CGM reports

Challenges and opportunities in municipal work towards long-term integration in the County of Västra Götaland

On behalf of the County Administrative Board of Västra Götaland, CGM has conducted a study on the challenges and opportunities in municipal work towards long-term and sustainable integration in the County of Västra Götaland. This study is written by Sylwia Jedrzejewska and Andrea Spehar, and is available in both Swedish and English.

The immigration of refugees, including families, adults and unaccompanied children, increased especially in 2015. Along with changes in the regulations in integration policy, this has presented new challenges for the municipalities’ work with the reception and integration of new arrivals. In recent years, the integration of immigrants into society has become a hot political topic. Integration is a heatedly debated topic in both politics and the media. But what does the word integration actually mean? How should integration be measured, who is to be integrated into what, and when is a person integrated?

The report focuses, among other things, on examining how the term integration is understood by civil servants who on a daily basis work with integration at the municipal level. To do so, civil servants’ perceptions and experiences of work on integration were studied.

In order to gather the experiences from different municipalities’ work with the establishment of newly arrived refugees in the period 2015–2018, the County Administrative Board of Västra Götaland organised two dialogue days with representatives of the municipalities within the county in May 2019. To gain deeper insight into how people who work with newly arrived immigrants regard the relation between their establishment period and long-term integration, the County Administrative Board of Västra Götaland commissioned CGM to conduct in-depth interviews with a number of civil servants working at municipalities and other government agencies within the County of Västra Götaland. The dialogue days were organized by the County Administrative Board with the aims of collecting positive experiences in the reception of newly arrived immigrants in the County of Västra Götaland and of identifying factors for success for the sustainable reception of new arrivals in the long term. Altogether, representatives of 29 of the county’s 49 municipalities participated at the event.

This study increases knowledge about the challenges and opportunities in municipal work and contributes to long-term and sustainable integration in the County of Västra Götaland. Furthemore, the experiences and conclusions that are described in this report contribute to strengthening future work on being prepared and having capacity in the reception of newly arrived immigrants in the County of Västra Götaland.

NEW IN THE CITY: How newly arrived refugees experience reception and integration in the City of Gothenburg, 2015-2017

On behalf of the City of Gothenburg, CGM has conducted a study on how newly arrived refugees experience the reception and integration activities organised by the City. On behalf of the City of Gothenburg, CGM has conducted a study on how newly arrived refugees experience the reception and integration activities organised by the City. This study is written by Kristin Franke Björkman and Andrea Spehar.

The purpose of the study is to explore how the newly arrived population themselves have experienced the reception in the City of Gothenburg, the second largest municipality in Sweden, focusing on housing, education in Swedish for immigrants (SFI), civic orientation, adult education and social services. In addition, activities for labour market integration are also included, despite primarily being the responsibility of the Public Employment Services (PES).

The study will contribute with more nuanced knowledge regarding the newly arrived population’s opinions, experiences and ideas. This knowledge can be used in order to identify how different aspects of the reception and integration process in the City of Gothenburg can be improved and made more efficient. To give newly arrived refugees a voice in the reception and integration debate has been a key aspect of the study’s purpose and the informants appreciated this opportunity to share their views. The study is based on group interviews and individual interviews with refugees that arrived during 2015- 2017.