Universitat Pompeu Fabra
e-mail: diletta.marcucci@upf.edu
Chinese Intercultural participation and Urban Governance after 2020.
The increasing significance of migrant integration gained relevance on the global agenda calling for research and action. The three normative and conceptual dimensions of the process include the cultural as the most intricated but most varied, whilst the social as the most ambiguous and multidimensional. Amid the COVID-19 upsurge that severely hit a wide array of countries worldwide and the labelling of the virus as “Chinese”, the diaspora has been confronted with new challenges. This study aims to analyse how the second-generation Chinese integrates into the cultural and social dimensions in Milan, Barcelona, and Amsterdam after 2020. In this context, migrants are referring to the specific category of the second generation of documented migrants. It investigates how urban regimes address the Chinese community through socio-cultural policies, how the selected category of Chinese migrants perceive these policies, and which socio-cultural integration strategies they enact. It also examines the impact of media and political narratives on perceptions simultaneously drawing attention to the topic of political participation and representation. Thus, the analysis covers all the integration process dimensions (legal-political, cultural-religious, socio-economic). To understand the phenomenon, to testify how do they integrate and within which policy frameworks, a comparative analysis based on a qualitative research method and carried out on the local level is deployed. The methodology is also built on discourse, content analysis, and data collection mainly consisting of in-depth semi-structured interviews. The research, framed within Chinese integration studies, meets its objectives by adhering to the concept of cultural and social capital advanced by P.Bourdieu, incorporated into the Urban Governance theoretical framework that serves as the primary “lens”, bringing a contribution to the field and filling a research gap. Specifically, inter-regional comparison in migration studies (Northern and Southern cities in the EU), and the role of ethnicity in the frame of urban governance.
Bio:
I hold a Masterin International Relations (Global Studies) from the University of Wrocław, Poland. I obtained a Bachelor’s degree in Language, Culture, and Society of Asia and Mediterranean Africa (major – Mandarin Chinese) at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Italy. My Master’s thesis titled “Construction of newcomers’ image in the Italian society in 2017. Case studies of Milan and Naples”.
I am currently a PhD candidate at the Department of Political and Social Sciences at Universitat Pompeu Fabra. I am incorporated in the GRITIM-UPF research group and I am the research assistant of my supervisor within the project “BROAD-ER: Bridging the Migration and Urban Studies Nexus” (ID 101079254) awarded under the HORIZON-WIDERA-2021 call. My primary research topic is framed within Chinese integration studies: “Chinese second-generation’s socio-cultural integration strategies and Urban Governance. Case studies of Milan, Barcelona, and Amsterdam”.