What is family? Citing national security and societal welfare, the Harper government adopted a strict definition of family to limit access to citizenship for certain immigrants. Megan Gaucher analyzes the government’s assessment of sexual-minority refugee claimants’ relationship history, common-law and married spousal sponsorship applications, and marriage fraud, concluding that this narrative of citizenship reinforces racialized, gendered, and sexualized assumptions about the “Canadian family.” As many Western governments ponder more restrictive immigration policies, A Family Matter offers a timely examination of the Canadian approach and proposes a course for re-evaluating how family is defined and for implementing fairer assessments of immigrants and refugees.

Megan Gaucher's profile page

• Commended, 2020 Lipset Book Award, American Political Science Association
• Short-listed, Donald Smiley Book Prize, Canadian Political Science Association

Megan Gaucher is an assistant professor in the Department of Law and Legal Studies at Carleton University. She has published a variety of articles in the Canadian Journal of Political Science; the International Journal of Canadian Studies; Social Politics: International Studies in Gender; State and Society; and Atlantis: Critical Studies in Gender, Culture and Social Justice.