Immigrants in the US Air Force: How Job Assignment Varies by Citizenship

As an institution, the contemporary military strives for diversity and a multicultural force. However, little is known about how citizenship status impacts job assignments within the US Air Force and the lives of its airmen. Few scholars have studied the US Air Force and even less is known about its immigrant servicemembers, but what is known at the aggregate level are that immigrant airmen are more likely to naturalize compared to those in other branches of the military. Drawing on classical assimilation theory and newfound population data retrieved from the Department of Defense originally inaccessible for the public, this study examines whether job assignment differs between native-born and foreign-born and whether the difference by nativity exists for naturalized immigrants as well as noncitizen immigrants. The result from ordinal logistic regression analysis shows there is a job placement difference between native born and immigrants, as well as the association may vary by race/ethnicity. Controlling for all other factors, the results suggest that the difference is found between enlisted noncitizen immigrant airmen and their native-born counterparts. Citizenship status does have certain effects on the occupational assignments of enlisted noncitizen immigrant airmen compared to that of their native-born counterparts, although there are other elements involved as well beyond citizenship status that impact the complexity of the Air Force job assignment process.

Author

• Waligora, Justin Luke

Language

• en

Keyword

• military
• assimilation
• immigrants
• occupation
• citizenship

Date created

• 2021

Type of Work

• Master's Thesis

License

• All rights reserved

Rights statement

• In Copyright

GW Unit

• Sociology

Degree

• M.A.

Advisor

• Ishizawa, Hiromi

Committee Member(s)

• Strader, Eiko

Persistent URL

•  https://scholarspace.library.gwu.edu/etd/pv63g105f