| Summary: | This work is a new approach to addressing undocumented Mexican migration through substantial investment in Mexico's infrastructure and economy. In his topical new book, the author asks, why do undocumented immigrants from Mexico continue to enter the United States and what would discourage this surreptitious traffic? An expert on immigration law and policy, he examines the relationship between NAFTA, globalization, and undocumented migration, and he considers the policy options for controlling immigration. He develops an ethical rationale for opening up the U.S./Mexican border, as well as improving conditions in Mexico so that its citizens would have little incentive to migrate. He insists that reforming NAFTA is vital to ameliorating much of the poverty that drives undocumented immigration and he points to the European Union's immigration and economic development policies as a model for North America. He considers the worldwide economic crisis and the social problems that attend labor migration. He argues for a spectrum of changes, including: a new vision of border enforcement; a broader view of the visa system; a path to citizenship for undocumented migrants; and consideration of a guest worker program. He also situates NAFTA and its effects in the larger, and rapidly shifting, context of globalization, particularly the recent rise of China as the world's economic giant. Showing how NAFTA's unintended consequences have been detrimental to Mexico, he argues that the United States is ethically bound to address the problems in a way that puts prosperity within the grasp of all North Americans.
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