Life in migrant neighbourhoods:

Turkey is currently the world’s largest refugee-hosting country. The country is home to over 3.3 million Syrians, more than 300,000 refugees and asylum seekers from other countries, some 1.3 million foreigners with residence permits , and an unknown number of irregular migrants. However, there is a limited availability of official data regarding the numbers of migrants and refugees, as well as their living conditions and access to public and private sector services. Despite the significant academic research that has been conducted on the subject, these studies have certain limitations.

The present research was undertaken to address the need for comprehensive data on the social integration or cohesion of migrants in Turkey. It discusses the findings of the quantitative and qualitative research in detail in subsequent sections. The section presenting the results of the quantitative research discusses various aspects such as the profiles of the respondents, their housing conditions, educational attainment, labour force participation, and economic status. It also compares the Turkish and Syrian and non-Syrian migrant groups in terms of their Turkish language skills, social participation, satisfaction with their place of residence, perceptions of discrimination, and the ability to act independently in daily life. This section also examines the socio-economic profile of households, as the survey collected information on all household members. In addition, the data are analysed separately for each province where the fieldwork took place, highlighting any regional variations. The section presenting qualitative findings focus on migrants’ and refugees’ access to employment, housing, education and health; civil society’s and municipalities’ services geared towards them; and finally prejudices and discrimination towards migrants and refugees.