The paper starts by pointing out the ambivalent attitude of host societies towards migrant participation. On the one hand, host societies call for ‘active citizenship’: migrants need to participate civically and politically in the name of integration. On the other hand, the societal changes which might be constituted through this participation, are feared. This attitude of European ‘natives’ leads to the paradoxical demand that migrants participate and embrace democratic values, without expecting to be acknowledged as full democratic citizens with an unconditional right to participate. I call this the ‘participation paradox’.
It is then argued that this paradox creates different citizenship norms for different categories of people, by reducing migrant political participation into an issue of proving membership rather than acts with intrinsic democratic value. These different citizenship norms both show, and reinforce a social boundary between ‘legitimate’ and ‘non-legitimate’ citizens. Through its attitude towards the political participation of migrants, the ‘civic integrationist discourse’ thereby seriously impedes, rather than enhances, integration.
