Logan B Ikubolajeh, Thomas Kevin J A
Department of Geography and the African Studies Program, The Pennsylvania State University, United States.
Department of Sociology and the African Studies Program, The Pennsylvania State University, United States.
Int Migr. 2012 Apr 1;50(2):1-19. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-2435.2011.00711.x.
The Diversity Visa (DV) programme is designed to improve the multicultural composition of the U.S. "melting pot" beyond the traditional source countries in Europe. In pursuit of this objective, the basic eligibility requirement for participation in the programme is a high school diploma. Despite its salutary objective and design, the programme's implications for the African brain drain may not all be benign. The "tired, poor, huddled masses" from Africa are defined in more restrictive terms, and the obstacles they face are more economically and administratively onerous than those encountered by their early European counterparts. The costs of transforming a lottery win to an actual diversity visa and Green Card are so high that only Africans in well-paying jobs, who are likely to be professionals rather than mere high school graduates, are likely to be able to afford the full costs of programme participation. In this sense, the programme has an in-built, skills-selective mechanism. The main objective of this study is to examine the extent to which the DV has facilitated the movement of professional, technical and kindred workers (PTKs) from Africa to the United States, and some of the economic and policy implications of the process.
多元化签证（DV）计划旨在提升美国“大熔炉”的多元文化构成，使其超越传统的欧洲来源国。为实现这一目标，参与该计划的基本资格要求是拥有高中文凭。尽管该计划目标有益且设计合理，但其对非洲人才外流的影响未必全是良性的。来自非洲的“疲惫、贫穷、挤在一起的大众”被定义得更为严格，他们面临的障碍在经济和行政方面比早期欧洲同行所遇到的更为艰巨。将彩票中奖转化为实际的多元化签证和绿卡的成本如此之高，以至于只有从事高薪工作的非洲人，他们可能是专业人士而非仅仅是高中毕业生，才有可能承担参与该计划的全部费用。从这个意义上说，该计划有一种内在的技能选择机制。本研究的主要目的是考察多元化签证在多大程度上促进了专业、技术及相关工作人员（PTKs）从非洲流向美国，以及这一过程的一些经济和政策影响。
