Varieties of Immigrant Integration in Post-Enlargement Europe– Spain v. Italy

This paper examines the policies through which states pursue immigrant integration in two new destinations in Western Europe: Spain and Italy. Unlike traditional countries of immigration, Spain and Italy have shifted from sending to preferred countries of destination over a short period of time, two decades, in which they have managed to absorb more than a third of the total foreign population residing in the EU (Eurostat 2012). The study builds on evidence from the three levels of policy making –the national, regional and city level – collected through interviews with key policy makers, document analysis of immigration laws and state programmes for immigrant integration introduced from 1985 to 2012. The paper shows first, that states chose to distance themselves from the integration policies of the more traditional countries of immigration in Europe which they classify as failures. Instead, the states searched from their “own” strategy for integration which they consider a sovereignty token just as much as it is immigration control. Secondly, I argue rather than pursuing only one integration strategy, the states examined use their resources and abilities to simultaneously pursue different integration strategies for different categories of migrants especially in what it regards the integration policies for European citizens, co-ethnics and third country nationals. These strategies range from less to more restrictive (from laissez-faire multiculturalism to neoassimilation). Finally, the paper discusses the specific challenges that integration policies pose in general.