Research-policy dialogues on migrant integration in Europe: comparison and conclusions

This concluding chapter compares forms of research-policy dialogues on migrant integration in the seven European countries included in this book as well as at the level of the EU. It analyses how knowledge for these dialogues is being produced and how policymakers make use of it. This comparative analysis is guided by the question how the politicisation of the issue, which has become visible all over Europe now, has impacted on the development of such dialogues, on the use of knowledge in policymaking and on the production of knowledge for policy purposes. A key conclusion of this book is that research-policy dialogue structures are increasingly diverse in form, and do not follow any uniform or converging pattern. There is, however, a clear tendency among policymakers to use knowledge more symbolically than instrumentally. This means that knowledge serves more often to substantiate policy arguments and to legitimize policy actors rather than for the direct development of policies and their instrumentalisation. Also, knowledge production tends to become more diversified under politicised conditions.