David Abraham Presents: Immigrant Integration and Social Solidarity in Pluralist Welfare States

Social solidarity is a key element of redistributive welfare states. Such solidarity is, however, not a given and must be built through political, legal, economic and cultural means. Each of the agents of that solidarity has weakened over the past generation: social democratic parties, legislatures, trade unions, and the various institutions that create a shared national culture. With the austerity of neo-liberalism, the growth of migration of various sorts, and the emergence of identitarian politics, we have moved from “what belongs to whom” to “who belongs to us.”

In this presentation, David Abraham (Emeritus Professor of Law at the University of Miami) will review and assess each of these developments for Germany and for the U.S. and then examine the prospects for immigrant integration policies that might build or rebuild solidarity.