The role of multiple local actors in shaping immigrants’ civic and political participation in cities: lesson from Italy and Spain

Abstract

This paper focuses on how multiple actors promote civic and political participation of immigrants locally. The dominant approach in scholarship on political participation of immigrants —the political opportunity structure—focuses mostly on the role of local institutional actors to examine the constraints and opportunities for immigrants’ civic and political participation. We argue that this main focus on top-down actors and processes does not allow for understanding the complexity of actors and dynamics involved in the promotion of immigrants’ participation in cities. For this reason, we propose to expand our conceptualization of the city and to combine both top-down and bottom-up dynamics to investigate how local contexts shape immigrants’ civic and political participation. Drawing on empirical research in Italy and Spain, we map the multiplicity of actors involved in the promotion of participation of immigrants in seven cities, identify the channels they offer and assess how their interactions explain variations.