Book Challenges Conventional Wisdom

David Cook-Martín, associate professor of sociology, challenges readers to rethink what they know about immigration policy in Culling the Masses: The Democratic Origins of Racist Immigration Policy in the Americas, co-authored with David FitzGerald, co-director of the Center for Comparative Immigration Studies at University of California, San Diego. Harvard University Press published the book last spring.

Immigration reform continues to make national headlines, and the book is an in-depth look at a complex and often controversial issue.

Cook-Martín and FitzGerald collected and analyzed laws between 1790-2010 from 22 countries. Cook-Martín says he wanted readers to consider who is allowed to enter “our” country and live among “us” in different kinds of political systems. The book challenges the conventional wisdom that democracy and racism are incompatible. The authors found the United States and liberal democratic countries used exclusionary laws earlier and much longer than undemocratic countries.

“Democracy, as we’ve seen time and time again but especially recently, is no guarantee against racism,” Cook-Martín says.