The Mobility of Workers under Advanced Capitalism: Dominican Migration to the United States (review)

The literature on U.S.-Dominican Republic circulation and migration is considerable, yet Ramona Hernández brings a refreshing critical lens to her explanation of the structural forces and structure-agency interplay driving the system. The book is more than a case study, though the author's empirical base is firmly centered on the Dominican experience in the metropolitan U.S. Hernández follows her mentor Frank Bonilla (and Saskia Sassen and Betty Petras, as well) by framing her theoretical explanation of the structural forces impelling island-to-mainland migration in critical neo-Marxist terms. I find the book's detailed examinations of the interplay of macro-structural determinants and consequences to be the most powerful arguments in this comprehensive sociological treatment. Indeed, in contrast, the empirical biographical inserts are less convincing, though they do lend life and substance to the heavier and more interwoven theoretical positions taken (and debated). Ramona Hernández is certainly not afraid to deal with the neocolonial geopolitical context of the Dominican Republic's contemporary situation. She is refreshingly direct and outspoken in posing her hypotheses on population control and migration instigation by the island authorities and the supportive U.S. administrations, and the confidence exuded is strengthened by the in-depth analysis and critical revisions of previous research and its hypotheses on the qualifications to stories and generalizations about Dominican migrant "success."

This is not a complete analysis of the Dominican-U.S. migration circuit, however. Although others are held accountable because of their sample biases, or their ethnographic coverage, this study also suffers from incompleteness. The island lives of families, dependents, and households with migrating members are not given much thought, or functional roles. The plight of Dominican men and women in Washington Heights are the empirical focus, and their bilocal, transnational worlds are scarcely referenced. Transnationalism is surprisingly absent from the theoretical discourse, which is a pity, because today's neo-Marxist structural explanations of international movement certainly have enough "space" in them to accommodate transnationalism and its dynamic, multilocal nature. Perhaps as another refreshing adventure, this scholarly, in-depth treatment of Dominican-U.S. circulation and migration might well be reincarnated to incorporate transnational notions into the explanatory framework. Moving on to dwell upon the evolving contexts and evolving changes in Dominican's international circulation and migration strategies would appear an essential next step. This would, from necessity, involve investigation of conditions at both the sending and receiving contexts and involve a more informed analysis of the complete circuit — its involved family, households, and communities and the concomitant circulation of people, capital, information, goods in kind, cultural practices, and survival strategies between island and metropolitan enclave community.

Despite this last observation and a call for an even more holistic treatment of Dominican migration to the U.S. than is delivered herein, Ramona Hernández has provided us with a refreshing, evocative analysis and a thoroughly readable and detailed structural explanation of this important life strategy for Dominicans. The tenor of the argument is refreshing, the sharpness of insight is engaging, and the coverage/recognition of the everyday racism, inequality, and disadvantage that awaits today's Latino immigrant is to be welcomed as an absolutely critical reality check. This is an exemplary text that deserves a place on any serious scholar's bookshelf. I am certainly glad it's on mine.