Is Immigrant Selection in Canada Racialized? Visa Officer Discretion and Approval Rates for Spousal and Federal Skilled Worker Applications

Despite publically abandoning racialized selection criteria for the selection of immigrants over 50 years ago, critics argue that Canada’s immigration programme continues to display elements of racialized bias and that a hidden intention of Canada’s immigration programme is to keep Canada ‘white’. In particular, the exercise of discretion by visa officers is said to allow for racial biases to creep into the decision-making process. By examining visa office approval rates for C50 Federal Skilled Worker and Family Class spouse and partner applications, this paper questions whether decision-making by overseas visa officers who process applications for permanent residence in Canada is racialized. Though visa office and visa category approval rates do in fact vary, the pattern of variation is not consistent with the view that visa officers’ work involves stemming the flow of visible minorities to Canada.