There is growing interest among political theorists in the ways in which states select which would-be immigrants to admit and which to exclude. Sahar Akhtar's book Immigration and Discrimination and Désirée Lim's book Immigration and Social Equality are both important contributions to this topic. This review contextualises and summarises both books and critically assesses the arguments in each book. In response to Akhtar's book, I raise some questions about the possibility of global status and whether the arguments for this hold. (...) In response to Lim's book, I ask whether her account of the importance of social equality applies to the immigration context and, if so, how demanding it is. I end by considering how Akhtar's focus on the global context and Lim's focus on the domestic context raises the interesting question of which context matters more in our evaluation of immigrant selection policy. (shrink)