A Resource approach to immigrants’ sense of attachment towards their host country : Explanatory factors for expecting and understanding differences on immigrants’ sense of attachment to Norway

Abstract

The Norwegian perspective of “the good citizen” acknowledges how an individual can have attachments to different places, and not only to one. This gave place to the research questions, (1) “Is there a different sense of attachment among immigrant groups in Norway? If so, (2) what factors can explain those variations?” To answer these two research questions the study considered the existing literature from “the good citizen”. According to this literature there are reasons to believe that variations on attachment can be found, which is understood under the framework of resources (Martinussen 1977, 2003 and Togeby 2002, 2003). The argument of the resource framework is that variations on attachment can be explained by a given set of factors that shape individuals’ attitudes of their perception of attachment (Martinussen 1977:119). Those factors are identified as social, cultural and political resources (Martinussen 1977, 2003 and Togeby 2002, 2003). It is therefore that the first goal in this study was to present the degree of attachment that immigrant groups have to Norway, which was done by analyzing new empirical data. This helped to answer whether or not variations on individual perceptions are found. The second goal was to present the factors that explain those findings, based on the framework of resources. These were the steps taken for answering: (1) “Is there a different sense of attachment among immigrant groups in Norway? If so, (2) what factors can explain those variations?”