Demographisation of the Political? An intersectional analysis of German family and migration policy since the mid-1990s

• Applicant: Dr. Susanne Schultz
• Subject Area: Sociological Theory ; Political Science ; History of Science
• Term: from 2013 to 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 241415806

This DFG research project examines the increasing importance of demographic knowledge within German family and migration policies since the mid-1990s. The aim is to analyze the scope, elements and dynamics of a new population policy with special attention to the scientific arguments offered for it. The project focuses on the regulation of fertility and immigration as those elements of the new demographic policy which are debated and/or implemented in order to influence actively the size and composition of the national population. By integrating family and migration policies it becomes possible to develop an intersectional perspective on the current biopolitics of the population, without ignoring important differences between these policy fields and the role of demographic knowledge within them. The project employs the concept of demographization as a social studies of science concept which makes it possible to analyze scientific problematizations and strategic political solutions as intertwined elements of political rationalities. For this purposes the project combines the methodological approaches of interpretative policy research and hegemony theory.The follow-up application has the aim to analyse important new dynamics of demographization as they have developed within migration policies since the G„summer of migration“ in 2015. These developments are researched empirically and integrated into the comprehensive intersectional analysis of demographization of the political. Thereby it becomes possible to capture the enormous dynamic of the demographic debate which has resulted since mid-2015 that immigration has developed from a marginal to a central aspect of German demographic policy consultancy and government strategies. Integrating this comtemporary phase of demographic policies into reserach is instructive for the theoretical analysis of intersectional statehood with regards to population science and policies, for during this phase immigration has gained weight with comparison to the polices of reproduction and fertility rates and has thus become an equal „demographic factor“ for government strategies. Important aspects for the follow-up research are labor-market-oriented actors which intervene since 2015 (more) into the German demographic debate; the debate on the uncertainty of population projections which came up in 2015 in the context of the „summer of migration“; the integration of the already arrived refugee population into the demographic debate. Moreover the relationship between the demographization and economization of migration policies will be elaborated conceptually and a stronger reference of the German demographic debate towards European and transnational approaches is evaluated.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants