2017 Best Book Award
APSA Section on Migration & Citizenship

More than half of the 41 million foreign-born individuals in the United States today are noncitizens, half have difficulty with English, a quarter are undocumented, and many are poor.  As a result, most immigrants have few opportunities to make their voices heard in the political process.  Nonprofits in many cities have stepped into this gap to promote the integration of disadvantaged immigrants.  They have done so despite notable constraints on their political activities, including limits on their lobbying and partisan electioneering, limited organizational resources, and dependence on government funding.  Immigrant rights advocates also operate in a national context focused on immigration enforcement rather than immigrant integration.  In Making Immigrant Rights Real, Els de Graauw examines how immigrant-serving nonprofits can make impressive policy gains despite these limitations.

Drawing on three case studies of immigrant rights policies—language access, labor rights, and municipal ID cards—in San Francisco, de Graauw develops a tripartite model of advocacy strategies that nonprofits have used to propose, enact, and implement immigrant-friendly policies: administrative advocacy, cross-sectoral and cross-organizational collaborations, and strategic issue framing.  The inventive development and deployment of these strategies enabled immigrant-serving nonprofits in San Francisco to secure some remarkable new immigrant rights victories, and de Graauw explores how other cities can learn from their experiences.
Contents
Introduction: The Local Politics of Immigrant Integration
1.  Nonprofit Organizations as Immigrant Rights Advocates
2.  Immigrants and Politics in San Francisco
3.  Providing Language Access through Nonprofit-Government Collaborations
4.  Raising Minimum Wages through Nonprofit-Union Collaborations
5.  Strategic Framing and Municipal ID Cards
Conclusion: Making Immigrant Rights Real  
Back Cover Praise
"In Making Immigrant Rights Real, Els de Graauw engages with three fascinating cases of immigrant nonprofits' involvement in city politics and program implementation.  The author brings to bear evidence from a well-executed, original survey of immigrant nonprofits, as well as incisive quotes from in-depth interviews with nonprofits' leaders and staff, elected officials, and public administrators.  The tripartite model de Graauw devises to show how immigrant nonprofits make gains for their clients in local politics is insightful and well supported by the evidence presented." --Paul G. Lewis, Arizona State University, author of Shaping Suburbia: How Political Institutions Organize Urban Development

"Immigrant rights become real when they're actually implemented and enforced.  Els de Graauw’s important book reveals how San Francisco’s immigrant-serving nonprofits quietly, mostly invisibly, but very effectively overcame legal restrictions and limited resources to become powerful political actors advocating for immigrant rights, mediating between local government and the immigrant community, and converting policy on paper into policy in practice. Highly recommended." --Richard DeLeon, author of Left Coast City 

"Els de Graauw tells us something new about the role of nonprofits at the local level in advancing immigrant rights.  She shows that nonprofits achieve success by effectively using three strategies: administrative advocacy, collaboration across sectors and with other types of nonprofit organizations, and strategic issue framing." --Mara Sidney, author of Unfair Housing 

"Taking stock of the important role that local nonprofits play in the lives of immigrants is required for a full understanding of immigrant integration in America.  Els de Graauw's deftly crafted account is required reading for anyone who hopes to cut through the heated political rhetoric of the immigration debate to understand how the politics of immigration actually happens." --Tomás R. Jiménez, author of Replenished Ethnicity
Reviews
Social Service Review 91(1) (March 2017)
Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare 44(1) (March 2017)
Contemporary Sociology 46(5) (August 2017)
​Perspectives on Politics 16(2) (June 2018)
International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 42(4) (July 2018)
Industrial and Labor Relations Review 71(4) (July 2018)
​Migration Studies (online) (April 2019)
Ethics and Social Welfare 13(2) (May 2019)
​International Migration Review 54(1) (March 2020)