National Identity and the Integration of the Children of Immigrants

Abstract

Studies on integration policies for the children of immigrants have tended to explore whether this group retains the national identities of their parents or not, based on the assumption that retaining this sense of identity would durably reproduce in their offspring their parents’ foreignness and lead to deficient social inclusion in their respective environments. In practice, however, there has been much discussion regarding the effects of the children holding onto the national identity of their parents and the indicators that enable us to measure this effectively. This article first considers this issue and then explains how viewing identity as social capital in the context of negotiation processes could help to overcome the difficulties raised by data on the national identity of the children of immigrants. In support of that opinion, the approach adopted in a qualitative study on the subject – conducted in Madrid – and the findings thereof are summarized.