Book Launch. Welcoming cities: how newcomers shape urban policy making
Panel chaired by Sunder Katwala (British Future)
This seminar is hybrid. Join us in person at The Hub, Kellogg College, or participate online via Zoom by registering here.
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Panellists:
- Jacqui Broadhead, University of Oxford
- Fuad Mohammed, Ashley Community Housing
- Nihad El-Kayed, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Welcoming Cities is a book which bridges this gap, offering an interdisciplinary framework grounded in empirical research and case studies from 12 UK cities and international partners. Engaging with key governance challenges, it explores how cities define and implement welcoming policies across multiple sectors.
Moving beyond critique, this book offers a constructive and action-oriented approach to integration and social cohesion. Sitting at the crossroads of academic research and policy and practice, this panel also aims to bridge this gap, drawing together insights from across the seminar series and engaging the key questions raised by Welcoming Cities.
A truly welcoming and inclusive city is not just an aspiration—it is essential to the future of our increasingly diverse urban societies. Yet too often, policy and practice lack the theoretical and research foundations needed for meaningful and effective implementation.
COMPAS Seminar Series Michaelmas Term 2025
Theme: ‘Welcoming Cities: Arrival Infrastructure’
This seminar series is co-convened by the Global Exchange on Migration & Diversity, University of Oxford and DeZim, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.
- Jacqui Broadhead, Director, Global Exchange on Migration & Diversity, University of Oxford
- Nihad El-Kayed, PI DeZIM collaborative project Political (In)Equality in Post-Migrant Democracy (PoMigDem), Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
The seminars will be given at 3.45pm on Thursdays, online (Weeks 3-5); online and in The Hub, Kellogg College (Weeks 6-8).
What does it mean for a place to be welcoming? Cities in particular, as sites of migration and arrival, are often a focal point for integration, and in some cases are seen as places where national-level hostility to migration might be replaced by a welcoming approach, with some cities adopting proactive policies of sanctuary or welcome. If migration governance is understood predominantly as a national government competence, then welcoming is predominantly oriented at the local level. How do these levels of government interact, and how can we know this multi-level governance of migration and welcoming?
More broadly, how does this work function in practice? Should it be best considered through an integration lens, focusing on access to the labour market, education, and social networks, or through a more spatial approach, focusing on the role of arrival infrastructure in supporting newcomer communities through social infrastructure and the built environment (Wessendorf, 2024). Is the role of the state (at the national or local level) central, or should we instead focus on grassroots urban solidarity movements that have inspired new practices in urban citizenship (Humphris, 2025).
Cities are not homogeneous spaces and are not uniformly proactive in this space, facing different challenges and levels of demographic change. How do cities understand their role in welcoming, and how do Mayors and other actors define their leadership and convening roles?
This seminar series aims to tackle these questions of welcoming, arrival, integration and inclusion in cities – from both a municipal and civic perspective. The series is co-convened by the University of Oxford in the UK and Humboldt University in Germany, allowing for a comparative lens between two countries with contrasting approaches to integration and welcoming, as well as allowing for broader global perspectives.
Please download and share the seminar series poster: Welcoming Cities Arrival Infrastructure
Attendance is free, and all are welcome.
