CALL FOR PAPERS: 22nd IMISCOE Annual Conference, Paris
Panel organizers: Nadine Blankvoort, Iva Dodevska, Stefan Manser-Egli
Colonial Logics in Knowledge Production on Migrant Integration
In academic discussions and public discourse, ‘integration’ is often unproblematically accepted as a process facilitating ‘inclusion’ and ‘cohesion’, with its subject the new ‘migrant’ crossing nation state borders. Within critical migration and integration studies, a growing body of knowledge challenges this widespread acceptance, bringing the concept of ‘integration’, it’s unproblematic normalisation, and the various forms of governance which solidify its existence into question. Critiques of the concept of integration highlight the normative nature of the concept, the negative dichotomy of “Us” vs “Other” embedded in its application, it’s reliance on methodological nationalism and its narrow focus on migrants.
An additional critique which is the focus of this panel highlights the modernity logics that operate within the concept of integration, and the forms of governance which exist around integration and migration more broadly. Scholars have identified modernity narratives which exist in migration governance (Fekete 2006, Brubaker 2017, Mayblin & Turner 2021, Astolfo & Allsopp 2023) and integrationism (Triadafilopoulos 2011, Brown 2016, Dodevska 2024). Favell, a leading critic on the use of the concept of integration recognizes these modernity logics and states ‘integration is and always was a fundamentally colonial term’ (Favell 2022, 2). Despite these critiques, the study and measurement of ‘integration’ continues to march on, incentivized by governmental demand for data on the integration of migrants as part of the ‘evidence-based policy’ paradigm.
Recognizing the colonial logics that form the foundation of integration as a concept, and the ongoing coloniality in knowledge production practices, this panel invites contributions that explore the coloniality shaping the science-policy nexus of integration governance. We welcome papers that address (neo)colonial relations of power either in a) the production of knowledge on migrant integration (academic research, government statistics, data produced by international organizations and civil society), or in b) the collaboration between science and policy. Please send a brief abstract of 150 words together with a very short bio to