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The focus of this paper is on how the state sets up discriminatory structures, how immigrants work out ways of managing those structures and how in this process they construct flexible and innovative identities. Two main issues are explored. The first is the relationship between state control and exclusion and immigrant resistance. The paper shows how, despite increased surveillance and digital nets mounted by European states to keep immigrants out of their territory, the British state is ambivalent towards irregular immigrants. At the same time, it is in the interstices of ambiguity that immigrants, by buying, renting and borrowing documents, have found ways through their networks and communities to resist or get around exclusionary and contradictory regulations. Second, the paper is concerned with the construction of innovative and flexible identities. The research reveals how immigrants occupy rebellious spaces and construct identities in difficult situations at the intersection of self and structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Normative debates and comparative studies on voting rights regulations are lively. However, little is known on what citizens think of enfranchising migrants. This paper starts to fill this gap. We conducted an original survey in 26 European countries (n = 16,555). In most countries, an (often narrow) majority of sedentary nationals supports enfranchising emigrants. In all countries, no majority favours the enfranchisement of immigrants, although falling short of a majority in several cases. Being a woman, a bi-national citizen, but also younger, and leaning to the political left is associated with higher support for enfranchising immigrants. However, no individual-level characteristics, apart from age, is associated with the support for enfranchising emigrants. An exclusive national identity is associated not only with lower support for enfranchising immigrants but for emigrants, as well. Furthermore, larger relative sizes of immigrant population fuel support for enfranchisement of this group – up to a certain level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper emerges from an ethnography of the economic and cultural life of Rye Lane, an intensely multi-ethnic street in Peckham, South London. The effects of accelerated migration into London are explored through the reshaping and diversification of its interior, street and city spaces. A ‘trans-ethnography’ is pursued across the compendium of micro-, meso- and macro-urban spaces, without reifying one above the other. The ethnographic stretch across intimate, collective and symbolic city spaces serves to connect how the restrictions and circuits of urban migration have different impacts and expressions in these distinctive but interrelated urban localities. The paper argues for a trans-ethnography that engages within and across a compendium of urban localities, to understand how accelerated migration and urban ‘super-diversity’ transform the contemporary global city. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The aim of this paper is to study the patterns of mobility from Spain to other European countries that have emerged since the economic crisis of 2008. To do this, we have carried out an in-depth analysis of the main statistical sources on migration flows from Spain's National Statistics Institute. Based on this analysis we have developed a typology of the "new emigrants", including returnees, re-emigrants and Spanish-born migrants. However, the article shows that these mobilities do not only result from a new phenomenon, since there is a continuity with earlier Spanish migration cycles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies on transnational families argue that the subjective well-being of migrant parents is negatively affected by living separated from their children. Most studies employ qualitative methods without a control group and hence are not able to distinguish whether the effects found are associated with separation only or with other factors. This paper investigates the association between parental subjective well-being and parent–child separation by comparing migrant parents who have at least one child in their country of origin with those who live with all their children in the Netherlands. The paper further investigates whether the same associations are found between migrant groups from Angola and Nigeria. Results indicate that transnational parents indeed report lower subjective well-being, as measured by happiness, life satisfaction and mental health for both groups and additionally, self-assessed health for Angolans. However, legal status, socio-economic status and the quality of the parent–child relationship are found to be important mediators. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Prior studies on Roma migration put much emphasis on either structural factors or networks that become key elements for explaining the growing migration flows of a population lacking economic resources and characterized by poor education. Although very relevant for explaining the perpetuation of migration, these studies posit the limit of downplaying migrants' agency and the role of identity markers mediating the influence of structural conditions in both destination and origin countries. Drawing on quantitative data from the Roma Inclusion Barometer (2006) as well as on in-depth interviews with Roma migrants from Eastern Romania, the paper provides a more comprehensive account of contemporary Romanian Roma migration towards Western European countries. The paper challenges the portrayal of the Roma migrant population, as conveyed by many scholars, as a rather passive one and argues that gender, religion and subgroup identities constitute key elements in explaining Roma migrants' agency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite recent advances, critical areas in the analysis of European migration remain underdeveloped. We have only a limited understanding of the consequences of migration for migrants and their descendants, relative to staying behind; and our insights of intergenerational transmission is limited to two generations of those living in the destination countries. These limitations stem from a paucity of studies that incorporate comparison with nonmigrants -- and return migrants -- in countries of origin and which trace processes of intergenerational transmission over multiple generations. This paper outlines the theoretical and methodological discussions in the field, design and data of the 2,000 Families study. The study comprises almost 50,000 members of migrant and non-migrant Turkish families across three family generations, living in Turkey and eight European countries. We provide indicative findings from the study, framed within a theoretical perspective of "dissimilation" from origins, and reflect on its potential for future migration research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that immigrant civic activism, which may at first glance seem to focus on diasporic ties and ethnic community building, becomes often a lever for transcultural capital and transcultural community building. The study is explorative of new repertoires and forms of transnationalism among sub-Saharan African immigrant activists in Europe. The findings suggest that immigrant civic activism, even if limited in size, proposes new types of transcultural societal networks and new forms of transcultural expression. In the first part of the study I discuss the theoretical background of transnationalism in migration studies and propose the notions of transcultural capital and transcultural community as working concepts. The second part of the study concentrates on the qualitative analysis of life story interviews with sixteen sub-Saharan African immigrants in Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces the concept of “double estrangement”. Drawing on a large qualitative dataset it will argue that young migrant group boys in Dublin’s north inner city suffer from a break with their embodied selves as they are pushed between habitual and reflective action. The dual elements of “double estrangement” will be outlined, firstly, through the contention that visible difference and dispositions of the body mark minority boys out as not belonging within peer exchanges in three primary schools. Secondly, by arguing this has the effect of heightening a boy’s self-consciousness of their body as an object of value estranging them from their habitual embodied being. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper shows that cultural and material threats exist side by side, serving different psychological functions, and that they manifest in differential attitudes towards immigrants from different ethnic or racial origins. While culturally threatened individuals prefer immigrants akin to themselves, as opposed to those from different races and cultures, the materially threatened prefer immigrants who are different from themselves who can be expected not to compete for the same resources. We test our hypotheses using multilevel structural equation modelling, based on data from twenty countries in the 2002 wave of the European Social Survey. The disaggregation of these two types of perceived threat reveals responsiveness to the race of immigrants that is otherwise masked by pooling the two threat dimensions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

International migration contributes to increasing cultural diversity in many European cities. Historically, migration studies have focused on the integration of immigrants foregrounding race/ethnicity and identity issues, limiting our understanding of intercultural diversity. A new paradigm focusing on relational patterns among groups is emerging, highlighting the importance of mutual relations, interactions and influences among residents of different origins and backgrounds, including the experience of both immigrants and autochthonous populations. The notions of superdiversity and conviviality have significantly contributed to this debate. This paper discusses how both were methodologically operationalized in multi-sited ethnographies carried out in Lisbon and Granada, during 2009–2012. Superdiversity and conviviality are the main theoretical frameworks used to understand how interculturality is lived and experienced at the local level. We reflect on their strengths and weaknesses, unpacking common assumptions about race, ethnicity and culture, specifically looking at the negotiation of difference in intercultural events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to its claim of contemporary exceptionalism, the notion of superdiversity raises suspicion among historians. However, historians would do well to not dismiss the entire superdiversity debate as more hype that does not concern them. As a multidimensional perspective on diversity, encouraging researchers to examine the interplay of many different factors that condition people's lives and to move beyond an ethno-focal perspective, superdiversity could be of interest to historians as well. This article shows how the notion can help historians debunk some of the homogenizing categories that tend to characterize the representation of past immigrant populations. The paper uses a superdiversity lens to examine migration to the city of Ghent from 1960 to 1980. It is an open invitation to historians to accept the challenges that superdiversity poses and to provide a proper historicization of the concept, thus furthering its theoretical development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The lives of transnational groups and individuals are marked by a spatial and imaginary split: a phenomenon wherein identity, belonging and representation have become increasingly elusive concepts, and the realm of the ‘cultural’ vastly important. And, the theoretical compasses of cosmopolitanism and transnationalism are particularly relevant and illuminating in considering social space, mediated communication and belonging in relation to urban diasporic communities and gendered subjectivities. The aim of this paper is to address expressions of identity and belonging at the intersection of online communicative practice and offline spatial formations, with a focus on the specificities of gendered constructions of sociality and subjectivity in the diaspora. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The notion of increasing immigrant diversity is prevalent in immigration literature. However, little empirical research has examined if immigrant populations have become more diverse during the past two decades. Using data from Pew Research Center's Global Religion and Migration Database and the World Bank's Global Bilateral Migration Database, origin and religious change in immigrant populations since 1990 is presented for six European countries. Findings demonstrate that immigrant origin and religious diversity has been relatively stable during the past ten years, with moderate increases during the 1990s. Further research can examine whether these patterns are true for other countries or what happens when alternative variables are considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In analysing efforts to pass as white, this article examines the ways racialized difference materializes on the bodies construed as "Eastern European". Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork among Russian-speaking migrants in Helsinki, it examines their attempts to inhabit whiteness through tactics of passing, such as changing their surnames, working on their accents, and adjusting how they dress. I argue that these efforts to pass as not "Russian" should be understood through the postcolonial formation of Europeanness, with its internal racialized division between (proper) Western Europeanness and (incomplete) Eastern Europeanness. The labour of approximating whiteness through passing draws attention to sites of racialized differentiation such as accent, audibility, language, surnames, and clothing. These efforts of attempting to pass for someone Russian speakers are not recognized as point to the structural racist hierarchies that refuse to attach value to their bodies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the happiness trajectory of Muslims living in European countries following the terrorist attacks on 11 September 2001, using six rounds of the European Social Survey (ESS). We find a decline, and then a subsequent return to average happiness among the general Muslim migrant population relative to others after 9/11. However, a small subgroup of Muslims, young male Muslim immigrants from Middle East, report a persistent low level of subjective well-being. This may be seen as a potential source of a threat on integration of Muslims and hence social cohesion and peace in European countries. Our findings persist after controlling for perceived discrimination, migrant status, and demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, as well as fixed effects for year and country of residence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the "Syrian Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Programme" (SVPRP) as a specific British response to the "European refugee crisis". Based on an analysis of media reporting (2014–17) and empirical evidence from agencies and volunteers tasked with implementing the programme, this essay reveals the ethical and political ambiguities at its heart. By focusing on the notion of "vulnerability" I argue that the humanitarian configuration of a refugee worthy of care is implicated in two significant practices: exceptionalising a small group of Syrians as legitimate targets for compassion and constructing compassion itself as a rationed resource in a climate of anti-immigrant hostility, austerity and Brexit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Negative attitudes towards Muslims have increased substantially in Europe, but European Muslims' perceptions of discrimination vary across national contexts. Three separate approaches explain perceptions of discrimination: social psychological theories at the micro-level, migration theories at the social structural level, and citizenship theories at the macro-level. We know less about how these approaches fit together to explain variation in perceptions of discrimination across national contexts. To evaluate this question, this article combines survey data of European Muslims (n = 1,618) with indices of policy commitments to immigrant integration in four countries. Contrary to hypothesized findings, this article identifies a striking puzzle: (1) Muslims report more experiences of discrimination in more inclusive contexts and (2) native-born Muslims are more likely to perceive societal hostility than Muslim immigrants in more inclusive contexts. To make sense of this puzzle, I offer an integrated approach that explains how macro-level contexts condition individual-level perceptions of exclusion through cultural knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is a theoretically oriented contribution seeking to review the existing literature directly or indirectly addressing the “diversity gap” in political parties. Within this particular field I identify two main areas to conduct research: participation and representation. The premise is that the particular features of political parties, given their role in the democratic system, implies that they cannot be neutral when they identify the diversity gap as a problem, and therefore have to follow some strategies to deal with it. Based on the literature review and by preparing the theoretical framework of the different case studies for this Special Issue, I propose an interpretative framework comprising four main channels of potential analysis. I will end by arguing that what all these studies highlight is that in dealing with the incorporation of immigrants into political parties, the utilitarian logic prevails over any argument based on equality and power sharing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ireland’s inclusive political rights for migrants, together with a favourable naturalization process and accessible political parties, present favourable factors for political participation; however, migrant representation among elected representatives has remained very low. Examining the institutional context and group structures, this article explores the trajectory of migrant involvement in Irish political parties from the point of first engagement to becoming a representative in an effort to explain their under-representation in Irish political life. It is shown that neither political parties nor migrants have made a collective and sustained effort to increase migrant representation in local municipalities, which is a necessary pre-requisite for enhancing representation in the legislature. The article concludes that while opportunity structures provide some explanation towards migrant under-representation in Irish electoral politics, additional factors such as how political actors interact as a group with the institutional context are also important. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study is based on narratives of successful lawyers in Europe who are descendants of migrants from Turkey. I will discuss the main mechanisms whereby social actors have a significant impact on the professional pathways of these upwardly mobile professionals. The findings provide two insights. The relevance of significant others found in literature on educational mobility of descendants of migrants can be extended to professional pathways. Some respondents became acquainted with the middle-class culture of the majority group through peers and school during their youth. This was instrumental in adjusting to the specific white-collar professional environments of corporate law firms. Others who grew up and attended schools in disadvantaged neighbourhoods had more difficulties adjusting. However, they became accustomed to middle- and upper-class norms and behaviour at university or on the job by observing and learning along the way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Violence perpetrated against migrants by Golden Dawn was rarely investigated or prosecuted by Greek authorities and was discursively constructed as exceptional, contrary to the norms of Greek democracy and committed by marginalized individuals and groups. The article argues that state responses have been shaped by racialized discourses and policies on migration and racism. Anti-migrant violence has been legitimated through three interlinked discursive strategies: a narrative of 'isolated events'; the denial of its racialized nature; and the rationalization of both state and non-state anti-migrant violence as a regrettable yet understandable defensive reaction to the threats posed by migration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The introduction of integration tests on a pre-entry or post-arrival basis has drawn attention to changing national integration policies. Yet, at the local level, language and civic culture courses have often been implemented before the development of national programmes. The way these policies came into place and the extent to which they responded to similar challenges has often been overlooked. This article explores the development of these measures in four cities – Stuttgart, Vienna, Barcelona and Turin – to find out which mechanisms account for convergence in policymaking. Integration courses present traits of similarity in their contents and target groups; however, this does not imply a consistent process towards convergence. Local introduction initiatives are the product of local policy arenas, which display different policy frames of migrant integration. On the other hand, new legislation and changes in the available financial resources for integration appear to be crucial factors that trigger divergence. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

While a considerable body of work examines immigrant networks, inadequate attention has been devoted to understanding how networks regulate the relationship between immigrants and host institutions. A rich immigrant process may reinforce current power structures by providing a convenient buffer between the elite and challengers. Conversely, immigration may challenge the status quo. I employ social network analysis to examine three understudied immigrant groups in Rome, Bangladeshis, Filipinos, and Peruvians. I find that they have developed systems of problem-solving and sense-making that often interrupt their interactions with host institutions. The state tolerates this because it situates immigrants’ concerns outside its sphere of responsibility. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

To what extent are perceptions of discrimination associated with religious affirmation among Muslim minorities in the Netherlands? Drawing on recent nationally representative surveys among self-identified Muslims from five ethnic groups in the Netherlands, we test boundary conditions of reactive religiosity. Our findings indicate that for Muslims from established immigrant groups, perceptions of discrimination are associated with more frequent religious attendance, but that this is not the case for Muslims from smaller, less established ethnic communities. Findings are interpreted using a boundary framework. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Immigration and the ways in which host societies receive newcomers pose challenges for modern civil societies. This article contributes to the ongoing discussion about how ethnic diversity influences tolerance towards immigrants. Compared to previous studies, we analyse tolerance as a sequential concept in order to uncover the effects of contextual diversity on attitudes towards immigrants and the granting of certain rights to this group. Moreover, we distinguish different shares of ethnic groups based on their ethnic and cultural origins both on the independent and dependent variable. The analysis relies on a subnational survey of sixty municipalities in Switzerland, revealing that only certain ethnic groups are seen as an economic and cultural threat. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

At a time when all the political parties of Scotland are trying to establish a persuasive vision of the nation, inquiry into where ethnic and racial minorities fit into these debates provides one understudied means of bridging literatures on multinationalism and multiculturalism. Focusing especially on the lesser known question of how elite political actors are positioning minorities within projects of nation-building, this article draws upon original empirical data in which three predominant clusters emerge. The first centres on an aspirational pluralism, in so far as political elites are less inclined – in contrast to counterparts in some other minority nations – to place ethnically determined barriers on membership of Scottish nationhood. The second concerns the competing ways in which the legacy of Scotland's place in the British Empire is appropriated by actors of different political hues, and so assumes a multiform role. The third cluster points to potential limitations in minority claims-making and recognition, especially in terms of formal multilingualism and corporate multifaithism, something that may partly be explained by the tension between multinationalism and multiculturalism. Taken together, the article illustrates how elite political actors can play a vital role in ensuring that appeals to nationhood in Scotland can be meaningfully calibrated to include minorities too. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we explore the added value of foregrounding temporal dimensions in migration research. Age at the time of migration, length of stay in the country of settlement and individual life-cycle stages matter for migrants' settlement and return considerations. However, these factors are rarely put centre stage in analyses. We draw on data from sixty-seven informants with different country backgrounds, who had either immigrated recently, arrived as children, or were born in Norway. We find that the implications of temporal dimensions cut across national and ethnic backgrounds. Age at the time of migration and the relative proportion of life spent in the origin and in the settlement country play an important role in migrants' considerations about settlement and return; as does being single, a parent with small children, or retired. An approach foregrounding temporal dimensions thus reveals the changeability of considerations over time and highlights similarities and differences beyond ethnicity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

‘Diversity’ has become a key term in recent years, yet it has been criticized for being a vague concept with different and contradictory meanings. This article demonstrates that there are at least three inherent meanings of the term: (1) discerned difference attributed with positive or negative value; (2) diverting diversity providing pleasure and amusement; and (3) distracting diversity directing attention from something of greater importance. I argue that the concept of diversity can be a fruitful focus in ethnographic research, if its inherent multiplex and duplicitous character is recognized and actively employed. This is shown through an analysis of the ways in which immigrants from the English-speaking Caribbean to Denmark have been perceived and received as foreigners since the 1960s as representing different kinds of diversity. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Political theorists hardly ever use empirical data when they discuss the problem of irregular migration. This article tries to fill this gap by engaging with sociological records provided by the CLANDESTINO project, which has produced country reports of data and trends of undocumented migration across Europe. After criticizing the attempt to offer undocumented individuals a large package of rights even if they are not regularized, the article discusses the options left for a host state: deportation and regularization. But none of the empirical and normative reasons for which states can legitimately exclude foreigners can justify already settled irregular immigrants' expulsion. Since some form of regularization of already settled irregular migrants is thus morally required, the article surveys several views of an appropriate residence threshold and argues for a short-time threshold view of one year. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines the dynamics through which the migrant field in Ireland is governed, and, through analysing NGO contention over the Immigration, Residence and Protection (IRP) Bill, explores the role they play in the field. The article argues that NGOs both influence and are institutionally channelled by state discourse surrounding migrants. The IRP Bill was designed to regulate non-EU citizens in Ireland, and codified the discretionary powers of the Irish state over migrants. While NGOs offered an influential critique of this process, in doing so they reproduced the dominant representation of migrants in Ireland as problems to be separated out and managed by elite experts. In explaining why this was so, I draw on Bourdieu's argument that those within a field of practice articulate their identities and goals through the dominant language of that field. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Citizenship representations within national populations have mainly been deduced from state policies on migration. Yet, at the individual level, no studies have investigated whether citizenship representations are reliably associated with preferences for specific migration policies (i.e. the underlying assumption for deducing citizenship representations from state policies). Because several studies have shown that state policies may not reflect understandings of citizenship within national populations, it may be more relevant to study citizenship representations at the individual level, in relation to personal preferences regarding migration policies. This study examined how ethnic, cultural and civic citizenship representations relate to migration policy preferences at the individual level among majority group high-school students (N = 1,734) in seven EU countries. Findings add to the understanding of citizenship representations and may have implications for the implementation of migration policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understood as a philosophy counselling group rights and concomitant public policies undertaken by governments to preserve and enhance group identities, multiculturalism has little purchase in European immigrant integration debates. However, based on interviews with various actors engaged in policies that affect immigrants in the Netherlands and Germany, we argue that multiculturalism remains a going concern if it is understood as a problem-solving practice through which governments acknowledge and work with ethnic and religious groups to address issues of mutual concern, particularly on issues related to gender. We label this ‘multicultural governance’ and argue that it supports the principal ends of integration policy: the socialization of immigrants into prevailing national languages, norms and institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article explores the topic of return migration as it is understood and practised by different actors who engage with this theme, albeit from different perspectives. Return migration is paraded in policy debates as a triple-win scenario, bringing advantages to receiving states, countries of origin and migrants. Yet this article reveals how return migration is understood differently by policymakers in Senegal and Europe and by the migrants targeted by their policies. Interpretations are based on conflicting underlying assumptions of what return is, its benefits and its relation to transnational movement. Inspired by the discursive paradigm in political studies, this article utilizes interpretive tools to examine the structures that support and give meaning to understandings of return among institutional actors and migrants. It concludes that new theorization is needed to grasp the full complexity of return migration as a phenomenon that is marked by different temporalities and aspirations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Governments have policies explicitly directed at the integration of migrants. This article addresses how policymakers and politicians privilege certain constructions of the social relationship between migrants and the majority society (expressed through narratives of ‘integration’), while making it seem as if they were presenting facts in their policies. These constructions provide the justifications for adopting a direction in policy-making over other alternatives. This article sets to analyse comparatively how policy actors in two urban contexts construct migrants' integration through policy narratives and how, within this, they evaluate migrants as ‘integrated’ and ‘non-integrated’. Through narrative analysis, the article sheds light on how migrants are positioned by political institutions within the normative order of the society in which they live. Furthermore, it shows that local policy-making is shaped by national citizenship regimes, models of steering, welfare regimes and stories about the nation and its people. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Religion is often perceived as one of the main barriers to immigrant integration in Europe. By focusing on the contested area of immigrants' gender role attitudes, this study analyses data of first- and second-generation immigrants from multiple origin countries and of different religious affiliations in comparison to the native population. It shows that higher levels of religiosity can explain immigrants' more traditional attitudes to some extent, but that origin country socialization acts as an important additional determinant of attitudes of the first generation. Among second-generation migrants, only Muslims continue to hold more traditional attitudes. Acculturation for longer-staying migrants is partly explained by declining religiosity, with some evidence for a decoupling of attitudes from religious beliefs among female migrants in particular. Intergenerational change, on the other hand, cannot be attributed to a decline in the role of religiosity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While research has traditionally focused on first- and second-generation immigrants' socio-economic incorporation and to a lesser extent on their cultural and political integration, we analyse their affective attachment to the host country. Specifically, we assess: (1) the extent to which immigrants appear more or less ‘patriotic’ than non-immigrants; (2) what individual-level characteristics lead immigrants to greater (or lesser) attachment and; (3) whether cross-national differences in affective feelings towards the host country can be explained by relevant contextual characteristics. Analysing the 2008 wave of the European Values Study, we arrive at the conclusion that immigrants are not disaffected in terms of national pride, and that their own attachment is largely a function of the community in which they find themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In 2011, al-Qaeda leader, Osama Bin Laden, was killed in Pakistan and the US president, Barack Obama, concluded a decade of global ‘war against terror’. In light of this, it seems only sensible to explore what implications the post-9/11 international developments have had on a local basis in specific national contexts. With this in mind, this article focuses on Denmark and discusses how the critical event of 9/11 motivated a security/integration response, including various pre-emptive measures that have cast the Muslim population asthe usual suspects. It will discuss how these changes have affected the everyday lives of ordinary Danish Muslims over the last ten years and changed the relationship between majorities and minorities. Finally, it will also examine how and why recent national and international events have created the potential for another shift in majority–minority relations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article approaches two shortcomings in previous research on religiosity and prejudice: (1) the lack of cross-country comparative studies; and (2) a failure to consider any moderating effects of religious contexts. We examine whether the relationship between religiosity and anti-immigration attitudes varies depending on religious contexts in Europe, and we find two things. First, strongly religious people are on average less likely to oppose immigration than non-religious people. Second, different religious contexts moderate the religiosity–attitude relationship in that religious people in Protestant countries and in countries with a low proportion of majority adherents are more tolerant than religious people in Catholic countries and in religiously homogenous countries. State policies also matter in that religious people are more negative where the government favours the majority religion. This calls into question the taken-for-granted understanding of religiosity and out-group attitudes found in the USA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

My aim in this contribution is to clarify in which way social scientific measurements of immigrant integration operate as a form of ‘social imagination’, that is, of the routinized and professionalized visualization of social life. Through such measurements, images of ‘society’ are produced that feed into larger social imaginaries. My discussion takes as an example Dutch discourse and research on integration. Crucial to the constitution of society in the Netherlands and many other Western European countries is what I call a culturist discourse that has many similarities to racism. This discourse demarcates the boundaries of society by rendering objectively observable the non-integrated who are considered to reside ‘outside society’. The image of society thereby produced is that of a morally cleansed realm: social problems are relegated to the domain ‘outside society’, consisting of persons in need of integration. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Documenting the extraordinary potency and reach of the European backlash against multiculturalism, this essay provides a new theoretical model for explaining it. Rather than focusing primarily on demographic and institutional facts about Islamic immigration – such as education, wealth, participation and mobility – the author proposes a cultural-sociological approach that focuses on meanings and emotions as core issues for civil societies. As the demographic presence of Islamic immigrants has intensified, the anti-civil construction of Islamic qualities has led European masses, leaders and intellectuals, not only from the right but from the centre and left, to demand homogenizing assimilation. Representing public practices of Islam as threatening European democracy, newly restrictive citizenship tests have emerged alongside growing xenophobic political parties and newly threatening neo-fascist violence. Initially brought to Europe for economic and political reasons, the question has now become whether the children and grandchildren of Islamic immigrants can be incorporated into European civil society. The conflict is not over whether immigrants should be incorporated but over the grounds for doing so. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]