Perspectives

People continue to come to the United States to pursue a better life, just as they have since the first white settlers arrived in the 1600s.

As much as the ideal of the melting pot is touted, students of history know that mistrust and misunderstanding of people who have made their way to our country is nothing new. In fact, immigrants have often been met with fear, scorn and even violence. Ultimately, though, the United States has continued to assimilate new citizens, with each group adding elements of its unique culture to what is perhaps more appropriately termed "the salad bowl."

In recent months, issues related to immigration and immigrants to the United States have mobilized people with widely divergent points of view. The self-proclaimed "Minutemen" proclaim that they are defending the U.S.-Mexico border and our country's immigration laws. Students nationwide have staged walkouts to demonstrate support for their families and friends who are here legally and illegally. Grassroots organizations have protested proposed measures that would criminalize the provision of any assistance to undocumented immigrants, while quietly continuing to offer such assistance. And people from all walks of life have joined forces to determine the facts and seek solutions in the face of hyperbolic arguments on both sides.

As of FN&C press time, the Senate had passed a bill that includes tightening border enforcement, creating a guest-worker program, allowing immigrants to legally fill available jobs for a set period, and permitting illegal immigrants who have resided in the United States for a long time to pay a fine and back taxes, learn English and then apply for citizenship. The House had passed a very different bill, and it was not clear how the conflicting provisions would be reconciled. Regardless of the outcome, as President George W. Bush has noted, our country cannot deport the estimated 11 to 12 million people who are in the United States illegally. Such an effort would be logistically impossible, and illegal immigrants affect our economy in myriad ways.

How are foundations and corporate giving programs addressing the issues facing immigrants from around the world as they seek footholds in 21st-century America? FN&C asked five people with varying perspectives on immigration and philanthropy to consider the current state of immigration in the United States and weigh in on the question: What is philanthropy's role in the immigration debate?

Promote a Civil Dialogue

By Arturo Vargas

This spring, we witnessed an unprecedented mass mobilization in support of comprehensive immigration reform and in opposition to legislation passed by the U.S. House of Representatives that would, among other changes in the law, make a felony of unlawful presence in the United States. Throngs of immigrants, including naturalized U.S. citizens, were joined by native-born citizens in marches in communities coast to coast, in gatherings ranging from several dozen people to crowds of more than half a million.

While Latinos visibly made up the majority of the marchers, those who came together represented virtually every ethnic and racial community and every age group as well. High school and college students, many of whom have immigrant parents or are immigrants themselves, held their own walkouts and marches. One local elected official in Dallas, where half a million gathered for a march and rally, recently told me that he was growing nervous when the size of the crowd swelled to more than twice what was expected. When he mentioned his apprehension to a colleague, he was assured it would all be fine. "Look at who's marching," the colleague said, "it's abuelitas with canes and in wheelchairs, it's families."

Such mobilizations did not occur overnight. While they were precipitated by what may be the most ill-conceived measure ever approved by the House, they also were the product of years of education, advocacy and organizing by ethnic NGOs, ethnic media, labor unions and immigrant rights organizations. Many of those organizations have been supported over the years by various philanthropic organizations—the investment in such an infrastructure has been invaluable and the need continues.

While the marches were largely organized by grassroots and community leaders, Latino elected officials also played a key role as the consummate "insiders," helping the organizers navigate municipal bureaucracies. They lent visible support to the rallies by speaking, and, at times, by telling students to end their walkouts and return to their schools.

And while Latino and immigrant communities are experiencing great hope and a sense of empowerment, emotions run just as deep among those on the other side of this issue. Just as Spanish- language radio disc jockeys spurred immigrants to action, English-language conservative radio talk show hosts are stoking the emotions of those who want to deport the estimated 12 million residents among us and who blame undocumented immigrants for practically all of our economic and social ills. This debate has too frequently brought out the worst in us. Whatever one's perspective on immigration and immigrants, philanthropy has a responsibility to promote dialogue that is civil and dignified.

As President George W. Bush stated on April 24, it is unrealistic to think that this country will deport 12 million people. We can be assured that regardless of the policy decisions from Congress, our nation will continue to have millions of immigrants who, as the signs they carried proclaimed, "are America." Philanthropy can help shape the future of an evolving America by supporting the currently in place but under-resourced immigrant integration programs, including English and civics instruction and, above all, naturalization assistance.

The current movement also presents an extraordinary learning opportunity for young people. Legions of future voters are seeing the lawmaking process in action, witnessing how both houses of Congress and the president have interacted in developing the recent legislation. The new generation of leaders requires support for personal, social and academic development.

This generation of immigrants to America has publicly expressed its love for this country. The Stars and Stripes have been prominently carried with pride throughout the streets of our cities and towns by newcomers who seek to live the American dream and embrace our ideals. I can still hear the chorus of first- and second-generation immigrant children reciting the Pledge of Allegiance during the student walkouts. Those young people are poised to establish a new culture of participation, renewing and energizing our democracy. Philanthropy can be a force in helping usher in an era of stronger, more vibrant, American civic life.

Arturo Vargas is a trustee of the Community Technology Foundation of California and executive director of the NALEO Educational Fund.

Shape a Shared Vision

By Daranee Petsod

This spring, millions of immigrants and their supporters peacefully demonstrated in more than 100 communities across the United States. Their powerful show of unity—like their quest for fair treatment and for a shot at the American Dream—are reminiscent of the African American struggle for civil rights four decades ago.

This groundswell of immigrant civic activism is a call to action not only for U.S. lawmakers, but also for American philanthropy.

Today, an estimated 37 million immigrants, including 11 to 12 million undocumented individuals, live in this country. Regardless of immigration status, those newcomers are integral to the fabric of our society. They fill critical jobs, own homes and businesses, raise families and engage in community life. Consider these facts:

• One in seven U.S. workers is an immigrant.     
• One in five K-12 students has an immigrant parent.     
• Three in four children of immigrants are U.S. citizens.

As the birth rate among U.S.-born families continues to decline and as the Baby Boom generation begins to retire, immigrants and their children—as workers, taxpayers, consumers and entrepreneurs—will play an even more critical role in ensuring our nation's vitality.

Within this context, foundations have a unique opportunity to shape a vision for a vibrant, cohesive society that is shared and valued by all of its members, regardless of their race, national origin or socio-economic status. To realize this vision, foundations can support efforts to:

• Engage in multi-sector collaboration to research, develop and implement immigrant integration policies at the local, state and national levels. Such policies currently do not exist in this country.     
• Expand the availability of self-sufficiency programs for immigrant children, families and low-wage workers (e.g., English classes, early-childhood education, job training and financial services).     
• Expand and sustain immigrant civic participation, through naturalization, nonpartisan voter registration and engagement and leadership development. Youth involvement is an important focus of those efforts.     
• Strengthen local, regional and national immigrant organizations, and the networks that link them together and with other strategic partners, such as civil rights groups, labor unions, businesses and faith-based organizations.     
• Enhance the communications skills of immigrant organizations and their allies, through work on message development and ethnic and mainstream media outreach, in order to educate immigrants, increase public understanding and inform policy decisions.     
• Strengthen race relations and intergroup collaboration, particularly multi-constituency efforts that address communitywide issues such as poverty, employment, education, healthcare and criminal justice. This approach focuses on commonalities that unify, instead of differences that divide.

These strategies not only create important ways for immigrants to participate as full members of their communities, but also help address longstanding social problems, improve racial and ethnic equity and strengthen our democratic traditions.

At this historic crossroads, philanthropic leadership can—and must—ensure that America lives up to its heritage as the land of freedom and opportunity. Nothing less than the future of our country is at stake.

Daranee Petsod is executive director of Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees. She can be reached at daranee@gcir.org.

Support Settlement

By Geri Mannion

At the beginning of the 20th century, the United States was in the midst of a wave of new immigration that would label it forever as the "land of immigrants." Hailing from all corners of the world, including China, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Lebanon, Poland and Russia, this wave of immigrants came seeking freedom and fortune. With their heavy accents, poor or non-existent English skills and near-empty pockets, they lived in ghettos and tenements, were ridiculed and discriminated against and often never saw their birthplace or extended families again.

Those immigrants also built the infrastructure of our country—the bridges and tunnels of our cities, and the railroads and highways that stretch across the nation. Immigrants populated the cities and rural areas, tilled the fields and worked the assembly lines to create the industrialized economy that is today the envy of the world. Immigrants became the backbone of our communities—the police and firefighters, shopkeepers, nurses, teachers, bankers and social services providers. They fought wars, saved their money, bought homes and educated their children. By the second and third generations, their children were the inventors, scientists, artists, educators and the civic, economic and social leaders of the nation. The immigrants were patriotic and hard-working, and just as America was good for them, they were good for America.

Today, the United States is facing another wave of immigration that will once again shape its economy, culture and politics. Again, these new immigrants come from many areas of the world. According to Jeffrey S. Passel and Roberto Suro's "Rise, Peak, and Decline: Trends in U.S. Immigration 1992–2004," Mexico is the leading country of origin (38 percent), followed by Asian countries (23 percent), other Latin American countries (20 percent), Europe and Canada (12 percent) and Africa, the Middle East and others (8 percent). And while twothirds of all immigrants continue to reside in six gateway states (California, Florida, Illinois, New Jersey, New York and Texas), many are now living, working and going to school in states such as Iowa, Georgia, Nebraska, North and South Carolina and Tennessee. As these immigrants become settled in their new communities, they are revitalizing local economies and abandoned neighborhoods, providing needed population replacement and becoming engaged in all aspects of the economic, social and civic life of their new homes.

Immigrants represent nearly 12 percent of the U.S. population, or 36 million people. An increasing number of these immigrants are becoming citizens, including 8 million currently eligible for naturalization. Given those naturalization trends, immigrants will represent a large share of the electorate in the coming two decades. And just as a network of churches and synagogues, community organizations, businesses and settlement houses helped the immigrants of the 20th century to learn English and to become American, the philanthropic community today can and should support similar settlement activities at the local, state, regional and national level.

Funders should consider the changing demographics of both the United States as a whole and of their local communities when making grantmaking decisions, and ensure that immigrants are among those benefiting from their funding programs, whether the foundation's focus is healthcare, aging, the environment, economic development, or some other area. Funders can also support programs that will provide English classes and school-based civics classes for children and their parents, help immigrants navigate the naturalization system (a much more difficult and expensive process in the wake of September 11, 2001) and provide revolving loans to help immigrants pay for the naturalization process. In addition, funders can provide opportunities for immigrants to advocate on their own behalf for safe working conditions, improved education for their children, fair housing and better immigrant integration policies at the local, state and federal levels.

For new citizens, foundations can support programs that will help these newcomers to participate in the political system. Efforts might include candidate training, nonpartisan voter registration, get-out-the-vote campaigns, demonstrations of new voting equipment, and voter education forums.

This latest wave of immigrants—not unlike my Irish parents—is eager to contribute politically, economically and culturally to the United States. While the many communities around the United States welcoming these new neighbors may face some initial hurdles and disruption, history shows that they will benefit from these newcomers. Philanthropy can help ease the integration process.

Geri Mannion, a naturalized citizen, is chair, Strengthening U.S. Democracy Program, Carnegie Corporation of New York and co-chair, Funders' Committee for Civic Participation.

Every Voice Needs to be Heard

By Theresa Fay-Bustillos

There is a role for philanthropy in every debate in which human rights or social justice is at issue. In the context of immigration, a particular institution's role will depend on its mission (in the case of a foundation) or the role it plays in the lives of immigrants, in the case of corporate philanthropy).

Levi Strauss was a Jewish immigrant who built a successful commercial enterprise with the significant assistance of a largely immigrant labor force. One hundred and fifty-three years after the founding of Levi Strauss & Co., the world is a very different place. With the advent of globalization, the company is manufacturing in nearly 50 countries and marketing its product in 110. But the profile of the apparel labor force remains very similar. Most apparel workers are women and many are migrants or immigrants.

Legal systems and market forces play important roles in the immigration debate. In countries where legal systems and market forces are most out of sync, migrant workforces emerge to fill gaps in labor requirements. In those countries, legal systems do not always protect the well-being of migrant laborers.

We've seen young workers who were enticed by the promise of work and wages leave their homelands, only to be denied the rights and privileges of residence in their new locations and denied access to critical services. In many cases, immigrants live in fear, with no social network from which to obtain information on critical issues such as healthcare, their rights as workers or basic life skills.

Levi Strauss & Co. believes that philanthropy can play a significant role in supporting people, like immigrant workers, who are struggling against disadvantage and inequity, by developing pragmatic solutions to address issues in the short term and by expanding the dialogue to explore creative—perhaps risky—solutions that would address the root causes of immigration and empower marginalized communities and individuals.

Levi Strauss & Co. and the Levi Strauss Foundation fund organizations that address the legal, social and economic issues that immigrants face in countries where the company has a business presence. Grantees provide education and services to increase understanding of worker rights under local labor laws; advance understanding of important health issues, including HIV/AIDS prevention; and promote financial literacy and asset building. It is our firm belief that when immigrants believe that they will be heard and respected, they can and will participate in the debate on their own behalf.

Philanthropy can also play a role in addressing issues of bias and discrimination by facilitating dialogue among diverse parties in established forums. For example, the Levi Strauss Foundation convened meetings in Mexico of government officials, trade unions, global brands and NGOs to discuss the implications of the end of apparel quotas. As a result, all parties began to understand the complexities of the issues and developed ideas on how Mexico could improve its competitiveness in a way that would benefit all parties without undermining the well-being of workers.

By addressing the disparity between market forces and legal systems, Levi Strauss & Co. has been successful in linking trade liberalization with labor and human rights protections and in funding organizations that strengthen the ability of governments to improve and enforce labor laws. The company's capacity-building work was instrumental in the passage of labor laws in China that now provide important workplace protections for all workers there.

Philanthropy most certainly has a role to play in the immigration debate. Whether institutions are funding litigation and advocacy work directly, helping to develop local organizations or working to empower immigrants to become part of the debate themselves, the participation of philanthropic organizations is critical to ensure that issues are thoroughly discussed and all voices are heard.

Theresa Fay-Bustillos is executive director of the Levi Strauss Foundation and vice president of community affairs at Levi Strauss & Co.

Connecting the Dots 

By Diana Campoamor

Immigration is to philanthropy today what civil rights were 40 years ago. Philanthropy has the greatest impact when it speaks to the heart and the mind at once, when it supports the responsible use of facts and data and connects them to human stories that transcend facile slogans. Our field is capable of supporting grassroots work alongside transnational initiatives, and this ability to connect the local and the global, while keeping both in perspective, is key to how philanthropy can help frame a sane and compassionate debate about immigration.

Promising strategies include:

• Support capacity building, general operations, community organizing and advocacy for immigrant-led organizations. Now more than ever, philanthropy needs to provide these organizations with the resources and assistance to defend the rights of the communities they serve and also help grassroots organizations engage in effective advocacy around immigrant rights. Advocacy and organizing efforts must be collaborative in nature. In recent years, philanthropy has created and facilitated dialogue and collaboration on immigration issues through programs such as the National White Ribbon Campaign for Dialogue.     
• Make sure the public has access to accurate information. So much of the immigration debate is shaped by perceptions like "the undocumented take jobs from Americans" and "immigrants are a drain on the economy." But what are the real numbers behind those perceptions? The University of North Carolina's Kenan Institute, a think tank supported by a range of local and national foundations and corporations, recently published the first report on the economic impact of the Hispanic population on North Carolina, which has experienced triple-digit growth in the last two decades. The study (available at www.kenan-flagler.unc.edu/ki/reports/2006_HispanicStudy) found that while North Carolina incurs a net cost of approximately $61 million—or $102 per Hispanic resident—due to its Hispanic population, the state's economy receives benefits of $9 billion per year from that same group, which is largely composed of recent immigrants.     
• Lift up voices from the margins that put a human face to the debate. It's easy to dehumanize newcomers. Journalist Sonia Nazario attaches a name and a face to immigration statistics in Enrique's Journey, the Pulitzer Prize–winning story of a 15-year-old Honduran boy who travels alone from his country to North Carolina to reunite with his mother. Enrique faces many perils on his journey, and his story is likened to a modern-day Odyssey. Nazario, who spoke at Hispanics in Philanthropy's annual membership meeting on May 7 during the Council on Foundations conference in Pittsburgh, highlights the transnational realities that immigrant communities face. Without understanding those realities, policymakers cannot appropriately address the immigration debate. Philanthropy can support the production and dissemination of work like Enrique's Journey.     
• Improve economic opportunity in the countries immigrants are leaving. What drove Enrique's mother to come to America? The Pew Hispanic Center, a think tank supported by the Pew Charitable Trusts, recently published a series of research reports (available at www.pewhispanic.org) that shed light on the economic realities facing undocumented Mexican immigrants. It was not the absence of jobs (only 5 percent of survey respondents who have been in the United States for two years or less were unemployed before migrating), but the low quality of those jobs that motivated migration. Through small-business loans, training, education and other investments, philanthropy can help create higher-quality opportunities for employment in other countries so fewer people are forced to leave their families and communities in search of an adequate income in the United States.

At its best, U.S. philanthropy has shaped the way communities discuss and address issues by supporting those who seek peaceful and inclusive resolutions of major policy debates. The country is caught up in a new debate over immigration and, just like during the original civil rights movement, philanthropy has a critical moderating role to play.

Diana Campoamor is president of Hispanics in Philanthropy.

View resources for funders interested in supporting immigration issues.