Network of Excellence: IMISCOE - International Migration, Integration and Social Cohesion in Europe

International migration, both into and within the EU, has become a fundamental issue in the current political discussion and daily politics. It is set to remain so for many years to come, for reasons that lie both inside and outside Europe. This will have far-reaching consequences for the member states and for the EU as a whole. Migration and integration issues such as how to manage demand and supply-driven migration, how to integrate residents with a migration background, how to adapt institutional arrangements to preserve social cohesion require in-depth and international comparative research. This task will be taken up for the next five years by the IMISCOE Network of Excellence (NoE), in which 23 established research institutes cooperate in an integrated approach.

The IMISCOE NoE was initiatived by Prof. Rinus Penninx of IMES at the University of Amsterdam, who assembled 15 European research institutes for a Call for Expressions of Interest by the EU Commission. All participating institutes have a long-standing experience of research in this field and dispose of an established infrastructure for continuous research in the fields of migration and integration.

The group of finally 19 institutes coordinated by Prof. Penninx filed in 2003 an application in the context of the 6th Framework Programme of the EU Commission on Research. Out of numerous applications, the IMISCOE NoE proposal was one of three successful NoE proposals within the 7th priority ( Citizenship and Governance).

The network is structured by nine thematic clusters. The network is divided into nine thematic clusters. The efms is involved in all of them with its senior researchers and doctoral students and conducted one of two studies on core "strategic lines of research" of the network, the INTPOL study.

Funding: European Union, DG Research, 6th Framework Programme, Networks of Excellence
Completion: 2010
efms Researchers: Friedrich Heckmann, Wolfgang Bosswick
Publications: IMISCOE