Immigrant Integration in Europe: Empirical Research

Abstract

Most European countries are examining how they have sought to integrate immigrants in the past and how they might change their policies to avoid some of the problems exhibited in immigrant and minority communities today. Discrimination and issues of racism, including the rise of anti-immigrant radical right parties, have become important, as evidenced in part by the passage of the European Union's Racial Equality Directive in 2000. This essay reviews comparative research in political science on immigrant integration in Western Europe. It discusses multiculturalism and assimilation, party politics, antidiscrimination policy, and policy at the European Union level.

Who Gets a Swiss Passport? A Natural Experiment in Immigrant Discrimination

“…Third, by comparing microlevel data about individual naturalization decisions across several municipalities, our study adds to the small but growing literature in immigration studies that has begun to examine outcomes and policies at the local level, where more focused comparisons are less vulnerable to biases from unobserved heterogeneity that often plague cross-national research (e.g., Adida 2011;Dancygier 2010;Helbling 2008;Hopkins 2010). Fourth, our findings add new empirical evidence to the extensive literature and policy debates about citizenship policies and the integration of already settled immigrants (e.g., Freeman 2004;Givens 2007;Hochschild and Mollenkopf 2009). Finally, our study contributes to the literature that studies the relationship between direct democracy and the protection of minorities' civil rights (e.g., Frey and Goette 1998;Gamble 1997;Hajnal, Gerber, and Louch 2002;Maskin and Tirole 2004).…”

“…of anti-immigrant sentiment (Brubaker 1989;Dancygier 2010;Givens 2007;Howard 2009;Koopmans et al 2005).…”

Pre‐ and Post‐Migration Determinants of Socio‐Cultural Integration of African Immigrants in Italy and Spain

“…There is a long research tradition on the integration of immigrants into Western societies. Whilst classical theoretical models of immigrant integration are largely based on research conducted among immigrant groups in the United States, they have also been applied and tested in northwestern Europe, where, since the 1960s, countries such as the United Kingdom, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium have evolved into major settlement countries of new immigrant groups (Givens, 2007; van Londen, et al, 2007; van Tubergen, Maas, and Flap, 2004). As there are major political and cultural differences among European societies, one of the most important contributions of European researchers to the debate on immigrant integration has been to introduce the national context as an important determinant of integration.…”

The Effect of Anti‐Discrimination Policies on Middle Eastern and North African Immigrants in 24 European Countries

“…Previous phases of immigration have caused tensions between immigrants and their European native‐born counterparts. Since the incentive to bring immigrants to Europe was mainly economic, the social aspects of integration have been relatively neglected (Givens, ; Raymer, ). Similar conclusions emerge from a study (Mayda, 2006) analysing individual attitudes in several European countries, the USA, Canada, and Japan.…”