The social and political incorporation of migrants and their descendants is a key concern for today’s diverse societies. However, as most scholarship about migration is produced in the North American and Western European centers of the global academic system (Piccoli, Lorenzo et al. 2023. “A global network of scholars?,” Comparative Migration Studies 11(16)), dominant theories about migrant incorporation have mostly been modeled on the experiences of countries from these regions. In her book Identities Matter: The Politics of Immigration and Incorporation, Angela Ju selects a case that promises to offer novel theoretical and empirical insights. She focuses on Brazil and the social and political incorporation of third-generation Jewish and Japanese Brazilians. In contrast to many migrant groups in the “Global North,” these two groups are related to countries that are currently more socioeconomically developed than their destination country, namely Japan and Israel.

As Ju reports in her book, there are around two million Brazilians of Japanese descent in Brazil, the largest population outside of Japan, and around 120,000 Jewish Brazilians, the ninth largest Jewish diaspora population in the world (p. 17). Both groups have immigrated to Brazil mostly in the first half of the twentieth century, with Japanese migrants recruited as labor migrants, and Jewish migrants entering as refugees from Europe. Ju acknowledges that both groups are not strictly similar, as Jewish Brazilians do not trace their heritage to a single country as Japanese Brazilians do. Nevertheless, due to the importance of the state of Israel as a point of reference for the Jewish diaspora, she argues that both groups can be compared for the purposes of her study. Most importantly for the book’s main argument, both groups enjoy an above average socioeconomic status in Brazil, with Jewish Brazilians ranking first and Japanese Brazilians third in the hierarchy of median incomes per group in Brazil.

Ju develops her argument starting from classic assimilation theory, which expects that third-generation descendants of migrants who have achieved high socioeconomic status assimilate to the dominant majority society. Contrary to this hypothesis, she argues that for groups that are associated with countries that are more socioeconomically developed than their destination country, like Japanese and Jewish Brazilians in Brazil, assimilation might not be the most desired and advantageous strategy. Instead, they may “strategically associate themselves with the heritage country” (p. 4) and emphasize their foreignness. Starting from this theoretically promising observation, the study investigates what kinds of ethnic or racial identities Japanese and Jewish Brazilians choose to emphasize and to leverage in their political behavior, for example, in terms voting patterns or support for specific policies.

Ju’s study is based on a combination of different quantitative and qualitative data sources. First, she analyzed the only available national survey from the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics containing a question about the national origin of respondents (from 1998). This enabled her to analyze the statistical determinants of racial identification among Jewish and Japanese Brazilians. Second, in 2012, Ju conducted 60 semistructured interviews with third-generation Jewish and Japanese Brazilian women living in São Paulo (Brazil’s largest city and economic center). All interviewees were university-educated to avoid confounding variables. These interviews were used for a more in-depth exploration of Jewish and Japanese Brazilians’ ethnic and racial identifications. What is somewhat unusual is that the analysis of the interview responses relies very much on counting responses, and less on an interpretive procedure aimed at uncovering subjective meaning. Finally, Ju also conducted interviews with city council members, as well as leaders and members of migrant NGO’s and analyzed informational material provided by two Jewish and Japanese Brazilian ethnic community-based organizations.

The study’s main theoretical argument is that Japanese and Jewish Brazilians’ strategies of social and political incorporation are shaped by the existing ethnoracial hierarchies in Brazilian society. To capture these hierarchies, Ju develops a “pigmentocracy and perceived integration model” for Brazil (see Figure 2.1, p. 55), which may be applicable to other Latin American societies as well. This model locates different ethnic and racial groups in a two-dimensional space. Groups are stratified vertically in terms of status, reflecting Brazil’s “pigmentocracy.” Even though Brazil has cultivated the myth of a “racial democracy” that has overcome racial divisions, research has pointed out the persistence of hierarchies based on skin color (Telles, Edward et al. 2014. Pigmentocracies: Ethnicity, Race, and Color in Latin America). “White Brazilians” are at the top, “Black,” and “Indigenous Brazilians” at the bottom of the status hierarchy. To this, Ju adds a horizontal division based on a group’s insider and outsider position (i.e., reflecting perceptions of foreignness) in Brazil’s society.

The empirical findings of the study are complex. First, Ju shows that Japanese and Jewish Brazilians are placed at or near the top of Brazil’s system of ethnoracial hierarchies. In particular, the status of both groups is enhanced by the work of ethnic community organizations that maintain ties to their respective heritage countries, which is also in the political interest of the Brazilian state. Furthermore, perceived foreignness is not necessarily a disadvantage for these groups: Particularly Japanese Brazilian politicians are encouraged to highlight their “Japanese” identity because Japanese Brazilians are positively stereotyped as being less corrupt than mainstream Brazilian politicians are.

The second and most important empirical finding from Ju’s analysis is that Jewish and Japanese Brazilians differ in terms of the social identity category they emphasize and mobilize politically. Jewish Brazilians tend to identify racially as “White” but mobilize politically based on their ethnic identity as “Jewish” (i.e., they are more inclined to vote for a candidate of Jewish heritage). In turn, Japanese Brazilians tend to identify racially as “Yellow” (the Census category offered in the survey) and also tend to mobilize politically based on this identity (i.e., they are more supportive of racial quota programs). Ju argues that this has to do with discrimination. For Japanese Brazilians, the racial identity category they tend to identify with is of lower status than “White” and is discriminated against. In line with social identity theory, perceived discrimination against their racial identity category then activates this identity and triggers political behavior in favor of more racial equality. In turn, Jewish Brazilians experience discrimination against their Jewish identity and thus activate this identity category politically by supporting ethnic voting.

One of the main merits of the book is to extend the study of migrant social and political incorporation beyond countries in North America and Western Europe. In particular, Latin America has experienced increasing levels of migration in recent years (among others due to the political and economic situation in Venezuela), and there is much need to analyze and theorize patterns of migrant social integration and political activity in these countries. Ju’s study carefully describes the complexity of this pattern in the case of Brazil and explains how it is shaped by a context-specific system of ethnoracial hierarchies that has emerged historically. Overall, the study is characterized by a close relationship between theoretical reflection and empirical analysis. Readers will also appreciate the structured writing and transparent argumentation of Ju’s book.

The study invites the following reflections. First, while the study argues that both Japanese and Jewish Brazilians are placed at or near the top of Brazil’s ethnoracial hierarchies, it emphasizes “discrimination” as the main mechanism that explains their political behavior. This might muddy the study’s main theoretical message somewhat. One is left wondering about possible alternative explanations for the political behavior of these groups, like social closure and status group politics. Second, as already mentioned above, the conclusions drawn from the qualitative interviews rest mostly on frequency analyses and less on interpretation. For instance, claims about the amount of discrimination experienced by the different groups and the associated political behaviors are derived from counting the number of affirmative responses to the corresponding questions. This underexploits the strength of qualitative data in providing access to the minds and life-worlds of respondents. A more in-depth analysis of the qualitative data might have added richness and nuance to the study. A final question relates to the finding that Japanese and Jewish Brazilians differ in terms of the social identity category they emphasize and mobilize politically. I think the book could have made a stronger case about the ways in which this difference matters. What different outcomes are related to mobilizing politically one’s racial or ethnic identity in Brazil?

Despite these observations, however, this book remains a valuable and timely contribution to the literature on the social and political incorporation of migrants across the world.