Huntington’s Point of View Analysis

Immigration has always been an important matter to citizens and governments all around the world. Particularly, it has been a crucial subject for the relation between Mexico and the United States of America. One man discussed this important topic throughout many years. He studied and analyzed several theories about human immigration, in Europe, Asia, and North America. He has been a distinguished professor but others think of him as a lunatic. Is his point of view that bad? Has he got any good ideas? What are the important points in his statements?

Samuel P. Huntington establishes in his book Who are we? The challenges to America's national identity (2004) that the United States are dealing with a massive immigration influx, that is dividing their land and people into two. Huntington also mentions that the world is separating into cultures rather than into countries. This is supposed by him in his book entitled The Clash of Civilizations (1993). He divides the world in about 9 – 12 “nations” united mainly by their common territory, as well as by their religion, culture and language. We could say that he separates the world into four different regions. United States of America, Canada, north-western Europe and Australia are part of the “orthodox” region. The other regions are Latin Americans, Asia and the northern part of Africa, and the rest of Africa.

In general, I disagree with Huntington’s point of view towards the evolution of civilizations. Talking about the United States, I think he is exaggerating its immigration rates. Another fact to take into account is that he wrote his work during 2002 and 2004, and immigration rates have diminished significantly since 2009 (Department of Homeland Security, 2011). I think that Huntington is kind of paranoid about what might happen with future civilizations. In my opinion, he is a religion fanatic who thinks that religion joins people and also makes them destroy other civilizations. Also, Huntington’s argument about the identity of Americans as part of the Anglican Church is totally baseless. Nowadays, Americans do not praise and recognize England’s King and Queen as God’s messengers. In fact, with the independence of the thirteen colonies, they “cut” relations with England’s totalitarian power over colonies.

The United States of America is a multi-cultural nation and will remain as this. Although there are lots of “isolated” citizens that belong to a specific race, they will not divide the country into two or three or more parts. Cubans, for example, have their little Habana; and Asian people have their “China Town”; also Mexicans and Puerto Ricans have their own communities. The United States doesn’t have to worry about the growth of immigration rates. It is unlikely that immigrants will try to defeat the government and take the nation.

However, Huntington’s point of view is not totally wrong. He gives true and interesting information, but the way he analyze it is wrong. As the book Challenges (1997) explains, he even was found guilty for interpreting mathematics and numbers the wrong way leading to a pseudo-science. What he did was to publish some statistics and make the readers believe what he wanted them to believe. With numbers and statistics on his side, readers would follow him and believe what he said. Huntington needed to be more open minded and calmed. He needed to erase that paranoia that he had about the Latinos and the Muslims attacking the United States. At the end, immigration benefits everyone.

References

Department of Homeland Security. (2011). Nonimmigrant Admissions to the United States: 2010:     

                Retrieved from www.dhs.gov

Lang S. (1997). Challenges. Berkeley: Springer

Huntington, S. P. (1993). The Clash of Civilizations. New York: Simon & Schuster.

Huntington, S. P. (2004). Who Are We? The Challenges to America's National Identity. New York: 

                 Simon & Schuster.