Integration through education : A comparative study of intergenerational educational mobility differences among native- and foreign background populations in Europe

Sammanfattning

Group-comparisons of intergenerational social mobility rates can speak volumes about a society’s degree of opportunity equality. In this study, the probabilities of upward- and downward mobility in tertiary education are compared between Europeans with native- and foreign-born parents, as an evaluation of integration operationalized as similarity in mobility patterns. The argument is that similar mobility rates given educational background indicate that the descendants of immigrants likely will be integrated over time. The research question is: Does the relationship between parental educational level and the probability of having a tertiary education differ between people with foreign background and those with native background? The comparisons are based on native vs. foreign background differences in the predicted probabilities of achieving high education, for those with high-educated and low-educated parents respectively, over three different age cohorts spanning the birthyears 1940-1999, in seven Western European countries. The estimates are calculated from a pooled ESS dataset using country- and cohort specific LPM models. The results show that different countries and cohorts face different integration challenges: some have foreign-background penalties in upward mobility, and others in high-status reproduction. In some countries and contexts, the foreign-background population is however integrated, or even has advantages in the mentioned aspects.