'Giving a voice' : negotiating civic engagements between civil society organizations and young immigrants in a precarious legal situation

As part of current migration processes, there is burgeoning scholarly interest in the civic engagements of non-citizens. While some scholars scrutinize the subversive potential of “acts of citizenship” (Isin) by non-citizens, prefiguring radically different modes of political organization, attention should also be drawn to more institutionalized processes of political socialization of immigrants, as aspiring citizens within the receiving nations. In light of critical scholarship that considers citizenship a disciplinary technology of in- and exclusion, advocating full participation on behalf of and by immigrants involves complex processes of negotiation and legitimation of desired/effective forms of civic engagement, both for immigrants and civil society organizations (CSO’s). To gain a more systematic and in-depth insight in the civic engagements of young immigrants without formal citizenship status in the context of a state-funded CSO, we conducted an ethnographic study of a project of a Belgian CSO specifically aimed at ‘giving a voice’ to young immigrants. Based on 2,5 years of participant observation and 22 in-depth interviews, we scrutinize what kinds of civic engagements are prevalent and how these are negotiated in everyday practices by young immigrants, volunteers and paid professionals. Building on Lichterman and Eliasoph’s (2014) civic action approach and their concept of ‘scene style’, we analyse different patterns of civic engagement and the tensions between these. Our study reveals a complex environment where different scene styles reflecting different forms of civic engagement occurred together: advocacy style, club style volunteering, personalized politics style and leisure style. Moreover, we point to a regulation of the youngsters’ voices and a process of political socialization through participation in the project. This study shows clearly the challenges and complexities of civil society projects that aim to emancipate immigrants within a state-funded CSO.

ISBN:9782956908708

Jaar van publicatie:2019