The project “Pathways to Power: The Political Representation of Citizens of Immigrant Origin in Seven European Democracies” is a cooperative international endeavour on the political representation of citizens of immigrant origin in eight European Democracies. Over the past decades, European societies have grown increasingly ethnically diverse. Immigration is one of the most important challenges facing Europe today. Social and political participation constitutes the ultimate expression of integration in society. The project seeks to advance knowledge on descriptive representation of citizens of immigrant origin at the national and regional levels over a twenty year period. Additionally, the project adds an innovative dimension by examining substantive representation of citizens of immigrant origin at the national level. PATHWAYS examines participation patterns in Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, and United Kingdom. The team includes over 20 scholars, working in several participant institutions, led by the University of Amsterdam (Netherlands), University of Bamberg (Germany), University of Leicester (United Kingdom), and Sciences Po Paris (France).
Within the project, I was a research fellow for the French team (led by Dr. Manlio Cinalli). I was also a contributor to the development and data collection guidelines of WP 4.1 (Patterns of Mobilisation: Public Opinion) and WP 4.2/3 (Pro- and anti-immigration mobilisation).
BE-PATHWAYS (website)
The project BE-PATHWAYS is an innovative and comparative inter-university collaboration of a team of junior and senior scholars examining the political representation of citizens of immigrant origin in Belgium. It is part of an international PATHWAYS consortium, which analyses the political representation of citizens of immigrant origin in seven additional European. The principal goal of this particular project is twofold. On one hand, the project seeks to advance the knowledge and scholarship of the descriptive representation of citizens of immigrant origin in Belgium’s legislative assemblies, at the regional (Flanders, Wallonia and Brussels) and national levels. On the other hand, and as part of its innovative nature, the project seeks to analyse the parliamentary activities of representatives of immigrant origin (substantive representation).
As a co-investigator, I coordinated the Belgian data collection and analysis.
The project “Living with hard times – How citizens react to economic crises and their social and political consequences” deals with citizens’ reactions to economic crises and their social and political consequences. It examines in particular the ways in which European citizens have reacted to the crisis that, at different degree of intensity in different countries, struck Europe since 2008, but also how they deal with economic crises and their consequences more generally. We examine both individual and collective responses by citizens, both the “private” and the “public” dimensions of such responses, and both political and non-political responses. In addition, while the focus of the research is on citizens’ responses, we also examine policy responses so as to have a baseline for assessing citizens’ reactions to crises. The project has three main objectives: (1) to provide systematic evidence of the ways in which European citizens react to economic crises and their social and political consequences, both individually and collectively; (2) to advance knowledge on the connections between individual factors, contextual factors, and the ways in which European citizens react to economic crises and their social and political consequences; and (3) to suggest a number of good practices as to how to deal with economic crises, both at the social and political level, through which their negative consequences on European citizens can be avoided or limited. LIVEWHAT examines individual and collective responses in nine countries: France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. The project brings together a multi-disciplinary and multi-national consortium of junior and senior scholars and is coordinated by Prof. Marco Giugni (University of Geneva). LIVEWHAT receives funding from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement 613237.
Within the project, I was a research fellow for the French team (led by Dr. Manlio Cinalli) and I primarily contributed to the development and analysis of a cross-national online survey.