Deportation, crime, and victimization
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Deportation, crime, and victimization Sandra V. Rozo1
· Therese Anders2 · Steven Raphael3
Received: 8 July 2019 / Accepted: 10 June 2020 / © Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract We study whether the forced removal of undocumented immigrants from the USA increases violent crime in Mexican municipalities. Using municipal panel data on homicide rates matched with annual deportation flows from the USA to Mexico, we assess whether municipalities with repatriation points experience higher violent crime when deportation flows surge. We consistently find that municipalities with greater geographic exposure to deportation flows have higher violent crime. The effects are mostly driven by increases in homicide rates of young males and minors. Keywords Crime · Migration · Latin America JEL Classification O15 · R2 · K37
1 Introduction With the unprecedented growth of international migration, many developed countries have increased enforcement to decrease the flow of illegal immigrants into their countries. For instance, total annual forced removals from the USA increased from approximately 400,000 in 1998 to 1.7 million in 2013 (DHS 2014), with more than 95% of the total number of deportees sent to Mexico and Central America. Additionally, the current US administration has placed an increased emphasis on illegal
Responsible editor: Klaus F. Zimmermann Sandra V. Rozo
[email protected] 1
USC Marshall School of Business, 701 Exposition Boulevard, USC, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA
2
Hertie School Data Science Lab & SCRIPTS Cluster of Excellence, Berlin, Germany
3
UC Berkeley Goldman School of Public Policy, Berkeley, CA, USA
S.V. Rozo et al.
immigration—further increasing deportations (see The New York Times 2017 and The Washington Post 2017 for reports).1 This article examines the effects of deportations from host countries on violent crime in the origin countries, focusing on the case of the USA and Mexico. Identifying these effects is crucial for the adequate formulation of public policy to inform the current debate on the consequences of increasing immigration enforcement in the USA and on the possible unintended effects of these policies. Additionally, it is an important step toward preventing higher levels of violence in origin locations and interrupting the vicious cycle of violence-driven migration toward the USA. A link between destination country enforcement policy and origin country crime may occur through two main channels. First, the selective removal of individuals with previous criminal backgrounds may create concentrated flows of deportees with weak ties to their home country and insufficient skills valued in the formal labor market but substantial criminal and correctional experiences. Such deportees may have a higher tendency to turn to criminal activity to generate income, with enforcement policy effectively exporting crime to the home nation. For example, to the extent that the individual’s experience in the USA was criminogenic (e.g., migrant youth growing
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