Rethinking migrant networks through a superdiversity lens

Presenter: Dr. Fran Meissner (European University Institute)
Date: May 22nd

Abstract

Much of the literature on the impacts of international migration has focused on better conceptualising urban social interactions. Superdiversity is a useful framework to develop this discussion and yet there is a distinct lack of empirical investigations using this lens to study local post-migration networks. Much of the literature on the closer-knit social ties formed post-migration remains focused on transnational links or is reduced to questions of ethnic sameness. In this paper a superdiversity lens is used to rethink migrant networks through multiple dimensions of differentiation. It presents the analysis of 55 personal networks of migrants from the South Pacific region, living in London and Toronto. First, I identify the complex patterns of differentiation that can be acknowledged through this approach. Second, I present the results of a cluster analysis identifying four types of migrant networks.  Descriptively the four clusters are called: long term resident networks, migrant peer networks, superdiverse networks and city-cohort networks - neither is solely linked to where migrants and their social contacts have come from. The clusters instead align along different combinations of migration related differentiations, including legal status and time spent in the city. This empirically derived typology allows for a more differentiated discussion of post migration networks. The analysis suggests that diversity is not only about understanding the implications of a proliferation of categories of difference, but that it is also necessary to study and make accessible the complexity of relational diversity, a task this paper contributes to. 

Estado actual del Sistema de Justicia Juvenil

Presenter: Cristina Rechea (Directora del Centro de Investigación en Criminología de la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha).
Date: May 13th

Organitzat per l' Itinerari d'Anàlisi i Prevenció del Delicte i el Grup de Recerca en Socio-Demografia (DemoSoc).
Ponència (oberta al públic) emmarcada dins el programa de l'assignatura "Sistema Penal Juvenil".