Immigration and the integration of immigrants continue to be controversial issues in Canada, Denmark, Finland and Sweden even though historically Canada was settled and developed by immigrants. The political and social uneasiness related to the absorption of immigrants in these four nations leads to considerable pressures on policy makers to adapt immigration and integration policies to appease a range of political and social special interests. In this anthology we identify political trends, economic challenges and anti-immigration movements which influence immigration policy making. Our collection also focuses on the contradictions between rights in principle and actual rights of immigrants situated within sovereign nations guided by systems of western democracy. The realization and protection of immigrants’ rights has in principle been taken care of in national, EU and international legal instruments. This collection shows that the protective legal provisions are in many cases weakened by implementation deficits. Another important observation is that discrimination and racism are major obstacles to the equitable treatment of immigrants and to their integration. Moreover, a fundamental problem is that the right to state protection is undermined by bureaucratically imposed distinctions between regular or real immigrants and irregular or inauthentic immigrants. We are grateful to all our contributors and to our able research team. The original planning was done by a working group including Dr Dorota A. Gozdecka, Professor P?ivi Honkatukia, Professor Johanna Niemi and Adjunct Professor (docent) Paul Van Aerschot. We are also grateful for the funding and other material support mainly provided by the Swedish School of Social Science at the University of Helsinki. We especially want to thank Henrik H?gglund, the rector of this institution, research director, Professor Elianne Riska, research secretary Minna Lehtola and research assistants Sabina Fortelius and Olivia Maury. Also the Faculty of Law of the University of Helsinki has supported our work, for which we are indebted to Dean Kimmo Nuotio and Vice Dean Johanna Niemi.