Peter Scholten

Bio: Peter Scholten is an academic researcher from Erasmus University Rotterdam. The author has contributed to research in topics: Corporate governance & Policy analysis. The author has an hindex of 27, co-authored 133 publications receiving 2647 citations. Previous affiliations of Peter Scholten include University of Twente.

Analysing the Politics of Migration and Immigration in Europe

Abstract: Analyzing the European Politics of Migration Maintaining 'Fortress Britain'? France Still the One and Indivisible Republic? Germany Normalised Immigration Politics? Multicultural Dilemmas in The Netherlands and Sweden The Politics of Migration in an Integrating Europe Southern Europe Immigration Politics in Newer Immigration Countries The Europeanization of Migration Politics in Central and Eastern Europe Assessing the European Politics of Migration

The Multilevel Governance of Migration and Integration

Abstract: This chapter focuses on migration and integration as multilevel policy issues and explores the consequences in terms of multilevel governance. Immigration policymaking has been characterized by continued struggle between national governments and the EU about the amount of discretion states have in interpreting EU directives. The involvement of local and regional governments in debates about intra-EU migration, particularly East–west migration from new member states, has further complicated the situation. Regarding integration, even more complex relations have emerged between local, regional, national, and EU institutions. The superdiverse cities of Europe, such as Barcelona, London, Berlin, and Rotterdam, have taken policy directions very different from their national governments, effectively “decoupling” national and local policies. While politicization of migrant integration continues to drive policies in many countries, the EU has developed various soft governance measures to promote policy learning between local governments. This chapter examines the recent evolution of migration and integration policies at the EU, national, and local levels, as well as the regional level. This enables us to understand the factors that drive policies at the different levels and the extent that these lead to convergence or divergence between the levels. Also analysed are the relations—or absence of relations—between levels of government. To make sense of these relations, a framework is applied that allows for different arrangements of relations. The notion of “multilevel governance” provides one possible way of structuring relations between various government levels.

Agenda dynamics and the multi-level governance of intractable policy controversies: the case of migrant integration policies in the Netherlands

Abstract: This article focuses on the relation between agenda dynamics and multi-level governance for a specific type of policy problems: intractable policy controversies. It discusses migrant integration policies in the Netherlands as a case-study, analysing problem, political and policy agendas in the cities of Amsterdam and Rotterdam and on the national level, as well as the relation and interaction between these policy levels. The article shows that in a contested policy area like migrant integration, patterns of agenda setting often have a strongly level-specific character, leading to different policy frames and thus complicating modes of governance in multi-level setting. Precisely when the framing of policy problems itself is at stake, level-specific agenda dynamics will produce different policy frames also in multi-level policy settings. This makes multi-level governance in terms of effectively coordinating relations between policy levels to create congruence of policies between different levels a particular challenge when faced with this type of policy problems.

The Role of Narratives in Migration Policy‐Making: A Research Framework

Abstract: While debates on migration policy often revolve around rival values and interests, they also invoke knowledge claims about the causes, dynamics and impacts of migration. Such claims are best conceptualised as ‘policy narratives’, setting out beliefs about policy problems and appropriate interventions. Narratives are likely to be more successful where they meet three criteria: they are cognitively plausible, dramatically or morally compelling and, importantly, they chime with perceived interests. Increasingly, such narratives are also expected to draw on expert knowledge, although knowledge is often deployed to legitimise particular actors or preferences rather than to enhance the cognitive plausibility of the narrative. The series of articles in this issue explore how narratives are developed, codified, revised and diffused in policy debates and policy-making. We hope that they contribute not just to understanding migration policy, but also to wider debates on the role of ideas and knowledge in public policy.

Theorizing the ‘local turn’ in a multi-level governance framework of analysis: a case study in immigrant policies:

Abstract: This Special Issue speaks to the emergent literature on the role of local governments in the context of broader multi-level governance (MLG) networks (Bache and Flinders, 2004; Hooghe and Marks, 2001; Peters and Pierre, 2001; Piattoni, 2010; Stephenson, 2013). Although often applied to European Union (EU) national-state relations or to federal states, we believe that MLG can also be used as a framework of analysis for relations between local, regional, national and EU governments in a broader sense. Furthermore, much of the MLG literature is currently considering specific policy areas, such as environment, climate change, social cohesion and higher education. Instead, we will focus on a policy topic that is currently challenging MLG in Europe in a profound way: immigrant policies. In particular, we consider the linkages between MLG and the growing importance of local governance in the area of immigrant policies. Although often strongly framed in the context of national models of integration, recent studies direct attention to the local – mainly city – level, which has become increasingly prominent and entrepreneurial in the field of migrant integration. In this respect, we will speak of a ‘local turn’ that we will attempt to make sense of from an MLG perspective. This Special Issue argues that although there is a growing interest in the local governance of migrant integration, very little work has been done on the implications of this turn for the MLG of migrant integration (see, for instance, the seminal

Bowling alone: The collapse and revival of American community

Abstract: The present historical moment may seem a particularly inopportune time to review Bowling Alone, Robert Putnam's latest exploration of civic decline in America. After all, the outpouring of volunteerism, solidarity, patriotism, and self-sacrifice displayed by Americans in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks appears to fly in the face of Putnam's central argument: that \"social capital\" -defined as \"social networks and the norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness that arise from them\" (p. 19)'has declined to dangerously low levels in America over the last three decades. However, Putnam is not fazed in the least by the recent effusion of solidarity. Quite the contrary, he sees in it the potential to \"reverse what has been a 30to 40-year steady decline in most measures of connectedness or community.\"' As an example of how the current \"war on terrorism\" could generate a durable civic renewal, Putnam points to the burst in civic practices that occurred during and after World War II, which he says \"permanently marked\" the generation that lived through it and had a \"terrific effect on American public life over the last half-century.\" 3 If Americans can follow this example and channel their current civic

Citizenship and Nationhood in France and Germany.

Abstract: Preface Introduction: Traditions of Nationhood in France and Germany I. The Institution of Citizenship 1. Citizenship as Social Closure 2. The French Revolution and the Invention of National Citizenship 3. State, State-System, and Citizenship in Germany II. Defining The Citizenry: The Bounds of Belonging 4. Citizenship and Naturalization in France and Germany 5. Migrants into Citizens: The Crystallization of Jus Soli in Late-Nineteenth-Century France 6. The Citizenry as Community of Descent: The Nationalization of Citizenship in Wilhelmine Germany 7. \"Etre Francais, Cela se Merite\": Immigration and the Politics of Citizenship in France in the 1980s 8. Continuities in the German Politics of Citizenship Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index

The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields (Chinese Translation)

Abstract: What makes organizations so similar? We contend that the engine of rationalization and bureaucratization has moved from the competitive marketplace to the state and the professions. Once a set of organizations emerges as a field, a paradox arises: rational actors make their organizations increasingly similar as they try to change them. We describe three isomorphic processes-coercive, mimetic, and normative—leading to this outcome. We then specify hypotheses about the impact of resource centralization and dependency, goal ambiguity and technical uncertainty, and professionalization and structuration on isomorphic change. Finally, we suggest implications for theories of organizations and social change.