The research is positioned within an international institutional movement interested in involving integrated migrants in the improvement of the reception and social integration policies. Consequence of a such process is the constitution of social enterprises with a migratory background aimed at fostering newcomers¿ social integration.
Studies in the migration field suggest that social capital - defined as the resources produced out of social relationships - as a driving factor for social integration. Literature has explored the social capital developed by connections that tie migrants with members of their communities of origin and community of resettlement. The latter networks emerged as the hardest to be established as frequently characterized by discrimination and prejudice. Because social enterprises with a migratory background are founded by integrated migrants they are positioned in between migrants¿ communities of origin and community of resettlement.
Aim of this longitudinal study is therefore to explore the social capital created by social enterprises with a migratory background aimed at fostering newcomers¿ social integration.
Two enterprises will be involved in the research. The group of participants will be made of 150 beneficiaries that will have got in touch and attended the activities of the enterprises for the first time.
Measures of participants¿ social integration and social capital will be collected before and after having attended the enterprises activities through a SES form and an ad hoc questionnaire that will be analysed through the Social (Ego) Network Analysis.
Repeated Analysis and Mediation Analysis will be computed in order to verify the objectives of the research.
Results will enhance knowledge in the social capital field and in particular in its application within the migration studies. In addition, the research will provide evidence-based results of the effectiveness of experimental inclusive practices.
The project is positioned within a new European movement interested in directly involving migrants in the improvement of the systems of reception and social integration. Such a movement pushes those migrants who are already an active part of the resettlement community to transform their direct experiences related to inclusion and social integration into professional competences that enhance newcomers¿ social integration.
The project takes place within the experimentation of innovative inclusive practices for migrants¿ social integration and it takes part to this process through an evidence-based assessment of their effectiveness.
The project has two more innovative elements.
From one side it fosters the Academia as a research context that can significatively contribute to the development and management of the reception system through its own specific competences in the research. The project therefore proposes to create a network between the academic world, civil society and local institutions supporting the effort that the latter make in order to facilitate the coexistence between old and new members of the European communities.
From a theoretical point of view migrants¿ enterprises offer interesting contexts in term of social capital providers. The entrepreneurs are in fact migrants who have passed through a successful process of social integration to the point that they decided to start enterprises that while fostering newcomers¿ integration support also the social development of the resettlement community (art.4-bis Testo Unico sull¿Immigrazione). Because of this, the ties that connect those contexts to newcomers can be classified both as bonding and bridging.
Literature has widely explored the resources that bonding and bridging networks produce for migrants¿ integration. Those same studies have as well highlighted that the greatest obstacles that migrants face are related to the creation of bridging networks with the resettlement community members (Erikkson, Wimelius, Ghazinour 2018; Bereins, Hughes, Hek, Spicer, 2007; Calhoun 2010). The latter are indeed more easily characterized by prejudice and discrimination. In addition, literature suggests that bridging connections may be affected by specific characteristics of bonding and linking networks. Studies have indeed demonstrated that both exclusive bonding relationship within the community of origin and distrustful linking networks hinder the chance to establish bridging connections with the resettlement community and consequently to take advantage of the resources they may produce (Erikkson, Wimelius, Ghazinour 2018; Bereins, Hughes, Hek, Spicer, 2007; Calhoun 2010).
On the contrary, because social enterprises with a migratory background belongs both to the resettlement community and to different communities of migrants- whereby their founders are part of - those contexts can effectively create bridges between the two of them. This very characteristic may help overcoming the obstacles that commonly hinder the chance to create resourceful connections between migrants and the resettlement community members. The research will therefore shed light on a such possibility.