This second volume of the monographic publication Inmigración y transformación social en Cataluña explores the legal issues surrounding immigration in Spain and Catalonia on the basis of a comparative analysis of the legislation of six countries; three of them with a long tradition of immigration, indeed whose modern existence is linked to the phenomenon – Australia, the United States and Canada, and three more – Germany, France and the Netherlands – whose previously emigrant societies have recently become the recipients of migrant flows. Its analysis focuses on the three key questions of entry to the host country, social rights and nationalisation.

The study provides a detailed map of the legal responses devised for immigration, the questions that remain unanswered and the challenges posed by new proposals and realities. It also identifies certain common options with regard to family reunion as a stabilising element which helps overcome the view of the immigrant as “guest”; control mechanisms for the entry of foreign nationals for economic motives (from closing borders to the regularisation of illegal residents); the debate generated around immigrants’ right to participate politically, or the use of naturalisation procedures as an integrating instrument. The book comes with a CD containing unpublished statistical data along with an exhaustive questionnaire about foreign nationals and immigration and the answers given by experts from the study countries.