G3) Islam and the European Migratory Context: City Policies in Managing Religious Sites and the Muslim Diaspora

Despite there being a rich body of literature on migrations, studies investigating religion within immigrant communities, including its role and impact on the second generation, have been less extensive. Even though several studies have been focussed on Muslims with a migratory background in Europe, this paper intends to address an emerging field of study concerning the management of the Muslim diaspora at the local level. Requests for places of worship, recognition of rights and appeals to participate in the policy-making process are managed at the level of local rather than national administrations. Across Europe, various approaches appear to dismantle the social construction of the Muslim exception; and the concepts of ‘spatial regime’, ‘street level bureaucracy’ and ‘secular place-making’ can be used to compare and contrast what each social reality gives to religion, thereby generating a specific spatial order negotiated between the state, the city's governance, secular space and the various religious affiliations, including Islam with its sub-groups. The paper will describe and discuss several European cities’ approaches (Turin, Amsterdam, Berlin) in managing Muslims’ requests of visibility through interviews (with stakeholders, policy-makers, religious associations’ representatives), and field visits carried out in the last five years outlining their strengths and weaknesses in the perspective of policy transferability.