The Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies has published a Special Issue on “Rethinking Integration. New perspectives on Adaptation and Settlement in the Era of Super-diversity”. The issue sheds new light on the question of integration addessing a range of diverse issues such as legal status diversity, tansition experiences, adaptation, settlement, spatial integration, and diasporic communities.

Researchers from project UPWEB, with its focus on superdiverse neighbourhoods, have been able to contribute significantly to this special issue. Project UPWEB reconceptualises welfare theory through responding to the question of how all residents living in superdiverse neighbourhoods access healthcare. It explores the multiple approaches that residents living in superdiverse neighbourhoods use to meet their health needs, encompassing the perspectives of service users and providers.

UPWEB project leader Jenny Phillimore, who is Director of the Institute for Research into Superdiversity (IRiS) in Birmingham, has co-authored the special issue’s introduction together with Aleksandra Grzymala-Kazlowska (University of Birmingham). The introduction argues for the concept of integration to be reconsidered in a way that takes into account both the multi-dimensionality of integration processes and the diverse nature of migrants as well as their integration opportunities and challenges. To read, click here.

A second contribution by Jenny Phillimore, Rachel Humphris (UPWEB) and Kamran Khan “Reciprocity for New Migrant Integration: Resource Conservation, Investment and Exchange” focusses on how new migrants use reciprocity to make and sustain connections. The authors argue that migrants use resource exchange strategies to develop social networks which may form important buffers against migratory stress and aid access to functional, psychological and affective resources that can further integration. To read, click here.