Investigating the Drivers of Cross-Country Differences in Admission Policies for Family-Related Immigration

The politics and policies of family immigration has received increasingly political as well as scholarly attention recently. Yet, there are very few cross-country analyses of the development and causes of policy variations, which is surprising given its importance as a regular entry track in many countries. Policies regulating family immigration have become not only increasingly restrictive but also more selective in recent decades. In the European context, growing restrictions have mainly been generated by the introduction of stringent qualifying conditions in several countries, which require applicants to fulfil various integration standards to obtain entry and residence for family reasons. At the same time, however, there are variations between European countries in regard of both their level of restrictiveness and in which direction they have moved. This raises at least two questions about the drivers of policy differences: what explains cross-country differences and what are the drivers of growing restrictiveness in different dimensions of admission policy? In an effort to address these questions, this paper propose a theoretical framework that links cross-country variations and growing restrictiveness in family immigration policy to the interplay between institutional, political, and contextual factors. More specifically, drawing on insights from the broader migration policy literature, this paper investigates how risk factors associated with the institutional design of different welfare states and immigrant incorporation regimes in combination with party-political dynamics and immigration rates shape different strategies to regulate family immigrant admission. Using longitudinal data from the Immigration Policies in Comparison (IMPIC) index, the relationship between different dimensions of family immigration policies and the different explanatory factors are tested over 14 European countries between 1990 and 2010.