The Network of Excellence on Regional Liveable Diversity (NoE), was established in 2019 from seed funding awarded from Monash University. It brings together extensive research expertise from the Monash Migration and Inclusion Centre (MMIC) and international partners from the Erasmus University of Rotterdam, Ryerson University, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, and the University of Bologna (see full membership list at Appendix A). The NoE seeks to develop evidence-based research from which effective strategies can be developed to support policies of inclusion and promote liveability in diversifying smaller cities and towns.
The project aims to understand the broader picture of how migration and diversity shape social, political and economic life, and to extend and apply knowledge and learnings to solve practical problems and challenges presented by the diversification of regional, provincial and rural areas from partners respective locations. Typically, Australia would be compared with Canada in terms of its regional/non-metropolitan settlement programs and overall proactive management of immigration, but here we also engage comparatively with European cases, notably from Italy, Germany and the Netherlands. The European countries have significant regional/provincial autonomy, imbalances in their distribution of migrants and a comparatively reactive immigration management approach.
