Exploring intercultural perspectives of migration futures in a super-diverse city through intercultural participatory futures workshops: The case of Istanbul

Abstract

Most migration futures studies focus on reacting to migration issues such as flows and crises rather than exploring alternative images of futures centered on individual’s migration experiences. Addressing the limitations of existing practices criticized for their short-term, problem-oriented, and predominantly western, male-dominated, and colonized perspectives, this article presents intercultural participatory futures workshops as a novel technique for exploring more inclusive and intercultural migration futures. This approach enabled participants to collaboratively envision, build, and discuss alternative futures of migration for Istanbul in 2050 in eight workshop sessions with 35 intercultural participants. Additionally, it fostered a space to share experiences, and thoughts on futures, while meaningfully interacting with one another. Therefore, the contribution of this article to the migration futures field is two-fold: first, it showcases the potential of intercultural participatory futures workshops for exploring and constructing inclusive and participatory visions of migration futures, while contrasting collective visions and individual concerns; and second, it explains the relevance of this approach as a unique opportunity to foster intercultural meaningful social interactions, a key kind of interaction for social inclusion between individuals with migration backgrounds and host society.