Evaluation Report: URBAN PARTNERSHIP ON THE INCLUSION OF MIGRANTS AND REFUGEES

This report presents an evaluation of the Urban Partnership on Inclusion of Migrants and Refugees. In its quality as a key delivery mechanism of the Urban Agenda for the EU, the Partnership has provided a framework for multi-level and multi-stakeholder cooperation on integration between 2016 and 2019.

The evaluation identifies success factors and shortcomings of the working methods and agenda setting of the Partnership and offers a comprehensive range of recommendations to inspire the Partnership’s reflection on future cooperation. The evaluation was conducted by Janina Stürner and Dr. Christiane Heimann from the Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nürnberg and the University of Hildesheim between May and September 2019.

Initial findings were drawn from a comprehensive desktop review of internal and public Partnership documents and ten expert interviews with the Partnership coordinators, Action leaders as well as city representatives. Based on this information, the researchers organised a focus group discussion with Partnership members taking part in the June 2019 meeting and handed out a questionnaire, which members filled in during the meeting. Sixteen members of the Partnership provided answers to the questionnaire. Subsequently, knowledge gaps were filled with seven additional expert interviews. Partnership members were not only requested to provide information about their cooperation experience within the Partnership but were also given ample space to voice their own ideas and recommendations for future collaboration.