scholarly journals Securitizing Borders: The Case of South Tyrol

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Andrea Carlà
Keyword(s):  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
Ethnic Politics ◽  
Power Sharing ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Interethnic Relations ◽  
South Tyrol ◽  
Foreign Countries ◽  
Complex Power ◽  
Linguistic Groups ◽  
Italian Province

Abstract Situated at the interplay between ethnic politics, migration, border, and security studies, this contribution analyzes processes of securitization of borders in South Tyrol, an Italian province bordering Austria and Switzerland with a German- and Ladin-speaking population and a past of ethnic tensions. South Tyrol is considered a model for fostering peaceful interethnic relations thanks to a complex power-sharing system. However, the arrival of migrants from foreign countries and the more recent influx of asylum seekers have revitalized debates around the borders between South Tyrol/Italy and Austria and among South Tyrolean linguistic groups. The current COVID-19 pandemic has brought further complexity to the issue. I use the concept of securitization—the process through which an issue is considered as an existential threat requiring exceptional measures—in order to understand why and how borders become exclusionary and restrictive, shaping dynamics of othering. With this framework, the article explores how South Tyrolean borders have been subjected to (de)securitizing and resecuritizing moves in discourses and practices. In this way, I shed new light on debates on the articulation of borders and interethnic relations that are occurring due to recent international migration, consolidation of nationalist agendas, and the current pandemic.

Societal Security in South Tyrol: A Model to Deal with Ethnic Conflicts

2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-93
Author(s):  
Andrea Carlà
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Diversity ◽  
Ethnic Politics ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Security Threats ◽  
Ethnic Conflicts ◽  
The South ◽  
South Tyrol ◽  
Security Concerns ◽  
Emergency Measures

South Tyrol has been referred to as a model to deal with ethnic diversity and resolving ethnic conflicts. This article explains the South Tyrol model’s success by blending ethnic politics with concepts from security studies: societal security and securitization. Societal security refers to threats that emerge from the fact that humans belong to communal groups that do not correspond to defined state borders. Securitization is the process by which an issue is considered as an existential threat that requires emergency measures. The article develops a framework to identify which dynamics made South Tyrol successful, analyzing factors that sparked security concerns and processes of securitization and highlighting actions and measures that tackled these dynamics. Concurrently, South Tyrol is used as an empirical case to expand our understanding of societal security and elaborate (and test) a detailed toolkit to prevent or dissolve the violent mobilization of ethnic diversity and societal security threats.

scholarly journals Deservingness and Uneven Geographies of Asylum Accommodation

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Paolo Novak
Keyword(s):  
Social Life ◽  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
Meaningful Participation ◽  
The Social ◽  
Italian Province

The arrival of over six million asylum seekers in Europe since 2011 has engendered profound and ongoing governance transformations, which this article examines through the understudied perspective of asylum seekers’ accommodation. The article uncovers the unevenness of accommodation standards across reception centres in an Italian province, demonstrating how this heterogeneity selectively dis/enables the meaningful participation of asylum seekers in the social life of communities surrounding them. Second, it reveals how the circulation of asylum seekers across these facilities responds to performance-based deservingness criteria. Deservingness functions as a disciplining mechanism that mediates access to better forms of accommodation.

scholarly journals Building Bridges in Divided Societies: Sustaining Democratic Transition Through Complex Power-Sharing in Lebanon and Iraq

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 18-32
Author(s):  
Petros Petrikkos
Keyword(s):  
Hybrid Model ◽  
Democratic Transition ◽  
Power Sharing ◽  
Divided Societies ◽  
Complex Power ◽  
Fragile Environment

This paper looks at how divided societies like Lebanon and Iraq currently incorporate very fragile models of governance. The recommendations in this study attempt to introduce a hybrid model that considers integration and consociationalism as effective tools to electoral management in both countries, in light of the recent elections taking place in May 2018, and the continuities presented to this day. In assessing the effectiveness of consociationalism as a power-sharing framework, this paper does not attempt to depart from the already-established model of governance. Rather, the analysis presents elements that would hopefully improve power-sharing and governance in the two divided societies of Lebanon and Iraq. Elements as such may bring forth a steadier process that aids democratic transition in divided societies. Sectarianism is heavily embedded in both the Lebanese and Iraqi communities. Ignoring the conflicting issues that rise with each successive election only promotes a fragile environment that deeply divides, instead of uniting societies.

Beyond the Nation

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johanna Mitterhofer
Keyword(s):  
Minority Groups ◽  
National Population ◽  
South Tyrol ◽  
National Heritage ◽  
German Speaking ◽  
Heritage Discourse ◽  
Italian Province

In this chapter the author explores the effects of the exclusive potential of heritage in culturally heterogeneous European societies and investigates initiatives that seek to make heritage more inclusive and pluralistic. How do minority groups negotiate heritage practices and discourses formulated by the dominant national population? From a war monument in South Tyrol, an Italian province inhabited by a large German-speaking minority, to the role of migrant memories in the making of national heritage discourses, the chapter focuses on processes that seek to include minority voices and contrasting heritage interpretations in what Laurajane Smith terms the “Authorized Heritage Discourse.”

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