Translating Policy Into Practice
Local Stakeholders' Interpretations of Refugee Integration in the Danish Multilevel State
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2999481 |
|---|---|
| Authors | K Vitus (0000-0003-1102-2742, NORCE Research AS, corresponding author), Frederikke Jarlby (0000-0003-4124-037X, VIVE - The Danish Center for Social Science Research) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 15 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Publication date | 2025-09-04 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Nordic Journal of Migration Research (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1799-649X • E-ISSN: 1799-649X |
| Publisher | Helsinki University Press (PUBLISHER • FI) |
| DOI | 10.33134/njmr.830 |
| OpenAlex | W4413986842 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 3 |
| References cited | 21 |
In Denmark, as in Europe, the concept of immigrant integration is highly contested, undergoing continuous policy changes and potentially being interpreted differently at various levels of governance in the multilevel state. To understand the complexity of integration policy, an understanding of how local stakeholders working with integration on the municipal frontline of the welfare state interpret government policies is needed. Based on 19 qualitative interviews with local stakeholders in 11 Danish municipalities, we explored how they interpret what integration is and should be in working with newly arrived young refugees. Drawing on post-structural policy analysis (Bacchi 2009; Yanow 2015), our analysis shows that local stakeholders articulate five interpretive ‘translations’ of integration, elucidating different local assumptions about the problems of and solutions to integration. Across the five ‘translations,’ we analytically identify two overarching ‘translation regimes,’ a national policy regime and a social justice regime, which we connect to competing understandings of the relationship between refugees and the Danish state, human rights, and citizenship. The analysis provides a deeper understanding of the complexity of local frontline work and the inherent fundamental dilemmas and ambiguities within integration policy implementation, reflecting paradoxical tensions within the Danish welfare state and Western liberal democracies between national border management and global–local solidarity
Danish · Linguistics · Political science · Refugee · Sociology · Computer Science · Law · Migration and Labor Dynamics · Migration, Health and Trauma · Migration, Refugees, and Integration · Public Administration
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Reflecting on reflexive thematic analysis
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The Status of the Asylum-seeking Child in Norway and Denmark
Why It Is Bad to Be Kind. Educating Refugees to Life in the Welfare State
Competing frames of immigrant integration in the EU
Direct and Indirect Welfare Chauvinism as Party Strategies
The resilience of citizenship traditions
Becoming an active citizen
Theory and Method of Social Representations
Understanding Integration
Muslims and the State in the Post-9/11 West
Assimilation and integration in the twenty-first century
Immigration, integration and citizenship
Translating Policy Into Practice
Thematic networks
"We Never Say We Are Integrating People!" Interpretative Repertoires of Integration Among Local Stakeholders in Sweden
| Unique citing works | 3 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 3 |
| Citation span | 2025 - 2026 (2) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 3 |