Urban citizenship and transcontinental lives: Crisis, connection and policy coherence through the lens of 'Somali Britain'

城市公民身份和跨大陆生活：“索马里英国”视角下的危机、联系和政策一致性

• 批准号: ES/X010848/1
• 负责人: Thomas Goodfellow
• 金额: $ 92.11万
• 依托单位: University of Sheffield
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2024 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=ES%2FX010848%2F1
• 关键词: Urban; citizenship; transcontinental; lives; Crisis

Recent years have further revealed the depth of inequality in UK cities, including in relation to race and unequal access to the elusive identity of 'Britishness' in the context of polarized attitudes towards migration, asylum and the UK's imperial past. The experience of Somali diaspora - among the UK's most stigmatized and misunderstood but resourceful communities - throws these issues and the broader challenges of post-Brexit, pandemic Britain into sharp relief. The UK Somali experience sits at the intersection of local and global challenges in ways that are emblematic of contemporary questions of race, refuge and unequal citizenship in the context of problematic ideas of 'integration'. Moreover, the lives of UK Somali communities are often highly transcontinental, with patterns of investment and political engagement in the 'homeland', and the reality or aspiration of 'return', shaping their relationship with the UK and the British state. The Somali experience of life in UK cities is thus intimately connected to development processes in Somalia, and vice versa. Consequently we need to think about policy in more connected ways too, spanning the divides between local communities policy and international development policy. This project will analyse these intersections. It frames the British Somali experience of urban citizenship in relation to the varying 'faces' of Britain both locally and globally, through research in three very different cities that illustrate diverse aspects of the UK's urban political geography and have different roles in Somali migration histories: Sheffield, Bristol and London borough of Camden. This is supplemented by research with returnees and transcontinental communities in Somalia/Somaliland. It combines an interdisciplinary approach drawing across urban studies and development studies with a collaborative, partnership-based design, drawing in civil society partners including the Refugee Council, City of Sanctuary, the Council of Somali Organizations and local Somali community-based organizations in all three cities. The research aims to explore: i) the experiences of multigenerational Somali communities in UK cities in terms of exclusion, representation, service access, aspirations and inter-community engagement; ii) how this relates to changing transcontinental networks and developments in Somalia; iii) how UK policy both globally and locally feeds into the Somali diasporic experience and capacity to manage recurrent crises; and iv) how a better understanding of these dynamics could foster enhanced urban citizenship and solidarity, and improved policy across a range of domains.Through engaging local and national partners and government at different scales, the project will generate new avenues of cross-sectoral dialogue, practitioner guidance and opportunities for research-led civil society activism. Moreover, as Somali refugees were the first significant incoming refugee group in the post Cold-War era, a long-term view on their experiences holds important lessons for present and future refugee experiences. The project will therefore put the research findings relating to the experience of Somali diaspora in conversation with the needs of more recent refugee arrivals, taken forward through project partnerships with the Refugee Council and City of Sanctuary.The overarching vision of this project is to deepen knowledge on the interdependence of global and local challenges through this focus on the urban experience of multigenerational Somali refugee diaspora, in order both to build inter-community solidarity and contribute to improved coherence across relevant policy domains. It offers fresh lenses on interconnected problems through a transcontinental research programme involving sustained inter-sectoral modalities of working, novel forms of multi-sited and interdisciplinary research, and a collaborative plan for impact and knowledge exchange predicated on deep community engagement.

近年来，英国城市的不平等现象进一步暴露出来，包括种族问题以及在对移民、庇护和英国帝国历史的态度两极分化的背景下获得难以捉摸的“英国性”身份的不平等。索马里侨民——英国最受侮辱和误解最严重的社区之一——的经历使这些问题以及英国脱欧后、大流行病中的英国面临的更广泛的挑战变得更加突出。英国索马里的经历处于当地和全球挑战的交汇点，象征着“融合”观念问题背景下的当代种族、难民和不平等公民身份问题。此外，英国索马里社区的生活往往是高度跨大陆的，在“祖国”的投资和政治参与模式以及“回归”的现实或愿望，塑造了他们与英国和英国国家的关系。因此，索马里在英国城市的生活经历与索马里的发展进程密切相关，反之亦然。因此，我们也需要以更加相互关联的方式思考政策，跨越当地社区政策和国际发展政策之间的分歧。该项目将分析这些交叉点。它通过对三个截然不同的城市的研究，将英属索马里的城市公民经验与英国在当地和全球的不同“面孔”联系起来，这些城市说明了英国城市政治地理的不同方面，并在索马里移民历史中发挥了不同的作用：谢菲尔德、布里斯托尔和伦敦卡姆登区。对索马里/索马里兰回返者和跨大陆社区的研究对此进行了补充。它将跨越城市研究和发展研究的跨学科方法与基于合作伙伴关系的设计相结合，吸引了民间社会合作伙伴，包括难民理事会、庇护城、索马里组织理事会和所有三个索马里当地社区组织城市。该研究旨在探索：i）英国城市多代索马里社区在排斥、代表性、服务获取、愿望和社区间参与方面的经验； ii) 这与索马里不断变化的跨大陆网络和发展有何关系； iii) 英国的全球和地方政策如何融入索马里侨民的经验和管理经常性危机的能力； iv) 更好地理解这些动态如何能够促进增强城市公民意识和团结，并改进一系列领域的政策。通过不同规模的地方和国家合作伙伴以及政府的参与，该项目将开辟跨部门对话的新途径、从业者指导和研究主导的民间社会活动的机会。此外，由于索马里难民是冷战后第一批重要的难民群体，因此从长远角度看待他们的经历可为当前和未来的难民经历提供重要的教训。因此，该项目将通过与难民理事会和庇护市的项目合作伙伴关系，将有关索马里侨民经历的研究结果与最近抵达的难民的需求相结合。该项目的总体愿景是加深了解通过关注多代索马里难民侨民的城市经验，认识到全球和地方挑战的相互依存性，以建立社区间的团结，并有助于提高相关政策的一致性域。它通过跨大陆研究计划提供了关于相互关联的问题的新视角，该计划涉及持续的跨部门工作方式、多地点和跨学科研究的新颖形式，以及基于深入社区参与的影响和知识交流合作计划。