The report analyzes certain problems relating to information retrieval and use by organizations in the immigration field and makes recommendations to address them. While some of the recommendations concern specific unmet information needs, such as the demand for more detailed breakdowns of demographic data, most are concerned with general weaknesses in communication plaguing the field as a whole.  The lack of a central clearinghouse serving a wide range of constituencies, particularly during times of crisis when rapid response and accurate information are paramount, is both a symptom and a cause of these communication problems.

During the symposium, Ms. Brooks Masters and Mr. Perlmutter administered a short survey to determine the institutional response of immigrant advocacy and service organizations to the events of September 11th.  They also sent the survey to a number of other groups who had participated in the research study underlying Networking the Networks.  Approximately twenty surveys representing fifteen organizations were completed. While this sampl e size is modest and has a New York bias, the consistency of survey responses suggests that the survey results are instructive.  The major findings are summarized below.

All but one organization interviewed indicated that 9/11 had altered its information needs and created demand for information on new topics.  Specifically, respondents were asked to rank a variety of new 9/11-related topics.  Respondents showed greatest interest in detention, due process, and reporting of bias incidents.  By contrast, respondents were much less interested in getting ahead on the issue with positive stories about immigrants or cautionary tales of prior backlashes against immigrants in America.

Taken by surprise on this issue and thrust into a defensive posture, most groups we interviewed were reacting to events affecting their community -- hate crimes, due process erosion, and restrictive legislation -- rather than shaping public opinion proactively.

When asked how they obtained new information, respondents said that they relied overwhelmingly on existing information sources.   Almost everyone we interviewed sought out information via email and listservs.  Slightly fewer indicated that they used websites and conference calls to obtain information.

Information patterns set before 9/11 seemed unchanged by the tragedy.  Groups that already provided information to others via the Internet used the web to disseminate new information about 9/11 and its aftermath.  Email and listservs were also used to a lesser extent to get the word out.   Similarly, the information users we interviewed did not undertake any special initiatives to search out new information sources after 9/11 such as subscribing to new listservs or searching out new websites.

As our search of web links showed, there are a small number of quality sites providing information on relevant relief and hate crimes issues (see annotated list at the end of this analysis) and Arab and Islamic affairs.  However, the information is widely dispersed and often duplicative.

Thus, two months after the 9/11 crisis unfolded, both the information providers and information seekers we interviewed were relying on their existing use patterns and relationships to access the new information they needed.  To the extent that they lacked easy and rapid access to information about immigration matters prior to 9/11, that situation was likely to continue after 9/11.

Despite relatively consistent information use patterns, 9/11 nevertheless had a discernible impact on programmatic activities. The most tangible manifestation of this is increased outreach to members of the Arab American community by groups involved in service work with immigrants and outreach to Arab American organizations as advocacy partners for groups involved in advocacy work.  Additional links were also forged with South Asians and South Asian organizations as a result of the bias incidents reported against South Asians after 9/11, and with Muslim organizations as well.

The uniformity of responses on this issue suggests that the Arab American community and the organizations that represent them were not well integrated into the immigrant advocacy and service infrastructure prior to 9/11.  A special effort was therefore required to form relationships with these organizations and to serve affected populations.

The events of 9/11 also spurred immigrant advocacy and service groups to reach out to a variety of organizations to fulfill their advocacy and service missions.  In addition to the Arab and Muslim groups previously mentioned, survey respondents initiated contact with anti-hate organizations, government agencies, relief organizations, and local as well as national coalitions and advocates.

It may be, therefore, that the greatest change in the activities of groups working with and on behalf of immigrants after 9/11 involved overcoming the isolation of Arab American and Muslim immigrants and advocates, particularly because those individuals were so suddenly the target of attack and their advocates in dire need of broad support from the immigrant and civil rights community.

Agenda-altering events like 9/11 profoundly impact how organizations working with and on behalf of immigrants shape their service programs to respond to new needs and formulate their legislative advocacy goals and community organizing work in response to new realities and changes in public sentiment.  Based on the research we conducted for Networking the Networks prior to 9/11, it became apparent that the immigration field would benefit from greater coordination of existing information sources, an enhanced division of labor among members of the field to provide deep “coverage” of issues and eliminate gaps in coverage, and better outreach to explain where to find information and how to access and use it.

When asked whether 9/11 had changed their perceptions of the need for a more coherent information infrastructure and greater collaboration in the immigration field, a majority of respondents indicated that they felt 9/11 had increased the need.  The remaining survey respondents felt that the need for such changes was already great and that 9/11 had only made the weaknesses in the existing information infrastructure more apparent.

It also appears that the development of new strategies and approaches was done without a strong reliance on the Internet.   We know from our pre-9/11 research that survey respondents showed a generalized lack of satisfaction with the Internet as an information source.  Extrapolating from this, we would conjecture that the lack of major new Internet-based 9/11 resources reflects the lack of a trusted clearinghouse to which groups would naturally turn in a crisis situation such as 9/11.

While the events surrounding 9/11 and its aftermath are unique, the politics of immigration in the United States are such that crises or dramatic changes in legislation requiring rapid diffusion of accurate information to numerous and diverse immigrant communities are recurring.  The immigrant advocacy and service field would benefit greatly from the development of a coherent communication system -- on the Internet and intra-organizationally -- to facilitate information sharing and collective action.