Migration and integration, especially the reception of refugees and displaced peoples, are widely shared social and political challenges across Europe. The purpose of GLIMER is to understand how the governance and local integration of migrants and Europe’s refugees is developing, and in ways that can be utilised through best practice sharing and reporting. Inspired by the success of ‘welcoming cities’ in southern Italy, we will work with civil society groups, local authorities, citizens and refugee groups in order to support sustainable the meaningful integration of diverse communities. We will focus on cities in both Southern and Northern Europe and a key aspect of the project will be dedicated to investigating how the local governance of new arrivals can secure successful integration across a range of indicators. This research will be carried out in close collaboration with practitioners with the aim of co-producing knowledge that can be beneficial for a range of stakeholders including civil society groups and NGOs as well as municipalities.

In a historical perspective, Sweden has transformed from being a country of emigration to one of immigration. Top emigration rates were reached in the 1880s. Immigration has exceeded emigration since 1931, but it didn’t really take off until after the Second World War (Nilsson 2004). The proportion of foreign born residents in Sweden in 1930 was less than one per cent; in 2016 it reached almost 18 per cent. Over this period of time, the approaches to asylum and integration have shifted. In the early post-war period, in particularly from the early 1950s to the late 1960s, the national borders were ‘open’ and most immigration was categorised as labour immigration. It was dominated by immigration from European countries. After this, from the early 1970s and until the late 2000s, labour immigration was very limited. The 1980s is usually described as the decade when immigration to Sweden shifted to non-European and refugee immigration. This is also the decade when the Swedish government reformed the system for the integration of refugees. In Sweden, on both policy and operational levels, there is a distinct separation between the reception of asylum seekers and the integration of refugees and their families. While the reception of asylum seekers has always been the responsibility of the state, between 1985 and 2010 the reception of refugees was transferred from state to local authorities. The Swedish welfare model, as it developed after the Second World War, has meant that civil society organisations have played a marginal role in the reception and integration of asylum seekers and refugees. As the model have transformed, in particularly since the 1990s, the role of civil society organisations has changed. Below, we describe the shifting approaches to asylum and integration divided into three periods.