Migration, Belonging, and the Resilience of Social Contracts

How do inequality, migration, and belonging shape the resilience of social contracts? In this episode of the CO3 podcast, hosted by Tugce Ercetin from Istanbul Bilgi University, Rui F. Carvalho from the Centre for Social Studies at the University of Coimbra discusses the relationship between migration, racialisation, and the social contract.

Drawing especially on his research with Brazilian migrants in North America and Europe, Carvalho explores how perceptions of how racialised people are treated affect migrants’ experiences, expectations, and sense of belonging. The discussion highlights how factors such as class, origin, and migration pathways shape the opportunities available to migrants, as well as the ways they understand their place in host societies.

The episode also turns to broader questions of minorities and majorities, and how relations between them influence the legitimacy and resilience of social contracts. Rather than treating migration as a separate policy issue, the conversation shows how migrant experiences reveal wider tensions around inclusion, recognition, inequality, and democratic belonging.

The episode also discusses the values and practices necessary to build more inclusive, sustainable and resilient social contracts and societies in contemporary democracies, with a particular outlook on European societies, the European Green Deal, and what has been known in late academic and policy circles as an eco-social contract.