Immigrants and the Community

First in a series based on the research project "Integrating the Needs of Immigrant Workers and Rural Communities," which attempts to inform New York communities about the nature and consequences of increasing immigrant settlement.Many upstate New York communities have experienced population loss and decline in the last decade. Increasing numbers of immigrants have settled in many of these communities, which poses possible community development challenges and opportunities. Because each community must address these issues in its own way, this report is intended to make communities aware of changes in their populations and highlight issues they may choose to address.USDA Fund for Rural America (grant #2001-36201-11283) and Cornell University Agricultural Experiment Station (grant #33452

Immigrants and the Community: Farmworkers with Families

Second in a series based on the research project ?Integrating the Needs of Immigrant Workers and Rural Communities,? which attempts to inform New York communities about the nature and consequences of increasing immigrant settlement.America's hired farm workforce has changed considerably in the last decade. The most apparent change has been its "latinization" during the past two decades. This is largely a consequence of large numbers of Mexicans coming to the United States to work. Although Mexican immigrants work in numerous industries across the American landscape, they are especially important in agriculture. There has been a growing tendency of farmworkers to settle in rural communities together with their immediate family. But how and to what extent does community integration occur? How do foreigners who have little familiarity with American culture become integrated into the community? Answers to these questions have practical importance to farmers interested in retaining their workforce, service providers working to improve farmworker well-being and communities interested in helping the new residents contribute to community development. To help us understand the factors that both promote and limit the integration of immigrants into rural communities, we chose for study five New York agricultural communities in different economic and social contexts that have relied heavily on hired farm labor. Each community has a minority population of some significance and a history of immigrant farmworkers settling there

Bureaucratization in Public Research Institutions

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the nature of bureaucratization within public research bodies and its relationship to scientific performance, focusing on an Italian case-study. The main finding is that the bureaucratization of the research sector has two dimensions: public research labs have academic bureaucratization since researchers spend an increasing part of their time in administrative matters (i.e., preparing grant applications, managing grants/projects, and so on); whereas universities mainly have administrative bureaucratization generated by the increase over time of administrative staff in comparison with researchers and faculty. In addition, I show that research units with higher bureaucratization have lower scientific performance

The institutions of archaic post-modernity and their organizational and managerial consequences: The case of Portugal

The long march of modernization of the Western societies tends to be presented as following a regular sequence: societies and institutions were pre-modern, and then they were modernized, eventually becoming post-modern. Such teleology may provide an incomplete or distorted narrative of societal evolution in many parts of the world, even in the ‘post-modern heartland’ of Western Europe, with Portugal being a case in point. The concept of archaic post-modernity has been developed by a philosopher, José Gil, to show how Portuguese institutions and organizations combine elements of pre-modernity and post-modernity. The notion of an archaic post-modernity is advanced in order to provide an alternative account of the modernization process, which enriches discussion of the varieties of capitalism. Differences in historical experiences create singularities that may be considered in the analysis of culture, management and organization

Immigrants and the Community: Community Perspectives

As related in our previous reports, the populations of many rural New York communities are becoming more ethnically diverse. This diversification became especially noticeable in the 1990s with the upsurge in Mexican migration. When agricultural production is found in or near communities, immigrants often first come there as farmworkers. As indicated in our previous report, our research has shown that after a fairly short time (less than 10 years), many of the workers leave seasonal farm employment for more steady work in agriculture or other industries. For these workers a departure from agricultural employment often does not mean that they leave the communities where they work. In fact, many of them told us they would like to settle here provided they can find work. The increasing tendency for Mexican immigrants to settle in the U.S. has been observed in many regions and in urban as well as rural areas. Diversifying communities are faced with a range of opportunities and challenges associated with this population change. However, this situation may be a source of confusion in communities that have only recently experienced increased immigrant settlement. The purpose of our study has been to document changes associated with the ethnic diversification of rural communities and to provide a factual foundation for community deliberations about how to capture opportunities and address challenges associated with this population change. Description: Fourth in a series based on the research project "Integrating the Needs of Immigrant Workers and Rural Communities," which attempts to inform New York communities about the nature and consequences of increasing immigrant settlement