State thought and social hierarchies between Italy and Tunisia. From history to identity

Abstract The paper draws on the notion of State though as critically discussed by Sayad and on related concepts (nationalism at a distance, integration) to analyse how the State naturalises the division between nationals and non-nationals, building unequal social hierarchies between immigrants and natives that affect the construction of the (social and individual) identities of the migrants themselves. The paper starts with a historical contextualisation of the relations between Tunisia and Italy. First, we show how the opposite migrations that have crossed the Mediterranean have been embedded in unequal racial and symbolic hierarchies characterising Italy and Tunisia, Europe and Africa. Then, we further delve into this dynamic by exploring the identity constructions of Tunisian migrants in Italy, which are sensitive to the demands of the country of immigration (seeking to maintain a given social hierarchy within its borders) and those of the country of emigration (striving to remain connected to its emigrants to extract maximum profit from them).