Alejandro Portes is Howard Harrison and Gabrielle Snyder Beck Professor of (Emeritus) Sociology at Princeton University and Professor of Law and Distinguished Scholar of Arts and Sciences at the University of Miami. He is the founding director of the Center for Migration and Development at Princeton. He has taught at several universities. He is a former president of the American Sociological Association.
Portes is the author of more than 250 articles and chapters on national development, international migration, Latin American and Caribbean urbanization, and economic sociology. He has published 40 books and special issues. His books include Immigrant America: A Portrait; Spanish Legacies: The Coming of Age of the Second Generation and The Global Edge: Miami in the XVI Century.
His current research is on the adaptation process of the immigrant second generation in comparative perspective, the role of institutions on national development, and the comparative study of global cities.
Portes is a former fellow of the Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences and the Russell Sage Foundation. He has received honorary doctorates from different university around the world. He was awarded the Princess of Asturias Prize in the Social Sciences from the Kingdom of Spain.