Evaluation of integration policy | Zuwanderung, Flucht und Asyl: Aktuelle Themen | bpb.de

By providing full information about projects, political decision-makers are open to public discourse and can, in principle, be judged on the implementation of their concepts. This assumes the existence of indicators that would allow the effect of the programs and measures to be assessed once they have been carried out. Moreover, if we wish to compare the success of integration policy across regional borders, we also need a standardised indicator system in which uniform data is compiled for all cities and states. Over the course of recent years some initial indicator systems have been developed to permit comparative evaluation of the integration policies of cities and states. Since 2004, for example, the Migrant Policy Index (MIPEX) has compared and evaluated the integration policy of EU member states . The MIPEX is what is known as a "composite indicator" and is comprised of 140 partial indicators in the following six areas: political participation, anti-discrimination, access to the labour market, citizenship, family reunification and the right of residence. The project has been promoted since 2006 by the European Commission, as it makes statements as to how close the EU countries are to best practice guidelines possible.

Whereas MIPEX relates exclusively to national integration policies, in 2005 the Municipal Association for Administration Management [Kommunale Gemeinschaftsstelle für Verwaltungsmanagement (KGst)], in cooperation with the commissioners for integration of German cities, created a set of indicators by means of which it is possible to monitor local integration (cf. KGst 2006). This set of indicators includes the following fields of action: legal integration, education, work and economy, social security, housing, language, health, social integration, social and political participation, and security. The CLIP network does not currently have its own indicator system to facilitate an objective comparison of regional approaches to integration policy, but rather pursues a qualitative approach (cf. CLIP 2007). However, there are plans to develop and implement a joint indicator system by mid 2009 .The future success of local integration policy will depend, among other things, on the successful development of meaningful indicators with which it is possible to evaluate policy measures. This should extend beyond representation of the status quo and enable an impact analysis as well as a comparison of regional integration policy measures.