Regional governance and institutional learning processes and their impact on regional labour markets’ resilience to shocks of refugee immigration: Four urban case studies in Sweden and Germany
My research will look at learning experiences in Swedish and German regions after the arrival of a relatively high share of war refugees from former Yugoslavia in the 1990s and the relevance of these learning experiences for strategies to integrate the relatively high share of refugee immigrants from Syria and other countries arriving during the last two years. Sweden and Germany became preferred destinations for refugee immigrants to the EU last year and face similar challenges for their labour markets. Many studies on the experiences with immigrants from former Yugoslavia revealed severe problems in both countries to integrate the immigrants in labour markets, particularly to avoid a dependence of the immigrants on low-qualified job segments. We will analyse, how Swedish and German institutions dealt and deal with issues of traumatisation, qualification and integration, the role of the regional dimension for these strategies and adaptation strategies to increase the adaptability of regional labour markets to “shocks” of refugee immigration waves.
The grant will allow the organisation of field research in Sweden and workshops to discuss and disseminate research results. Furthermore, it shall serve as a basis to extend research network links for the organisation of longitudinal studies on the link between refugee immigration, institutional structures and regional economic resilience.
Further details on this research can be found at: https://blog.regionalstudies.org/regional-governance-and-institutional-learning-processes-and-their-impact-on-regional-labour-markets-resilience-to-shocks-of-refugee-immigration-four-case-studies-in-sweden-and-germany/