For two decades veteran photojournalist David Bacon has documented the connections between labor, migration, and the global economy. In Illegal People Bacon explores the human side of globalization, exposing the many ways it uproots people in Latin America and Asia, driving them to migrate. At the same time, U.S. immigration policy makes the labor of those displaced people a crime in the United States. Illegal People explains why our national policy produces even more displacement, more migration, more immigration raids, and a more divided, polarized society. Through interviews and on-the-spot reporting from both impoverished communities abroad and American immigrant workplaces and neighborhoods, Bacon shows how the United States’ trade and economic policy abroad, in seeking to create a favorable investment climate for large corporations, creates conditions to displace communities and set migration into motion. Trade policy and immigration are intimately linked, Bacon argues, and are, in fact, elements of a single economic system. In particular, he analyzes NAFTA’s corporate tilt as a cause of displacement and migration from Mexico and shows how criminalizing immigrant labor benefits employers. For example, Bacon explains that, pre-NAFTA, Oaxacan corn farmers received subsidies for their crops. State-owned CONASUPO markets turned the corn into tortillas and sold them, along with milk and other basic foodstuffs, at low, subsidized prices in cities. Post-NAFTA, several things happened: the Mexican government was forced to end its subsidies for corn, which meant that farmers couldn’t afford to produce it; the CONASUPO system was dissolved; and cheap U.S. corn flooded the Mexican market, driving the price of corn sharply down. Because Oaxacan farming families can’t sell enough corn to buy food and supplies, many thousands migrate every year, making the perilous journey over the border into the United States only to be labeled “illegal” and to find that working itself has become, for them, a crime. Bacon powerfully traces the development of illegal status back to slavery and shows the human cost of treating the indispensable labor of millions of migrants—and the migrants themselves—as illegal. Illegal People argues for a sea change in the way we think, debate, and legislate around issues of migration and globalization, making a compelling case for why we need to consider immigration and migration from a globalized human rights perspective. “David Bacon is the conscience of American journalism; an extraordinary social documentarist in the rugged humanist tradition of Dorothea Lange, Carey McWilliams, and Ernesto Galarza.” —Mike Davis, author of No One Is Illegal “Illegal People documents how undocumented workers have become the world’s most exploited workforce—subject to raids and arrests, forced to work at low pay and under miserable conditions, and prevented from organizing on their own behalf. In this richly reported book, David Bacon makes a powerful case for the centrality of ‘illegals’—of all nationalities—in the global struggle for economic justice.” —Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America “David Bacon’s book brings us the reality of the deplorable conditions under which immigrants live when they get here. David also demonstrates that there is hope, and we can win something better, today, not just for immigrants, but for all working people. We just have to commit ourselves to make the policy changes that create these unacceptable conditions. ?Sà Se Puede!” —Dolores Huerta, co-founder of United Farm Workers and president of the Dolores Huerta Foundation “Read this book to understand why we must stop uprooting people abroad and how we can ensure rights and jobs for all people in this country. Bacon’s book highlights the real value of a comprehensive approach to immigration reform, which America supports!” —Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee “In clear and comppelling language, Bacon connects the dots between trade, migration and the maldistribution of wealth. A must-read for anyone who wants to understand the cynical politics and human costs of the corporate protection racket we call globalization.” —Jeff Faux, distinguished fellow at the Economic Policy Institute and author of The Global Class War “This new and urgently needed rethinking of the global economy and migration is a unique roadmap, showing not only how we arrived at our current immigration debate impasse but outlining the possibilities for what lies ahead.” —Raj Jayadev, journalist, organizer, and executive director of Silicon Valley De-Bug “As he has before with both pen and camera, Bacon reminds us that we’re all in this together—and that organizing to reject divisive racism and nativism both celebrates our common humanity and promotes a twenty-first-century vision of global citizenship.” —John W. Wilhelm, presideent/Hospitality Industry, UNITE HERE “Illegal Peopleeeee is like a fine Oaxacan tapestry woven ever so carefully with the human face of the main protagonist of the immigration dynamic—the mighty migrant laborer.” —Nativo V. Lopez, national president of Hermandad Mexicana Latinoamericana and the Mexican American Political Association
✦ Table of Contents
ILLEGAL PEOPLE......Page 2
Contents
......Page 4
Preface......Page 6
Merry Christmas. You’re fired.......Page 12
How the Housekeepers Saw It......Page 19
The Smithfield Raids: Overt Union-Busting......Page 23
Flight from Oaxaca......Page 34
Battles in the Mines......Page 44
Forcing People into the Migrant Stream......Page 62
The Sensenbrenner Family Business......Page 75
Migrant Labor: An Indispensable Part of a Global System......Page 81
The Profitability of Undocumented Labor......Page 88
Not Enough Workers!......Page 94
Modern-day Braceros......Page 103
How Corporations Won the Debate on Immigration Reform......Page 116
Paolo Freire on LA’s Mean Streets......Page 130
Los Angeles: Class War’s Ground Zero......Page 140
The Story of Ana Martinez......Page 147
Immigration Enforcement Becomes a Weapon to Stop Unions......Page 153
Operation Vanguard......Page 158
Immigrant Workers Ask Labor: “Which Side Are You On?”......Page 164
Mississippi Battleground......Page 178
Katrina: Window on a Nightmare......Page 190
The Common Ground of Jobs and Rights......Page 194
Remedy the Past’s Injustice......Page 200
People in the Streets Want More......Page 204
Seven: ILLEGAL PEOPLE OR ILLEGAL WORK?......Page 210
Illegal Means Not European and Not White......Page 211
Fighting Second-Class Status......Page 220
Silicon Valley’s High-Tech Sweatshops......Page 225
“What Future for Our Children?”......Page 233
High Skills and Low Salaries......Page 244
From Guest Worker to German Citizen......Page 249
Suppressing Asylum Seekers While Promoting “Managed Migration”......Page 254
Mode 4 and the UN Convention on the Rights of Migrants......Page 257
Transnational Communities: A New Definition of Citizenship......Page 261