Ethnic Minorities’ Embeddedness in Host Versus Origin Places

The study is an exploratory test of ethnic minorities and ethnic migrants success in embedding themselves in host societies either in destination country or their majority space. It is based on a cross-cultural comparison of three cultural groups in three Mediterranean countries (Morocco, Italy, Israel). Methodology consists of a multidimensional model that investigates the sources of social, cultural, and emotional forms of capital either from intra-ethnic or inter-ethnic sources as it has been developed by Schnell et al (2015). We have developed a questionnaire distributed among 40 subjects in each of the three communities around the Mediterranean (120 in total): Italians in Morocco; Moroccans in South Italy, and Christian Arabs in Israel. Six indicators were tested. The results were used in order to characterize patterns of embeddedness either in places of origin or in host/majority places. The results show that minorities either tend to isolate themselves from host/majority milieus or to integrate by embedding themselves in both host/majority and origin places. The assimilationist strategy is rejected in almost all cases. The main level for embedding in host/majority milieus is the emotional aspect that is followed by learning host/majority language and socializing in host milieus.