Power, Immigration and the "Prescribed Amount" Rule: The Canadian Government and the Syrians in the Early Twentieth Century.

A governmental regulation prescribing a minimum amount of money to be possessed by "Asiatic" immigrants at point of entry to Canada became part of an assemblage of instruments and procedures established by the Canadian state in the early twentieth century to restrict immigration from Asia. Among the "Asiatic" immigrants who were especially affected by the regulation were the Syrians. In 1911-1912, the Syrians in Canada mounted a challenge against the control measure. This represented a momentous turn in the Syrian group's political agency and in the terms of its power relationship with the state. Yet, this oppositional agency was seriously limited. It challenged the mode of deployment of the "prescribed amount" regulation as well as some of its operational assumptions about Syrians. However, it also manifested compliance with the general mode of thinking about populations, "race" and "desirable" immigrants that gave justificatory ground to the state's power practices. This paper examines this episode of tension and contention in relations between the state and Syrians in Canada with a view to deepening understanding of power relations in the immigration domain in Canada. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]