Comparing Urban Citizenship, Sanctuary Cities, Local Bureaucratic Membership, and Regularizations

• Author: David Kaufmann
• Date: 01 May 2019
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13029
• Published date: 01 May 2019

Comparing Urban Citizenship, Sanctuary Cities, Local Bureaucratic Membership, and Regularizations 443

Public Administration Review,

Vol. 79, Iss. 3, pp. 443–446. © 2019 by

The American Society for Public Administration.

DOI: 10.1111/puar.13029.

David Kaufmann

University of Bern

Comparing Urban Citizenship, Sanctuary Cities, Local

Bureaucratic Membership, and Regularizations

Abstract: Irregular migrants tend to live in dense urban settings. Cities respond to this phenomenon with a variety of

urban immigration and citizenship policies in support of irregular migrants. These urban policies produce a disparity

between local inclusion and national exclusion. This article describes and compares such urban policies, namely, urban

citizenship, sanctuary cities, local bureaucratic membership, and regularizations. Urban citizenship serves as the

normative foundation of these policies because it claims membership for all people who inhabit a city. Regularization

programs confer national residency status on irregular migrants. Pro-immigration actors favor this policy; however,

when regularizations are not possible, cities can turn to sanctuary city and local bureaucratic membership policies. It is

important for practitioners to comprehend and engage with these types of urban policies since they are likely to travel to

cities worldwide.

The intertwined trends of globalization,

migration, and urbanization establish cities

as sites of migration. Cities worldwide are

experiencing a growing population of irregular

migrants who tend to live in dense urban areas

because of the higher likelihood of finding jobs and

suitable accommodations; better access to relational,

ethnic, social, or cultural networks; and greater

anonymity (Lee 2017). City governments feel a

certain immediacy to support, protect, and regularize

irregular migrants because they “are de facto members

of the community—they work in the city, pay local

taxes, are homeowners, tenants, or landlords in the

city, send their children to local schools, attend

city churches, shop in the city, etc.” (de Graauw

2014, 312). Thus, cities perceive irregular migrants

as regular participants in the everyday life of their

communities and not as abstract illegal constructs

(Varsanyi 2006). Based on the concept of jus domicili

(membership upon residence), certain cities perceive

themselves as an alternative locus of economic,

social, and political membership for all types of

residents.

Irregular migrants have become an urban policy

target group. Cities engage in the formulation

and implementation of a variety of migration and

citizenship policies in support of irregular migrants,

although they do not possess the legal power to

expand these migrants’ de jure rights. By formulating

these policies, often in cooperation with local

nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) (Sidney

2014), cities can take a direct policy stance against

national immigration and citizenship policies (Bauder

2017; de Graauw 2014). This is especially the case as

national policies that target irregular migrants in the

Global North have become stricter (de Haas, Natter,

and Vezzoli 2016). Conflicting urban and national

policies toward irregular migrants produce a disparity

between local inclusion and national exclusion

(Bauder 2017; de Graauw 2014; Gebhardt 2016;

Varsanyi 2006).

Urban policies toward irregular migrants often

confront or complement national policies, and they

challenge national sovereignty over immigration and

citizenship. It is not a new phenomenon, however,

that cities are at the forefront of addressing societal

problems. Cities are arenas where societal problems

accentuate themselves and where socioeconomic

transformations, developments, and problems first

manifest themselves (Magnusson 2011). Thus,

addressing societal problems is a constant urban

policy task. Urban policy making operates within

the tension of complying with the policies of higher-

tier governments and formulating progressive and

problem-oriented policies; this tension is apparent in

different urban policy fields, such as environmental

(Hughes 2017; Sapotichne and Jones 2012) or drug

policy (Kübler and Wälti 2001).

The goal of this article is to describe and compare

the existing variety of urban immigration and

citizenship policies toward irregular migrants. This

article elaborates on the ambiguously used concepts,

policies, and practices that exist on the ground and

David Kaufmann is a postdoctoral

researcher in the KPM Center for Public

Management, University of Bern,

Switzerland.

E-mail: david.kaufmann@kpm.unibe.ch

Viewpoint

Stephen E. Condrey

and Tonya Neaves,

Associate Editors