Immigration, Bureaucracies and Policy Formulation: The Case of Quebec

Abstract

Based on an ethnography of one illuminating case – the formulation of new immigration policy statement entitled “Together, we are Quebec” between 2014 and 2016 – this article argues that policy formulation is an important site of power and influence over immigration‐related policies for bureaucrats. In dialogue with concepts and theories from public administration, it demonstrates that a broad mandate of reform and modernization, coupled with political tensions surrounding diversity, created opportunities for the bureaucracy to influence Quebec's immigration policy following its interests, relations, expertise and experience. In this case, the bureaucracy's influence operated through two pathways: problem definition and consensus building. While this influence is partially contingent on political and institutional characteristics of the Quebec context, this case shows that scholarship on immigration policy and politics should embrace a much broader reading of the influence of bureaucrats on the content and development of immigration‐related policies.

COVID-19, migration and inclusive cities through e-governance: strategies to manage asylum seekers in Durban, South Africa

“…While studies on migration are skewed towards preoccupations and interests of wealthier regions, as a result, theories are transposed in explaining migration in Africa (Bakewell and J onsson, 2013). Despite reasons for migration, once a person has immigrated, their details must be captured in a national registry system by a relevant government department, whose primary responsibility is to document immigrants for their own records, planning and national security, among other aspects (Paquet, 2020). Briskman (2020) defined asylum seekers as migrants who leave their country of origin because of conflict, political instability, crime, hunger or economic instability and seek refuge in another country.…”

Beyond street‐level bureaucracy: the organisational culture of migration policy‐making and administrative elites

“…The typical inside factors are the beliefs and practices of policymakers (Paquet, 2020; Rhodes, 2011; Seol & Skrentny, 2009). Practices are a course of actions that policymakers take, based on their beliefs which reflect their status and interests.…”

“…They include, but are not limited to politicians (Acosta Arcarzo and Freier, 2015), business sectors (Freeman, 1995, 2002), civil society (Milly, 2014), courts (Joppke, 1998) and regional institutions (Geddes et al, 2019). A wide variety of actors are indeed involved in the process of policy‐making, but relatively few studies have focused on the principal hands‐on actor of policy formation: elite bureaucrats (Paquet, 2020).…”

Understanding bureaucratic support for coerced institutional change

“…However, they matter in the shaping of reform proposals as well as in their implementation. They matter from the street‐level administrator to the élite civil servant working in the higher echelons of the bureaucracy (Christensen, 2012; Paquet, 2020). Bureaucracies both shape and constrain reforms, especially when the reform directly concerns the public administration itself (Asatryan et al, 2017; Boon & Verhoest, 2018).…”