Migrants and Religion: Paths, Issues, and Lenses

Front matter

Mierants and Religion: Paths, Issues, and Lenses

A Multidisciplinary and Multi-Sited Study on the Role of Religious Belongings in Migratory and Integration Processes

Volume Editor L. Zanfrini

Contents

List of Figures and Tables IX Notes on Contributors XII

PART1 Migrations and Religious Belongings: from Periphery to Core, for a New Humanism

1 Introduction: General Description of the Study, Key Issues, and Provisional Conclusions 3 Laura Zanfrini

PART 2 Where (Forced) Migrations Are Generated

5 No Size Fits All: Diversity, State and Politics in the Contemporary Middle East 143 Paolo Maggiolini, Andrea Plebani and Riccardo Redaelli

6 Christians Navigating through Middle East Turbulences: the Case of the

Copts in Egypt 175 Alessia Melcangi and Paolo Maggiolini

CONTENTS

7 Religious Affiliations and Social Coexistence in the Islamic Middle East Countries 205 Giancarlo Rovati 8 Women’s Rights and Shari‘a Law in the MENA Region 231 Vera Lomazzi References to Part 2 251 PART 3 The Religion’s Dimension in the Trajectories of (Forced) Migrants Directed to Italy 9 The “Place” of Religion in the Italian Asylum Seekers’ Reception System: Constitutional, Legislative and Procedural Framework 267 Paolo Bonetti

On the Role of Religion in the Decision to Migrate 315 Laura Zanfrini

The “Space” of Religion in the Assessment of Asylum Applications 357

Laura Zanfrini On the Role of Religion in the Process of Adaptation of (Forced) Migrants 376

Laura Zanfrini and Mario Antonelli

PART 4 Religion, Faith-Based Organizations, Integration and Social Cohesion

Religion and Integration: Issues from International Literature 433 Annavittoria Sarli and Giulia Mezzetti

CONTENTS VII

14 Religious Persecution, Migrations and Practices in Faith-Based Organizations: Some Recommendations from a Qualitative Study 464

Lucia Boccacin and Linda Lombi

15 Interreligious Dialogue in the Governance of Migration and Interethnic Cohabitation 504 Fabio Baggio

16 The Multi-Ethnic and Multi-Religious Transformation of the Largest Diocese in the World: the Church of Milan and the “Synod from the Peoples” 526

Laura Zanfrini and Luca Bressan

PART 5 Migrations, Intergenerational Relations and Families

17 Migrations and Intergenerational Religious Transmission: Issues from International Literature 569 Donatella Bramanti, Stefania Meda and Giovanna Rossi

18 The Copts in Italy: Migration and Generosity 589 Beatrice Nicolini

19 Religious Belonging and (Forced) Migration: a Study on Migrant Coptic Families in Italy 596 Cristina Giuliani and Camillo Regalia

20 Religious Belonging and (Forced) Migration: a Study on Migrant Coptic Minors in Italy 615

Giovanni Giulio Valtolina and Paola Barachetti

CONTENTS

PART 6 Religious Diversity in Italian Schools

The Religious Dimension in Plural Schools: Institutional, Relational and Strategic Issues 655 Maddalena Colombo

Religious Belongings in Multi-Cultural Schools: Freedom of Expression and Citizenship Values 676 Rosangela Lodigiani

Religious Conflicts in Multi-Cultural Schools: a Generational Divide between Students and Adults 715

Mariagrazia Santagati

Religions and Laicité in the French Republican School 754 Alessandro Bergamaschi and Catherine Blaya

Religious Education in Schools as a Necessity in a Secular State: the Perspective in Catalonia 770 Nuria Llevot-Calvet, Olga Bernad-Cavero and Jordi Garreta-Bochaca

Index 799

Figures and Tables

7.1 7.2

8.1

14.10

15.1 15.2

2.1

Figures To have people of a different religion as neighbors 228 To have people of a different sect of Islam as neighbors 228 Feminism typologies by country 247 The Greimas square applied to interview number 1 484 The Greimas square applied to interview number 2 484 The Greimas square applied to interview number 6 485 The Greimas square applied to interview number 3 485 The Greimas square applied to interview number 4 486 The Greimas square applied to interview number 8 487 The Greimas square applied to interview number 5 487 The Greimas square applied to interview number 7 488

Migratory processes and the religious dimension in migrant narratives 496

Action conducted by the FBos and the explication of the religious dimension 502

Religious composition of international migrants, 2010 508 Religious composition of international migrants in the EU, 2010 509 Tables

Countries where nationalist political parties or politicians targeted religious groups in 2016, and religious groups that were targeted 56 The “Drama triangle” 65

Countries involved in the third and fourth Arab Barometer

survey 206

Religious belonging of representative samples interviewed in 2014 (3rd wave) and 2016 (4th wave) 207

Do you consider yourself to be a religious person? 208 Do you pray daily? 208

Do you always listen to or read the Quran/the Bible? 209 Islam Law Conformity Index by sex and age 212

Which of the following statements is the closest to your point of view? Laws of our country should be based... 214

X

7.8

713 714

7-23

8.1

8.2

14.7 21.1 21.2

21.3

22.1 23.1

23.2

FIGURES AND TABLES

Compatibility of Western democracy with Islam teachings:

agreement 215

Banks charging interest contradict the teachings of Islam 216 Islamic Traditionalism Index by sex and age 217

Gender mixed education should be allowed in universities 218

Women should wear modest clothes without needing to wear

hijab 218

Islam Openness Index by sex and age 219

Islamic Traditionalism Index (recorded in three levels) (Ist INDEX R3) by Islam Openness Index (recorded in three levels) (Iso INDEX R3) 220 Islam pluralistic typology 220

Secular Politics Index R3 222

Secular Politics Index by sex and age 222

Fundamentalism Index by sex and age 223

Fundamentalism Index R3 223

Religious — Not religious political party agreement 224

Correlation coefficients between indexes 225

Frequencies of indexes grouped in three levels 225

How do you view the relationship between Christians (in Egypt: Copts) and Muslims in reality? 227

CEDAW Convention acceptance 236

Sample sizes by country and survey 245

Results of asylum applications. Italy, 2016-2018 325

The empirical reference group: case studies and interviews 468 A summary of the first case study 471

A summary of the second case study 474

A summary of the third case study 477

A summary of the fourth case study 479

Religious persecution and migration paths: a summary based on the case studies 492

Values andactionsin the interreligious dialogue and religious integration 498

Focus groups with students — participants’ composition 673 Focus groups with adults — participants’ composition 674 Items for focus group interview — reference to 4 keywords and comparison between targets 674

Most frequently mentioned words during the focus groups 685 Number of conflicts mentioned in focus groups by students or adults 724

Religious-based conflicts emerging from FGs with students 726

FIGURES AND TABLES

23-3 23.4

23-5

23.6

23-7 24.1

25.1

Religious-based conflicts emerging from FGs with adults 731 Word frequency query concerning conflict and problems in relationships 735

Words, attitudes, behaviors emerging in religious-based conflicts from FGs with adults 736

Words, attitudes, behaviors emerging in religious-based conflicts from FGs with students 739

Religious divide among generations 750

The feeling of being French according to the religion and school experiences — linear regression, stepwise method (N = 2 625) 765 Actions/activities carried out while working on cultural

diversity 774

Notes on Contributors

Mario Antonelli

is a Priest of the Archdiocese of Milan. At the Pontifical Gregorian University, he took his doctorate in Theology with a thesis about the Action by Maurice Blondel. He started teaching in 1989. Until 2018, he was Professor of Fundamental Theology at the Seminary of the Archdiocese of Milan, with the occasional teaching of Trinitary Theology and Ecclesiology. He was sent as fidei donum to the area of Belém (Brazil) where he also taught Theological Anthropology, Trinitary Theology and Christology from 2004 to 2010. He is a collaborator of the missionary Pastoral and of the pastoral Care of Migrants, and since 2018 he has been Episcopal Vicar for Education and Celebration of Faith in the Archdiocese of Milan.

Fr. Fabio Baggio

is a member of the Missionaries of St. Charles Borromeo. He gained a doctorate in Church History at the Pontifical Gregorian University in 1998. Fr. Baggio worked as a pastor in Santiago de Chile from 1995 to 1997 and was also advisor for migrations to the Chilean bishops’ conference (INCAMI). Afterwards, until 2002, he served as Director of the Department for Migration of the Archdiocese of Buenos Aires. From 1999-2010, he taught at the Universidad del Salvador in Buenos Aires as well as at the Ateneo de Manila and at the Maryhill School of Theology at Quezon City in the Philippines, where he was Director of the Scalabrini Migration Center (smc). Since the year 2000, he was also Professor at the Scalabrini International Migration Institute (SIMI), which is incorporated into the Theology Faculty of the Pontifical Urban University in Rome. He became Director of the Institute in 2010. From 1 January 2017 he is Under-Secretary of the Refugees and Migrants Section, Dicastery for the Promotion of Integral Human Development (Holy See).

Paola Barachetti

graduated in Political and Social Science. She has had a long career in a nonprofit organization offering social welfare services, including those devoted to migrants and refugees. She is currently affiliated with the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, where she is serving as Teaching Assistant. Her research interests include intercultural psychology and social practice; acculturation and integration in migrant families and children; the influence of religious values in the process of social inclusion.

NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS XIII

Alessandro Bergamaschi holder of an international French-Italian Ph.D. in Sociology, is Associate Professor at the University of the Côte d'Azur. His research focuses on the manifestations of xenophobia among adolescents and on the role of formal education in the prevention of interethnic intolerance. He is a member of the “Migrations et société” research unit (CNRS 8245 — IRD 205) and fellow at the Institut Convergences Migrations — INED Paris.

Olga Bernad-Cabero

is a Postdoctoral fellow of the Department of Pedagogy at the University of Lleida, Catalonia, Spain. Her research lines focus on the sociology of education, family and school relations, migration and cultural diversity. She has carried out research at the University of Montreal and at the University of Dakar. She is a trainer and consultant at educational centers and has given numerous lectures, communications and consultations for various institutions. In recent years, she has published articles and book chapters in prestigious publishing houses. She is part of the GR-ASE research group “Educational and Social Analysis” of UdL.

Catherine Blaya

is Professor of Education Sciences at the University for Teachers’ Education in Lausanne (Switzerland). She teaches at the Special Education Needs unit and is Co-Director of its Research Centre for the Prevention of School Dropout (LASALE). She is member of the Research Unit on Migrations and Society (UMR CNRS 8245-IRD 205), specialized in the study of migrations and interethnic relations at the University Nice Sophia Antipolis. She has been dedicating her academic career to researching issues that might affect young people’s lives, such as dropping out of school, school climate, cyberbullying, and cyberhate.

Lucia Boccacin

Ph.D. in sociology, is currently Full Professor of Cultural Sociology in the Faculty of Education, Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan. Chair of National Scientific Qualification in Sociology of the Cultural and Communicative Processes, Scientific Sector 14/C2, years 2016-2018.

Her investigations focus on the third sector, partnership models among the third sector and other social macro-players, social policies and social services, family and intergenerational relations.

Paolo Bonetti is Associate Professor of Constitutional Law at the University of Milano- Bicocca, where he teaches Institutions of Public Law and Immigration Law in

XIV NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS undergraduate and postgraduate degrees. Among other things, he conducts research on the organization of jurisdiction and fundamental rights, on social and family rights and on the principles of equality, the conditions of foreigners and the right to asylum. He has collaborated with ismu Foundation — Initiatives and Studies on Multi-ethnicity and with oRIM (the Regional Centre for immigration supported by the Lombardy Regional Council) on the collection, analysis and processing of regulatory and judicial data regarding immigration and asylum applications from a constitutional perspective. He also collaborated with the Inter-University Research Centre on Service of Public Utility for the Individual (CRISP) on a report about the situation of undocumented foreigners in Italy for the EU Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA). He took part in and coordinated the working group for the research on “Administrative Judges and Constitutional Rights” that ended with the convention held at the University of Trento (2011), where he delivered an introductory lecture on the independence and impartiality of the administrative judge.

Donatella Bramanti

is Full Professor of Sociology of the Family and Sociology of Personal Services at the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan. She has conducted a number of studies on the themes of family and of ageing population. She has also participated in numerous research projects. She has collaborated with the National Observatory of the Family with a research on “Self-sufficient Seniors and Family Friendly Services”. She is the author and co-author of over 100 monographs and articles concerning social policies, personalized services and good practices, social and cultural family transformations, impact evaluation in the field of personalized services and educational processes.

Luca Bressan Presbyter of the Diocese of Milan since 1987. At the Archiepiscopal Seminary of Milan, he teaches Homiletics and Pastoral Theology. He is a permanent Professor at the Theological Faculty of Northern Italy (Milan). Since June 2012, he has been Episcopal Vicar for Culture, Charity, Mission and Social Action.

Maddalena Colombo is Full Professor of Sociology of Cultural and Communicative processes; she teaches “Sociology of Education’, “Sociology of Educational Policy” and “Sociology of Inequalities and Differences” at the Faculty of Education, Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan and of Brescia. She is the Director of the CIRMiB (Centre of Initiatives and research on Migration — Brescia) and of the Laris (Laboratory of Research and Intervention on Society). She is a

NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS XV member of the Scientific Board of several journals in Italy. She co-ordinates the AIS-Education section. At the Milan campus of ucsc, she co-ordinates the Jean Monnet Module IDEAL -Intercultural Dialogue in Europe and Active poLicies (a.y. 2016/2019). Last publication on the topic: “The impact of Ethnicity on school life: a cross-national post-commentary’, in “Italian Journal of Sociology of Education’, (3) 2018.

Jordi Garreta-Bochaca

holds a degree and a doctorate in Sociology from the Autonomous University of Barcelona and is currently teaching at the University of Lleida. He has carried out research on educational sociology and sociology of migrations and is Director of GR-ASE research group “Educational and Social Analysis” of UdL. As well as presenting his work in conventions, he has published articles in national and international journals and books (https://lleida.academia.edu/JordiGarretaBochaca). He has carried out various research visits at the Centre d'Études Ethniques at the University of Montreal (1996, 1998, 2000 and 2009) and the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris (1997, 1998, 2007, 2010 and 2020).

Cristina Giuliani is an academic researcher and serves as Assistant Professor of Social Psychology at the Faculty of Linguistic Sciences, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan. She is also member of the Family Studies and Research University Centre. Her main issues of research are the following: critical family transition and resiliency processes, migration processes, acculturation process and family relationship transformations in post-migration, Muslim immigrant families.

Paolo Gomarasca

Ph.D. , is an Associate Professor in Moral Philosophy at the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences — Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, where he currently teaches “Social Philosophy”, “Philosophy of Intercultural Dialogue’, “Ethics of Care”, “Ethics and Professional Conduct for Social Work” and “Global Ethics”. At the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, he is a member of the Doctoral Board of Ph.D. “Social Work and Personal Social Services”, a member of Research Centre of Relational Social Work (Rsw) and a member of the Transdisciplinary Research On Food Issues Centre (TROFIC). He is also an external collaborator in the international project “Emotional culture and identity’, Instituto Cultura y Sociedad, Universidad de Navarra, Pamplona (Spain). His areas of study and research are the following: care ethics for social work, gender studies, studies on refugees, and food ethics.

XVI NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS

Nuria Llevot-Calvet

is Professor in the Department of Pedagogy at the University of Lleida, Catalonia, Spain (Serra Hunter Programme of the Generalitat of Catalonia). Her lines of research focus on mediation and intercultural education, religious diversity, ethnic minorities and cooperation between Africa and Europe. She has carried out several research stays at universities such as Sherbrooke, Quebec, Montreal, Paris, Mostar, Dakar, Padua, Rome; she has given lectures and training courses in various centers and has published articles in journals, as well as book chapters and books. She is a member of the Board of Directors in the Research Institute “INDEST” and in the Research Group GR-ASE “Educational and Social Analysis” of UdL.

Rosangela Lodigiani

Ph.D. , is an Associate Professor of Sociology of Economics at the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences — Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, where she currently teaches “Employment relations and active labor market policies”, “European Social Policies’, and “General Sociology”. She is member of the WWELL (Work, Welfare, Enterprise and Lifelong Learning) Research Centre’s Steering Board at the Department of Sociology, and member of the Scientific Committee of the Ph.D. Course in “Sociology, Organizations, Cultures” at the same University. Her research interests are focused on labor market, lifelong learning and activations policies, as well as on Italian and European active welfare system’s reform and innovation, in a comparative perspective. On these issues, she has carried out and managed many field-research projects and published several essays and papers.

Vera Lomazzi

received her Ph.D. in Sociology and Social Research Methods in 2015. She is a Senior Researcher at the Data Archive for Social Sciences at GEsIs — Leibniz Institute for Social Sciences in Cologne, Germany, and Secretary of the Executive Committee of the European Values Study. Her substantive research mainly focuses on the cross-cultural study of gender equality and gender role attitudes, youth engagement, and collective identities. She has a specific interest in the quality of the instruments adopted by large cross-sectional survey programs and on their measurement equivalence. Before joining GESIS, she took part as trainer and consultant in a UNICEF-funded project in South Lebanon (2014-2015) and was research fellow at the University of Aberdeen, where she was involved in the Ec-funded project “Arab Transformations”.

NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS XVII

Linda Lombi Ph.D. in Sociology, is Assistant Professor at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, where she teaches “Sociology and Methods” (Faculty of Education Science). Her research interests are around welfare policies, health sociology, and digital research.

Paolo Maggiolini is Research Fellow at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, Faculty of Political and Social Sciences, and Adjunct Professor in “Regional Studies — Middle East and History of Islamic Asia’, Faculty of Linguistic Sciences and Foreign Literatures.

Monica Martinelli is Associate Professor of Sociology at the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan and a member of the “Centre for the Anthropology of Religion and Cultural Change” (arc). Her scientific research focuses on the study of the sociological classics and their questions about the relationship between the individual and society, applied to contemporary socio-cultural transformations.

Stefania Giada Meda is a sociology researcher at the Universita Cattolica’s Centre for Family Studies and Research. Her main research topics are in the field of sociology of the family, ageing, and social policies. She was awarded a Marie Curie Actions fellowship for international mobility and research.

Alessia Melcangi

is Tenure Track Assistant of “Contemporary History of North Africa and Middle East and Globalization and International Relations’ at the Sapienza University of Rome, Department of Social Sciences and Economics (DissE), Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council, Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East, Washington D.C., and collaborates with the Centre of Research on the Southern System and the Wider Mediterranean (CRissMA-—Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore).

Giulia Mezzetti has recently obtained a Ph.D. in Sociology. She is Researcher and project Officer at ISMU Foundation — Initiatives and Studies on Multiethnicity, a research institute on migration and integration. Her research interests concern children

XVIII NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS of Muslim migrants’ religiosity, activism and visibility, contemporary forms of jihadist radicalization and the religion-integration nexus.

Beatrice Nicolini

has a degree in International Relations and Comparative Government from Harvard University, U.S.A. and graduated in Political Sciences from Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan. She obtained a Ph.D. in History of Africa from Siena University, Italy. She is Full Professor of “History and Institutions of Africa, Religions, Conflicts and Slavery, Indian Ocean World’, Faculty of Political and Social Sciences at the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan. Expert for Zanzibar V-Dem — Varieties of Democracy Project, Oslo University, Norway. She has received grants and recognition for her research from Italy, from the Sultanate of Oman and from the UK. She has released more than 110 publications, most of which in English, and a number of them have been translated into Arabic.

Andrea Plebani is Associate Fellow at the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan and Adjunct Professor in Geopolitics, Faculty of Linguistic Sciences and Foreign Literatures.

Riccardo Redaelli

is the Director of the Center for Research on the South and the Wider Mediterranean System (CRiSsMA) and Director of the Master in Middle Eastern Studies (MIMES) of the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, and Full Professor of “History and Institutions of Asia”. He also teaches “Post Conflict and Emergency Management”. Member of the “Observatory on Religious Minorities in the World and the Respect for Religious Freedom’ of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, since 2004 he has been coordinating a plurality of Track-two programs of national reconciliations, international cooperation and knowledge transfer in the Middle East. He published more than 100 monographs, edited books, essays and articles on the history and contemporary politics of the Middle East.

Camillo Regalia is Full Professor of Social Psychology at the Faculty of Education, Director of the Ph.D. program in Social and Developmental Psychology at the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, and member of the executive committee of the Family Studies and Research University Centre. His main issues of research are the following: psychological integration of first and second generation of immigrants; cultural identity and family processes; Muslim migration in the West.

NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS XIX

Giovanna Rossi

is a Full Professor of Sociology of the Family, Faculty of Psychology, and Head of the Centre for Family Studies and Research, Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, since 1997. She is also Member of the EsA (European Sociological Association) Advisory Board of Research Network 13 “Sociology of Families and Intimate Lives”. She carried out extensive and documented research focusing on family, social policy, and third sector. She is author and co-author of many books and over 130 scientific contributions on national and international journals, editor of “Studi di Sociologia” (Sociology Studies) and of “Sociologia e Politiche sociali” (Sociology and Social Policy), Co-Director of “Studi interdisciplinari sulla Famiglia” (Interdisciplinary Studies on Family) and “Politiche sociali e servizi” (Social Policy and Services).

Giancarlo Rovati

was Full Professor of Sociology at the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan (from 2003 to 2018), teaching “General Sociology” and “Sociology of Development” in the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences. He has been involved in several national research projects, supported by CNR and MIUR and in multinational research projects on Values System change (in the context of European Values Study program), cultural enterprises (in the context of the European Community ADAPT program), international cooperation programs with Russia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine (in the context of Tempus-Tacis program); development cooperation programs (in the context of the Orphan Vulnerable Children — ovc program managed by Avsi and supported by USAID in Kenia, Rwanda, Uganda, Ivory Coast). He was member of the national board of the Italian Sociological Association (1996-1998); President of the national Inquiry Commission on Social Exclusion — CIES (2002-2007), member of EVS Theory Group and Italian Director of the Iv and v wave of the European Values Survey (EVS-Italy 2008 and 2017) coordinated by University of Tilburg. His main fields of theoretical and empirical researches are the following: cultural institutions, social-economic élites, social stratification, change in religious, moral and political values, development and globalization, poverty and social exclusion.

Mariagrazia Santagati is Assistant Professor of “Sociology of Education” in the Faculty of Education at the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, as well as Scientific Secretary of the CIRMiB. She is the head of the Department for Education of the ISMU Foundation (Initiatives and Studies on Multiethnicity) and, since 2010, she has been the editor of the annual “Report on students with non-Italian

XX NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS citizenship’, promoted by the Ministry of Education and IsMu. Her main scientific interests deal with the connections between education and migration (ethnic inequalities; successful students with an immigrant background; interethnic and interreligious relationships; intercultural policies). Last publication on the topic: “The (im)possible success of disadvantaged students. Reflections on education, migration and social change” in Arxius de Ciències Socials, (40) 2019.

Andrea Santini

is Associate Professor of European Union Law at the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, where he also coordinates the Bachelor course in Political Sciences and International Relations and is a member of the Ph.D. School of Institutions and Policies. He has recently published, with Ugo Draetta and Francesco Bestagno, the handbook Elementi di diritto del’ Unione europea — Parte istituzionale, Giuffrè Francis Lefebvre, Milan, 2018.

Annavittoria Sarli Ph.D. in Anthropology, collaborates as a researcher and expert in migration studies with the wwELL (Work, Welfare, Enterprise Lifelong Learning) Centre of the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan and with IsMu Foundation- Initiatives and Studies on Multi-ethnicity in Milan. Author of several scientific publications, she has collaborated in various national and international research projects.

Monica Spatti Ph.D. in International, Supranational and European Institutions at the University of Teramo, is a researcher of “European Law” at the Faculty of Political and Social Science at the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan. Her main research subjects concern the international and European system of protection of human rights, especially regarding migration, privacy, freedom of expression and religious rights.

Giovanni Giulio Valtolina educated in Padua, Milan and Chicago, is currently affiliated with the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, where he is serving as Associate Professor of “Developmental Psychology”.

At the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, he is also member of the faculty board of the Ph.D. program in Relational Social Work and Personal Social Services.

NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS XXI

His research interests are the following: intercultural psychology and social practice; migrant children; acculturation and psychosocial adaptation in migrant families. Since 2000, he has been a member of the editorial committee of the Ismu Italian Report on Migrations and since 2009 he has also been serving as Head of the Child and Family Department at Ismu Foundation - Initiatives and Studies on Multiethnicity in Milan.

Ph.D. in Sociology, is Full Professor at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore of Milan, where she teaches “Sociology of Migrations and Interethnic Relations” and “Organizations, Environment and Social Innovation”. She is the Scientific Director of the research center WWELL (Work, Welfare, Enterprise and Lifelong Learning); the coordinator of the Board of Professors of the Master's Degree in Labor and Business Management; and the Scientific Director of the Summer School “Human Mobility and Global Justice”. She is Head of the Economic and Labor Department, as well as the scientific supervisor of the Documentation Center (CeDoc) at ısMU Foundation — Initiatives and Studies on Multiethnicity, the most important Italian scientific institution studying international migrations and intercultural relations. She is member of several editorial boards, scientific networks, and consultative bodies; she took part and coordinated various international research project. She is the author of about 400 publications, including books, essays, articles and research reports, published both in Italy and abroad. Among these, the first Sociology of Migration and Sociology of Interethnic Coexistence handbooks ever published in Italy and several dictionary and encyclopedia entries.

Part 1

Migrations and Religious Belongings: from Periphery to Core, for a New Humanism

Chapter 1

Introduction: General Description of the Study, Key Issues, and Provisional Conclusions

1 Migrants and Religion: a Challenging Couple for European Contemporary Societies

There has been an extraordinary surge in international migration in recent years, both in the volume of flows and in their composition.! Within this complex scenario, Europe has become the first destination in the world in terms of migrants’ arrivals and, in the last years, it has faced the most dramatic refugee crisis since the end of World War11. In amore patent way than ever, newcomers are obliging Europe to confront with the multi-faceted religious landscape of migrants’ sending countries. Dramatic circumstances such as the growing influence of Boko Haram in Nigeria -and of its foolish attempt to “purify Islam” and society as a whole-, the increasing intolerance towards Christians in Egypt -a sort of “spill-over” effect of terrorism in Iraq and Syria (Open Doors, 2019)-, or the upsurging of religious nationalism in India are now irrupting in European society, through the arrival of people claiming protection or, at times, accused of corrupting “our” —European- religious identity, or even of importing the virus of religious intolerance and religious radicalism to Europe.

While forcing European societies to become aware of the tremendous religious-based violations and persecutions that are characterizing the contemporary global scenario, new arrivals are challenging the main distinction on which European migration regimes have been traditionally based: the discrimination between voluntary and forced migrants. For this reason, all along the book we will put the adjective “forced” within brackets, in order to emphasize the porous and disputable character of this concept. More deeply, paraphrasing Sayad’s well-known concept (1999), new arrivals “disturb” Europe and its systems of refugee protection, whereas asylum seekers’ religious affiliations seem to represent, in themselves, an “embarrassing” variable that discloses the

1 https://www.un.org/development/desa/en/news/population/international-migrantstock-2019.html.

This is an open access chapter distributed under the terms of the Cc BY-NC-ND 4.0 license.

weaknesses and pitfalls of these systems, since the latter were built in a geopolitical context that was very distant from the contemporary one.

As a matter of fact, religious-based claims mirror the extraordinary enlargement of the concept of forced mobility, once circumscribed by the definition provided by the Geneva Convention. However, today it has been progressively extended to include new categories of individuals, situations, and agents of persecution. Yet, because of their nature, both complex and intimate, this kind of claim easily feeds the suspect of the recurrence of “bogus” requests (as we will describe in Chapter 11), thus contributing to the delegitimization of the asylum institute. Finally, asylum’s procedures and practices face while being influenced by them, preconceptions and distorted convictions about the different religious groups, and about the relations among them. As is shown by the Middle Eastern region —the cradle of the three main monotheistic faiths, chosen as one of the focuses of the present study-, current analyses are often dominated by opposite understandings, unable to comprehend the “turbulent” situations of Europe’ peripheries, but also unable to grasp what is really at stake.