‘Urban regimes’ and ‘migration regimes’: contradictions, connections and potentials

Abstract

The article aims to foster a conceptual discussion about the potentials and pitfalls that emerge when the two concepts 'migration regime' and 'urban regime' are brought together. Recent developments in the field of migration studies have led to the regime concept becoming an increasingly popular strategy. Terms like 'local migration regime' or 'urban migration regime' have enjoyed growing popularity due to an expanded interest in the intersection of localities, regulation techniques and immigration. Within this debate, the 'urban regimes' concept has also gained increased attention.This paper argues that these are two essentially different types of regime analysis, both of which have potentials and problems. Making use of both of them in the field of migration studies requires conceptual clarity and preciseness, and will likely lead to very different findings. A synthesis of the two concepts is, therefore, not achievable, yet a careful and reflected use of them can provide new impulses both for empirical research and theory. Zusammenfassung: In der Migrationsforschung hat das Regimekonzept in den letzten Jahren erheblich an Popularität gewonnen. Dabei wird auch immer öfter von "local migration regimes" oder "urbanen Migrationsregimen" geredet und geschrieben. Gleichzeitig handelt es sich bei "Urbane Regimes" um ein Konzept, das eigentlich seit den 1980er Jahren aus der Forschung zu Stadtpolitiken bekannt ist und auf weitgehend andere Fragestellungen zielt, als dies in der Forschung zu Migration der Fall ist. Der vorliegende Artikel vergleicht deshalb "Urban Regimes" und "(Urban/ Local) Migration Regimes". Er argumentiert, dass beiden Konzepten grundlegend verschiedenen Fragestellungen und Herangehensweisen zugrunde liegen. Beide Konzepte haben zudem ihre jeweils eigenen Potenziale und Probleme. Ihre Verwendung führt zudem in der empirischen Forschung zu unterschiedlichen Ergebnissen. Eine Synthese der beiden Konzepte erscheint daher kaum möglich. In der Diskussion wird gleichwohl für einen produktiven Austausch geworben, denn eine präzise und reflektierte Verwendung der beiden Konzepte kann Anregungen für die weitere Forschung bereithalten.

Refugee Migration to Europe – Current Challenges and Potentials for Cities and Regions

“…The increasing interest of interdisciplinary social science research in the interface between immigration and regulatory processes, as discussed by Bernt (2019), is already clear from the publications just discussed, whereby the "local" focus seems to play a special role (e.g. Glorius/Doomernik 2020).…”

Governing Precarious Immigrant Workers in Rural Localities: Emerging Local Migration Regimes in Portugal

“…We take Bernt's (2019) argument that insights from regime theory in migration studies and urban studies can potentially inform one another, as a starting point to inform our theoretical approach.…”

The secret lives of urban kampong chiefs : a political ethnography of grassroots leaders in Singapore's neighbourhood governance and regime politics

“…This also benefits existing theoretical attempts at bridging Western and non-Western experiences of urban political analysis. Concurring with scholars who posit that urban regime analysis can still yield substantive insights into urban politics by incorporating urban cases from outside of the US context (Bernt, 2019;Lambelet, 2017;Stone, 2014;Holman, 2007), I contribute to furthering Stone"s regime political analysis by showing that regime politics can be applied to study Singapore"s grassroots politics to answer the question of "who rules?" in this political space.…”