̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - immigration

Displaced lives: Investigating Europe's handling of the refugee crisis and giving voice to asylum-seeking migrants

ta385 — Mon, 30 Nov 2020 08:00:00 +0000

For the last three years, the RESPOND project has been investigating migration governance in 11 countries by foregrounding the insights of asylum-seeking migrants. Now principal investigator Dr Naures Atto has launched a digital exhibition featuring work by migrant artists.

Opinion: Angela Merkel to run again: why she's the antithesis of Donald Trump in a post-truth world

ljm67 — Mon, 21 Nov 2016 10:33:56 +0000

Angela Merkel has finally confirmed that she will run for reappointment as German chancellor in the country’s 2017 parliamentary elections. Many have hoped for this moment, despite the setbacks of the past few years. There is a strong sense that the world needs Merkel now more than ever. She has made some unpopular decisions in her 11 years as chancellor but she is, to many, the antithesis of Donald Trump.

Tough times

Chancellorship has been no walk in the park for Merkel of late. In 2015, she upset many supporters of her party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), by opening German borders to hundreds of thousands of refugees. To curb the influx, Merkel had to commit to a dirty deal with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, offering generous EU visa terms for his citizens in exchange for stopping millions of refugees from entering Europe.

̽��ֱ��pressure intensified in 2016, when a spate of sexual assaults, apparently committed by migrants, stirred up a significant backlash against the new arrivals.

Merkel’s CDU went on to suffer bitter setbacks in federal elections. And an Islamic State-inspired axe attack by a young man from Afghanistan in Bavaria in July 2016 was seen as evidence that Merkel’s open door refugee policy had failed.

In September 2016, Merkel’s popularity reached a five-year low. No more than 45% of German people were satisfied with her performance. During a public speech on German Unity Day in Dresden, angry protesters drew on Nazi language and called Merkel a “traitor of the people” and demanded her resignation.

On the international stage, the Brexit vote was a huge blow to Merkel and her pro-European course. She now needs to negotiate an exit for Britain without also triggering the demise of the entire EU project.

And as if all of this wasn’t enough, Merkel will have to deal with Donald Trump as president of the United States. After Trump’s election victory, Merkel gave a remarkable speech, offering him close collaboration on the basis that the new American president would respect freedom, democracy and the dignity and worth of all people.

While most other world leaders gave bland statements of half-hearted hope that the president-elect would not see through on his more controversial promises, the German leader was sending a strong signal – and even a challenge.

After the open sexism and racism that characterised Trump’s campaign, it looks like close collaboration is an extremely unlikely scenario. Merkel was effectively saying that standing up to such prejudice was more important to her than relations with the US – although whether she remains true to her principles should she be re-elected is another question.

A sense of responsibility

Given the overwhelming number of problems facing whoever wins in 2017, the easiest decision would have been to let someone else do the job of chancellor. But Merkel isn’t one for easy solutions.

There was little enthusiasm or excitement in her voice as she announced her candidacy, and she openly admitted that standing had been a difficult decision. Although Merkel didn’t mention any names, it was obvious that she wanted to send a message to Trump and right-wing populists in Europe. She emphasised that political decisions need to be based on the fundamental values of freedom, democracy, respect for the law, and the dignity of every human being.

Merkel responds to Trump’s victory.

Following her announcement, Merkel appeared on a talk show and left no doubt that she expected difficult times and an “exhausting and challenging” election campaign. Yet, she added that she felt confident that she could defend these values that hold our society together.

Merkel openly challenges Trump because there is a lot more at stake than Anglo-German relations. Fears grow that in 2017 the right-wing populist Marine Le Pen could become the next French president, and that Europe’s far right will grow further. Against this background, Merkel sees an urgent need to oppose the populism, racism and gender ideology of the extreme right, and this feeling is shared by many Germans.

Can she win?

Merkel’s statement was a manifestation of everything that people love and hate about her. She carefully assesses situations before taking decisions, she is stubbornly committed to Christian values and the European project, she seeks consensus rather than victory, and she displays a striking lack of charisma.

̽��ֱ��New York Times has called Merkel “the liberal west’s last defender” and while she is too smart to get excited about such headlines, she knows that her approach and personality traits have become a rare commodity in the post-truth era of global politics.

Merkel has described herself as a “chancellor for turbulent times” and there is good reason to believe that she could act as an important counterbalance to the charismatic, impulsive, erratic, and polemical President Trump.

Recent polls suggest Merkel’s popularity scores are slowly recovering. Although it is to be expected that some CDU voters will switch to vote for the right-wing populist Alternative for Germany (AFD), she has a good chance of re-election. She may not win an outright majority, but her party would be able to form a coalition with various other parties, which would leave the CDU in a strong position to push through their candidate for the chancellorship.

Katharina Karcher, Sutasoma Research Fellow at Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge

This article was originally published on ̽��ֱ��Conversation. Read the original article.

In this article, Katharina Karcher from the Department of German and Dutch discusses the election prospects of the self-described “chancellor for turbulent times”.

European People's Party

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Improving support for pupils with English as an additional language

ta385 — Fri, 08 Jul 2016 10:45:00 +0000

̽��ֱ��report identifies opportunities to target outreach to parents of EAL pupils, and develop frameworks and qualifications for English language support specialists to enable better assessment of language proficiency among pupils.

̽��ֱ��researchers, from the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and Anglia Ruskin ̽��ֱ��, were commissioned by the Bell Foundation to conduct a two-year longitudinal study of secondary schools in the East of England between 2013 and 2015.

̽��ֱ��project, which took a new cross-disciplinary approach and linked quantitative and qualitative methods, involved a regional survey of 46 secondary schools as well as tracking the progress of 22 newly-arrived EAL students at two case study schools over a two year period and interviewing dozens of teachers, parents and carers.

Diana Sutton, Director of the Bell Foundation, said:

‘Crude headlines which assert that EAL children either outperform others or are a drain on scarce school resources miss the point. ̽��ֱ��picture is mixed, complex and nuanced, as this and previous research shows.’

̽��ֱ��new research highlights the benefits which such children receive from growing up in mixed-language social groups, and gives an impression of the pace at which they start to feel a sense of belonging as well as academic achievement.

But the survey found that EAL support was uneven across different schools. While some have qualified EAL coordinators managing schoolwide support, others have teaching assistants covering the role, and some have an already overstretched subject teacher subbing in.

Key recommendations in the report include:

‘EAL coordinators’ within schools should be part of a national framework of support specialists for children for whom English is an additional language

Michael Evans, Reader in Education at Cambridge’s Faculty of Education, said:

‘There is a need to develop high quality, Masters level accredited training for the EAL co-ordinator role, akin to the requirements for the new Special Education Needs co-ordinators. ̽��ֱ��role of the EAL Coordinator should be professionalised. Networks could be established and guidelines developed and shared to raise the status of EAL support, and the prominence of those who coordinate it within individual schools, as well as the wider system.’

A model of accountability should be established, similar to Pupil Premium support for those eligible for free school meals, in which resource from the national budget is contingent on pupil progress

̽��ֱ��report warns that there is a lack of accurate information on linguistic proficiency, which can mask EAL pupils’ academic potential. While pupils within the study developed functional oral proficiency within a year, many continued to struggle to use appropriate “academic” English.

Currently, recorded data gives no indication of an EAL pupils’ proficiency and funding is for three years only, after which there is no additional support, regardless of the pupil's proficiency in English. By contrast, in the US, assessment continues and pupils only exit the EAL status once proficiency is achieved.

Embedding EAL training in teacher training programmes, and including EAL inductions as part of the school orientation for newly qualified teachers

In interviews, the researchers found that the parents of EAL students cared considerably about the social and academic progress of their child. However, they also observed that school staff often use very limited definitions of parental engagement, such as attendance of parents’ evenings. Many parents of EAL pupils had little understanding of the school system, leaving them lacking confidence and fearful of engaging, along with barriers of language. This can lead to assumptions about parents that are ‘unlikely to represent actual level of interest’.

Encouraging parental involvement

Claudia Schneider, Principal Lecturer in Social Policy at Anglia Ruskin ̽��ֱ��, said:

‘Schools should take advantage of the opportunities offered by high levels of parental interest, by developing information and communication strategies which reflect an ‘outreach mentality’.’

‘Targeted strategies for encouraging community and parental networks could, for example, offer bilingual support by sharing translations of routine school information. Parents of EAL are significantly underrepresented in school structures, and such cost-effective networks could help integrate this untapped resource.’

̽��ֱ��report’s authors have created a template through which newly-arrived families could be encouraged to get involved by presenting on their country of origin. They also highlight simple technological aids such as embedded widgets on school websites that allow for translated information when clicked on.

̽��ֱ��report contains forewords by the Vice Chancellors of both Anglia Ruskin ̽��ֱ�� and the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge who both have a migration background and highlight the importance of migration for Higher Education.

Cambridge’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, himself the child of Polish immigrants, wrote:

‘[T]he report underlines the need for a holistic approach to EAL children’s experience, involving parents as well as schools. It calls for evidence‐based approaches to the teaching of EAL students, for greater consistency in the assessment of their progression, and for a review of testing that may put them at a disadvantage.’

̽��ֱ��new research builds on the Bell Foundation’s 2014 report on school approaches to the education of EAL students.

Download the Executive Summary of the 2016 report.

Download the Full Report.

A new report on UK school pupils who speak English as an additional language (EAL) argues that their progression in English language proficiency, academic achievement and social integration is closely linked and that a strong professional knowledge base is needed in schools to support the pupils. ̽��ֱ��authors also argue that parents are an ‘untapped resource’ for support and social integration. ̽��ֱ��report makes a series of policy recommendations.

̽��ֱ��report underlines the need for a holistic approach to EAL children’s experience, involving parents as well as schools

Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, Vice-Chancellor, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge

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Psychotic disorders in minority groups: the high price of being an ‘outsider’

amb206 — Fri, 01 Apr 2016 12:00:00 +0000

In 1932 a psychiatrist called Ornulv Odegaard published a paper in which he reported that Norwegian immigrants in Minnesota had a much higher incidence of mental health problems than Norwegians back in their home country of Norway. ̽��ֱ��percentage of people in the Norwegian immigrant population experiencing such disorders was also much higher than it was among other minority groups in America.

“We’ve known for a long time that immigrant populations experience a greater frequency of psychotic disorders than the host population – and that it’s higher in immigrant groups than in the populations of the countries they have left,” says Hannah Jongsma, a PhD candidate in the Department of Psychiatry.

“Odegaard’s study is striking because he was the first researcher to carry out an academically robust study showing these variations. His findings were frequently interpreted to suggest a ‘selective migration’ hypothesis – and that those who migrated were somehow innately at a higher risk of developing psychotic disorders. This hypothesis has since been thoroughly tested and found to be false.”

Jongsma’s doctoral research draws on data gathered by an ambitious in-depth study of schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders in six countries. The data she uses was gathered by a project known as EU-GEI which sought to identify the interactive genetic, clinical and environmental determinants, involved in the development, severity and outcome of schizophrenia, right across the population of a number of countries.

Next week (2-6 April 2016) Jongsma will present her first findings from the EU-GEI study at the 5th Biennial Schizophrenia International Research Society Conference in Florence, Italy. Her presentation will give an overview of the incidence rates of psychotic disorders (the number of new cases per head of the population) and look at variations between the different study settings.

“My research looks specifically at the experiences of minority communities – for example British citizens with Trinidadian heritage,” says Jongsma. “ ̽��ֱ��data I’m using is from the case-control arm of the EU-GEI study and based on six-hour interviews and assessments with individuals who experienced a first episode of psychosis, their siblings and healthy controls. As far as I know, it is the most ambitious study of its kind to date, combining a rich set of socio-demographic, clinical and cognitive variables with a very large sample size – more than 2,000 people across the three groups.”

Although she has a background in public health, Jongsma’s undergraduate degree was in liberal arts and she holds a masters in philosophy. “As someone without a medical training, I was thrilled to be offered this PhD position in the Department of Psychiatry,” she says. “What I bring to my work on psychosis in minority communities is an ability to look at things from different points of view – a skill you develop when you study philosophy. I find the ability to think at different levels of abstraction has really helped my understanding of psychosis. I’m able to relate societal level variables, such as racial discrimination, to an individual’s chance of developing a psychotic disorder.”

It’s estimated that, in the UK, one in four people experience a mental health problem each year, and one in hundred will experience a psychotic disorder. Psychosis is a catch-all term that covers disorders of thought and perception that may have organic causes (such as a brain lesion or abuse of alcohol or other drugs) as well as a range of genetic components and environmental triggers. ̽��ֱ��World Health Organisation divides psychosis into affective and non-affective disorders. Affective disorders are dominated by their effects on mood and include depression and bipolar disorder. Non-affective disorders are not dominated by their effects on mood and include schizophrenia and delusional disorders.

“It’s likely that psychosis often develops as a consequence of a cluster of factors which have a cumulative effect and stack up to have a negative effect on psychological well-being. ̽��ֱ��factors that interest me most are the cultural and societal ones,” says Jongsma. “One of the great strengths of a university as broad as Cambridge is that it encourages dialogues between, for instance, neuroscientists, geneticists and epidemiologists. For the researcher, this provides valuable opportunities to exchange and develop ideas.”

̽��ֱ��EU-GEI data on which Jongsma is basing her research was gathered in Brazil, England, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain. It confirms that psychosis often presents in late adolescence and peaks in adulthood – and that men are more vulnerable. “Our data also shows that psychosis is more prevalent in urban compared to rural areas. Rural Spain showed the lowest incidence and south-east London the highest,” says Jongsma.

Research has shown that the high incidence of psychosis in minority communities is not limited to first-generation immigrants who might have experienced stress and upheaval in moving countries and finding their feet in a new culture.

“Second and subsequent generations are similarly vulnerable to higher levels of psychosis than the majority population around them. Second generation immigrants may struggle with finding a clear identity and experience a conflict in their affiliations and loyalties – on the one hand with the culture of their parents and on the other with the culture of the wider community,” suggests Jongsma. “Interestingly the density of an immigrant community sometimes seems to have a protective effect – in other words, the denser the immigrant community, the lower the level of psychosis – while sometimes the opposite is apparent.”

When a particular, and easily identifiable, community is seen to have raised levels of mental illness, there is a real danger of stereotyping. “In the UK, it is well known that psychotic disorders are particularly prevalent among Afro-Caribbeans who represent one of the largest groups of immigrants,” says Jongsma. “But, in the Netherlands, where I come from, psychosis is most common among Moroccan immigrants. To me, this suggests we need to look at the role these groups hold in society. Both minority groups suffer from deep-seated prejudices and discrimination.”

One possible reason for raised levels of psychotic disorders in minority groups is their lack of economic and social status. ‘Social defeat’ is a term coined by Professor Jean-Paul Selten (Maastricht ̽��ֱ��) and colleagues to describe the persistent negative experience of being excluded from the majority population. “This idea makes an interesting starting point for trying to understand the root causes of psychotic disorders,” says Jongsma. “Being at the lowest rung of the ladder has been shown to be stressful in primates and is likely to have the same effect on humans.”

̽��ֱ��freedom to express cultural identity is important to mental health. “Identities are formed and maintained on the basis of complex interactions with, and imitations of, those around us – and this social aspect of identity is crucial. Empathy with others and seeing them as fellow citizens, for example, comes from shared identity. It might be the case that minorities are excluded from the group of people regarded as fellow citizens,” says Jongsma.

With so many factors in the mix, unravelling the cause and effect of psychotic disorders will continue to present a challenge. For example, does an individual become mentally unwell as a consequence of being isolated – or does he or she withdraw as a result of being unwell? Genetic factors play a part as do environmental factors such as childhood trauma, cannabis use and deprivation.

“One of the arguments I find very interesting to explore is that psychosocial disempowerment could be seen as an explanatory framework. Over a long period, the feeling that you’re not in control of your life, and that you’re stuck in a hopeless situation that’s unlikely to improve, has been shown to increase mortality and the chance of developing physical illnesses such as heart attacks. I think it is important to look at this in the context of mental illness too,” says Jongsma.

“Poor health is strongly linked to deprivation and inequality – and all that comes with disadvantage. This is as true for heart disease and diabetes as it is for mental illness. In order to improve public mental health, we will have to look not just at the individuals who develop psychotic disorders, but at society more broadly.”

Hannah Jongsma is attending the 5th Biennial Schizophrenia International Research Society Conference with a travel grant awarded by the organisers.

Immigrant groups experience a high incidence of mental illness. Hannah Jongsma (Department of Psychiatry) is looking at data from an international study of the distribution of psychotic disorders. She suggests that ‘psychosocial disempowerment’ might be a powerful contributing factor to raised levels in minority communities.

Identities are formed and maintained on the basis of complex interactions with, and imitations of, those around us – and this social aspect of identity is crucial.

Hannah Jongsma

Robert Swier (Flickr Creative Commons)

Still, In a Crowd

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Opinion: German election: is this really a verdict on Merkel’s open door to refugees?

Anonymous — Tue, 15 Mar 2016 11:26:49 +0000

Three German federal states have elected new parliaments in regional votes that have seen major gains made by Alternative for Germany (AfD), a right-wing populist party that wants drastically to reduce immigration to Germany. State parliaments in Baden-Wuerttemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and Saxony-Anhalt have been reshuffled, although the AfD didn’t actually come first in any of the votes.

These elections were being framed as a verdict on Merkel’s “open-door” refugee policy. Critics of her pro-refugee stance have been eager to observe that it has isolated her in her own party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), and alienated many voters. Now, they say, the electorate has punished the whole party for Merkel’s single-handed attempt to help refugees.

At first glance, it seems they were right. ̽��ֱ��CDU has lost votes in all three federal states, and more than a few former CDU voters have switched to supporting the AfD.

̽��ֱ��anti-Merkel, anti-establishment, anti-immigration rhetoric appealed particularly to voters in Saxony-Anhalt, where the AfD became the second-strongest party. It also secured good results in Baden-Wuerttemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate, winning more than 10% of the vote.

But to suggest that Merkel’s refugee policy sent voters “flocking to the populist party” is wrong, even dangerous.

AfD voters are, for the most part, not frustrated CDU voters but people who are so frustrated by party politics that they have haven’t voted at all in past elections. Their discontent with the existing political system is not limited to Merkel’s immigration policy, even if it has become particularly visible. Many people feel that their voices and concerns are ignored by the CDU and other established parties.

Although the refugee crisis has been an important election issue, we shouldn’t fall into the rhetoric of right-wing populists and claim that it is solely responsible for the legitimacy crisis of representational politics in Germany. Rather than addressing the root causes of Germany’s social and economic problems, they blame migrants for everything that is going wrong.

In fact, a closer look at these election results shows that the people who won are, by and large, the people who support Merkel’s refugee policy.

Reading the results

Baden-Wuerttemberg is considered one of Europe’s economic powerhouses, and has the lowest unemployment rate in the German republic. For almost 60 years, it was governed by conservatives. That changed with the elections in 2011 when the Green Party’s Winfried Kretschmann became Prime Minister of the state. Kretschmann is an explicit supporter of Angela Merkel’s refugee policy. He has been re-elected in 2016, achieving an even better result for his party than in 2011.

Neighbouring state Rhineland-Palatinate has been governed by a red-green coalition of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and Greens since 2011. This has long been an SPD stronghold, and the party again won this election – albeit narrowly. Prime Minister Malu Dreyer was re-elected in spite of (or perhaps because of) her pro-refugee stance.

Dreyer’s rival, the conservative Julia Klöckner is one of several prominent politicians in the CDU who have openly criticised Angela Merkel’s “welcome policy” – a strategy which didn’t pay off in these elections.

Saxony-Anhalt is a bit different. It struggles economically and the unemployment rate is almost three times higher than in Baden-Wuerttemberg.

CDU Prime Minister Reiner Haselhoff has been in office since 2011, and will remain there if he can build a majority government (although this might be difficult because he refuses to collaborate with the AfD, which is now the second strongest party in parliament).

Like Klöckner, Haselhoff is critical of Angela Merkel’s immigration policy. However, he also distances himself decisively from the right-wing populism. He has warned that there has been a shift to the right across Europe, and emphasised that the threat of right-wing populists needs to be tackled at all levels of society.

Why so popular?

Due to the strong focus on the refugee question, a number of central problems have been neglected by the mainstream parties in the run up to this year’s elections. They haven’t focused on the growing gap between the rich and the poor in Germany and across the world, economic and political insecurities within and beyond the European Union, and the fact that many people feel alienated from the people supposedly elected to represent them.

There is good reason to believe that all of these factors have contributed to the rise of the AfD, and the ways in which other politicians respond to them could decide the future of the AfD and other right-wing populist parties.

Even if it seems that migrants have become a scapegoat for everything that is going wrong in German politics, nobody can seriously claim that a clampdown on immigration would solve all of Germany’s social, political, and economic problems.

Many of Merkel’s party colleagues disagree with her pro-refugee stance, and have distanced themselves from the Chancellor. But even if she were overthrown as CDU leader, her replacement would have a hard job persuading voters that established parties can meet the challenges of our times – regardless of where they stand on immigration. From austerity to the eurozone crisis, to the global financial meltdown, migration is not the only thing voters think about when they head to the polls.

Katharina Karcher, Affiliated Lecturer in German Studies, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge

This article was originally published on ̽��ֱ��Conversation. Read the original article.

̽��ֱ��opinions expressed in this article are those of the individual author(s) and do not represent the views of the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge.

̽��ֱ��author will be giving a talk at this year's Hay Festival http://www.cam.ac.uk/public-engagement/hay-festival-2016

Katharina Karcher (Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages) discusses Germany's regional elections, which saw major gains made by the right-wing populist party.

Thomas Dämmrich

Merkel took a hit at the polls but so have most other European leaders.

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Honeypot Britain? EU migrants’ benefits and the UK referendum

fpjl2 — Thu, 25 Feb 2016 12:04:03 +0000

A new Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� research project is gathering “robust empirical evidence” on the experience of EU migrant workers in the UK, exploring everything from hopes and expectations to how they find work and what use EU migrants make of benefits.

̽��ֱ��research is timely, as perceptions of EU migrants undercutting British workers or acting as ‘benefits tourists’ are fuelling much of the debate in the lead-up to June’s EU Referendum.

Some MPs are warning that Britain has become a “honeypot nation” with its social security system acting as a primary pull factor, leading to David Cameron’s negotiation of a so-called ‘emergency brake’ on benefits for EU migrants.

However, critics argue that the government have been consistently unable to provide any evidence that this is the case. For example, last week’s response to a Parliamentary question on the amount spent on benefits to EU migrants was simply: “the information is not available”.

̽��ֱ��EU Migrant Worker Project will aim to fill some of that knowledge gap. By combining interviews and focus groups with new methodologies for analysing available data, the research team hope to build an evidential base for EU migrants’ experiences of and attitudes toward Britain’s employment and social security systems.

̽��ֱ��project, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, is led by Professor Catherine Barnard and Dr Amy Ludlow from Cambridge’s Faculty of Law, and is launched today (Friday 26th February) with a roundtable discussion involving Labour former Home Secretary Charles Clarke and current Conservative MP Heidi Allen among others.

Professor Barnard said: “We hope to shed new light on the big question of how we adequately regulate migration within a socio-economically diverse EU and a post-financial crisis context. This question is central to Brexit and to the outcome of the UK's referendum on EU membership.”

Initial work has already been carried out, and a study published last October in the journal Industrial Law shows that EU migrants are using UK employment tribunals at much lower rates than would be expected relative to population size.

̽��ֱ��study, the only one of its kind, is based on analysis of three years of Employment Tribunal decisions alongside field interviews. It suggests that migrant workers from EU-8 nations use employment tribunals over 85% less than would be expected, given the size of the workforce they represent.

̽��ֱ��researchers identified various factors affecting migrants’ willingness and ability to use tribunals, including: lack of knowledge of their rights, reluctance to engage with the judicial system and, for those in the UK for a short time, a desire to maximise their earnings that is prioritised over complaints about mistreatment.

Under current EU law, EU migrants have rights to equal treatment in their terms and conditions of employment offered to domestic workers.

However, this initial study suggests that when it comes to employment conditions these may be rights that “exist more ‘on paper’ than in practice”, write the researchers.

“While we found good evidence to suggest that EU-8 workers were fairly treated by Employment Tribunal judges, navigating the system and accessing enough advice to understand the basic elements of the rights these workers are due is deeply problematic,” said Dr Ludlow.

“In interviews, we were told that largescale cuts to local authorities have had a negative impact on resources such as Citizen Advice Bureaus. These are important sources of guidance for workers who cannot afford legal advice, including workers from the EU.”

Professor Barnard said that the introduction of Employment Tribunal fees has meant that many workers are now priced out of claiming their employment rights. “If the Government is concerned about migrant workers’ undercutting employment terms and conditions and labour standards for domestic workers, our research suggests that resource needs to be directed to enabling migrant workers to enforce their rights, and to properly resourcing enforcement organisations such as the Gangmasters’ Licencing Authority.”

Unlike some other EU Member States, the UK did not impose restrictions on the admission of workers coming from the so-called EU-8 countries (such as Poland and the Czech Republic), apart from the requirement to register under the Workers’ Registration Scheme.

Over a million EU-8 workers, taking advantage of their free movement rights under Article 45 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), have arrived in the UK since 2004. They enjoy rights to equal treatment in any social and tax advantages offered to domestic workers – including the payment of child benefit and ‘in-work benefits’ such as tax credits.

Barnard and Ludlow plan to use the research design from their employment enforcement study and apply it to social security tribunals, to help give some sense of the number of EU migrants who claim benefits and the nature of the cases in which they are involved. They will also interview EU migrants and those that work closely with them, to explore migrants’ hopes, expectations and experiences.

I didn’t come to the UK just to work in any kind of job

Early interviews have highlighted the importance of online grass roots communities such as Facebook groups for migrant workers seeking advice, and that stopping child benefit for EU migrants may result in fewer family units making the transition to the UK, and an increase in younger, unattached men working in the UK, who are likely to integrate less permanently within their host community.

While some interviewees are preparing to leave Britain, citing a better quality of life in their home nation (“I'm not interested in staying in the UK just because it's possible”), the researchers also found migrant success stories.

One interviewee spoke of her determination to work in nursing: “I didn’t come to the UK just to work in any kind of job. Either I’m working my way towards nursing or, if that’s not possible, I’m going back.” After struggling through bar work and learning medical English on her days off, the woman is now a nurse in a local hospital.

“Many of the EU migrants we’ve talked to so far don’t understand our complex social security system; their only interest is in finding work,” said Dr Ludlow.

As well as one-to-one interviews and focus groups, the researchers will be making a documentary and providing migrant workers with disposable cameras. “It’s another way of trying to capture the migrant experience that offers an alternative insight to words on paper,” said Professor Barnard.

̽��ֱ��project is a two-way process, she says, with minute-long podcasts summarizing relevant aspects of the law, which will be available on EU Migrant Worker Project later this month.

“What we can offer the migrant community in return is quite detailed knowledge of the law and their rights and how to enforce those rights, both to claim employment rights but also social security benefits.”

Added Dr Ludlow: “Accusations that the UK has become a ‘honeypot nation’ has become a key issue in the debate about the UK’s membership of the EU.

“By gathering empirical evidence about EU migrants' experiences of navigating the labour market and social security system in the UK, we hope to increase our understanding of EU and domestic law as it works in practice and to inform public opinion in anticipation of the referendum on 23 June and beyond.”

If you are interested in learning more about Professor Barnard and Dr Ludlow’s work please email euworker@hermes.cam.ac.uk, tweet @eumigranworker, or contact them on their Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/eu.migrantworker/. Their project website is: www.eumigrantworker.law.cam.ac.uk.

Ahead of Britain’s EU referendum, research will explore the experiences of EU migrants working in the UK, and attitudes to employment and social security – for which there is little empirical evidence, despite intense political rhetoric. An initial study suggests workers from the EU are significantly under-represented in employment tribunals.

Accusations that the UK has become a ‘honeypot nation’ has become a key issue in the debate about the UK’s membership of the EU

Amy Ludlow

Kip Loades

EU migrant workers

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Yes

Opinion: Harsh Republican immigration rhetoric is invigorating Latino voters

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Feb 2016 12:20:32 +0000

Donald Trump has said Mexicans “are bringing drugs, and bringing crime” to the US, while his fellow Republican presidential hopefuls are also talking up hawkish anti-immigration policies as the primary season unfolds.

That they feel confident doing so says something about American Latinos' surprising history of not showing up at the ballot box in big numbers. But based on the data we have, it seems the anti-immigration right may have finally gone too far.

Latinos are the largest ethnic minority group in the US, making up 17.4% of the population, yet the Latino electorate has so far underperformed at the ballot box. ̽��ֱ��Pew Research Centre projects that a record 27.3m Latinos will be eligible to vote in 2016. That’s 4m more than in 2012, but still only about half of the US’s Latino population.

Expanding the size of the electorate through voter registration and naturalisation campaigns is undoubtedly an important step towards augmenting the political influence of the Latino community. But the impact of a larger electorate will be mitigated if half of eligible Latino voters continue to stay home on election day.

At the 2012 election, an alarming 12m eligible Latinos chose not to vote, and the Latino turnout rate dropped from 49.9% in 2008 to 48%. Conversely, 66.6% of African Americans and 64.1% of non-Hispanic whites voted.

While mobilising unlikely voters in Chicago in 2014, I witnessed how misinformation and a lack of understanding of how the government functions fuels public disillusion with the political process, a major reason many voters, not just Latinos, opt to reject the ballot box.

But the viciously anti-immigrant rhetoric promulgated by Republican candidates is forcing Latino voters to pay attention.

Waking up

A 2015 survey of registered Latino voters jointly conducted by the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) and Latino Decisions found that 43% of respondents felt more interested in this year’s presidential election than in 2012. ̽��ֱ��same survey found that immigration reform, deportations and Barack Obama’s recent interventions via executive actions are the most important issues for 39% of respondents, tied with job creation and the economy – whereas immigration issues ranked only fourth among Latino voters' priorities in 2012.

This doesn’t make good reading for the Republican presidential front-runners, who claim to recognise the importance of the Latino vote to their campaigns but repeatedly alienate voters with their xenophobic rhetoric and unrealistic immigration policies.

On some themes, Donald Trump is in a league of his own: at the start of his campaign in the summer of 2015, he described Mexicans, by far the US’s largest Latino subgroup, as criminals and rapists. But all three candidates have called for mass deportations of undocumented immigrants and have promised to end Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), an administrative policy that allows certain undocumented youth the ability to temporarily live and work in the US.

These promises alarm me since I’m a DACA beneficiary. DACA, among other things, made it possible for me to gain employment after graduating from Amherst College and to continue my graduate education. I am currently a Gates Cambridge Scholar at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, and a future Schwarzman Scholar at Tsinghua ̽��ֱ�� in China.

If Trump, Cruz or Rubio reach the White House, the other 660,000 beneficiaries and I would return to living under fear of deportation without access to legal employment.

From the ground up

Deporting all 11m of us is not realistic and will hurt the economy. ̽��ֱ��cheap labour of undocumented workers subsidises the standard of living of every American. Undocumented immigrants also pay billions in taxes which help support public programs. ̽��ֱ��Institute on Taxation and Economy Policy that undocumented residents paid an estimated $11.84 billion in state and local taxes in 2012 – and that legalising undocumented people would add $2.2 billion a year to state and local taxes.

Republican candidates know their immigration proposals are unrealistic, but they chose to ignore the facts to score political points with their conservative base.

Fortunately, the American people are on our side. A 2015 Gallup poll found that 65% of US adults and 77% of Latinos favour a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. While I can’t vote, most of my extended family members, my colleagues and my friends can, and they will not vote for a candidate who wants to deport my mother and me.

Cruz and Rubio, both Cuban Americans, are perhaps hoping Latinos will ignore their stance on immigration and support them in the general election by virtue of their last names. But, if nominated, their ethnicity alone will not endear them to Latino voters. In the aforementioned NCLR survey, only 4% of respondents said they would blindly vote for a Latino candidate; 55% of Latinos listed the candidates’ positions as the most important factor influencing their vote.

This will only matter if Latinos vote in numbers that can make a real difference. Raised turnout and greater political representation are not the catalysts for political empowerment, but the products of it. If those who stand up for Latino interests want to sustain political participation in a meaningful way, civic engagement at the grassroots level must be their focus.

If they can be brought to the ballot box in representative numbers, they could dramatically change American politics. But without a sustained grassroots organising effort, a significant number of Latinos will remain political bystanders in the US.

Carlos Adolfo Gonzalez Sierra, ‎Gates Scholar in Latin American Studies, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge

This article was originally published on ̽��ֱ��Conversation. Read the original article.

̽��ֱ��opinions expressed in this article are those of the individual author(s) and do not represent the views of the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge.

Carlos Adolfo Gonzalez Sierra (Centre of Latin American Studies) discusses how the anti-immigrant rhetoric of Republican candidates is forcing Latino voters to pay attention.

Darron Birgenheier

Donald Trump in Reno, Nevada

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

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Stability, unity and nonchalance: What does it mean to be English?

tdk25 — Thu, 06 Nov 2014 00:00:47 +0000

It may seem difficult to believe amid continual current debates over immigration, but an aversion to patriotic flag-waving and a relative tolerance of other cultures are both key components of English identity, according to a new history of England, published today.

̽��ֱ��conclusions are just two of those reached in ̽��ֱ��English and Their History, a sweeping survey of the last 13 centuries by the historian Professor Robert Tombs which, by examining the development of the nation and Englishness since Anglo-Saxon times, attempts to answer the enduring and complex question of what it means to be English.

Part of that answer, he suggests, is to be found in a healthy “nonchalance” about national identity that has made the English – while by no means saints – resistant to racism and broadly tolerant of other cultures.

This is, however, only one small piece of the extensive verdict that Tombs, who teaches and researches modern European History at St John’s College, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, reaches in the conclusion of a study that has been six years in the making.

Elsewhere, he perhaps surprisingly argues that the widespread view that England is in a state of post-Imperial political and economic decline is a myth. ̽��ֱ��book also suggests that political isolationism from larger structures – whether the Empire or Europe – has rarely been a part of English history or nature, and identifies a fascinating history of political polarisation on sectarian lines that has, in the modern age, evolved into the split between “Ambridge and Coronation Street”.

̽��ֱ��book, published on Thursday, November 6 by Allen Lane, is the first single-volume history of England to be produced on this scale since the 1930s. Starting in the Anglo-Saxon era and ending in 2014, it aims in part to explore, through the English people’s developing understanding of themselves, what their history means at a time when ties within the United Kingdom appear to be loosening.

“It tries to reflect on how we have understood history, what the past means to us today, and what it might mean to us in the future,” Tombs said. “It is an attempt to say, ‘this is the sort of country we are, and this is what our history has made us’. It’s up to the reader to decide how to use that and whether or not they agree.”

While the multicultural character of English history has been well-documented, Tombs argues that a tolerance of other peoples and, historically, of immigration, has become a component of the country’s national identity.

Central to his argument is the fact that England has, for very little of its history, stood alone. Most of the time it has been the core nation in a multinational state, or at one stage in the Empire. Only between King Alfred and King Cnut, and then during the Tudor period (along with Wales), did England operate as an isolated political entity.

Because of this, the book suggests that English identity tends not to be expressed in terms of ethnic purity or cultural distinctiveness, and it has typically made little political sense for England to “beat the nationalist drum”. Instead, Tombs argues that England has historically propagated its values through interaction with others – spreading Christianity in Medieval times, as a force for European civilisation and free trade more recently, and as an Empire. ̽��ֱ��result, he says, is that Englishness is not founded on ideas of opposition and exclusion, but on inclusion and expansion.

One effect of this is a general “nonchalance” about national identity. “We don’t normally go in for a lot of flag-waving, we find that fairly un-English,” Tombs said. “That nonchalance has made us pretty resistant to racism. That is not to deny that racism has played a part in English history, but it has not been a defining character of our history. And thanks to our memory of resistance to Hitler in the Second World War there is no nostalgia for Fascism in England as we are now seeing in several other countries.”

While some agonise over the lack of a clear patriotic identity or devotion to the national flag, Tombs argues that “there is something to be said for national nonchalance”.

“In recent decades, the English have largely accommodated the shifts brought by changing moralities and multi-ethnicity, incorporating them into new varieties of Englishness,” he writes. “Who could be more English today than Rita Ora and Dizzee Rascal, Jessica Ennis and Rio Ferdinand?”

Another eye-catching argument within Tombs’ extensive survey is that “declinism” – the suggestion that England and Britain as a whole have lost economic and political standing on the world stage since the end of Empire – is a myth.

Key to this is one of the book’s central propositions – that the history of England shows the nation to have been relatively rich, secure and orderly for most of its history. Notwithstanding periods of upheaval, such as the Wars of the Roses, Peasants’ Revolt or even the Civil War (a small-scale affair compared with the prolonged and bloody experiences going on in France and Germany at the same time, Tombs says), Britain has been relatively immune to transformative catastrophes such as invasion, war and revolution.

̽��ֱ��result is the survival of ancient buildings, cultural treasures, and national institutions such as the Crown, Parliament, shires, boroughs, the Church, universities, schools, charitable foundations, voluntary associations and more. This is reinforced by long-term cultural consistencies, in particular the use of English itself as a mainstream spoken and written language dating back to Anglo-Saxon times. “ ̽��ֱ��nation changes, but it has certain structures that continue,” Tombs argues. “England has an ancient structural unity in a way that in Italy, Germany or France do not.”

Taking the same long view reveals that Britain’s power, wealth and global status has been remarkably stable, even though all are typically seen to have failed following the end of the Empire, and decolonisation. When Britain emerged as a significant force in the early 18th century, it was the smallest, and yet the most global, of the world’s half dozen most powerful states. Three centuries later it remains so, outdistanced – like all other states - only by the USA.

Other measures also raise questions about the “declinist” view that British international power has fallen, and its political and social organisation have failed. Britain in the mid-20th century was, for instance, stronger militarily than in the mid-19th, the study observes. In the 1960s it was richer than ever; by 2008 England was second only to the USA among large countries in gross per capita income.

̽��ֱ��book is also critical of the highly centralised nature of Britain’s administration which, it points out, is a relatively recently development – “a seventy year habit that we cannot, or will not, break,” Tombs says. He argues that it leaves British governments having to handle “a neverending conveyor belt of everyday problems”, relating to transport, education, and health, for example, which other countries deliver through local government.

In a complex way this clashes with a long-standing division in the nation’s politics that, unusually, was brought about by the legal recognition given to two religious cultures in England following the “Glorious Revolution” of 1688. Unlike other countries, where a single religious denomination tends to have been dominant, England has since the 17th century held Anglicanism on the one hand, and Nonconformism on the other, in tension.

̽��ֱ��study suggests that this unusual situation, of rival religious parties, then evolved new layers. Whig, Liberal and Labour politics were built on foundations of religious Dissent, then took on social and geographical characteristics as the country became divided between the working-class north and wealthier south.

One result of this religious point of origin, Tombs says, is that English politics has a distinctly moral and ideological tone. As a result, the commonplace details handled by a heavily-centralised Government have become the subjects of heated ideological debate – health and education are now disputed in the same terms as slavery or suffrage were in centuries past, when in most other countries they arouse far less emotion.

̽��ֱ��over-arching message of the book is, however, a positive one, suggesting that structural and cultural unity are at the heart of what it means to be English. “We should be fairly optimistic about the future of England, as part of the UK and as a country that will want to reassess itself and will probably gain more autonomy in the coming years,” Tombs added. “ ̽��ֱ��history of England shows that we have, in the long term, been very stable. We are not a nation in decline – and we never really have been.”

̽��ֱ��English and Their History, by Professor Robert Tombs, is published by Allen Lane and is priced at £35.

Inset image: Coronation Street by Allan Lee; Robert Tombs

An epic new history of England offers some eye-catching conclusions on Englishness – suggesting, among other things, that a “remarkable” level of cultural unity and a relative openness to other cultures are both key components of English national identity.

̽��ֱ��history of England shows that we have, in the long term, been very stable. We are not a nation in decline – and we never really have been.

Robert Tombs

Delaware Art Museum / Bridgeman Images.

Detail from the cover image of “ ̽��ֱ��English and Their History”.

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Licence. If you use this content on your site please link back to this page. For image rights, please see the credits associated with each individual image.

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