METROPOLIS INTER CONFERENCE -
International Conference on Divided Cities and Strategies for Undivided Cities,
Göteborg, Sweden, May 25 - 26, 1998

Some fell upon stony places, some fell into good ground!

Summary from the evaluation of the project Special Measures in Immigrant Residential Areas in the Districts Hyllie and Rosengård in Malmö

Gunnar Alsmark (ed.) Jonas Bjälesjö, Per Broomé, Rolf Ohlsson

Background and Disposition of the Report

At the request of the Scientific Council of the Welfare and Social Health Committee in Malmö, Gunnar Alsmark, Associate Professor of Ethnology and Rolf Ohlsson, Professor of Economic History, both based at Lund University, headed an evaluation of the project Special Measures/Efforts in Immigrant Residential Areas in the Districts Hyllie and Rosengård in Malmö.

The following report is the final result of this evaluation, which was carried out primarily by Jonas Bjälesjö, an ethnologist, and Per Broomé, a researcher at the Foundation for Demographic Economics in Stockholm. This evaluation encompasses the first year of the project, 1997, and is more or less considered to be a pilot survey which lays the foundation for more in-depth research in the future activities of the project.

Proposition 1994/95:100, Appendix 11, on Special Measures in Areas with High Immigrants Densities describes the background of this report on the measures taken in Hyllie and Rosengård in the following way:

A number of residential areas, primarily in big cities, have very high percentages of immigrants. Some areas are even entirely dominated by immigrants who seldom have contact with the general population. This makes integration into Swedish society much more difficult.

On this basis, the government earmarked SEK 125 million in the 1995/96 national budget for special measures in areas in big cities with high immigrant densities. The aim of these measures is to increase the skills and labour market participation of the residents in these areas as well as to concretely contribute to positive social development and combat exclusion. The proposition also states what measures should be supported by the fund:

The funds appropriated should be used for project measures in a limited number of segregated areas with high immigrant densities in big cities. The measures should build upon local initiatives from the municipalities and districts in question. The municipalities in question are to have the operative responsibility for the implementation of the project. It is expected that the Employment Office[arbetsförmedlingen], the Social Insurance Office [försäkringskassa], the county government, trade union organizations and other organizations will participate in the project.

In a supplementary directive (Ministry of Labour A 95/1307/IP) which followed the proposition deriving from communication between the Ministry of Labour and the municipalities in question, the conditions for the fund were further specified, including the following:

• that the fund is seen as a start-up contribution and that continuation should be financed by the municipalities;
  
• that the fund is to contribute a maximum of half of the cost of a project;
  
• that a detailed plan of action must be made for each city district;
  
• that special measures for women and girls should be accounted for;
  
• that the fund is not to be used to pay waged employment positions;
  
• that three percent of the total cost of the plan of action should be set aside for follow-up and evaluation work.
  

Malmö has used the fund for areas with high immigrant density in 1996/97. The overarching goals for the City of Malmö largely follow the directive from the Ministry of Labour:

• to increase the skills of immigrants and increase their participation on the labour market;
  
• to increase the daily contact between immigrants and other Swedes to facilitate learning the Swedish language and to improve opportunities for entering the labour market;
  
• to contribute to positive social and cultural development and combat exclusion by creating workplaces and meeting places in the residential areas.
  

The following sub-projects have been evaluated, the first by an ethnologist, the other three by economic historians:

• Meeting places in Hyllie and Rosengård
• Basic education study courses for adult immigrants
• OPS resource centres
• The self-help group within the RONJA project

The evaluators from the respective disciplines entered into the process in early 1997, that is to say after the planning work had already been under way for a while. The emphasis in our work lies in following the implementation of the ideas, that is to say, to what extent success has been achieved in carrying out the project, what has been positive and negative, etc. On the one hand, the opportunity to give fair value based evaluations has varied between the sub-projects which the ethnologists and economic historians investigated. For the latter, it was possible, to a degree, to use measurements in reaching conclusions, such as counting the number of people who go through the system and on to further studies.

The meeting place project, on the other hand, is highly heterogeneous, with a number of different interests involved. Opinions about what is good and bad vary greatly, resulting in difficulty in creating a coherent, exact picture.

For both disciplines as well as for the practitioners out in the field, the very limited time period of operation has meant that it has been very difficult to judge some of the most important goals of the project- increased social and cultural development and the degree of integration into society. Integration takes time and is a complex process, which hardly can be captured in figures and value judgements.

Summary of the Ethnological Evaluation in Hyllie and Rosengård

The project Special Measures in Residential Areas with High Immigrant Densities was comprised of intensive co-operation between the Ministry of Labour, the Municipality of Malmö, the Welfare and Public Health Committee, the Immigration Administration [Invandrarförvaltningen] and the district administrations in Hyllie and Rosengård in order to draft the overarching guidelines and goals of the project. A leadership group for the project was set up with the task of initiating activities in the residential areas of Hyllie and Rosengård. Within the framework of the project we have closely studied eight of the approximately twenty meeting points which were started, four in Hyllie and four in Rosengård.

• State directed projects of the type at issue here always contain unreflected upon and often unconscious presumptions with regard to ideological values, ways of thinking and work practices. Our opinion is that the project is permeated by a very Swedish organizational model, where the National Labour Exchange[arbetsförmedlingen], the Social Insurance Office[försäkringskassa], the county government, trade unions and other organizations are expected to participate, as is stated in the proposition. The consequence of this project culture is that implementation follows certain patterns and action strategies. Already at the initiation stage guidelines and limitations have been set which in part restrict Malmö’s freedom and ability to develop the project as it sees fit.

• The project’s overarching point of departure rests upon a description of reality dominated by segregation, spiritual and social misery, which is questioned all too little, and is all to un-nuanced. This negative attitude "motivates" the measures, but it has a residual effect of reinforcing a we versus them picture of immigrants as helpless people in dire need of municipal and state support.

• In accordance with the preceding point, the Immigrant Policy Association [Invandrarpolitiska föreningen] in Malmö criticized many of the measures for which the district administrations and immigration council, and especially the Welfare and Public Health Committee, made the final decisions concerning how money was to be used and prioritized. Much of the project’s activity appeared to be of a protected workplace character and the measures are not directed at the heart of the problems in Hyllie and Rosengård – unemployment and difficulty generating adequate income. In our analysis, we have chosen to metaphorically speak of aspirin instead of surgery, that is, treating the symptoms rather than the illness.

• The Immigrant Political/Policy Association [Invandrarpolitiska föreningen] along with the Co-operation Organization for Immigrant Associations in Malmö, as well as the Welfare and Public Health Committee criticized the starting up of the process as all too hasty and sudden. Many immigrant associations felt left out. The district administrations in this process ended up caught in the middle and were forced to devote a great deal of time trying to reconcile theory with praxis, which was experienced as divisive. Many respondents pointed to the lack of communication between different levels, primarily caused by a very tight time schedule. Most of the parties involved saw that things happened, but didn’t know "who had the ball". Many felt that they were not involved in planning, and waited for decisions to be made.

• When the specific subsidies were paid out, the meeting place activities commenced relatively quickly. Many people stated that the district administrations as the executive organizations were very responsive and flexible both as decision-makers and in implementation. Equally, co-operation between housing companies/landlords and the meeting places worked well. Premises were made available as well as help with the other activities. Co-operation between the residential areas, Hyllie and Rosengård, appears not to have developed. Contact and co-operation between the meeting places was primarily evident in Hyllie, where a well-functioning, overarching organization/network was created.

• In the proposal for meeting places in areas with high immigrant densities it was stated that if at all possible, their representation should mirror the neighborhoods' residential composition. We don’t believe that this has been the case in reality. Without being able to explain the causes of this, we can say that there are many groups which have not participated in the meeting place activities. Are they forgotten or do they simply not wish to participate?

• The project has primarily been planned in association with, and resources have been channeled to already established types of activities. The guidelines which were established have been interpreted and implemented in a traditional manner from the decision-makers’ side. The bottom-up perspective and local rooting which was intended has only partly been achieved. Such is also the case with the idea of striving for and/or developing the project without any preconditions and from entirely new ways of looking at matters. We view this as an expression of a situation which is difficult to reconcile as the municipality sits on two chairs at once. On the one hand, it encourages alternative activities, formulated from a grassroots perspective. On the other hand, it is governed by the more long-term goal implying that projects, with time, should become incorporated into other ordinary activities. This has resulted in most cases in electing to proceed down already well-trodden paths.

• The various meeting places, as well as the actual activities have shown that there has been an overall theme upon which all activities are based. Initiative and active participation aimed at breaking anonymity and isolation were naturally given objectives. Many meeting places also actively worked at teaching a form of civics and understanding Swedish society. Expressed a bit less pretentiously, these activities were oriented towards giving a few keys to unlocking a hidden and difficult to understand Swedishness.

• To the most difficult problem, the integration issue, it is difficult to offer a satisfactory answer. Time has been too short, both for the activities themselves and for us as evaluators. Even with more time it is methodologically difficult to assess to what extent individual projects, in this case the meeting places, have contributed to a person’s integration. However, some tendencies can be seen.

• A fundamental problem is that what is meant by integration has not been adequately analyzed and described by the responsible authorities. On this matter we, and the staff involved in the field, desire greater clarity.

• Associated with the first point in this summary, special measures as an expression of a Swedish organizational model, we see two risks in connection with the meeting place activity, (and most likely with a number of other projects as well). In part, this can ultimately result in assimilation rather than integration. The objectification of immigrants and the requisite help-package can also lead to pacification in the long run, seen from a broader societal perspective.

• Some meeting places are primarily oriented towards a certain category of people based on an experienced community. It is, for example, doubtful whether the aspects of the learning process we mentioned earlier neutralizes the ethnification which the interaction at the meeting places greatly contributes to. Contemporary IMER research (International Migration and Ethnic Relations) questions the often accepted presumption that integration and security within an ethnic group automatically makes it easier for individuals to actively work for integration into the majority society. It can just as well lead to ethnification and marginalisation, and in extreme cases to a sort of fundamentalism.

• If one is content with viewing the meeting places, in general, as a way of breaking anonymity and isolation, getting to meet new people over ethnic boundaries, etc., the meeting places by and large have been successful in attaining this goal. But, the question must always be posed in terms of to what extent, for how long and at what price this takes place? Looked at from this perspective we are more doubtful, while we are also aware that precise answers to these questions should be posed to phase two of the project, rather than the first phase which was studied.

• Finally, we see evaluation as an important first step in the development of co-operation both at the national level with similar research groups in Göteborg and Stockholm, and transnationally through future comparisons with similar studies within and outside Europe, (such as through Metropolis) and through workshops, conferences and the like. By participating in the project Special Measures in Residential Areas with High Immigrant Densities, the City of Malmö has taken an important step towards developing a competence in the area of integration in Sweden. The fact that politicians as well as practitioners have openly displayed an interest in an evaluation of this process is also something which should be pointed out.

Summary of the Economic-Historical Evaluation of Hyllie and Rosengård

In 1996/97, the City of Malmö used a special appropriation provided by the state for "areas with high immigrant densities", the so-called "Blomman fund". In our report, three projects financed by this fund have been evaluated. The projects which have been selected have been aimed at increasing immigrants’ skills and labour market participation in two districts of Malmö, Hyllie and Rosengård. The three projects are:

1. Basic education classes for adult immigrants
2. The OPS resource centres
3. The self-help group within the RONJA project in Hyllie

 Concisely stated, the goals of the projects have not been well met. The basic education studies for adult immigrants do lead to an increase in learning among the participants. But, as the goal and methods are not tailored to the students, failure is almost total when it comes to measurably increasing skills and inspiring continued studies.

The OPS resource centre has attained a greater rate of success, as approximately 41% of the participants go on to employment or further studies, which is the primary goal for OPS. There is also an opportunity within OPS to markedly improve its results via changes and improvements in its activities.

The self-help group marks an ideological departure from central management to local autonomy. The experimental nature of the self -help group, as well as its limited and temporary activity, makes it difficult to assess its results. Expectations about work and waged employment are modified in the self-help group based on the individual and the local context in a much more open manner than in the other projects. The question remains as to what position one should take with reference to the individual goals which the group mediates, for example, voluntary work versus the goal of the state’s measures of increasing skills and labour market participation.

The measures we have evaluated can, according to our analysis, be greatly improved. Integrating immigrants into society is a complex process. The proposals we present below are intended only to point out some important aspects which touch upon the measures which we have evaluated.

1. The first and most important point is to take immigrants seriously as individuals, with personal histories, in an acute situation and with a future when planning and implementing measures aimed at integration.
2. Second, it is important to have a holistic perspective of the integration process and work with it in a professional manner. The quality of the efforts is more important than the quantity!
3. Third, it is important to improve language training regardless of the other aims of the various measures.
4. Fourth, access to the world of employment for immigrants should be greatly increased through internships, contact meetings and field trips.
5. Fifth, support should be given to self-organized integration work.
6. Finally, the plurality of support measures should be increased by working in Malmö as a whole, while reducing the number of small competing and complementary actors engaged in integration activities.