The 2015 European refugee crisis highlighted some inherent shortcoming in European migration and ... more The 2015 European refugee crisis highlighted some inherent shortcoming in European migration and asylum policies. Hundreds of thousands of people moving across the borders of Schengen and seeking international protection were quickly classified by the highest institutional offices of member states as " irregular migrants " , they were associated with threats such as organized crime and terrorism and they have been exposed to the risk of being criminalized. These official reactions are both the consequence and the reflection of the Eu-ropean asylum system. A regime that has been created in almost thirty years-from the Schengen agreement to the most recent immigration conventions-on the basis of an obsession for border security which, on the one hand, led to the approval of increasingly restrictive immigration and asylum policies, and, on the other hand, have transformed asylum seekers from victims of political persecution , wars, natural or human disasters to disguised economic immigrants or " false refugees ". Two interesting interpretations of this trajectory have been provided by Valluy-who explains it as the result of a competition between three political ideological views-and Huysmans-who analyzes it in terms of a classical securitization process. In the last part of our paper, we briefly address three main points: 1) the generative power of borders; 2) the need to critically reconsider the vocabulary we as scholars use to analyze human mobility; 3) the link between the European immigration policy framework and the reworking of a European cultural and ethno-racial identity.
The paper addresses the relationships between administrative and penal treatment of il/legal immi... more The paper addresses the relationships between administrative and penal treatment of il/legal immigrants by police forces in Italy. It draws upon interviews with high-level police officers and attorneys-general from a research project carried out in 1999 in Emilia-...
In recent years, European politics and public discourse about immigration and asylum have been pe... more In recent years, European politics and public discourse about immigration and asylum have been permeated by a humanitarian stance. Yet the same political representatives who speak up humanely often produce merciless statements that imply inhumane treatment for people on the move. To explain this contradictory regime of humanitarian and security discourse we start from the early securitization of European borders, which has established a link between immigration, crime, and terrorism. The securitization of the issue of immigration , with its related rhetoric of fear and security, has made the metaphor of the siege seem natural, credible, and validated by facts. After illustrating the pendular regime of humanitarian/security discourse, we show how while the first is deemed inevitable after high profile shipwrecks, but is soon forgotten, the second is justified by a paradigm of siege and institutionalized in norms, bureaucracies , technologies, and doctrines that privilege security over human life.
Al llarg dels ultims anys no nomes s’ha produit un augment de la poblacio immigrant sino, sobreto... more Al llarg dels ultims anys no nomes s’ha produit un augment de la poblacio immigrant sino, sobretot, un canvi radical en les seves caracteristiques i procedencia. Si a mitjan anys setanta nou de cada deu estrangers procedien de l’Europa comunitaria o d’America del Nord, actualment nomes un de cada deu es comunitari o nord-america, mentre que quatre son europeus extracomunitaris, dos son africans, dos son asiatics i un es de l’America llatina. Tambe cal tenir en compte que gairebe el 50% dels immigrants professen religions diferents de la cristiana i que una tercera part son musulmans.
Journal of International Migration and Integration, 2021
The subject of naturalisation among intra-EU migrants has only recently drawn the attention of so... more The subject of naturalisation among intra-EU migrants has only recently drawn the attention of social science scholars. Empirical evidence from quantitative studies shows an increase in citizenship applications among this new wave of mobile people, indicating a strategic use of naturalisation. However, there is not a great deal of micro-level research, especially as to the subjective meanings attached to citizenship take-up in a new EU member state. Drawing on 68 in-depth interviews conducted with Italians and Spaniards living in London and Berlin, we argue that an individual’s understanding of naturalisation within the EU context is based on two aspects: on one hand, a strictly pragmatic evaluation of the pros and cons of the new status; on the other, a new sense of belonging as well as new cultural and territorial identifications that intra-EU migrants are not often willing to experience. Therefore, this article suggests that EU migrants that strongly identify with their country o...
This working paper explores new Italian migrants' arrival and settlement in the UK and Ge... more This working paper explores new Italian migrants' arrival and settlement in the UK and Germany; work experiences; and, issues of identity and citizenship. It draws on 41 in-depth interviews with migrants in London and Berlin; 10 'prospective' migrants; and, 10 labour agency experts. www.gemm.eu
The coupling between migrants and crime is increasingly shaping the way in which political and in... more The coupling between migrants and crime is increasingly shaping the way in which political and institutional actors in European states define the criteria for inclusion and exclusion of foreign people within the borders of European Union. The social construction of migrants' as criminals involves different social and institutional actors. This paper focuses on the specific role played by the judicial system. Drawing on an ethnographic research in the Criminal Courts of Milan - involving participant observation and semi-structured interviews with judges, public attorneys, lawyers and interpreters - this paper shows the organisational practices (both formal and informal) and the common sense representations by which migrants are recognised, investigated, evaluated, and treated as criminals by the judicial systems
In our paper, we aim at pointing out the way the most relevant institutional actors currently def... more In our paper, we aim at pointing out the way the most relevant institutional actors currently define the security agenda for the Milanese metropolitan area, which kind of goals they try to pursue, upon which instruments and resources they can rely, which division of labour and forms of cooperation they try to putting into practices. We draw from an analyses of both official documents by the main public institutions involved in the governance of security in Milan and semi-structured interviews to all the members of the Comitato provinciale per l’ordine pubblico e la sicurezza – a board that gather the president of the province, the mayor of the province capital (plus mayors of other cities and towns of the province who can be involved on an ad hoc basis), the representative of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (Prefetto), the District Attorney and the chiefs of all the national police forces – as well as to politicians, civil servants and commissioners of the local police of the city ...
Community has often been used impressionistically as a tool for concealing a lack of theorising i... more Community has often been used impressionistically as a tool for concealing a lack of theorising in analytical concepts. As a result, its operationalization in empirical social research gave rise to reified descriptions as is quite often the case with studies on ethnicity and international migration. Drawing upon recent developments in systems theory, second order cybernetics, and organizational theory an alternative conceptualization is suggested which brings together notions of place, time and the idea of memory as an including/excluding device. Understanding community in terms of communication enables not only to fully exploit both an ethnographic approach and network analysis, but also to work out more sensitive tools for policy-making. In this perspective, the concept has been used in an ethnography of migration in Milan (Italy), and its results evaluated.
This working paper explores new Italian migrants' arrival and settlement in the UK and German... more This working paper explores new Italian migrants' arrival and settlement in the UK and Germany; work experiences; and, issues of identity and citizenship. It draws on 41 in-depth interviews with migrants in London and Berlin; 10 'prospective' migrants; and, 10 labour agency experts. www.gemm.eu
The 2015 European refugee crisis highlighted some inherent shortcoming in European migration and ... more The 2015 European refugee crisis highlighted some inherent shortcoming in European migration and asylum policies. Hundreds of thousands of people moving across the borders of Schengen and seeking international protection were quickly classified by the highest institutional offices of member states as " irregular migrants " , they were associated with threats such as organized crime and terrorism and they have been exposed to the risk of being criminalized. These official reactions are both the consequence and the reflection of the Eu-ropean asylum system. A regime that has been created in almost thirty years-from the Schengen agreement to the most recent immigration conventions-on the basis of an obsession for border security which, on the one hand, led to the approval of increasingly restrictive immigration and asylum policies, and, on the other hand, have transformed asylum seekers from victims of political persecution , wars, natural or human disasters to disguised economic immigrants or " false refugees ". Two interesting interpretations of this trajectory have been provided by Valluy-who explains it as the result of a competition between three political ideological views-and Huysmans-who analyzes it in terms of a classical securitization process. In the last part of our paper, we briefly address three main points: 1) the generative power of borders; 2) the need to critically reconsider the vocabulary we as scholars use to analyze human mobility; 3) the link between the European immigration policy framework and the reworking of a European cultural and ethno-racial identity.
The paper addresses the relationships between administrative and penal treatment of il/legal immi... more The paper addresses the relationships between administrative and penal treatment of il/legal immigrants by police forces in Italy. It draws upon interviews with high-level police officers and attorneys-general from a research project carried out in 1999 in Emilia-...
In recent years, European politics and public discourse about immigration and asylum have been pe... more In recent years, European politics and public discourse about immigration and asylum have been permeated by a humanitarian stance. Yet the same political representatives who speak up humanely often produce merciless statements that imply inhumane treatment for people on the move. To explain this contradictory regime of humanitarian and security discourse we start from the early securitization of European borders, which has established a link between immigration, crime, and terrorism. The securitization of the issue of immigration , with its related rhetoric of fear and security, has made the metaphor of the siege seem natural, credible, and validated by facts. After illustrating the pendular regime of humanitarian/security discourse, we show how while the first is deemed inevitable after high profile shipwrecks, but is soon forgotten, the second is justified by a paradigm of siege and institutionalized in norms, bureaucracies , technologies, and doctrines that privilege security over human life.
Al llarg dels ultims anys no nomes s’ha produit un augment de la poblacio immigrant sino, sobreto... more Al llarg dels ultims anys no nomes s’ha produit un augment de la poblacio immigrant sino, sobretot, un canvi radical en les seves caracteristiques i procedencia. Si a mitjan anys setanta nou de cada deu estrangers procedien de l’Europa comunitaria o d’America del Nord, actualment nomes un de cada deu es comunitari o nord-america, mentre que quatre son europeus extracomunitaris, dos son africans, dos son asiatics i un es de l’America llatina. Tambe cal tenir en compte que gairebe el 50% dels immigrants professen religions diferents de la cristiana i que una tercera part son musulmans.
Journal of International Migration and Integration, 2021
The subject of naturalisation among intra-EU migrants has only recently drawn the attention of so... more The subject of naturalisation among intra-EU migrants has only recently drawn the attention of social science scholars. Empirical evidence from quantitative studies shows an increase in citizenship applications among this new wave of mobile people, indicating a strategic use of naturalisation. However, there is not a great deal of micro-level research, especially as to the subjective meanings attached to citizenship take-up in a new EU member state. Drawing on 68 in-depth interviews conducted with Italians and Spaniards living in London and Berlin, we argue that an individual’s understanding of naturalisation within the EU context is based on two aspects: on one hand, a strictly pragmatic evaluation of the pros and cons of the new status; on the other, a new sense of belonging as well as new cultural and territorial identifications that intra-EU migrants are not often willing to experience. Therefore, this article suggests that EU migrants that strongly identify with their country o...
This working paper explores new Italian migrants' arrival and settlement in the UK and Ge... more This working paper explores new Italian migrants' arrival and settlement in the UK and Germany; work experiences; and, issues of identity and citizenship. It draws on 41 in-depth interviews with migrants in London and Berlin; 10 'prospective' migrants; and, 10 labour agency experts. www.gemm.eu
The coupling between migrants and crime is increasingly shaping the way in which political and in... more The coupling between migrants and crime is increasingly shaping the way in which political and institutional actors in European states define the criteria for inclusion and exclusion of foreign people within the borders of European Union. The social construction of migrants' as criminals involves different social and institutional actors. This paper focuses on the specific role played by the judicial system. Drawing on an ethnographic research in the Criminal Courts of Milan - involving participant observation and semi-structured interviews with judges, public attorneys, lawyers and interpreters - this paper shows the organisational practices (both formal and informal) and the common sense representations by which migrants are recognised, investigated, evaluated, and treated as criminals by the judicial systems
In our paper, we aim at pointing out the way the most relevant institutional actors currently def... more In our paper, we aim at pointing out the way the most relevant institutional actors currently define the security agenda for the Milanese metropolitan area, which kind of goals they try to pursue, upon which instruments and resources they can rely, which division of labour and forms of cooperation they try to putting into practices. We draw from an analyses of both official documents by the main public institutions involved in the governance of security in Milan and semi-structured interviews to all the members of the Comitato provinciale per l’ordine pubblico e la sicurezza – a board that gather the president of the province, the mayor of the province capital (plus mayors of other cities and towns of the province who can be involved on an ad hoc basis), the representative of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (Prefetto), the District Attorney and the chiefs of all the national police forces – as well as to politicians, civil servants and commissioners of the local police of the city ...
Community has often been used impressionistically as a tool for concealing a lack of theorising i... more Community has often been used impressionistically as a tool for concealing a lack of theorising in analytical concepts. As a result, its operationalization in empirical social research gave rise to reified descriptions as is quite often the case with studies on ethnicity and international migration. Drawing upon recent developments in systems theory, second order cybernetics, and organizational theory an alternative conceptualization is suggested which brings together notions of place, time and the idea of memory as an including/excluding device. Understanding community in terms of communication enables not only to fully exploit both an ethnographic approach and network analysis, but also to work out more sensitive tools for policy-making. In this perspective, the concept has been used in an ethnography of migration in Milan (Italy), and its results evaluated.
This working paper explores new Italian migrants' arrival and settlement in the UK and German... more This working paper explores new Italian migrants' arrival and settlement in the UK and Germany; work experiences; and, issues of identity and citizenship. It draws on 41 in-depth interviews with migrants in London and Berlin; 10 'prospective' migrants; and, 10 labour agency experts. www.gemm.eu
Il carattere multiculturale delle società contemporanee è ritenuto, tanto da chi se ne rallegra q... more Il carattere multiculturale delle società contemporanee è ritenuto, tanto da chi se ne rallegra quanto da chi paventa un ineluttabile conflitto tra culture, un dato incontrovertibile. Babbo Natale, pizza, hijab sono diventati simboli di appartenenza culturale. Parole come "cultura" e "identità" costituiscono il lessico di base per raccontare il mondo in cui viviamo. I critici del multiculturalismo, inteso come retorica o "feticcio", ritengono invece che l'accento sulle differenze culturali serva a rimuovere dal dibattito politico il tema dell'uguaglianza, legittimando spesso scelte politiche che ampliano il divario tra chi è incluso e chi è escluso. In questa prospettiva, l'autore, seguendo il duplice binario dell'approfondimento teorico e dell'indagine etnografica, riflette sulla complessità culturale dell'esperienza quotidiana e sulla dimensione interculturale della comunicazione, mostrando come identità e differenze siano continuamente riprodotte nella comunicazione ed entrino a far parte del "senso comune condiviso" in virtù del quale ci riconosciamo membri di una comunità.
Questo libro affronta il tema della formazione linguistica offerta da soggetti pubblici e del pri... more Questo libro affronta il tema della formazione linguistica offerta da soggetti pubblici e del privato-sociale agli stranieri che hanno scelto l'Italia come paese d'approdo del loro percorso di emigrazione. Il libro non si rivolge esclusivamente agli operatori del settore della formazione linguistica e professionale destinata agli immigrati, ma anche a chi, per motivi di lavoro, studio o interesse personale, è attento ai temi dell'immigrazione e del confronto multiculturale.
This is the second overview of country-specific literature on the theme of migration in the EU co... more This is the second overview of country-specific literature on the theme of migration in the EU covering the six countries taking part in GEMM Workpackage 4 ‘The lived experiences of migration’: UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Bulgaria and Romania. The first literature review focused on the individual factors for migration such as gender, ethnicity and age, as well as the formal and informal channels for mobility from the countries of departure to the countries of destination. The second overview concentrates on the institutional and contextual factors facilitating or preventing mobility in the European labour market. The objective is to examine previous research findings about the structures of opportunities and constraints for the successful labour market integration of migrants, common in the research literature from the different countries, and to outline the discrepancies, uncertainties and gaps among different studies. It will serve as a background for writing the subsequent country reports which will be based on the analysis of the rich qualitative data collected in the fieldwork of the GEMM Workpackage 4 study.
In our paper, we discuss intersectionality not only as an analytical tool to address discriminati... more In our paper, we discuss intersectionality not only as an analytical tool to address discrimination as it was conceived when it was introduced but as a way of rearticulating the dichotomy between structure and agency. Moreover, we show if and to what degree it offers social actors an opportunity to transform stigmatising categorizations of objectified power relations into a tactic to reshape personal identities avoiding the cage of gender/ethnic/race categories. Drawing on an ongoing ethnography, we illustrate how lesbian or bisexual migrant women negotiate their intersecting identities in Milan and in Brussels.
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Papers by Fabio Quassoli
objectified power relations into a tactic to reshape personal identities avoiding the cage of gender/ethnic/race categories. Drawing on an ongoing ethnography, we illustrate how lesbian or bisexual migrant women negotiate their intersecting identities in Milan and in Brussels.