Some ethnic minorities are often recognized as particularly vulnerable to the risks of social exclusion in their communities. The purpose of this master thesis is to analyze perceptions of integration in relation to social work. Integration is a concept of great complexity, a concept that in our time is heavily debated. The perceptions are many, with a number of competing discourses seeking to define or redefine its meaning and workings. Treating a concept of such abstraction stresses the importance of clearly defining the limitations. The treatment in this thesis reflects on how integration affects citizenship of minority groups in Denmark. The order and structure that constitute society indeed have an impact on which opportunities ethnic minorities have in their everyday life. In this context Denmark’s ruling policies entangle the prospects of the ethnic minority.

However, politics are not consequently the cause that decides how integration is pursued. Politicians decide which policies should be pursued; the social worker decides how such policies are best practiced; ethnic minorities decide how the practiced policies are received. Moreover, integration is a process that is realized by various actors at different levels. To encapsulate how integration is adapted into society we find it relevant to include these various actors in a discourse-analysis. Specifically our study is based on a discourse-analysis of the integration law, the government integration policy and Aalborg municipality integration policy. Further, our discourse-analysis is based on interviews with ten social workers and seven ethnic minorities.

This master thesis proposes to outline a discussion of how the concept of integration is located in people’s daily lives, and that social work can contribute more firmly to a process of integration which requires equality between majority and ethnic minorities.