Ethnic Organization and Political Integration in Cities

Bo Bengtsson, Uppsala University

The aim of the project has been to test empirically, in the light of theories about social citizenship, political participation, political opportunity structures and social capital, to what extent and through which mechanisms organisational engagement can function as a political resource to persons with migrant background, and contribute to their integration in the new country of residence. The geographical focus of the project is the Stockholm metropolitan area and it has been part of a European network, where corresponding studies have been carried out in some 15 other cities. In 2008 the national datasets will be integrated into a European data base within the EU project 'Multicultural Democracy and Immigrants Social Capital in Europe: Participation, Organisational Networks, and Public Policies at the Local Level' (see http://www.um.es/localmultidem). This will make possible systematic comparison between cities with differing structural and institutional conditions and between countries with different types of migration policies and citizenship regimes. We are now applying for funding of the Swedish participation in the comparative efforts.

The Swedish project has focused on persons and groups with a background in Chile and Turkey, the latter including Kurds and Syrian Christians. Members of these categories have been residents in Sweden long enough to have established ethnically organisations of some importance. based time that they have had time to develop their own ethnic organisations. On the other hand these groups have not become so integrated in the Swedish society that their organisations have lost their political relevance.

Four empirical studies have been carried out:

1. A population survey (Myrberg, Bengtsson) based on face-to-face interviews of about 60 minutes with a sample of 1,500 respondents (500 with a background in Chile, Turkey and Sweden only respectively). The interviews focused on political participation and efficacy, organisational activities and political resources.

2. An organisational survey (Strömblad, Bengtsson) based on face-to-face interviews of about 75 minutes with representatives of associations organising Chileans, Turks, Kurds and Syrian Christians. The interviews covered the organisation, activities, resources and external networks of the associations. Supplementary funding from the Swedish Council for Working Life and Social Research made it possible to conduct this study as face-to-face interviews instead of postal questionnaires.

Both surveys were successful. In the population survey the response rates vary between 49 and 66 per cent for the three sub samples. 87 per cent of the population took part in the organisational survey.

3. A local study (Hertting) of ethnic organisations in Norra Botkyrka, South of Stockholm, based on documents, interviews and observation. In this local context the number of ethnic organisations is high - including Turkish, Kurdish and Christian Syrian associations, and the local policy of democracy makes it an interesting field site for a study of political integration.

4. A contextual study (Borevi, Hertting) based on official documents, websites, expert interviews and press material. The purpose has been to map the general institutional and discursive prerequisites of ethnic organisation and political participation.

The most important theoretical contribution from the project is a specification of the concept 'political opportunity structures' for the study of organisational engagement and political integration. The analysis emphasizes two mechanisms. One is direct and collective and functions when an association successfully promotes the interest of its members. The other is indirect and individual and implicates that organisational engagement helps to build up individual members' political resources by developing civic capabilities, building social networks and fostering mutual trust. Both the collective and the individual mechanism may work either via ethnic or non ethnic organisations.

Our studies at the individual level confirm that associational participation is lower among persons with a background in Chile or Turkey than among those with an entirely Swedish background. For the latter category engaging in organisations seems to be to be mainly a way to go in for activities of personal interest, whereas immigrants from Chile and Turkey as often take part in order to influence politics and society and to be a good citizen. For all categories associational engagement contributes towards enhanced political efficacy and participation, in particular in the form of protests and contacts. Such effects work primarily through practice in politically relevant skills - i.e. in arranging and leading meetings and writing officious letters. These effects also seem to be larger among persons with a background in Chile and Turkey.

Our studies at the organisational level indicate that the potential of ethnic organisations to supply members with political resources is highly dependent on their organisational capacity. Associations with many members and a broad repertoire of activities seem to have better possibilities to support members in their contacts with the surrounding society. This is the main reason why Kurdish and Syrian Christian associations as a group are more active in political life than their Chilean counterparts. Chilean organisations are more seldom used as an instrument to influence politics through demonstrations, contacts with public authorities and similar activities. Furthermore, associations with a well developed internal democracy seem to be more capable to contribute towards the political integration of their members.

Results from our local study give cause for modification of the theories about the ways in which organising on ethnic grounds promotes political integration, and to some extent call in question political ideas about the value of participative and deliberative co operation between local authorities and voluntary organisations. It is true that such co operation may create new opportunities for organisations to forward their interests, but this may sometimes be at the expense of the function of organisations as arenas of participation, deliberation and learning. This points to a potential conflict between the direct and indirect integration mechanisms (cf. above). The study identifies a number of institutional mechanisms, which may create dilemmas of this type: professionalization, conflict avoidance, strategic vagueness etc.

Data from our contextual study will be included in the European database. The Swedish material will also be used in comparison with earlier results from other countries by means of a theoretical framework of citizenship regimes developed by Ruud Koopmans and his colleagues. In this context Koopmans' model will also be discussed and developed.

New research questions generated from the project concern the effects of differences in national opportunity structures on associational engagement and political integration, which will be the subject of the European comparative analyses. Our materials can also be used to elucidate the impact of gender (which to some extent we have already analysed) class and age. Furthermore, the patterns that we identify in our quantitative studies can be further explored applying qualitative research methods to organisations and members.

To implement a research project of this type a certain amount of supportive work is needed. At different points of time 6 researchers and 5 research assistants have been involved. The actual interviews were made by professional interviewers from Sweden Statistics, but the project members were responsible for the contents of the interview forms. The Swedish project members also played a leading role in producing the common core questions for the European network. In the absence of reliable and up to date registers over ethnic associations, we used research assistants with a background in Chile and Turkey respectively to trace the population for the organisational study.

In our test interviews we found that the traditional wordings of standard questions were sometimes rather abstract, which caused misunderstandings and fatigue with respondents who did not have Swedish as their mother tongue. In contrast, the interview forms in everyday language that were finally used functioned well according to the interviewers. We have also supplied interview forms and response cards in (Chilean) Spanish, Turkish and Kurdish, and sometimes interpreters.

Gunnar Myrberg defended his Ph.D. thesis on September 28, 2007. Besides Myrberg's dissertation the main publication from the project will be an edited book, which presents results from the different studies together with commentary articles written by other researchers.

Results from the project have been presented at international conferences in Reykjavík, Rotterdam, Gent and Pisa, at meetings with the European network, at seminars at the Department of Government and the Institute for Housing and Urban Research at Uppsala university and at the Institute for Future Studies. Early results were published in an edited book from the Commission of Inquiry on the Political Integration of Immigrants.