In January 2022 the new Dutch Civic Integration programme was launched together with promises of improvements it would bring in facilitating the ‘integration’ of newcomers to the Netherlands. This study presents a critical discourse analysis of texts intended for municipalities to take on their new coordinating role in this programme. The analysis aims to understand the discourse in the texts, which actors are mobilized by them, and the role these texts and these actors play in processes of governmental racialization. The analysis demonstrates shifting complex assemblages are brought into cascades of governance in which all actors are disciplined to accept the problem of integration as a problem of cultural difference and distance, and then furthermore disciplined to adopt new practices deemed necessary to identify and even ‘objectively’ measure the inherent traits contributing to this problematic. Lastly, the analysis displays that all actors are disciplined to accept the solution of ‘spontaneous compliance’; a series of practices and knowledges, which move the civic integration programme beyond an aim of responsibilization, into a programme of internalization, wherein newcomers are expected to own and address their problematic ‘nature’, making ‘modern’ values their own.
To what extent can the application of blockchain technologies be employed toward civic empowerment, organizing local civic and circular economies, reinstating trust in civic institutions, or, perhaps, creating entirely new types of institutions?
European civic integration programmes claim to provide newcomers with necessary tools for successful participation. Simultaneously, these programmes have been criticised for being restrictive, market-driven and for working towards an implicit goal of limiting migration. Authors have questioned how these programmes discursively construct an offensive image of the Other and how colonial histories are reproduced in the constructions seen today. The Dutch civic integration programme is considered a leading example of a restrictive programme within Europe. Research has critically questioned the discourses within its policies, yet limited research has moved beyond policy to focus on discourse in texts in practice. This study presents a critical discourse analysis of texts used in the civic integration programme and demonstrates that they participate in multiple discursive constructions: the construction of the Dutch nation-state and its citizens as inherently modern, the construction of the Other as Unmodern and thus a threat, and the construction of the hierarchical relationship between the two. The civic integration programme has been left out of discussions on decolonisation to date, contributing to it remaining a core practice of othering. This study applies post-colonial theories to understand the impacts of current discourse, and forwards possibilities for consideration of decolonised alternatives.
This project develops a European network for transdisciplinary innovation in artistic engagement as a catalyst for societal transformation, focusing on immersive art. It responds to the professionals in the field’s call for research into immersive art’s unique capacity to ‘move’ people through its multisensory, technosocial qualities towards collective change. The project brings together experts leading state-of-the-art research and practice in related fields with an aim to develop trajectories for artistic, methodological, and conceptual innovation for societal transformation. The nascent field of immersive art, including its potential impact on society, has been identified as a priority research area on all local-to-EU levels, but often suffers from the common (mis)perception as being technological spectacle prioritising entertainment values. Many practitioners create immersive art to enable novel forms of creative engagement to address societal issues and enact change, but have difficulty gaining recognition and support for this endeavour. A critical challenge is the lack of knowledge about how their predominantly sensuous and aesthetic experience actually lead to collective change, which remains unrecognised in the current systems of impact evaluation predicated on quantitative analysis. Recent psychological insights on awe as a profoundly transformative emotion signals a possibility to address this challenge, offering a new way to make sense of the transformational effect of directly interacting with such affective qualities of immersive art. In parallel, there is a renewed interest in the practice of cultural mediation, which brings together different stakeholders to facilitate negotiation towards collective change in diverse domains of civic life, often through creative engagements. Our project forms strategic grounds for transdisciplinary research at the intersection between these two developments. We bring together experts in immersive art, psychology, cultural mediation, digital humanities, and design across Europe to explore: How can awe-experiences be enacted in immersive art and be extended towards societal transformation?
De TU Delft neemt sinds 2017 deel aan de City Deal kennismaken (CDKM) Delft. Hiermee verweven is de pijler van het convenant van 2016 tussen de TU Delft en de gemeente Delft die gaat over “de verbinding van de Universitaire gemeenschap, stad en inwoners”. In de afgelopen vier jaar is vanuit deze programma’s met docenten en studenten gewerkt om zowel academische resultaten te bereiken als resultaten die tot nut zijn van de stad Delft en bewoners van Delft. Tegelijkertijd is er een Education Fellow op het gebied van community engagement aangewezen en is er een Special Interest Group op dit gebied opgericht waarin docenten die werken met stedelijke vraagstukken ervaringen delen en hieraan bekendheid geven. Aan de zijde van de studenten is door een enorm toegenomen belangstelling voor maatschappelijke inzet voor de stad Delft de Social Hub ontstaan. Op basis van al deze ervaringen, energie om dit groter te maken en aanbevelingen vanuit het onderzoek Routes naar stedelijke vraagstukken dat in het kader van de City Deal Kennismaken is gestart aan de TU Delft willen we nu de stap zetten naar opschaling in het onderwijs. Het onderzoeksproject dat moet leiden tot een implementatieplan voor opschaling van stedelijke vraagstukken in het onderwijs aan de TU Delft heeft een looptijd van een jaar en richt zich op de vraag hoe we onderwijsvormen kunnen ontwikkelen waarin studenten die op zoek zijn naar maatschappelijke opgaven samen worden gebracht met overheden en organisaties met kennisvragen. We onderzoeken de toepasbaarheid in het onderwijs van vraagstukken in vier diverse segmenten en maken optimaal gebruik van de Social Hub om studenten te betrekken, de Special Interest Group community engagement om docenten te betrekken en de gemeentelijke connecties om de stedelijke vraagstukken te formuleren.
