Immigration to build the nation, not to transform it

Organised by

• Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies
• MPC: Migration Policy Centre

Immigration policies in Quebec (and more generally in Canada) are designed to favour economically driven nation-building process, with selection policies based on skills and employability. This emphasis on economic immigration has reduced the importance that has long been accorded to immigrants’ ethnicity in the selection process. Has this shift from an overall preference for immigrants based on ethnicity to a preference for immigrants based on their work skills also occurred in the public eye? Relying on an original survey experiment of 2,400 respondents, we present a study in which we investigate whether Quebecers are equally comfortable with immigration from different social classes and from different countries of origin. Through a survey experiment, we compare reactions to immigrants of different professional statuses (associated with lower, middle and upper classes) and national origins (France and Algeria) to investigate if certain types of economic immigration can reduce origin-based prejudices. Results show that they can, but only to a limited extent: only lower and upper classes immigration can contribute to mitigate preferences for more culturally similar immigration, i.e., from France.