Diasporic Marginalities and the Second-Best Destination

Beschreibung

‘Theoretically innovative and empirically rich, this book opens up new insights into the uneven geographies of access, economic opportunities, gendered work regimes and social and digital spaces.’
—Russell King, Professor of Geography, Sussex Centre for Migration Research (SCMR), UK

‘A valuable contribution not only to comprehending a particular migratory flow, but also to understanding several new aspects of contemporary migrations: second-best destinations, diasporic marginalities, and learning to stay.’
—Maurizio Ambrosini, Professor of Sociology of Migration, University of Milan, Italy

‘Entering the field as a translator and cultural mediator, Gül Ince-Beqo combines exceptional access with sustained ethical reflexivity.’
—Ayhan Kaya, Professor of Politics, Istanbul Bilgi University, Türkiye

This open access book examines Turkish and Kurdish settlement in Italy, an under-studied "second-best destination" within Europe's stratified mobility regime. Drawing on decade-long ethnographic fieldwork and more than 100 interviews with families and second-generation young adults, the book traces trajectories of arrival, through asylum, irregular transit, family reunification, and work networks, and the gradual consolidation of lives in which onward-migration remains a live horizon. Through the concepts of "learning to stay" and "diasporic marginalities," the analysis moves between intimate family routines and wider transnational social fields. Destinations, the book argues, are structurally produced positions, not chosen endpoints, a reframing that opens new ground for understanding how precarity, aspiration, and belonging are negotiated across mobile lives for scholars and students of sociology of migration, diaspora studies, and transnational studies, as well as practitioners working on integration policy, legal precarity, and everyday bordering.

Gül Ince-Beqo is a researcher in the Department of Social and Political Science at the University of Milan, Italy, and an adjunct professor at Eastern Piedmont University, Italy.

This open access book examines Turkish and Kurdish settlement in Italy, an under-studied "second-best destination" within Europe's stratified mobility regime. Centering a context long overshadowed by Northern European hubs, it shows how border governance, legal status, segmented labour markets, and welfare arrangements combine to shape migrant lives at the margins of the continent's more resourced receiving societies. Drawing on decade-long ethnographic fieldwork and more than 100 interviews with families and second-generation young adults, the book traces trajectories of arrival, through asylum, irregular transit, family reunification, and work networks, and the gradual consolidation of lives in which onward-migration remains a live horizon.

Through the concepts of "learning to stay" and "diasporic marginalities," the analysis moves between intimate family routines and wider transnational social fields. It examines gendered labor, religious and associational infrastructures, and the digital comparisons through which migrants position Italy against more established diasporic centers in Europe. Destinations, the book argues, are structurally produced positions, not chosen endpoints, a reframing that opens new ground for understanding how precarity, aspiration, and belonging are negotiated across mobile lives.

The book speaks to scholars and students in the sociology of migration, diaspora studies, and transnational studies, as well as practitioners working on integration policy, legal precarity, and everyday bordering.

Autor*in

Gül Ince Beqo

Themen in »Diasporic Marginalities and the Second-Best Destination«

Open Access identity Turkey Italy diaspora migration policy intra-European migration intersectionality migration governance legal precarity ethnographic methods transnational mobility critical migration studies post-migrant scholarship Kurdish diaspora

Stimmen zu »Diasporic Marginalities and the Second-Best Destination«

“Grounded in long-term ethnographic engagement with Turkish and Kurdish migrants in Italy, Gül Ince-Beqo’s book is eloquently written and eminently readable. A ‘second-best’ destination for migrants from Turkey, Italy is a ‘diaspora on the margins’, a pragmatic space to settle, survive and, perhaps, move on. Theoretically innovative and empirically rich, this book opens up new insights into the uneven geographies of access, economic opportunities, gendered work regimes and social and digital spaces.” (Russel King - Professor of Geography, Sussex Centre for Migration Research (SCMR), University of Sussex, UK)

“Gül Ince Beqo's beautifully written book portrays Turkish and Kurdish migrants making life possible in Italy, a destination shaped by constraint rather than choice, where belonging is negotiated through sustained uncertainty. Through more than a decade of ethnographic fieldwork, she develops three interconnected concepts, "second-best destinations," "learning to stay," and "diasporic marginalities" , showing how migrants remain at the edges of European opportunity structures, peripheral to both Italian society and Northern European diasporic spaces. Readers will enjoy this rich, nuanced, conceptually innovative, and critical analysis of learning to stay in a second-best destination, situated at the margins of core diasporic social and political spaces, where we see differential inclusion operating at many levels.” (Luin Goldring, Professor of Sociology, York University, Toronto)

“This book offers a valuable contribution not only to comprehending a particular migratory flow, that from Turkey to Italy, but also to understanding several new aspects of contemporary migrations: second-best destinations, diasporic marginalities, and learning to stay. It intersects and fosters dialogue between different disciplinary perspectives: migration studies, migration policies, family studies, women's studies, human rights, and sociology. It will be a valuable tool for those who wish to examine contemporary migration in greater depth and for those who intend to work to improve its governance.” (Maurizio Ambrosini - Professor of Sociology of Migration, University of Milan, Italy)

“This book offers a rare example of deeply embedded ethnographic research on migration. Grounded in long-term, relational engagement with Turkish and Kurdish migrant families in Italy, it traces migration as an ongoing social condition shaped by uncertainty, adjustment, and endurance. Fieldwork unfolds across everyday institutional settings, such as schools, courts, and hospitals, where language mediates access to rights and belonging. Entering the field as a translator and cultural mediator, Gül Ince-Beqo combines exceptional access with sustained ethical reflexivity. Gendered and intergenerational dynamics emerge from the research design itself, while attention to silence and hesitations reveals the politics of vulnerability.” (Ayhan Kaya - Professor of Politics, Istanbul Bilgi University, Turkey)

“Gül Ince-Beqo offers a powerful reinterpretation of migration by underlining insecurity, violence, and structural tensions as enduring conditions shaping human mobility. Moving beyond conventional push-pull frameworks, this research reveals how conflictual social environments continuously influence migration decisions. The result is a nuanced and timely contribution that will resonate with migration scholars and practitioners across the world.” (Ibrahim Sirkeci, Director of The International Business School, Manchester, UK)

“Gül Ince Beqo’s book on Turkish and Kurdish migration to Italy demonstrates the power of a fresh, nuanced sociological approach in understanding contemporary societal transformations. Moving beyond the "usual suspect" destinations of the Turkish diaspora, the author masterfully navigates the complexity of migratory trajectories. By balancing structural constraints (e.g. migration governance and regulations) with individual agency, she finds consistency within the "chaos" of superdiversity in action. The author shows how migrants turn necessity into virtue, developing place-specific incorporation strategies and habitus, and activating plural resources even at the margins of established diasporas. Ultimately, this work deconstructs hierarchical systems of mobility while providing a critical reflection on core concepts like migration hubs, infrastructures, and preferred destinations. It is a vital contribution that gives voice to migrant agency within multiscalar systems, providing evidence of factors widening the gap between migration projects and migrants' actual paths.” (Eduardo Barberis, Professor of Sociology, Urbino University, Italy)

“This work marks a welcome new chapter in the story of Turkish–European migration, redirecting scholarly attention from traditional aspirational hubs like Germany toward the ‘second-best’ destinations of Southern Europe, with significant implications for European migration research and Turkish studies.” (Susan Beth Rottmann, Assoc. Professor, Ozyegin University, Istanbul)

Details

Link teilen