Introduction to the special issue on immigration to OECD countries

Immigration is a central topic in public and public policy debates and will remain a critical issue in the foreseeable future. To reflect this importance and create a forum for exchange between economists and policymakers, the OECD's Immigration Unit and CEPII, a French public think-tank belonging to the Prime Minister's Office established an annual conference on “Immigration in OECD countries” in 2010. They have been joined by the Luxembourg Institute on Socio-Economic Research (LISER) in 2020. Since the beginning, the conference has taken place in December at the OECD headquarters in Paris with additional support from scientific partners such as the Fondazione Rodolfo De Benedetti, IRES (Louvain), the University of Luxembourg, the University of Lille, and the Paris School of Economics. Over the years it has hosted keynote lectures by scholars such as Christian Dustmann, Leah Platt-Boustan, Assaf Razin, Tim Hatton, George Borjas, Richard Freeman, Alberto Alesina, Giovanni Peri, Frederic Docquier, Jennifer Hunt, Dani Rodrik, Paola Giuliano, Eliana La Ferrara, Christina Gathmann, Thierry Mayer, Giovanni Facchini, Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, and Michel Beine (...)