Structured luck : downstream effects of the U.S. Diversity Visa Program

"The Diversity Immigrant Visa Program is a lottery that awards winners from underrepresented countries the chance to apply for legal permanent resident status in the United States. The program serves as one of the main migration pathways for Africans entering the country, yet despite its long history and increasing popularity in developing countries, there are few studies on the experiences of African diversity immigrants. Structured Luck explores the impact of the DV Program on immigrants, non-migrants, and communities from Nigeria and Ghana. Despite the pervasive aura of fortune surrounding the visa lottery, Onoso Imoagene argues that the DV Program is entirely a process of "structured luck": from who gets to register for the lottery, how people hear about it, and who chooses to participate, to the design and administration of the program's bureaucracy and the steps required to apply for the lottery and then for the immigrant visa. The author's interviews with immigrants reveal the successes and failures of the DV program. It is a tool of upward mobility for its winners. Most have succeeded in improving their lives and the lives of their family members. At the same time, their stories reveal how the lottery's design, implementation, and consequences result in substantial human capital interruption, significant exploitation within origin countries, and persistent suboptimization of immigrants' potential in the United States. Coining the term "migrapolicy interventions" to label and name such consequences, the author argues that several forms of migrapolicy interventions affect diversity immigrants' integration into the United States."