ABSTRACT
Despite the “crisis” rhetoric that characterized discussions about the sudden influx of asylum-seekers and other immigrants to Europe in 2015, immigration policy has actually been a top priority of the European Union (EU) since 1999 (European Commission 2015). Given the significance of migration in all EU member states, the Council of the European Union (CEU) has developed a series of mechanisms to promote member states’ efforts to integrate their newest citizens and residents. The Common Basic Principles for Immigrant Integration Policy in the European Union, for example, sets out a series of guidelines and frames integration “a dynamic, long-term, and continuous two-way process of mutual accommodation, not a static outcome” (CEU 2004: 19; see also Niessen and Kate 2007). In researching this dual nature of integration, scholars have tended to focus on formal mechanisms as well as employment and other economic “pathways of integration” (Agner and Strang 2008; Gilmartin and Migge 2015). However, as I argue in this chapter, other societal forces besides work are equally, if not more, significant to the larger integration debate. Everyday activities such as sports are central to how recent migrants are being integrated in their new European homes. Indeed, in 2010, the CEU formally recognized sports’ role as an active component in the social integration process of migrants, arguing in a recent council document:
Sport holds an important place in the lives of many EU citizens and plays a strong societal role with a powerful potential for social inclusion in and through sport, meaning that participation in sport or in physical activity in many different ways contributes to inclusion into society.
