ACIT

Access to citizenship and its impact on immigrant integration

EUDO CITIZENSHIP has been selected by the European Fund for the Integration of Thirdcountry Nationals (administered by DG Home Affairs) for financing of our new  research  project Access to citizenship and its impact on immigrant integration (ACIT).

The five consortium partners who will carry out the project jointly are: the European  University Institute, the Migration Policy Group (Brussels), University College Dublin,  University of Edinburgh and Maastricht University. Main goals of ACIT are to explore the  links between acquisition of nationality and the integration processes and to  encourage  effective measures for facilitating immigrants’ access to citizenship in the EU.

In its 18-month programme, ACIT will develop four sets of citizenship indicators on  citizenship laws, their implementation, rates of citizenship acquisition and its impact on  integration in all 27 EU Member States and accession candidate and EEA countries (Croatia,  Iceland,  FYROM Macedonia, Norway,  Switzerland, and Turkey). 10 EU  Member States  (Austria, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Portugal,  Spain, United  Kingdom) will be selected for in-depth case studies because of their large  immigrant and  foreign populations, diverse citizenship laws and high or low acquisition  rates. National  stakeholder dialogues will be organised by subcontracted NGO/think-tank partners in these  10 countries (in Vienna, Tallinn, Paris, Berlin, Budapest, Dublin, Rome, Lisbon, Barcelona,  London).

ACIT will collect and compare available national and international evidence on how  acquiring citizenship enhances immigrants’ participation in society and the democratic  process. It will analyse indicators to reveal the hidden links between citizenship and  integration policies within EU competence, including anti-discrimination, family reunion and  long-term residence.

ACIT will make a first-ever impact assessment of citizenship law in each country and across  Europe. The findings will reveal the effects of recent reforms and compare the impact of legal  rules with that of societal factors such as origin, residence duration, gender, age and social  status. Research results will be disseminated in 10 national handbooks, 4 comparative reports  based on the indicators and a final European-level report. ACIT will also highlight changes in  citizenship laws and implementation that  have improved integration in practice and it will  provide policy recommendations to  reinforce EU indicators on active citizenship and to  develop an EU module on “Citizenship and Integration.” 

Academic researchers, government and civil society will obtain data, comparative  analyses  and practical guidelines on how to evaluate policy outcomes, set targets and good governance  standards, and assess the prospective impact of policy changes. ACIT will contribute to more  effective policies and practices  for integration and citizenship  acquisition by creating  authoritative, comprehensive and easy-to-use databases which will foster European  information exchange and cooperation.

List of Publications