Recently, I read the NYT article on Haitian Immigrations in Chile and I began to bombard myself with a number of different questions that I knew I had no answer.
For instance:
- Which Latin American country or countries has a good track record of welcoming them into society? I know that historically Argentina and Uruguay received a large influx of mostly European immigrants in the 20th century.
- Which countries have welcomed or have been forced to deal with an influx of immigration for neighboring countries are from the region? I know much has been made of the mass exodus from Venezuela in recent years, but are there other examples?
From my experience living and working in a number of different countries I can say that Latin American countries are not set up to handle large influxes of immigrants and those groups that do settle for an extended period tend to stay within their own communities – thinking of the Japanese and Chinese communities in Peru.
I hope Latin America can work to improve how immigrants are treated as the issue of immigration across the Western Hemisphere is not going away anytime soon.
Hemipshere Politico 