Irish Pro-Migrant Nongovernmental Organizations and the Politics of Immigration

Abstract

In this article social movement theory is used to assess the strategic repertoire of a relatively new sector of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) advocating for migrants rights in Ireland. Pro-migrant NGOs are majority community-led and face a challenging political and societal context for mobilization including a restrictive immigration regime, political and media discourse that racializes migrants, weak public support for the expansion of migrants' rights, and high rates of discrimination and social exclusion experienced by migrant communities. A competitive funding environment also inhibits pro-migrant NGOs capacity to work with emerging migrant-led organizations that simultaneously compete for state and foundation funds. Pro-migrant NGOs in Ireland have responded with a three levelled strategy, namely alliance building with sympathetic public officials and service and information provision to state bodies, campaigns contesting negative media and societal framing of migrants, and networking with transnational NGO coalitions working on immigration issues.Résumé Dans cet article, la théorie du mouvement social est utilisée pour évaluer le répertoire stratégique d'un secteur relativement nouveau qui fait valoir les droits des immigrés en Irlande par le biais des Organisations non gouvernementales. Celles-ci sont en faveur de l'émigration recevant l'aval des communautés et font face à un défi du contexte politique et social stimulant y compris un régime d'immigration restrictif, un discours politique médiatisé qui a tendance à marginaliser les émigrés, un appui du public sporadique en ce qui concerne l'extension des droits des immigrés et beaucoup de discrimination et d'exclusion sont endurées par les émigrés. Un environnement de financement compétitif empêche également la possibilité aux organisations non gouvernementales en faveur de l'immigration de travailler de pair avec les organisations menées par les émigrés qui rivalisent simultanément avec l'état et les fonds nécessaires. Des Organisations non gouvernementales en faveur de l'immigration en Irlande ont répondu par une stratégie à trois niveaux : (1) La mise au point d'une d'alliance avec des fonctionnaires publics compatissants et le service et l'information prévisionnelle destinée aux corps éta-tiques.(2) Des campagnes contestant la négativité des médias et l'encadrement social des émigrants. (3) Et enfin la constitution de réseaux de coalitions d'Organisations non gouvernementales transnationales travaillant sur les questions des problèmes suscités par d'immigration.Zusammenfassung In diesem Artikel wird die Theorie der sozialen Bewegung genutzt, um das strategische Repertoire eines relativ neuen NGO-Sektors, der sich für die Rechte von Migranten in Irland einsetzt, zu bewerten. Pro-migrant-NGOs sind mehrheitlich von lokalen Gemeinschaften geführt und stehen einem schwierigen politischen und gesellschaftlichen Kontext für die Mobilisierung gegenüber, inklusive restriktivem Immigrationsregelwerk, politischem und medialem Diskurs, der Migranten rassifi...

Demand and Deliver: Refugee Support Organisations in Austria

“…Langthaler and Trauner (2009, p. 454) found that there is almost no cooperation between self-organised refugee associations and NGOs that offer services for asylum seekers and refugees (cf. Cullen, 2009, for a similar observation in the Irish context). One exceptional event that brought these organisations together was the Refugee Protest Camp Vienna.…”

“…The first are usually more formalised and have a closer relation to the state and related resources (Cullen, 2009). The latter, as self-organised organisations, are usually based on a close relation between 'members' based on shared nationality, ethnicity, migration status, religion and regional origin or a combination thereof (Piacentini, 2015), reducing or even annulling the gap between providers and service-users (Martin, 2014).…”

Challengers in the migrant field: pro-migrant Irish NGO responses to the Immigration, Residence and Protection Bill

“…They are also relatively isolated in Irish society, despite efforts to build up alliances with other civil society actors. In addition, these small isolated groups are viewed negatively by state actors in areas outside service provision; some alliances have been made with regard to implementation strategies, but none over policy, partly because of senior civil servant hostility (Cullen 2009). Pro-migrant NGOs are often not migrant-led and indeed are in competition with migrant-led NGOs for increasingly scarce resources.…”

“…That there was no mobilization is hardly surprising. In Ireland, the migrant field, as in other countries, is cut off from the domestic political field, meaning that organizations, while they try to build up alliances, often find themselves isolated (Cullen 2009;Statham and Geddes 2006). In addition, these groups, working as service providers, found it difficult to move into the realm of more contentious politics.…”

“…I am less interested in the argument as to whether immigration policy is affected more by liberalizing promigrant NGOs (Freeman 1995) or by restrictive state elites (Ellermann 2006;Nicholls 2013). In Ireland at least, the answer is clear; previous work has highlighted the restrictive nature of the migrant field dominated by arbitrary state controls and the weakness of pro-migrant NGOs and migrant groups in affecting public discourse, portraying them as weak isolated bodies dependent on a state that regards NGOs with hostility and migrants with suspicion (Boucher 2008;Cullen 2009;Landy 2014;Lentin and Moreo 2012;Loyal 2011). The question that this article investigates is rather how this field operates, and whether these weak challengers can change the dominant discourse of the migrant field.…”