Josep Bielsa Guiu analyzes the process of integration of extra-community immigrants in the municipalities of Vandellós and Hospitalet de l’Infante (province of Tarragona) populations with the double objective of knowing how and in what way the integration process is carried out and, on the other hand, improving the patterns of insertion social status of these minorities.
When I proposed the realization of the present investigation on the integration of the second generations and an approach to the immigration situation of non-community origin in the municipality of Vandellós and Hospitalet de l’Infant, I established some lines of research framed in the concept of “community”, developed from the conception of neo-etnicity that Oliver Roy exhibited of it. Later, we will analyze Roy’s treatment of the community concept, and how it relates to the Islamic umma (community of believers). I believe, too, that its interpretation can be extrapolated to other groups that maintain community ties not only articulated from the religious fact. From this point, the investigation of settlement processes of non-community origin in Catalonia is developed, and consequently, in the municipalities of Vandellós and l’Hospitalet de l’Infant.
I do not only want to refer to the current migratory flows motivated by the socioeconomic changes that have taken place at a global level, which undoubtedly aggravate the existing differences between the South and / or Periphery (poor countries), and the North and / or Center (rich countries), but also would like to make special mention of the new stage of settlement of the different communities that make up the diversity arc of immigration from non-EU origin. I think that a first phase of provisional arrival of foreign population has already been overcome, and the time has come for a new sector of Catalan citizenship to appear publicly, the sons and daughters of those who have come to the Principality for basically economic reasons from countries of extra-community scope. Young people are in a stage of life in which the definition of identity is key to the establishment of integration models that configure our society as a meeting point for different cultures, and that these are redefined by creating a new one, taking advantage of the traditionally integrating channels of Catalan society (ius solis). Therefore, respect for the multiculturalism of Catalan society should be the objective of policies aimed at fostering social cohesion. However, multiculturalism must gradually give way to the interaction of different cultural features, not only of collectives, but also of individuals, who through participation should be able to model spaces of public and private intervention.
