According to the statistics, some European countries including Germany, France, and United Kingdom have international migrants as more than 10 percent of total population (UN, 2013). In 2013, the number of international migrants reached an all-time high rate of 232 million which, at the same time, raises the higher possibility of diverse conflicts between the immigrants and the natives (ibid, 2013).
The term, immigration, has been applied to situations where a person moves to a different country for the purpose of permanent stay (Anon. 2012). Considering aforementioned facts, it can be easily recognized that the issue of immigration is not something only for particular countries but for a wider range of countries that needs to be dealt with in a global view. This essay highlights that in the context of immigration, integration in a native society can bring about cultural conflicts among people, whereas economic and sociocultural benefits can be gained within the society depending on whether they are proactive or reactive immigrants.
This essay first identifies the two different types of immigration which are proactive and reactive. Then, it explores their positive and negative consequences and further pinpoints the willingness of the immigrants to become parts of a country when it comes to what extent immigrants should assimilate with the natives. Immigration is used to refer the movement of foreigners into a country for permanent residence (Anon. , 2012). According to Richmond (1988), the term can be classified into two different forms depending on the motives or conditions: “proactive” and “reactive immigration”.
In case of the former, the reason for movement may be due to consideration of a higher quality of life, whereas the latter one happens due to an intolerable crisis or a threat that people face. Proactive immigration results in a positive integration to the society with less possibility of conflicts among the natives and the immigrants (Richmond, 1988). Theoretically, proactive immigrants are considered as a type of people who voluntarily agree to find a new living environment without anyone’s compulsion; they are often married immigrants, migrant workers, long-term study abroad students, or ‘ordinary emigrants (Richmond, 1988).
In the light of proactive immigration, this paper highlights family-based immigration which is one of the most common proactive immigrations that can contribute to the development of the local communities in various aspects (Richmond, 1988; AAJC, 2011). In particular, the country is significantly influenced in a positive way when familybased immigrants participate in the labor force and contribute to the local community (AIC, 2013). One factor for such positive influence is that in the U. S. , the majority of new family visa immigrants have become “the most upwardly mobile of American workers,” (ibid, 2013, n. . ) considering “their high rates of post-immigration human capital investment” (ibid, 2013).
Such notion indicates benefits not only for immigrants, but also in an economic connotation. Another factor is that despite the lack of proper immigrant policies, the help offered by families and ethnic communities plays a role in integrating new immigrants groups and the natives. To be specific, ethnic communities or families play a part of providing critical resources for newcomers such as employment opportunities, credit establishment, and other personal support (ibid, 2013).
In other words, when family-based visa immigrants first settle in, they can easily gain access to resources that help them with getting used to the system, how to get employed, or how to set a background for new business. Unfortunately, it is inevitable for both immigrants and the natives to face conflicts within the local societies, as no perfect integration can be guaranteed in every region. For instance, immigrant families who move to Canada and the United States are at risks of conflicting with the native groups in their adjustment to the new cultural nvironment (Direnfeld, n. d. ). Particularly, risk of conflict can lie for immigrant children who have to ultimately socialize with friends from other cultures; this is because even though parents are responsible for educating new culture to their children, it is also time-consuming for them to learn new cultures (ibid, n. d. ).
So, it can be a challenge for the parents to adapt and find practical strategies to meet cultural expectations, considering the possibility that their children will be influenced and changed by the new host culture. Also, Direnfeld (n. d. insists that “it is less a question of whether the children will be changed by the host culture, but rather how and to what degree. ” Such distress may be problematic in a long term. In the case of reactive immigration, the society is relatively exclusive towards those immigrants who have no choice but to adjust to the natives’ environment, and such phenomenon only causes more negative consequences than positive ones. Due to irreversible or insoluble situations such as wars, coups, or natural disasters, some people have to move to other countries without any preparation or plan (Richmond, 1988).
Such case only delays the time for the immigrants to completely become a part of society and for the natives to totally embrace the new people, because those immigrants do not intend to move by their will, rather being compelled to move, and therefore, it takes more time for both the natives and those immigrants to understand each other (Iyengar et al. , 2013). When it comes to the discussion of reactive immigration, this essay focuses more on the refugees who flee away from the corrupted or destroyed countries.
When refugees start their new life in a totally new environment, the discourses of integration and possible conflict are the core issues (Harding, Oltermann and Watt, 2015; Kirk, 2015). In fact, the reaction of the natives regarding this matter is not so favorable; rather, there have been voices against the refugees. For instance, according to the German interior ministry, there are 336 attacks on refugee shelters since the beginning of 2015 due to the conflicting political ideology (Harding, Oltermann and Watt, 2015).
Even in the statistics, it indicates that nearly a half of the natives still struggle to accept and integrate with the refugees. To elaborate, Hamado Dipama (2015), a local spokesman for the ProAsyl refugee council in Munich who is originally from Burkina Faso, claims that “after 13 years in Germany, and long battles for permanent residency, the Burkina Faso native is deeply grateful for the second chance this country has given him. ” The unsettled issue of German identity, he says, “remains a deep well of casual racism” (Scally, 2015) for him and new arrivals from Syria.
This viewpoint also indicates that some cultural features or phenomenon are yet unacceptable or unendurable for the natives to completely understand the immigrants without any antagonism or prejudice On the other hand, not every reactive immigrant is struggling, as a number of successful cases demonstrate how reactive immigration can be stabilized. For instance, in the case of the United States that runs the largest official resettlement program in the world, Capps and Fix (2015) recognizes that the number of refugees is increasing in terms of settling and obtaining official citizenship; in fact, a majority of them become citizens.
With respect to the case of Syrian refugees in the U. S. , many of them are already in a high level of education and wellbeing (Capps and Fix, 2015). According to MPI (2015, n. p. ), in 2014, “39 percent of Syrian immigrants (ages 25 and older) were college graduates, compared to 29 percent and 30 percent of the overall foreign- and U. S. -born populations. ” Also, the average income of Syrian immigrant households was higher than foreign households, but slightly lower than U. S. ouseholds, which indicates the refugees’ capacity to make a stable living (ibid, 2015). However, although numerous efforts and protection or policies are made, the reality is still problematic and insoluble. When it comes to the discussion of immigration, the issue about to what extent immigrants should assimilate with the natives follows; in other words, the willingness of the immigrants to become parts of a country should not be overlooked, as it truly affects the degree of integration (Saggar, et al. , 2012; Iyengar, et al. , 2013).
In the light of integration or assimilation, Iyengar (2013) proposes that the native groups are more likely to have hostility against the immigrant groups, when they perceive dissimilarity of the immigrants on cultural aspects. This indicates a conception that the willingness of both immigrants and the natives to admit or embrace each other plays an important role in creating a perfect integration within the society; that is, the more people are willing to assimilate to the local societies, the more stable integration can be achieved.
In sum, this paper covers the possible conflicts among immigrants and social integration in the context of proactive and reactive immigration. In particular, the concept of proactive immigration identifies the specific type, a family-based immigration, whereas reactive immigration focuses more on refugees. In terms of proactive immigration, it is revealed that although some struggles exist within the societies, most proactive immigrants, such as family-based ones, are most likely to find their own ways to integrate with the natives.
On the other hand, reactive immigrants, particularly the refugees, often fail to shorten the gap between them and the natives, which only broadens the invisible cultural gap and deepens their isolation. Considering both positive and negative points of the two types, the significant point is on which type of immigration is more manageable and profitable for the people and countries in reality. In fact, the willingness of immigrants to become parts of a country may most likely lead to a higher possibility of successful integration, which results in a win-win situation for both the natives and the country.
