Im Zusammenhang mit der globalen okonomischen Offnung der Welt entfaltet sich heute zunehmend der Typ des "Migrationsstaats", der neben Kapital und Gutern auch Menschen zulasst und deren Auswahl nach bestimmten Kriterien zu optimieren versucht (Kapital, Qualifikation, Demografie, Bindung zum Nationalstaat oder zu seinen Angehorigen, politische Praferenzen etc.). Der Band stellt die unterschiedlichen Facetten dieses Prozesses dar. In einem zweiten Teil werden unterschiedliche Migrations- und Integrationsweisen an Hand besonders aussagekraftiger Landerbeispiele verglichen.

Different national traditions of migration research are strongly connected to national narratives and patterns of policies - be it in affirmative or critical ways. In this volume, policy and research traditions in twelve countries are portrayed and discussed - including the old immigration countries Canada and Australia, European countries with decades of immigration experience (Britain, Germany, Austria and the Netherlands), emerging immigration countries (Italy, Japan and Poland), and post-Colonial nation states (India, Malaysia and Nigeria). Thus, the volume opens the way for a critical evaluation of migration research from a comparative perspective, and beyond the limits of traditional Western discussion. We better understand the limits of different national patterns of integrating or excluding immigrants and the intellectual discourse about it if we can confront them with other paths and ideas. Since the leading disciplines in migration research vary between countries, the volume also includes inter-faculty varieties: Sociologists, political scientists, anthropologists and philosophers define migration, integration and the relationship between immigration and the structures of societies, challenging assumptions that have been considered self-evident in given national contexts.