Why Analyze Immigrants? Ethical and Empirical Aspects

Authors

• Østby Lars

DOI: https://doi.org/10.23979/fypr.44973

Keywords:

immigration, immigrants, integration, and ethics of social science

Abstract

The Norwegian pattern of international migration changed profoundly in the
last part of the previous century. Norway is now an immigration country, with a
significant immigration surplus from all parts of the world. This is a comparatively
new phenomenon in Norwegian society. In accordance with Norwegian traditions,
it called for research. During the last 10-15 years, the amount of statistics and
analyses on immigration and immigrants has been growing, inside and outside
Statistics Norway. Ethical aspects should be important, as this a very sensitive field.
Questions have been raised as to the use of immigrant as a permanent classification
in analyses, comprising even persons who never immigrated themselves. The
basic idea of this article is that as long as the concept of immigrant is useful in
revealing discriminatory practices, we have to carry out the analysis. Without
knowledge of discrimination we cannot work effectively against it.