In Brussels, Belgium, we investigated attitudes and practices regarding the provision of care to older family members from a gender perspective. Using a multi-method approach that combined a face-to-face survey with in-depth interviews, we found that attitudinal and behavioural differences between men and women on family-based elder care were limited. The results challenge the conventional wisdom that caregiving is always highly gendered, instead revealing similar levels of involvement between men and women across participation, frequency, and types of tasks performed - including personal hygiene, cleaning, keeping company, and administrative duties. However, the qualitative analysis highlights gender-based differences, particularly in the motivations underlying men's and women's involvement. Despite similar engagement in caregiving, men and women construct their narratives through distinct gendered discourses. Women's accounts align with traditional gender norms, portraying caregiving as an inherent and expected extension of their role as women. In contrast, men reframe their caregiving responsibilities in ways that align with their masculine identity, distancing themselves from the perception of caregiving as 'women's work'.

Relational and societal exclusion of immigrants in Western countries fuels negative perceptions of immigrants among non-migrants. We investigated how relational and societal inclusion in the form of friendship and immigrant integration policies jointly relate to perceptions of immigrants. We conducted a longitudinal multilevel analysis drawing on probability samples of non-migrants from the Transatlantic Trends Survey (N = 27,513) in nine North American and European countries over 5 years. Extending prior scholarship, we provide longitudinal evidence that more inclusive immigrant integration policies correspond to greater numbers of immigrant friends. Greater friendships with immigrants, in turn, corresponded to more positive perceptions of immigrants. Furthermore, we found that exclusive policies predict negative perceptions of immigrants but only among non-migrants who have few immigrant friends. Instead, when non-migrants report more immigrant friends, their perceptions of immigrants are positive regardless of policies. Thus, societal inclusion is related to stronger relational inclusion, but once intergroup friendships are established, societal exclusion is less consequential.

Research on migrant entrepreneurship has extensively focused on the ethnic dimension of these economic activities, especially entrepreneurs’ use of ethnic resources. Many scholars have tended to reify ethnicity and overlook migrant entrepreneurs’ ability to define and use ethnic resources. Adopting a dynamic perspective that acknowledges in-group diversity and entrepreneurs’ agency in utilizing these ethnic resources, we examine how Italian migrant entrepreneurs in Brussels conceive their relationship with the Italian community and leverage their ethnicity (Italianness/Italianità, i.e., the fact of being Italian). We find in-group variation, challenging reifying and deterministic analyses of “ethnic” entrepreneurship. Instead, ethnicity emerges as a resource that entrepreneurs mobilize to distinguish themselves socially and entrepreneurially from other Italians.

Increasing ethnic and racial diversity often fuels feelings of threat among ethnic-racial majorities (e.g., self-identified white Americans and European nationals). We contend that these threat perceptions depend on the policy context. Across four studies, we test whether more inclusive immigrant integration policies attenuate ethnic-racial majorities’ threat reactions. Studies 1 to 3 ( n = 469, 733, and 1745, respectively) used experimental methods with white American participants in the United States. Study 4 ( n = 499,075) used secondary analysis of survey data comparing attitudes of nationals in 30 European countries and measured the impact of actual changes in diversity and policies over 10 years. Our results show that integration policies shape threat reactions even in those situations when increasing diversity could be seen as the most threatening: when narratives highlight the majority’s impending minority position or when diversity suddenly increases. When policies are more inclusive toward immigrants, ethnic-racial majority participants report less threat (or no threat) in response to increasing diversity.

ABSTRACT Critical readers of the book “Contested concepts” have pointed out the choice of concepts that are being treated is debatable. It has also been said that the book suffers from “European parochialism”. However, it could be argued that a more valid criticism would be that we should have focussed more on the effects of language, linguistically embedded discourses and the difference of perspective of scholars living in “sending” countries of migration flows rather than focus on the point of view of scholars working in “destination countries”.

Intangible cultural heritage, such as a tradition, folk dance or carnival, contributes to cultural diversity within a society. Therefore, the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage was adopted with the intention of safeguarding and perpetuating intangible cultural heritage and intercultural dialogue. But what happens if intangible cultural heritage has been recognised and inscribed on one of the UNESCO lists and, within its expression, the tradition goes against the list's inscription criteria and causes controversy? This article explains the events that took place during the Carnival of Aalst, as well as the controversies it sparked. It sheds light on the visible tensions between different aspects of the controversy. Its scope thus remains limited to a brief explanation of intangible cultural heritage and the tradition of Aalst Carnival. Within this context, a judicial approach through case law research of the European Court of Human Rights concerning the right to freedom of expression and its limitations is used to provide a legal assessment of the controversy. Moreover, this article discusses the limitations of this legal approach and proposes recommendations in other policy fields. The article will thus attempt to reconcile these tensions and balance the competing interests in order to diminish the likelihood of controversies happening again in the future. It will aim to illustrate the tensions between stereotypical and derogatory depictions that are legally acceptable, however controversial given the multicultural society, and further concisely explore possible solutions within different policy areas.

The World Wide Web and digitization have strongly improved the possibilities to search and find. What happens if applying these tools to your family history, leads to the discovery of several ancestors with controversial stories? Think for instance about unexpected stories, ranging from connections to the slave trade in the 18th century, an ancestor connected to a famous gang of 18th-century highway robbers like Jan de Lichte, or a woman condemned and executed after accusations of witchcraft. It raises many questions, but also the challenge for your family or heritage (project): if you do your homework and research, and look far enough, you will find many shades of heritage or genealogies.

In this paper Jacobs examines the connection between attitudes on migration, perceived threats linked to migration and the (lack of) willingness to help refugees using a data set of twelve countries from a survey project called the Aurora Humanitarian Index. The higher the perceived ethnic threat (economic, cultural or religious), the less willing individuals are to mobilize for refugees. In addition to patterns on the individual level, we examine the impact of country characteristics (gross domestic product (GDP), number of migrants and so on) through correlational and multilevel analysis. While neither the proportion of migrants nor the proportion of refugees impacts on the willingness to mobilize in favour of refugees, the economic situation does have an effect. In richer countries there is less willingness to help. Furthermore, we can observe that the effect of both opposition to migration and the perception of refugees as posing an economic threat is exacerbated in richer countries (countries with a higher GDP).

Deze wegwijzer biedt een handig overzicht van praktijken die de professional kan gebruiken om migranten en etnische minderheden te ondersteunen bij drughulpverlening. Deze bevolkingsgroepen vinden immers vaak moeilijk toegang tot de drughulpverlening. Heel wat praktijken in deze wegwijzer kunnen snel en met minimale investering worden ingezet. Tegelijk schetst deze uitgave de achtergronden van de Belgische situatie ter zake en het onderzoeksproject (MATREMI, Belspo) dat eraan ten grondslag ligt. Project en uitgave gecoordineerd door de Universiteit Gent en uitgevoerd in nauwe samenwerking met Universite Libre de Bruxelles en de koepels die de gespecialiseerde drughulpverlening vertegenwoordigen in Belgie: VAD, FEDITO BXL en FEDITO Wallonne.

Ce recueil fournit un apercu de pratiques que les professionnels peuvent utiliser pour accueillir et accompagner les migrants et les minorites ethniques dans les services de sante et specialises en toxicomanie. Ces personnes ont souvent des difficultes d’acces aux soins. Ce recueil souhaite inspirer la mise en place de nouvelles pratiques pour ces publics dans le secteur social sante. Cette publication propose egalement un apercu de la situation en Belgique sur base du projet de recherche MATREMI (Belspo). Projet et publication coordonnes et mis en œuvre par l’Universite de Gand en etroite collaboration avec l’Universite Libre de Bruxelles et les organisations faitieres qui representent le traitement specialise en toxicomanie en Belgique : VAD, FEDITO BXL et FEDITO Wallonne.

Research on migrant transnationalism has mostly focused on particular transnational activities, their salience in various contexts and populations, and their relationship with migrant incorporation. Less attention has been paid to the interplay between the different domains of transnationalism (economic, political, and socio-relational) and to the way in which they affect migrants' identity. This study investigates whether and how one domain of migrant transnationalism-transnational entrepreneurship-influences migrants' (1) transnational involvement in other domains and (2) sense of belonging to different social groups and places. Focusing on the case of Moroccan entrepreneurs in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and Milan, Italy, we compare transnational migrant entrepreneurs, whose business is based on cross-border relationships and exchanges, with domestic migrant entrepreneurs, who are active exclusively in the destination country. Combining quantitative and qualitative data, we find that transnational entrepreneurs differ from domestic entrepreneurs mostly in terms of socio-relational transnational involvement. On the other hand, transnational entrepreneurship does not substantially change transnational practices in other domains or sense of belonging among Moroccan migrants.

This chapter examines the parliamentary debates on enfranchisement of foreign residents in the Netherlands and Belgium, focusing, necessarily, on nitty–gritty politics and on related processes of polarisation. The Netherlands and Belgium, two countries with almost similar nationality legislation, yet in the Netherlands non–national residents gained the vote at the municipal level in 1985, while this is impossible in Belgium until 1998. Formulating a meaningful answer to the research question using critical discourse analysis (CDA) becomes quite difficult in the circumstances. The rise of the post–national narrative led to the rapid extension of rights to migrants. In sum, the idea of stable cultural idioms is empirically untenable and mainly seems to reproduce stereotypes, at least if it is uses in rigidly, reducing actual discusses to political cultures. To assess the importance of ethnocentrism in debate and politics in different countries, one should focus on the degree of polarisation on migrant issues, along with its link to inter-party electoral and ideological competition.