Migration and Social Cohesion in the UK

This book argues that social cohesion is achieved through people (new arrivals as well as the long-term settled) being able to resolve the conflicts and tensions within their day-to-day lives in ways that they find positive and viable. These everyday tensions and difficulties are not the result of segregated communities or introduced by problematic new arrivals but rather arise from the conditions of postindustrialism, individualism and neoliberalism. These social and economic forces shape the contours of people's everyday lives, varying according to where they live and the histories of those places. Most important are the histories and narratives of earlier migrations in each place. This book challenges the prevailing view that social cohesion is about the assimilation of new immigrants through acceptance of shared values of Britishness. Rather social cohesion is achieved through people's broad acceptance of a diverse Britain and by navigating the fine lines between separateness and commonalities/differences and unity in the places where they live.

NICOLA MAI is reader in Migration Studies at the Institute for the Study of European Transformations at London Metropolitan University, UK.

HELEN CROWLEY is senior research fellow in the Institute for the Study of European Transformations at London Metropolitan University, UK.