Theorizing national models of integration: An ideational perspective

Research on the ‘civic turn’ in European citizenship policies suggests that concerns over immigrant integration have fueled the restrictive development of citizenship policies in recent decades. However, few efforts have been made to explore the normative ideas underlying this development. Departing from Favell’s (1998) influential concept of ‘philosophies of integration’, this article draws on elite-interviews with top-level bureaucrats, politicians and citizenship experts in the Scandinavian countries and explores how ideas about nationhood and integration have influenced the divergence in citizenship policies in the region, and what overall purpose the policy-changes reflect. We find that, especially in Denmark, the gradual introduction of ever more demanding civic integration requirements appears to be a part of the broader aim of controlling the inflow of migrants and not to enhance the integration of those already present in the country. Conversely, the Swedish liberal approach to citizenship, which regularly has been analyzed as a steppingstone to societal integration, might in reality have been a reflection of benign neglect. In Norway, immigrant integration has clearly been part of the underlying rationale for changes in naturalization requirements, yet the control dimension have played an increasingly important role. These findings suggests that, although the citizenship institution remains important in nation states’ efforts to solve their ‘ethnic dilemmas’, the underlying rationale behind policy-change is more multifaceted than previously understood.

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Philosophies of integration? Elite views on citizenship policies in Scandinavia

Brochmann

Midtbøen

2020

“…Most social scientists agree that social groups in general, and political communities in particular, are not natural entities; instead, they are social constructs or, in Benedict Anderson's famous wording, imagined communities (Anderson, 1983;Brubaker, 2002;De Cillia et al, 1999;Smith, 2003). Many scholars have differentiated between various types of these imagined communities, often building on (or criticizing) the distinction between ethnic and civic constructions (Brubaker, 1992;Jensen, 2019;Joppke, 2007). This paper has a different interest.…”

Section: Political Communities As Narrative Constructsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Repetition, adaptation, institutionalization—How the narratives of political communities change

Hase

2021

At times when migration and diversity are politically salient and controversially discussed, the rhetoric of staying ‘as we are’ is widespread. But how do ‘we’ actually change and how would ‘we’ know when it happens? Based on the premise that political communities are the products of narratives of peoplehood, this paper explores how such narratives evolve over time. It conceptualizes different modes of balancing narrative continuity and change. These modes – repetition, adaptation, and institutionalization – are illustrated with reference to evolving German narratives of peoplehood centring around (not) being a country of immigration. The paper argues that all modes lead to some degree of change in narratives of peoplehood. Against the backdrop of different understandings of the core of a narrative, it further discusses when such changes fundamentally affect who ‘we’ are. Overall, the paper invites scholars, policymakers, and citizens to think critically about the essential aspects of their political communities’ narratives and to be aware of the stories that ‘we’ are told and that ‘we’ tell ourselves.

“…Civic integration policies emerge within messy and interactive institutional contexts of nation-states, where street-level bureaucrats and professionals also play a significant role (Lipsky, 1980). As Jensen (2019) stresses, only ‘if both national and local politicians, bureaucrats and frontline workers reason about integration using the same set of philosophical ideas over an extended period, [can we] speak of a strongly embedded national model of integration’ (Jensen, 2019: 623).…”

Section: From National Models To National Fields Of Civic Integrationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Following the policy changes in the 2000s, the theoretical and empirical relevance of the concept of ‘national models’ in studying and comparing national contexts has been a subject of scholarly debate (Bertossi, 2011; Bertossi and Duyvendak, 2012; Jensen, 2019; Mouritsen et al., 2019; Schain, 2012; Van Reekum et al., 2012). Despite the overall convergence in citizenship policies (Joppke, 2007), national differences remain.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

National fields of civic integration: Operationalization of citizenship requirements

Suvarierol

2020

In comparative studies of European migration and civic integration, most attention tends to be invested in analyzing the content of policies and national citizenship models. How these policies have been operationalized, i.e., how different European governments translated their policies into actual civic integration programs, is a relatively less explored area of study. In this article, the Bourdieusian concept of ‘field’ guides us in opening the box of national models and generates a complex and dynamic analysis of civic integration as a policy field: Which actors have been involved in processes of defining the form and content of civic integration? How has their involvement affected the rules and norms of the resulting civic integration regime? These are the main questions the case studies address, relying on original empirical qualitative data gathered in 2011 in France, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. Using historical analysis, I reconstruct and compare how the composition of the particular civic integration field in each country influenced the actual civic integration programs as migrants experienced them in practice.