Producing Pathways to Success: New Perspectives on Social Mobility

Abstract

AbstractThis chapter sketches the state of the debate on the roles and positions of native-born children of immigrants in European countries more than half a century after the transformation of these countries into immigration societies. It focusses on the social mechanisms, potentials and effects of the increasing number of socially upwardly mobile offspring of immigrant working-class families – and the lacunae in research on them. We introduce some of the central theoretical concepts that have informed the diverse research projects within the Pathways to Success consortium and the empirical comparisons throughout this book. We describe and justify why we talk about new social mobilities in light of the extraordinary nature of this group’s social mobility. Many of the social climbers’ parents, recruited as part of ‘guest worker’ schemes, had attained levels of formal education well below the average of non-immigrant workers’ families. But having taken the risk of migrating to another country, these parents also transmitted high levels of ambition and expectations to their children. In addition to individual characteristics, we emphasize the importance of institutional arrangements by making use of the integration context theory, which offers an important framework for understanding the opportunities and obstacles put in place by educational and labour market systems and specific professional sectors.