Showing papers in "Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies in 2016"
TL;DR: This paper conducted a meta-analysis of 738 correspondence tests in 43 separate studies conducted in OECD countries between 1990 and 2015, focusing on groups of specific tests to ascertain the robustness of the results.
Abstract: For almost 50 years field experiments have been used to study ethnic and racial discrimination in hiring decisions, consistently reporting high rates of discrimination against minority applicants – including immigrants – irrespective of time, location, or minority groups tested. While Peter A. Riach and Judith Rich [2002. “Field Experiments of Discrimination in the Market Place.” The Economic Journal 112 (483): F480–F518] and Judith Rich [2014. “What Do Field Experiments of Discrimination in Markets Tell Us? A Meta Analysis of Studies Conducted since 2000.” In Discussion Paper Series. Bonn: IZA] provide systematic reviews of existing field experiments, no study has undertaken a meta-analysis to examine the findings in the studies reported. In this article, we present a meta-analysis of 738 correspondence tests in 43 separate studies conducted in OECD countries between 1990 and 2015. In addition to summarising research findings, we focus on groups of specific tests to ascertain the robustness of fi...
294 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that super-diversity theory can only partially show us the way, and they also need to borrow from the intersectional approach and the integration context theory.
Abstract: International migration changed large West European cities dramatically. In only two generations’ time, their ethnic make-up is turned upside down. Cities like Amsterdam and Brussels now are majority–minority cities: the old majority group became a minority. This new reality asks for an up-to-date perspective on assimilation and integration. In this article, I will show why grand theories like segmented and new assimilation theory no longer suffice in tackling that new reality of large cities, and I will question critically whether using the perspective of super-diversity is more pertinent for our analyses. Children of immigrants nowadays no longer integrate into the majority group, but into a large amalgam of ethnic groups. Next to the diversification of ethnic groups, we see diversification within ethnic groups in the second and third generations. I will focus on intergenerational social mobility patterns given that they are key to existing grand theories of assimilation. I will argue that super-diversity theory can only partially show us the way. To further build an alternative theoretical perspective, we also need to borrow from the intersectional approach and the integration context theory.
225 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors show how the striving for border security under a prevailing emergency frame has generated absurd incentives, negative path dependencies and devastating consequences and argue that we need to grasp the mechanics and logics of the European "border security model" in order to open up for a change of course.
Abstract: Despite Europe's mass investments in advanced border controls, people keep arriving along the continent's shores under desperate circumstances. European attempts to ‘secure’ or ‘protect’ the borders have quite clearly failed, as politicians themselves increasingly recognise – yet more of the same response is again rolled out in response to the escalating ‘refugee crisis’. Amid the deadlock, this article argues that we need to grasp the mechanics and logics of the European ‘border security model’ in order to open up for a change of course. Through ethnographic examples from the Spanish-African borders, the article shows how the striving for border security under a prevailing emergency frame has generated absurd incentives, negative path dependencies and devastating consequences. At Europe's frontiers, an industry of border controls has emerged, involving European defence contractors, member state security forces and their African counterparts, as well as a range of non-security actors. Whenever another ‘border crisis’ occurs, this industry grows again, feeding on its own apparent ‘failures’. This vicious cycle may be broken, the article concludes, once policy-makers start curtailing the economies of border security underpinning it – yet the challenges are formidable as the industry retrenches along with the political response to the drama it has itself produced.
149 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the role of sociocultural variables such as language proficiency, interethnic social ties and gender values as alternative sources of unexplained ethnic group differences was examined.
Abstract: Numerous studies have shown that even after controlling for relevant socio-economic background variables, the labour market position of immigrant minorities lags considerably behind that of natives. The label ‘ethnic penalties’ is often used to denote these gaps and reflects the idea that differences between natives and immigrants that cannot be explained by demographic and human capital variables must be due to discrimination by employers. I challenge this interpretation by looking at the role of sociocultural variables such as language proficiency, interethnic social ties and gender values as alternative sources of unexplained ethnic group differences. I use the data from the cross-national ‘Eurislam’ survey of four immigrant ethnic groups of predominantly Muslim belief—Turks, Moroccans, former Yugoslav Muslims and Pakistani—as well as native ethnics. The results indicate that once sociocultural variables are taken into account, differences in rates of labour market participation and unemploymen...
137 citations
TL;DR: Shaping Immigration News as discussed by the authors is a rich new volume that connects comparative media studies, cultural sociology, and immigration studies, with a focus on media coverage of immigration in the US.
Abstract: Shaping Immigration News is a rich new volume that connects comparative media studies, cultural sociology, and immigration studies. Benson's empirical target is media coverage of immigration in Fra...
111 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examine how the urban context, rather than national or regional context, shapes local immigrant integration policies and highlight the importance for cities to have left-leaning governments, immigrants who constitute a large part of the city electorate and are part of local decision-making structures.
Abstract: This article examines how the urban context, rather than national or regional context, shapes local immigrant integration policies. We draw on the integration experiences of four large European and American cities—Berlin, Amsterdam, New York City, and San Francisco—to develop a basic inductive framework for explaining when and why city officials enact and implement policies that promote immigrant integration. Our framework highlights the importance for cities to have (1) left-leaning governments, (2) immigrants who constitute a large part of the city electorate and are part of local decision-making structures, and (3) an infrastructure of community-based organisations that actively represent immigrants’ collective interests in local politics and policy-making. We show that when these three factors exist synergistically, cities are more likely to commit themselves to policies that promote immigrant integration even when the national context is not very hospitable to immigrant rights.
105 citations
TL;DR: The authors argued that much of the literature has focused too narrowly on the discriminatory effects of counter-terrorist policies and has been unable to grasp the more insidious political effects of the counter-terrorism policies based on the active participation and involvement of Muslims in their own policing.
Abstract: How to think about the impact of counter-terrorism and counter-radicalisation on ethnic and religious accommodation? Much of the literature draws on the concept of ‘suspect community’, suggesting it has primarily alienated the Muslim community, favouring an assimilationist model of ‘muscular liberalism’. In this article, while I consider the merits of the ‘suspect community’ hypothesis, I argue that it only partially accounts for the effects of counter-terrorism and counter-radicalisation on multicultural societies. I contend that much of the literature has focused too narrowly on the discriminatory effects of counter-terrorist policies and has been unable to grasp the more insidious political effects of counter-terrorism policies based on the active participation and involvement of Muslims in their own policing. The main hypothesis of this paper is that rather than promoting ‘assimilation’, as the government would expect, or alienation, as the advocates of the ‘suspect community’ hypothesis would...
97 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that empirical researchers would benefit from studying how cognitive migration, the narrative imagining of oneself inhabiting a foreign destination prior to the actual physical move, influences migration behavior. But they note a gap in our current understanding of the process by which individuals decide to cross international borders and offer an agenda for remedying this.
Abstract: Most migration research is focused on migrant experiences after mobility and settlement. We argue that empirical researchers would benefit from studying how cognitive migration, the narrative imagining of oneself inhabiting a foreign destination prior to the actual physical move, influences migration behaviour. This article notes a gap in our current understanding of the process by which individuals decide to cross international borders and offers an agenda for remedying this. The interdisciplinarity of migration research has not fully extended to social psychology or cognitive social sciences, where a dynamic research agenda has examined human decision-making processes, including prospection and the connections between culture and cognition. The study of socio-cognitive processes in migration decision-making has been largely overlooked because of the after-the-fact nature of data collection and analysis rather than an aversion to these approaches per se. We highlight a number of strategic finding...
77 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examine the dynamics behind multilevelling of EU external policies and distinguish three strategies of institutional interplay: counterweight, whereby international organisations act as independent complement or corrector to EU policy; subcontracting, referring to the outsourcing of EU project implementation to international organisations; and rule transmission, a process in which international organisations engage in transferring EU rules to third countries.
Abstract: The thematic and geographical expansion of EU migration policies has gone along with an increasing mobilisation of pertinent international organisations such as the IOM and UNHCR. Combining insights from the external governance approach with IR debates on international institutional complexity, this article examines the dynamics behind this ‘multilevelling’ of EU external policies. Three strategies of institutional interplay are distinguished: counterweight, whereby international organisations act as independent complement or corrector to EU policy; subcontracting, referring to the outsourcing of EU project implementation to international organisations; and rule transmission, a process in which international organisations engage in transferring EU rules to third countries. Whereas greater organisational authority and autonomy have allowed the UNHCR to keep an independent voice as counterweight to EU action, both the UNHCR and IOM have become increasingly involved in the implementation of the EU's ...
68 citations
TL;DR: This article examined the relationship between the parliamentary presence of radical right parties and anti-immigration attitudes over time and found that neither the presence, the representational strength, nor the nationalistic framing of an RRP affect opposition towards immigration over time.
Abstract: This paper tests the theoretically assumed relationship between the parliamentary presence of radical right parties (RRPs) and anti-immigration attitudes over time. Data come from six rounds of the European Social Survey between 2002 and 2012. Using multi-level models with applications for repeated cross-sectional data, the study examines the implications of changes tied to the political advancements of the radical right with a focus on three possible scenarios: people's attitudes about immigration have generally become more negative, opposition towards immigration has become more dependent on immigrants' ethnicity, and attitudes towards immigration have become more polarised. Contrary to expectations, it is found that neither the presence, the representational strength, nor the nationalistic framing of an RRP affect opposition towards immigration over time. Thus, the conclusion is that the RRPs, so far, have not driven anti-immigration attitudes in Europe. Possible explanations for these results ...
66 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a research agenda on the socio-cultural integration of Muslims in their Western European societies of settlement is outlined, where the main data source is a survey that includes four groups of Muslims from distinct countries of origin.
Abstract: Islam has become the key site for demarcating boundaries between majority populations and individuals of immigrant origin across Europe. This article outlines a research agenda on the socio-cultural integration of Muslims in their Western European societies of settlement. Integration issues with regard to Muslims have especially tended to focus on cultural and religious aspects. This raises questions. First, does culture/religion matter in shaping Muslims' relative disadvantage in the socio-economic domain? Alternatively, does Muslim social disadvantage result from majority society's discrimination and bias against religious/cultural difference? Second, religious and cultural difference seems to matter in its own right. Do Muslims identify with their countries of settlement and accept the core liberal democratic values and norms? Or do persistent socio-cultural "gaps" between Muslims and non-Muslims result from intolerance by the majority population? The article outlines a theoretical approach and empirical research programme. The framework is cross-national comparative, including France, Germany, Britain, Netherlands, Belgium, and Switzerland. The main data source is a survey that includes four groups of Muslims from distinct countries of origin (Turks, Moroccans, former-Yugoslavians, and Pakistanis) plus a majority sample, which facilitates cross-group, cross-national comparison. This introduction concludes by introducing contributions that address a specific question embedded within the overall framework.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors investigate how members of Kurdish diasporas in Sweden and the UK conceive and experience statelessness in a world of unequal nation-states and hierarchical citizenship.
Abstract: Mass displacement in the Middle East is a major political challenge for contemporary Middle Eastern and Western states. As a consequence, statelessness has emerged as one of the central political issues in relation to the collapse and weakening of the states in the Middle East. Through deploying a qualitative inquiry and interviews with 50 Kurdish immigrants, this article investigates how members of Kurdish diasporas in Sweden and the UK conceive and experience statelessness in a world of unequal nation-states and hierarchical citizenship. Since diasporas are important non-state actors in nation-building processes, it is important to analyse their diasporic visions and the ways they challenge or reinforce the power of the nation-state in the context of migration. While from a legal or a right-based approach, the solution to statelessness is found in acquisition of a nationality/citizenship, I posit that in a world structured by the political normativity of the nation-state, nations without states ...
TL;DR: This article argued that cities possess certain qualities that enable the formation of immigrant counter-publics, which in turn become critical spaces of politicisation, and applied these general assumptions about cities to understand the political formation of immigrants.
Abstract: Immigration scholars have long considered cities to be important environments that mediate how immigrants are incorporated into receiving countries. While most scholars recognise that cities have some importance, they continue to prioritise national-level institutions, organisations, networks, and cultural dynamics. This paper introduces the special issue on 'Migrant Cities'. The special issue asserts that cities are not simply backdrops where national-level processes and mechanisms unfold. The contributing scholars reveal how cities are distinctive environments with unique constraints and opportunities. Following a basic introduction, the paper examines how to apply these general assumptions about cities to understanding the political formation of immigrants. The paper does this by urbanising Nancy Fraser’s concept of 'counterpublic'. We suggest that cities possess certain qualities that enable the formation of immigrant counterpublics, which in turn become critical spaces of politicisation.
TL;DR: This paper found that a substantial portion of Latino respondents would be less likely to voluntarily contact the police if they are the victim of a crime, or to provide information about a crime because they fear that police would use this contact as an opportunity to investigate their immigration status or that of their friends and family members.
Abstract: Using data from a survey of 2004 Latinos in four urban counties in the USA, this paper considers a question that has not been systematically investigated: how has increasing police involvement in immigration enforcement impacted the perceptions of the police that are held by immigrant and non-immigrant Latinos? Survey results indicate that many Latinos report fear of police, contributing to their social isolation and exacerbating their mistrust of law enforcement authorities. A substantial portion of Latino respondents report that they would be less likely to voluntarily contact the police if they are the victim of a crime, or to provide information about a crime, because they fear that police would use this contact as an opportunity to investigate their immigration status or that of their friends and family members. We use regression analysis to further analyse the determinants of these responses. Our findings suggest that negative encounters with police involving questions of immigration status ...
TL;DR: It is 16 years since European heads of state gathered for the 1999 summit meeting at Tampere, Finland, and agreed to create a common asylum and migration policy as mentioned in this paper. But cooperation on mig...
Abstract: It is 16 years since European heads of state gathered for the 1999 summit meeting at Tampere, Finland, and agreed to create a common asylum and migration policy.1 Before Tampere, cooperation on mig...
TL;DR: In this paper, a micro-level longitudinal data from Dutch municipal population registers between 1995 until 2012 was used to track naturalisation among different immigration cohorts, finding evidence that indeed naturalisation is part of a larger life course trajectory.
Abstract: Traditionally, immigrants’ propensity to naturalize is attributed to individual characteristics and the origin country. Recently scholars increasingly recognise that naturalisation decisions do not take place in a vacuum: they are conditioned both by the individual life course of immigrants, such as the age at migration and family situation, as well as the opportunity structure set by citizenship policies of the destination country. Yet it is less clear what impact specific policy changes have, and to whom these changes matter most. In this paper we address these questions by analysing citizenship acquisition among first generation immigrants in the Netherlands in light of a restriction in citizenship policy in 2003. We employ unique micro-level longitudinal data from Dutch municipal population registers between 1995 until 2012, which allow us to track naturalisation among different immigration cohorts. We find evidence that indeed naturalisation is part of a larger life course trajectory: immigra...
TL;DR: The authors found that immigrants' feeling of host national belonging depends on how the host nation imagines its community and its concomitant boundaries, and that the majority population prioritises attainable criteria of national membership.
Abstract: Across Western democracies, the place for newcomers in the host society is debated, involving often a questioning of immigrants’ belonging to their new nation. This article argues that immigrants’ feeling of host national belonging depends on how the host nation imagines its community and its concomitant boundaries. Utilising survey and country level data in multilevel regressions, immigrants’ belonging is found to vary significantly across the 19 countries included. A central contribution is the finding that citizenship policies do not explain this cross-national variation. Instead, what matters is the informal boundary drawing produced in the majority population's conception of what is important for being part of the national ‘us'. Thus, immigrants’ belonging is significantly greater when the majority population prioritises attainable criteria of national membership. In addition, these priorities are shown to have deep historical roots as immigrants’ belonging is greater in settler countries and...
TL;DR: The authors explored this issue using interviews with 84 Ghanaian entrepreneurs in the Netherlands and found that despite the higher levels of human capital and the shifts in the urban economies, a significant number of Ghanaians entrepreneurs still end up in the lower echelons of the opportunity structure.
Abstract: The Ghanaian population in the Netherlands is relatively well-endowed in terms of human capital. In addition, a large number of them came when deindustrialisation had run its course and the Dutch economy, the service sector in particular, started growing again after 1985. On the basis of the Mixed Embeddedness model, we expected that the combination of, on average, higher levels of human capital and the transformation of the (urban)economy, would lead to rather different patterns of entrepreneurship when compared to their predecessors who came as guest workers. We explored this issue using interviews with 84 Ghanaian entrepreneurs in the Netherlands. Our data only partly corroborated our hypotheses. Notwithstanding, the higher levels of human capital and the shifts in the urban economies, a significant number of Ghanaian entrepreneurs still end up in the lower echelons of the opportunity structure.
TL;DR: The authors argue that the utility of social networks is influenced by the reason for displacement and regional geopolitical frameworks, and that some political migrants must exercise caution in the face of potentially harmful new relationships in receiving countries.
Abstract: The study of migrant networks has led scholars to believe that political migrants, including refugees and asylum seekers, utilise social networks in similar ways to economic migrants. This assumption is based on empirical investigations of South–North migration in which the Western receiving context is held constant. I argue that the utility of social networks is influenced by the reason for displacement and regional geopolitical frameworks. Like economic migrants, political migrants believe that they would benefit from networks; however, some political migrants must exercise caution in the face of potentially harmful new relationships in receiving countries. These political migrants practise strategic anonymity to navigate social networks. This refers to proactive acts of withholding personal information to maintain security for oneself and one's family. I rely on 30 interviews conducted between 2009 and 2010 with Iraqi refugees in Jordan displaced after the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq.
TL;DR: The authors argue that the post migrant perspective remains of limited analytical value as it denies migrants coevalness with "non-migrants" and suggest an alternative perspective deploying concepts of displacement, disposession and emplacement, which might allow us to avoid the spatial and temporal impediments of the post-migration perspective and would instead facilitate us to approach migrants and nonmigrants from within a common analytical lens.
Abstract: This article concentrates on the ‘post migrant’ perspective formulated by migration scholars and cultural producers in to analyse migrant subjectivities, and practices beyond the culturalising and ethnicising logics of migration scholarship and public debates. I put the spatial and temporal frameworks informing this approach to migrant dynamics under scrutiny and argue that this concept remains of limited analytical value as it denies migrants coevalness with ‘non-migrants’. I suggest an alternative perspective deploying concepts of displacement, disposession and emplacement, which might allow us to avoid the spatial and temporal impediments of the post migrant perspective and would instead facilitate us to approach migrants and non-migrants from within a common analytical lens. In the last part of the article, I situate the strategic success of the post migrant intervention in Vienna, despite its analytical fault lines, within the scalar dynamics of city making at a particular conjuncture in time.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors explore the role of state-led civic integration programs (CIPs) in the integration of immigrants in the Netherlands, Germany and Sweden, and demonstrate how they reduce the role cities have in immigrant integration and transform integration policies from being developed in relationship to locally emerging needs to being charged with state sovereignty.
Abstract: The idea that cities enjoy a certain degree of autonomy from the state when it comes to shaping immigrant integration policy has been repeatedly highlighted by research and promoted by good governance discourses. However, the emergence of state-led civic integration programmes (CIP) across Europe would seem to jar with this movement. This is the contradiction that this article explores. CIP mobilise significant resources and streamline immigrant integration through language courses, the provision of information about the host society and vocational orientation. Drawing on policy documents and interviews with local policy-makers on the CIP in the Netherlands, Germany and Sweden, this article demonstrates how they reduce the role cities have in immigrant integration; and how they transform integration policies—to varying degrees—from being developed in relationship to locally emerging needs to being charged with state sovereignty. These findings challenge the idea that there is an increasingly local...
TL;DR: In this paper, the interplay of parties' preferences, political institutions and electoral competition affects the liberalisation of immigration policies, and the degree of electoral competition and the politicization of immigration issues affect how susceptible political parties are to the anti-immigrant sentiment in the population.
Abstract: This paper investigates how the interplay of parties' preferences, political institutions and electoral competition affects the liberalisation of immigration policies. It joins a growing body of research that focuses on the role of domestic factors in shaping immigration policies. While several studies point to the important role of partisanship and the activation of public opinion, they fail to provide a clear mechanism that takes into account differences in parties' preferences as well as the institutional context they act in. By adding two crucial factors to the analysis, this paper presents a new framework for liberal change in the field of immigration politics. First, institutional veto points determine if left-of-centre parties can reform policies according to their preferences. Second, the degree of electoral competition and the politicisation of immigration issues affect how susceptible political parties are to the anti-immigrant sentiment in the population. A time-series cross-section ana...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present fieldwork from Mumbai and Kolkata to show that citizenship status, rights, and belonging are more restrictive for Indian citizens who are internal migrants than for those who are not.
Abstract: Immigrants and the process of incorporation can elucidate what it means to be a member of a national citizenry and sociopolitical community. However, relatively little scholarship has focused on the potential of internal migration to highlight citizenship outcomes. This article presents fieldwork from Mumbai and Kolkata to show that citizenship status, rights, and belonging are more restrictive for Indian citizens who are internal migrants than for those who are not. It argues that development factors alone are insufficient explanations for citizenship outcomes in India, and shows that internal migrants experience a lesser citizenship status and curtailed citizenship rights because they are migrants rather than because of their impoverishment or because of the limited capacity of the state.
TL;DR: The authors provided an overview of various readings of the literature and identified a need to better understand how our knowledge about smuggling is constructed in this messy field and argued for more critical work in the field of human smuggling.
Abstract: Human smuggling is a global phenomenon which has been difficult to research. Even though there is a large and growing literature on human smuggling, it lacks a systematic review of the major theoretical and conceptual approaches. Besides the lack of conceptual cohesion, there is fundamental lack of hard evidence to substantiate most aspects of the smuggling process because of methodological challenges. This ‘double disadvantage’ is an important explanation for theoretical as well as conceptual discrepancies in existing smuggling studies. In order to clarify and understand the diversity of theoretical approaches within the field of smuggling this article provides an overview of various readings of the literature. We identify a need to better understand how our knowledge about smuggling is constructed in this messy field. Furthermore, we question why we are producing particular types of knowledge and argue for more critical work in the field of human smuggling.
TL;DR: This paper examined how the combined effect of state policies, socioeconomic incorporation, community characteristics and societal attitudes shape the composition and geographical orientation of an immigrant group's collective organisational space, revealing a growing fragmentation between affluent cosmopolitan immigrant elites and the impoverished segments of Toronto and NYC Pakistani communities.
Abstract: This study examines how ‘contexts of reception’ in two migrant cities shape the organisational infrastructure for Pakistani immigrant communities in Toronto and New York City (NYC). Previous research is divided into two epistemic camps, one focusing on locally oriented organisations promoting settlement/incorporation and the other on transnational organisations—thus obscuring the relationships between these organisations. The present study transcends this division by examining how the combined effect of state policies, socioeconomic incorporation, community characteristics and societal attitudes shape the composition and geographical orientation of an immigrant group’s collective organisational space—comprised of local and transnationally oriented organisations. Data come from a newly constructed database of Pakistani non-profit organisations based in Toronto and NYC and from qualitative research conducted in both cities. Contrary to our expectations and previous research, we find that state-sponsored multiculturalism in Toronto is not associated with a larger or more transnationally oriented organisational space. Rather, it is the affluence of the Pakistani community in NYC that is associated with the larger and more transnational of the two Pakistani organisational spaces. Findings also reveal tensions between local and transnationally oriented organisations in both cities, reflecting a growing fragmentation between affluent cosmopolitan immigrant elites and the impoverished segments of Toronto and NYC Pakistani communities.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors explored the intersecting themes of mobility and security that were identified by participants as the most important benefits of acquiring formal state citizenship in the country of resettlement, in contrast to the insecurity of forced migration.
Abstract: In recent decades, the meaning and value of formal state citizenship has shifted dramatically. In the same period, scholarship on citizenship has drawn attention to the proliferation of alternative forms of sub-, supra- and transnational citizenship, at times obscuring the ongoing importance of formal state citizenship. For refugees, however, formal state citizenship remains a critical and widely shared goal. Drawing on interviews with 51 young people from refugee backgrounds in Melbourne, Australia, this article explores the intersecting themes of mobility and security that were identified by participants as the most important benefits of acquiring formal state citizenship in the country of resettlement. In contrast to the insecurity of forced migration, formal state citizenship provides a privileged mobility that enables refugee-background youth to maintain and create transnational identities and attachments and to be protected while doing so, while also granting a secure status within the nation state and insurance against further displacement in an uncertain future. In offering these forms of mobility and security, formal state citizenship contributes to a sense of ontological security among refugee-background youth, providing an important foundation for building national and transnational futures.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors used data from the 1st Wave of the Dutch Longitudinal Life-Course Study (2009-2010) to revisit the analysis of "ethnic penalties" for second-generation Moroccans and Turks.
Abstract: In Western Europe, the children of Moroccan and Turkish migrants were found to be significantly disadvantaged in the labour market. This ethnic gap was found to persist after considering differences in schooling, which was argued to reflect ‘ethnic penalties’ driven by cultural, religious, or racial factors. This study uses data from the 1st Wave of the ‘Netherlands Longitudinal Life-Course Study’ (2009–2010) to revisit the analysis of ‘ethnic penalties’ for second-generation Moroccans and Turks. Unlike in previous research, empirical analyses not only consider differences in schooling, but also skills and social origins. Results show substantial ethnic inequalities in the labour market, with the exception of women from Moroccan origins. For men, these ethnic inequalities do not disappear when human capital factors are considered, but they do when accounting for the unprivileged social origins of ethnic minorities. For women, the disadvantage of second-generation Turks in achieving privileged occu...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors investigate the lived experience of multiculturalism often referred to as "everyday multiculturalism" and suggest that the concept of everyday otherness offers further insight in understanding the intercultural dynamics of diverse communities and explore the ways in which individuals and communities have negotiated intercultural encounters and otherness.
Abstract: In this paper, I investigate the lived experience of multiculturalism often referred to as ‘everyday multiculturalism’. I suggest that the concept of ‘everyday otherness’ offers further insight in understanding the intercultural dynamics of diverse communities and explore the ways in which individuals and communities have negotiated intercultural encounters and ‘otherness’ in a regional Australian community. The research is based on ethnographic fieldwork in a South Australian regional town and draws on an analysis of 20 in-depth semi-structured interviews with long-term residents and recent humanitarian migrants – those who are from Afghan Hazara refugees/asylum seeker backgrounds. Following on from Amanda Wise’s (2009) conception of individuals who facilitate bridging difference between diverse groups, ‘transversal enablers’, I identify two types of ‘transversal enablers’ that can be found among both long-term regional residents and new migrants – structural and everyday enablers – and draw out ...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors studied intermarriage between migrants and natives from countries with a large Muslim majority and found that parents' interference and possibly the importance of value transmission through marriage reduce the likelihood to intermarry.
Abstract: The most influential theory on partner choice, from which I will also depart, the theory on assortative mating, starts from the premise that individuals prefer to marry someone who shares certain characteristics denoted by the Greek term ‘homophily’. Religious and ethnic homophily are very important in this context. Consequently, this paper looks at marriages between natives and migrants of different origin, which are at the same time interreligious as the focus is on Muslim migrants. Marriages between natives and migrants from countries with a large Muslim majority have been reported as exceptionally low. Further analyses try to find out what is so exceptional about intermarriage between Muslim migrants and natives and devote attention to levels of individual religiosity, conflicting ideas about family life and relationships, premarital sexuality, attitudes about intermarriage and lastly, the role of parents in the matchmaking process. The latter have been understudied in previous research, as it was mostly not able to go beyond socio-demographic variables. My research provides evidence for all of these factors, but in contrast to earlier research, my analyses show for the first time that parental interference and possibly the importance of value transmission through marriage reduce the likelihood to intermarry.
TL;DR: The authors explored different reasons for this variation, ranging from socio-economic conditions, the inflow of labour migrants to the role of labour market institutions and political actors, and found that countries badly affected by the crisis and with a recent influx of labor migrants were more likely to respond to mobilised groups lobbying for restrictive policies than those countries weathering the crisis r...
Abstract: The recent economic crisis provided a shock to the system, and led governments to scramble for solutions to problems of falling economic growth, high unemployment and weak job creation. Many European governments responded to protectionist calls by restricting immigration policies, even towards the highly skilled. Yet countries have faced different challenges and thus the cross-national variation in the demand for policy closure or openness is remarkable. Some seized the opportunity to restrict their high-skilled immigration policies, while others took advantage of the crisis for further liberalisation. The article explores different reasons for this variation, ranging from socio-economic conditions, the inflow of labour migrants to the role of labour market institutions and political actors. Countries badly affected by the crisis and with a recent influx of labour migrants were more likely to respond to mobilised groups lobbying for restrictive policies than those countries weathering the crisis r...