The Transnationalized Social Question

Thomas Faist is Professor of Sociology at Bielefeld University. His fields of interest are transnational relations, cross-border migration, citizenship, and social policy. His previous publications include Dynamics of International Migration and Transnational Social Spaces (2000), Dual Citizenship in Europe (2007), Beyond a Border: The Causes and Consequences of Contemporary Immigration (with Peter Kivisto, 2010), Diaspora and Transnationalism: Concepts, Theories and Methods (with Rainer Bauböck, 2010), and Environmental Migration and Social Inequalities (with Robert McLehman and Jeanette Schade, 2016).

• 1: Introduction: Migration as the Transnationalized Social QuestionPart I: Approaching the Transnationalized Social Question2: The Social Question Then and Now: From Voice to Exit?3: The Nexus of Cross-Border Migration and Social InequalitiesPart II: Social Inequalities in Social Protection4: Social Rights and Social Standards in Cross-Border Migration5: Migration, Social Protection, and the (Re)Production of inequalities in the European Union6: Social Protection Among Small Groups in European Transnational Social SpacesPart III: The Transnational Puzzle: The Politics Around the Social Question7: Externalization in Cross-Border Migration8: Immigration Countries: Internalizing the Social Question9: Emigration: Development and Securitization in Global NationsPart IV: Outlook10: The Socio-Natural Question: The Future is the Present11: No Alternative? The Public Role of Social Scientists in the Transnational Social Question

The transnationalized social question is a remarkable and very original book, analyzing migration movements between the Global South and the Global North from the point of view of social gaps. Exit, as a response to global inequalities, takes place in a world where social inequalities between countries are stronger than inequalities inside the countries. Cross border migration is a crucial field for understanding social inequalities in the context of transnationalization of labour and global asymmetries. The choice of Thomas Faist to explore the whole migration complex through the transnational approach of social questions is a brilliant renewal of research. The final claim towards researchers to engage in the public sphere is an urgent request when decision makers have difficultly agreeing with them on the solutions.