Bridging, bonding, and linking? Syrian refugee-led organisations and integration in Berlin

ABSTRACT

In this article, we analyse Syrian refugee-led organisations and initiatives in Berlin, Germany, including those led by individuals, small groups or as part of religious institutions, to understand their role in the integration process for Syrians. We draw on a framework of refugee integration to examine the role of bridging, bonding, and linking in fostering social connections. We argue that the types of social connections these organisations aim to foster impact the integration process for Syrian refugees, and indeed that the process of creating such initiatives is demonstrative of important components of integration into Germany. Notably, the existence of Syrian refugee-led organisations demonstrates a compelling interplay between Germany’s enabling environment for civil society and refugees’ engagement in it in ways that were largely suppressed in Syria. We posit that refugee-led organisations constitute an important conceptual site of examination relating to theories on refugee integration, and have the potential to be analysed as independent actors within such frameworks. Many organisations appear to be intermediaries or even suppliers of social services, suggesting they are integral yet overlooked actors within refugee assistance. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first mapping of Syrian refugee-led organisations and initiatives in Berlin.

KEYWORDS:

• Syrian refugees
• refugee-led organisations
• refugee integration
• Berlin
• Germany
• social connection

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 As a large body of literature on refugee integration in both European and other contexts exists (Sigona 2005; Smyth, Stewart, and Da Lomba 2010, Strang & Ager 2010, Bakker et al. 2016), it is important to note that these forms of connection may be described in other terms by informants or in literature.

2 The others are: markers and means (employment, housing, education, and health), facilitators (language and cultural knowledge, and safety and stability), and foundation (rights and citizenship)(Ager & Strang 2008).

3 A person in Germany has a so-called migrant background if they do not have German citizenship by birth or if one of their parents does not, making it possible to describe social integration processes of foreign nationals and naturalised first generation immigrants and their descendants.

4 A full overview of the asylum process in Germany is available at: http://www.bamf.de/EN/Fluechtlingsschutz/AblaufAsylv/ablauf-des-asylverfahrens-node.html

5 Chancellor Merkel has emphasized that the German constitution rather than Sharia law applies, a stance recently reinforced by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR 2018).

6 With this statement we are not attempting to idealise German culture. Indeed Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, and racism are unfortunately also very real components of Germany society. For a discussion on this, see Der Spiegel (2018).

7 The German Federal Ministry of the Interior, Building and Community states for example, ‘Integration means feeling part of a community and developing a common understanding of how to live together in society. Integration can work only as a two-way process.’ (FMIBC 2019)

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Toyota Foundation: [grant number D16-R-0243].