty could thus be expanded to include a mutually reinforcing obligation between the resident and the state. Otherwise, the state unnecessarily antagonizes people who are inclined to respect it, in doing so risking losing their loyalty the "exit" option formulated by Hirschman. All persons engaged in transnational activities could benefit as a result of more relaxed and less exclusive demands for political loyalty. Confrontational or discriminatory practices using potential disloyalty or outright fear of the "Other" as their rationale only increase trans-border tensions and hamper the process of immigrant integration.
The case of Mexican immigrants, who maintain close ties to their country of origin and its culture and, at the same time, show clear signs of loyalty to the United States, demonstrates that mass immigration does not have to be a major threat to the fundamental political processes and institutions in the host country. The Case of Mexicans in the U.
This text is under a Creative Commons license : Attribution-Noncommercial 2. European journal of American studies. Contents - Previous document - Next document. Abstract This article analyzes the concept of political loyalty in the context of mass migration flows to the U. Introduction 2. A Definition of Political Loyalty 3. Loyalty Concerns and Immigration in the U. Context 4.
Case Study: Review of loyalty concerns related to immigrants from Mexico 4. Conclusion: Loyalty Concerns and Immigration. Index terms Top of page. Outline 1. A Definition of Political Loyalty. Loyalty concerns and immigration in the U. Case study: Loyalty concerns related to immigrants from Mexico. Full text PDF Send by e-mail. Introduction 1 Political loyalty is one of the key demands that the modern state places on its citizens; disloyalty can lead to disobedience, threatening its very foundations.
The author would like to thank Dr.