A social proximity explanation of the reluctance to assimilate

Document Type

Journal article

Source Publication

Kyklos

Publication Date

2-1-2007

Volume

60

Issue

1

First Page

55

Last Page

63

Publisher

Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Abstract

The pursuit of migration is an extreme example of the severing of ties with, or a distancing from, one's friends and home. The 'failure' of migrants to assimilate cannot plausibly be attributed merely to an urge to stay close to their friends, or they might not have migrated to begin with. Non-assimilation arises from a fear of enhanced relative deprivation if they reduce their distance from the natives as a reference group. Fundamentally, migration is a change of those with whom people associate. But it would be wrong to infer that a change of associates crowds out a change of behavior, given the associates. Through their actions, migrants can elect to associate more with some groups, less with others. However, when actions to keep in check the weight accorded to the rich natives as a reference group are not viable, the very choice of migration destination could be affected in an unexpected way: a country that is not so rich could be preferable to a country that is rich; migrants will protect themselves from an unfavorable comparison by not migrating to where the comparison, when unavoidable, would be highly unfavorable. Relatedly, the variance in the assimilation effort of migrants across host countries could arise from the variance in the income distance with the natives: the richer the natives, the weaker the effort to assimilate, other things held the same.

DOI

10.1111/j.1467-6435.2007.00358.x

Print ISSN

00235962

E-ISSN

14676435

Publisher Statement

Copyright © 2007 Blackwell Publishing Ltd

Access to external full text or publisher's version may require subscription.

Full-text Version

Publisher’s Version

Language

English

Recommended Citation

Fan, C. S., & Stark, O. (2007). A social proximity explanation of the reluctance to assimilate. Kyklos, 6(1), 55-63. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-6435.2007.00358.x

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