New Wine in New Wineskins? the Emergence of Superdiversity and Its Mixed Potential for Theory, Policy and Research

This paper analyzes the discursive, conceptual and practical interface between the notions of diversity [D] and super-diversity [SD]. What does the latter term add to the former (if anything), under what conditions, and why? While this interface may apply to diversity studies as a whole, it is particularly salient in the debate on immigrant and ethnic minority incorporation. Against a background of pervasive rejection of “multiculturalism”, the notion of SD points to the need to move beyond all narrowly ethno-cultural readings of diversity. Theoretically speaking, though, this lexical innovation seems to be ended in deadlock. Much of the discussion on SD has so far resulted in a simple split between its supporters and sceptics. Much more remains to be done in order to interrogate the distinctive analytical value added of SD, its implications for everyday boundary-making (on ethnic lines or otherwise), and its suitability as a representation of the majority-minority field. This mapping exercise is critical to assess the contribution of SD in terms of theory-, policy- and research-making. Politically speaking, the jargon of SD has a potential to relaunch a progressive agenda of minority recognition without over-culturalizing or ethnicizing difference. Sociologically speaking, nonetheless, its foundations are unclear. Does super stand only for an increase in societal diversity, or does it hold a theoretical value in itself? Does it really point to a changing configuration in majority-minority relations and in the underlying alignments and identifications? What “units of analysis” are more consistent with a SD perspective, when it comes to empirical research? It is on this threefold terrain – what the super label adds, what its policy implications are, how it feeds into fieldwork – that the SD approach needs to be interrogated further, to assess its innovative potential within diversity studies.