Kind Of Community Research Articles

Exploiting online environment to engage customers: social commerce brand community

Purpose Taking jointly into account social commerce and online brand community, this paper aims to investigate how the growth of social commerce and the fast adoption of online brand communities have given firms the opportunity to establish a new kind of community, namely, the social commerce brand community. Adopting a managerial perspective, the research aims to identify the core dimensions of social commerce brand community and shed light on how they contribute in engaging customers and transform them into brand advocates. Design/methodology/approach Five social commerce retailers operating into five different sectors of activity have been involved in a multiple case study. Data retrieved from semi-structured interviews have been triangulated with information gathered from different sources to provide depth to the cases and enhance data validity. Findings This study substantiates the rise of social commerce brand community as a new phenomenon that differs from traditional online brand communities and provides firms with concrete support in selling activities and in managing relationships with customers. The multiple case study allows also to detect social commerce brand community core pillars, namely, participants’ identification, participation, conversation and social support. These four elements turned out to be crucial to develop an effective social commerce brand community. Research limitations/implications This study extends existing theory on social commerce and online brand community by investigating the social commerce brand community as a new phenomenon and clarifying the fundamental pillars on which it relies. Originality/value This study extends existing theory on social commerce and online brand community by investigating the social commerce brand community as a new phenomenon and clarifying the fundamental pillars on which it relies.

Community as a discursive construct in contemporary Danish singing culture

Community singing—the informal practice of collective singing at social occasions—has traditionally served various societal purposes. Recently, however, new types of community singing events have emerged in Denmark that make the singing act itself the central purpose for gathering rather than an appendage. Such events indicate that community singing is becoming more about participating in a performance and less about consolidating an ideological common ground. On the basis of an analysis of present public discourse, this article pursues the questions of how singing is perceived to construct community, and what kind of community can be formed when the importance of semantic song content fades. In conclusion, it is proposed that modern singing events, rather than merely reinforcing existing communities, now produce self-reliant, musically imagined communities.

Brand community integration, participation and commitment: A comparison between consumer-run and company-managed communities

In the past two decades there has been a growth in the rate at which consumers join, companies use, and researchers study brand communities. Given the expansion of brand communities, scholars insistently analyze why individuals join and stay in them. However, no study concurrently examines the links among the members’ integration, participation and commitment to a brand community. Furthermore, research conceive brand communities as homogenous. Whether the feelings and behaviors of members of different kinds of communities, and specifically consumer-run and company-managed brand communities, are comparable is unknown. Using a sample of 2167 consumers of a leading motorcycle brand, this study examines the members’ integration, participation and commitment to consumer-run and company-managed communities. The findings reveal that consumer-run communities stimulate higher levels of integration, participation and commitment than the company-managed communities, but that the mechanisms connecting integration, participation and commitment are invariant across the two types of community.

At the end of the line: on kairological history

AbstractThis essay examines, from a position within Classics, different angles on critiques of historicism and the turn to anachronism in History, Art History, Medieval Studies, and Queer Theory before proposing the idea of ‘kairological history’, on the model of the artist Paul Chan’s ‘kairological art’. On this analysis, ‘kairological history’ engages the critical and creative resources of anachronic thinking alongside tools of historicism (e.g. empiricism, successionism, periodization, alterity) in making choices about ‘telling time’. These choices reflect a critical understanding of how temporality shapes the valuation of the past, particularly in relation to a ‘classical’ past; the negotiation of identity and difference between past and present; and the kinds of communities that history aims to support. The second half of the essay examines two instances of anachronism within the history of anatomy, one from Galen and one from the early twenty-first century. Both cases represent problems that historicism can correct. But the modality of correction, in itself, is anaemic and risks the very teleology that linear history is so often faulted for. The essay therefore explores what gets lost and what gets found when temporality is aligned with linearity, as well as non-linear modes of telling time.

Reflexiones en torno a la formación de un organismo asociativo que acoja y represente al colectivo de trabajadoras culturales

Existen múltiples asociaciones conformadas por artistas y trabajadoras culturales cuya misión es principalmente aunar esfuerzos para defender y reivindicar mejoras desde el punto de vista laboral, político, social y existencial. Sin embargo, siguen siendo pocas las trabajadoras culturales que se afilian a algún tipo de organismo estructurado y formal. Frente a esta realidad, ejemplos como la comunidad de InsultARTe, ofrecen alternativas complementarias para el encuentro entre profesionales de la cultura. Se trata de otro tipo de colectividad de carácter más informal que se establece en espacios digitales, desde los márgenes y en condiciones de una mayor precariedad en cuestión de recursos, visibilidad y capacidad de instaurarse como sujeto interlocutor social. El caso de InsultARTe plantea el debate sobre qué tipo de organización se podría crear, cuáles son los perfiles que conforman esa posible asociación o sobre cuál debería ser su funcionamiento y modelo organizacional.

Radical ecclesiology: The church as an arena for reconciliation through cultivating alternative community

Rising tensions in communities around the world have created contexts of conflict to which the church has been challenged to respond with a theology of reconciliation. This, however, raises the question: What kind of communities do we need in order to create such a theology amid so much conflict? Drawing on an Anabaptist vision of the church as an “alternative community,” this article demonstrates how dislocation amid conflict allows the church to become an arena for reconciliation by creating neutral social space, crafting new social narratives, and exercising creative freedom.

New Media and the Internet in the Regional Stability Design Process

The paper presents the results of a number of author's studies on the possibilities of using new media and the Internet to design innovative social reality in the conditions of such a polyethnoconfessional region as the Republic of Tatarstan. Using an example of an analysis of online discussion and practices around two problematic cases (the obligation to learn the Tatar language by schoolchildren of the republic and the construction of a new incinerator in the territory of Tatarstan), we managed to obtain results, firstly, regarding typical areas of using the Internet by users, and models for their responding to online information; secondly, an assessment of the main sources of information about the Republic of Tatarstan in the network, representations of the positive and negative aspects of the life in the republic in the context of online discussion; thirdly, to identify groups of factors that determine the degree of activity demonstrated by users of social networks online and offline; and, finally, describe strategies for linking online and offline activity when discussing socially significant problems of the republic. The conclusions indicate the factors and necessary conditions for mobilizing users of online discussions for specific actions outside the Internet (participating in meetings, flash mobs, and charity events, joining various kinds of communities, and establishing new personal contacts).

Social Emotional Opinion Decision with Newly Coined Words and Emoticon Polarity of Social Networks Services

Nowadays, based on mobile devices and internet, social network services (SNS) are common trends to everyone. Social opinions as public opinions are very important to the government, company, and a person. Analysis and decision of social polarity of SNS about social happenings, political issues and government policies, or commercial products is very critical to the government, company, and a person. Newly coined words and emoticons on SNS are created every day. Specifically, emoticons are made and sold by a person or companies. Newly coined words are mostly made and used by various kinds of communities. The SNS big data mainly consist of normal text with newly coined words and emoticons so that newly coined words and emoticons analysis is very important to understand the social and public opinions. Social big data is informally made and unstructured, and on social network services, many kinds of newly coined words and various emoticons are made anonymously and unintentionally by people and companies. In the analysis of social data, newly coined words and emoticons limit the guarantee the accuracy of analysis. The newly coined words implicitly contain the social opinions and trends of people. The emotional states of people significantly are expressed by emoticons. Although the newly coined words and emoticons are an important part of the social opinion analysis, they are excluded from the emotional dictionary and social big data analysis. In this research, newly coined words and emoticons are extracted from the raw Twitter’s twit messages and analyzed and included in a pre-built dictionary with the polarity and weight of the newly coined words and emoticons. The polarity and weight are calculated for emotional classification. The proposed emotional classification algorithm calculates the weight of polarity (positive or negative) and results in total polarity weight of social opinion. If the total polarity weight of social opinion is more than the pre-fixed threshold value, the twit message is decided as positive. If it is less than the pre-fixed threshold value, the twit message is decided as negative and the other values mean neutral opinion. The accuracy of the social big data analysis result is improved by quantifying and analyzing emoticons and newly coined words.

Community structure and functional diversity of epiphytic bacteria and planktonic bacteria on submerged macrophytes in Caohai Lake, southwest of China

Epiphytic bacteria on the surfaces of submerged macrophytes play an important role in lake biodiversity and ecological processes. However, compared with planktonic bacteria, there is poor understanding of the community structure and function of epiphytic bacteria. Here, we used 16S rRNA gene high-throughput sequencing and functional prediction analysis to explore the structural and functional diversity of epiphytic bacteria and planktonic bacteria of a typical submerged macrophyte (Potamogeton lucens) in Caohai Lake. The results showed that the species composition of epiphytic and planktonic bacteria was highly similar as 88.89% phyla, 77.21% genera and 65.78% OTUs were shared by the two kinds of samples. Proteobacteria and Bacteroidetes were dominant phyla shared by the two kinds of communities. However, there are also some special taxa. Furthermore, the epiphytic bacterial communities exhibited significantly different structures from those in water, and the abundant OTUs had opposite constituents. The explained proportion of the planktonic bacterial community by aquatic environmental parameters is significantly higher than that of epiphytic bacteria, implying that the habitat microenvironment of epiphytic biofilms may be a strong driving force of the epiphytic bacterial community. Functional predictive analysis (Functional Annotation of Prokaryotic Taxa, FAPROTAX) found that epiphytic bacteria and planktonic bacteria are dominated by heterotrophic functions, but epiphytic bacteria have more prominent fermentation and denitrification functions (nitrate reduction, nitrate respiration, and nitrite respiration) than planktonic bacteria. This study has increased our understanding of the communities and functions of epiphytic bacteria on submerged macrophyte leaves, and their role in lake denitrification cannot be ignored.

Analyzing the determinants of the size of investments by community renewable energy members: Findings and policy implications from Flanders

Community renewable energy initiatives are increasingly recognized as important actors to trigger citizen investments in renewable energy facilities. Little is known, however, about the factors that determine the size of financial investments made by community renewable energy members. To address this gap, this paper presents a multivariate econometric analysis of the economic, social, environmental and institutional determinants of the size of investments in community renewable energy. It relies on a large-scale survey of 4061 members of two renewable energy cooperatives located in Flanders, in the northern part of Belgium. Results show that the return on investment is the most important determinant for members of large communities of interest, while environmental, social and other non-economic drivers tend to dominate financial motives for members of smaller communities of place. The presence of other cooperative members in close social networks plays a particularly important role in the latter kind of communities, highlighting the strength of social interactions as a driver for investments. These results can help policy-makers to design more adapted policy measures for fostering financial investments at the community level, and project developers to tailor segmented communication strategies about the goals and benefits of projects.

Regulatory Fitness: Fintech, Funny Money, and Smart Contracts

This article argues that there are many questions that lawyers might ask, and conversations that they might have, about smart contracts; that some questions that are asked are more important than others; and that there are some questions that are not asked but which should be asked. First, it is argued that the question that preoccupies ‘coherentists’ (concerning the application of the law of contract to smart contracts, and the fit between smart contracts and the paradigmatic ‘fiat contracts’ that are recognised by the law of contract) is neither as puzzling nor as important as might be supposed. Secondly, it is argued that, if there are concerns about the acceptability of smart contracts, then the conversation that needs to be had is of a ‘regulatory-instrumentalist’ nature; in particular, if the question is one of public policy restrictions on the use of smart contracts, then the appropriate balance of interests needs to be made by an institution that has both the necessary mandate and the appropriate mind-set. Thirdly, it is argued that there are conversations that we currently do not have but which urgently need to be had. Blockchain is a potentially transformative technology and it is important to have more fundamental conversations about the kind of community that we want to be.

Online console game club as a resource a case study of the perceived meaning of club membership

ABSTRACTWhat kind of community an online console game club is? Console game playing has often been viewed as having only negative influence on young people’s lives. In this research, a group of gamers (N = 8) was investigated. They were young adults who played the National Hockey League (NHL) console game regularly. The qualitative case study focused on finding out what made the club meaningful in the club members’ opinions and how they describe activities and interaction in the club. The study showed that the console game club had multiple positive effects in the members’ lives, which were analysed as emotional, social, cognitive, and functional resources. The study suggests that online game networks could provide new ideas on how to arrange, for example, online education in way that the young adults could find motivating and meaningful to attend.

Antibiotics in two municipal sewage treatment plants in Sri Lanka: Occurrence, consumption and removal efficiency

Abstract Most of the monitoring data on the occurrence of antibiotics in sewage treatment plants (STPs) have been reported from Europe, North America and some countries in Northeast Asia, while very limited data can be found in Southeast Asian countries. As a pioneering research in Sri Lanka, we collected 24 h composite wastewater samples at the influent and effluent of two municipal STPs for consecutive 7 days to investigate occurrence, consumption and removal efficiency of seventeen antibiotics. The STP was located in Colombo and Hikkaduwa, respectively, representing two kinds of communities (i.e. local and tourists) in Sri Lanka. The targeted antibiotics were extracted by solid-phase extraction method and detected on an Agilent HPLCMSMS (1290/6470QQQ). Results illustrated that the majority of the antibiotics can be always detected from both STPs, except for chlorotetracycine (CTC), doxycycline (DOX) and florfenicol (FF). Fluoroquinolones (FQs) were detected at highest concentrations with ciprofloxacin (CIP) being the dominant compound. Concentrations of CIP in the influent samples were in the range of 433–6010 ng/L. The consumption of antibiotics was estimated on the basis of influent mass load and catchment population data. We found difference in consumption patterns between the two served areas. Compared to local people in Colombo, tourists in Hikkaduwa appeared to take more antibiotics during the study period with the estimated daily dose of 0.25 g per 1000 persons. Moreover, macrolides accounted for a larger portion than FQs in Hikkaduwa, with azithromycin (AZM) being the most prevalent antibacterial agent. After comparison with an official report by Medical Supplies Division of Sri Lanka, we conjected that AZM was not commonly used among local people and it was mainly introduced by foreign arrivals. As for the removal efficiency, the activated sludge system of Colombo exhibited better elimination and more stable performance than the constructed wetland process of Hikkaduwa.

Testing Times Ahead: Non‐Invasive Prenatal Testing and the Kind of Community We Want to Be

AbstractThis article reviews the Nuffield Council on Bioethics’ report on Non‐Invasive Prenatal Testing (NIPT); and introduces two general questions provoked by the report – concerning, respectively, the nature and extent of the informational interests that are to be recognised in today's ‘information societies’ and the membership of today's ‘genetic societies’. The article also considers the role and nature of the Nuffield Council. While the Council's report identifies a range of individual and collective interests that are relevant to determining the legitimate uses of NIPT, we argue that it should put these interests into an order of importance; we sketch how this might be done; and we suggest that, failing such a prioritisation of interests, the Council should present its reflections in a way that engages public debate around a number of options rather than making firm recommendations.

Studies of Microbiota Dynamics Reveals Association of "Candidatus Liberibacter Asiaticus" Infection with Citrus (Citrus sinensis) Decline in South of Iran.

Citrus Decline Disease was recently reported to affect several citrus species in Iran when grafted on a local rootstock variety, Bakraee. Preliminary studies found “Candidatus Phytoplasma aurantifoliae” and “Candidatus Liberibacter asiaticus” as putative etiological agents, but were not ultimately able to determine which one, or if an association of both, were causing the disease. The current study has the aim of characterizing the microbiota of citrus plants that are either asymptomatic, showing early symptoms, or showing late symptoms through amplification of the V1–V3 region of 16S rRNA gene using an Illumina sequencer in order to (i) clarify the etiology of the disease, and (ii) describe the microbiota associated to different symptom stages. Our results suggest that liberibacter may be the main pathogen causing Citrus Decline Disease, but cannot rule out the possibility of phytoplasma being involved as well. The characterization of microbiota shows that the leaves show only two kinds of communities, either symptomatic or asymptomatic, while roots show clear distinction between early and late symptoms. These results could lead to the identification of bacteria that are related to successful plant defense response and, therefore, to immunity to the Citrus Decline Disease.

Theory and Ethnography of Affective Participation at DIY Shows in U.S.

Many scholars have argued that live concerts constitute a community. My question in this article is how is this achieved, what kind of community is generated in the process, and how do we analytically approach answering these questions? In this regard, Thomas Turino suggests that community can be generated through an active and synchronous physical and music-related participation at live events. As a corrective to his deductive model of participatory and presentational music, I propose an inductive model of socio-musical participation, based on practices of DIY (“do-it-yourself”) music communities in the US. In the article, I engage with various theories of audience participation, as well as analyze different types of DIY music participation through the ethnographic study of American DIY shows. The interaction between DIY performers, audiences, and organizers, and the various forms of their social and musical participation at DIY shows suggest not only physical, music-related, and synchronous, but also spectatorial, non-synchronous, and co-creational participation; and not only harmonious but also antagonistic participation. This approach utilizes affect theory, recognizes difference and conflict in the constitution of a music community, and refutes some prevalent assumptions about the notion of audience participation.

Predictive functional profiles using metagenomic 16S rRNA data: a novel approach to understanding the microbial ecology of aquaculture systems

AbstractMicro‐organisms are an essential component of natural marine ecosystems, but also play important roles in anthropogenically modified ecosystems, including aquaculture. Although metagenomics is currently used to explore microbial communities, its application has not been as extensive in aquaculture. Although some taxonomic profiles and phylogenetic studies have been deciphered using biomarker genes, the functional potential of microbial communities associated with aquaculture systems is still unknown in most cases. Predicting functional profiles through 16S rRNA gene‐based metagenomics analysis is perhaps the most promising tool to elucidate the metabolic capabilities of microbial communities because there is no need to perform shotgun sequencing to have an idea of these capabilities. Moreover, robust bioinformatics background is not required to assess this information, and so the same data (16S rRNA sequences) are used to estimate both taxonomic and functional profiles, therefore providing deeper insights into these kinds of communities. In this review, we suggest the need to major use of novel bioinformatics tools that construct functional profiles from metagenomic 16S rRNA data, as strategy to obtain a preliminary approach about metabolic capacities of microbes that coexist in aquaculture systems.

We Look Deep Down and Yet Believe

We Look Deep Down and Yet Believe Caitlin Smith Oyekole Click for larger view View full resolution Caitlin Smith Oyekole. Photo courtesy of Oyekola Oyekole. At the Eleventh Annual International Melville Society Conference, I saw a new interest in the kinds of community that spring up around Melville's works. The "Looking for Melville" event at the British Library highlighted three different kinds of ongoing engagement with Melville. John Bryant's biography, which focused on transatlantic slavery's impact on [End Page 111] Melville's life and literature, demonstrated the constant discovery of Melville's contexts. Caroline Hack, Philip Hoare, Shelley Piasecka, and Michael Hall showed how Melville's concepts, characters, and literary style continue reverberating through artistic production, inspiring new adaptations, art forms, and ways to re-envision and represent the world. David Shaerf's documentary, Call Us Ishmael, particularly struck me. Shaerf focuses on collective readings of the novel, like New Bedford's annual Moby-Dick Marathon, and the communities they create. Call Us Ishmael emphasizes what I heard repeated from all quarters: Melville's work attracts an unusually diverse audience, a fitting parallel, perhaps, to the racial, religious, and cultural diversity of the Pequod's crew. Reminiscing on the Moby-Dick Marathon at the conference, Mary K. Bercaw Edwards told me, "There is no 'type' of Moby-Dick reader." This remark instantly brought to mind a 2015 thinkpiece by the Australian writer Mikaella Clements, entitled "Moby-Dick and Me: A Teenaged Love Story" (The Toast, 12 November 2015, <http://the-toast.net/2015/11/12/moby-dickand-me-a-teenaged-love-story>). Explaining her decision to add a second middle name, "Melville," Clements writes that her teenaged self—queer, displaced, deeply unhappy—identified with first Ahab, then Melville himself: "I felt Melville could have written [Moby-Dick] about me." And then she describes becoming not just a reader of Moby-Dick but a Melvillean: "I met Melville, and he already knew me inside and out sympathized with me … it is always comforting to meet someone that is made of the same stuff as you." Moving from text to author, Clements joins the larger, trans-institutional community organized around Melville's contexts, literary works, and life. This community caught my interest, not just in terms of its productions (new artwork, scholarship, museums, biographies) or organizational forms (MobyDick marathons, internet forums, the Melville Society), but how it functions as a community. What allows this community to hang together in its diversity? Where does it derive norms of conduct? And how does it relate to newcomers and outsiders? I am particularly interested in the last question because the Melville Society international conferences stand apart in my knowledge and in that of many of my colleagues as a kind of exemplary intellectual community. "The Melvil-leans are very convivial," a friend told me, before my attendance at my first Melville Society conference in 2015, "I can't recommend a better experience for your first presentation." And indeed my experience during both conferences has been overwhelmingly positive. I came to the 2015 conference as a first-year PhD student presenting to senior scholars, and I received extensive feedback, welcome, and encouragement. The Melville Society's conviviality shone, as it did again this summer: discussing the future of religion and literature over [End Page 112] drinks, chatting about Melville's reception in Japan on the bus to Oxford, or learning about the Society's history while touring London. Convivial—living together—was the adjective that best describes the conference. I suspect I am particularly attenuated to the small gestures of inclusion, honesty, or acceptance because intersectional feminism provides terminology (the microaggression) to name and contextualize nuances of harm and exclusion. But there are no terms for the small welcomes, the thousand ways that those older, more well-established, and more powerful can show inclusion to the newcomer. Of course, the question "why does the Melville Society work so well as an intellectual community" is easily answered by looking at the exemplary individuals that compose it. But I am not satisfied in treating as pure coincidence the existence of a healthy intellectual community—the Melville Society—centered around Melville's life; the diversity of...

The End of the Line: A New York Diary

The End of the Line: A New York Diary Katherine Sharpe (bio) When I graduated from college, I knew what I wanted so clearly that I even had a word for it, “community.” Though I couldn’t define the term precisely, I knew how it would feel: like a version of that warm and nebulous thing that had embraced us during college itself. After graduation, my best friend Anna and I began meeting after work in a dark bar and grill off Pioneer Square in Portland, Oregon. Our jobs—hers at a toy store; mine at the local paper, unpaid—struck us as all right, but limited. When we gathered in our sticky booth, what we talked about most often was a big move to a big city, someplace we could find people and activities as promising as we felt ourselves to be. A few months later, I went home to Virginia to take an internship at a nonprofit organization’s member magazine. The job paid, and rent at my parents’ place was free, though I missed having people my own age to hang out with. Still, when Anna called to suggest, then demand, that we move to New York, what I felt at first was terror. The kind of community I yearned for was slow and warm, more small-town than metropolitan. But hadn’t we sat for hours at the bar, nursing drinks and saying things like “I think New York is the only place in the country where people go if they’re serious”? We had, and because I could not forget this, because I couldn’t not be serious, and because I found it difficult to impossible, at that time in my life, to say no to anyone, I agreed. [End Page 651] ________ Anna was still on the West Coast, so finding an apartment fell to me. On a cold and blindingly sunny December morning, my mother drove me from our home in suburban Washington, DC, dropping me off in front of a small storefront bus station in DC’s Chinatown, where I bought a 12-dollar ticket and sailed into the unknown. On the bus I met a group of people a little older than me that included a speaker of fluent Chinese. At the other end, he led us to a tiny restaurant under the Manhattan Bridge and ordered wonton noodle soup for everyone. He showed me how to season the broth with plum vinegar and chili oil, how to ask for greens on top, how to make a cheap meal. A friend from high school who had just started at NYU Law let me sleep on his tiny patch of dorm-room floor. In the morning, I rode the subway to Williamsburg, the Brooklyn neighborhood so many people had asked Anna and me if we were moving to we’d decided we might as well. The area struck me as confusing and ugly. Rows of attached houses with vinyl siding terminated in Italian bakeries filled with dry cookies in sickly hues. There was no skyline, and I couldn’t get my bearings. I started to walk anyway, and as I did the surroundings began to change, turning more industrial, more like the urban landscape I’d imagined and hoped for. Near Metropolitan Avenue, I noticed scruffy people only slightly older than I was trickling out of a scarred brick building the size of a city block. They were all heading the same direction, so I did too, until I popped out on Bedford Avenue and recognized I was home. Over the next days, I met with a few real estate brokers. To hire a broker to rent an apartment seemed insane, but we’d been told it was what people did. I almost welcomed it—as a sign that New York was different from other places, that life here would be a life apart. The broker I ended up renting with wore a yarmulke, a full beard, and a black suit over a white shirt. He drove too fast, was nice to me in a brusque way, and refused to shake my hand. “It’s against my religion,” he explained. I...

What Does a Constitution Expect from Immigrants?

It is a long-established commonplace in any debate on immigration that immigrants should integrate into their receiving society. But integrate into what precisely? Into the labor market, into the legal order, into the political system, into a national culture whatever this might comprise? The Article tries to approach the question from the legal point of view and looks for hints or clues in the constitution which might help us with the answer. For this purpose, it explores the general theory of the constitution as it has been shaped by its professional interpreters as well as by political actors, the media and the public. The main intuition is that “constitution” is not only a written document, a text with a predefined, though maybe hidden meaning; instead, it is a social practice evolving over time and thereby reflecting the shared convictions of a political community of what is just and right. Talking about constitutional expectations toward immigrants then also tells us something about ourselves: about who we are and what kind of community we want to live in. As it turns out, we may not have a very clear idea of that.