Migration and Organized Civil Society : Rethinking National Policy

Migrant organizations are of vital importance for countries of residence and countries of origin, but the empirical and theoretical knowledge of the cross-border character of migrant organizations remains incomplete.

It is clear that migrant transnationalism challenges the governance of nation-states on the local and national levels. This book, the outcome of an ECPR joint session, systematically and empirically analyzes the differing roles that transnational migrant organizations play in their countries of residence and origin. Drawing on research conducted in Belgium, England, Germany, Holland, Poland and Portugal, it focuses on the relations between migrant organizations and the state. Offering an opportunity for comparative analysis, it also examines why migrants and their organizations engage in different forms of border crossing activities, and how various political systems influence, and are influenced by these forms of engagement.

Migration and Organized Civil Society will be of strong interest to students and researchers of political science, political sociology, migration studies, transnationalism, and Diaspora studies.

Dirk Halm is associate professor at the Centre for Studies on Turkey and Integration Research at Duisburg- Essen University and teaches Political Sociology at Münster University, Gernmany. His main research interests: Migration and civil society, political participation and the organizational structure of Islam in Europe.

Zeynep Sezgin, is Coordinator of the Volkswagen Foundation Research Project "Diffusion and Contexts of Transnational Migrant Organizations in Europe (TRAMO)" at the Sociology Department at Ruhr-University Bochum. Her main research interests are political participation and citizenship, migrant rights in the European countries, migration regimes and migrant organizations.