A Riotous Success
A Riotous Success
Guestworkers, “Illegal Immigrants,” and the Promise of Managed Migration
This chapter reveals the intimate and early relationship between illegal immigration and authorized guestworker programs, a relationship that continues to this day. Guestworker programs had persisted in the postwar period because they appeared to offer a manageable alternative to unregulated migration. However, to the extent that this was managed migration, it was managed to benefit the nation's largest farm employers, not the farmworkers. Managed migration was a success from the growers' perspective, precisely because the Caribbean and Mexican guestworker programs kept wages low and labor plentiful. From the policy makers' perspective, the guestworker programs seemed like sensible and legitimate ways to keep the border open. Temporary worker contracts and guestworkers' deportability added a patina of legality to what was, in essence, a grower-dominated labor recruitment scheme.
Keywords: unregulated migration, illegal immigration, authorized guestworker programs, postwar America, farm employers, managed migration, labor recruitment scheme
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