The Self-esteem of Syrians in Sweden as an internal factor during the integration process

Abstract: Many migrants face difficult times during the integration in the new society, especially during the first stages after their arrival. Among others, they face discrimination, racism, and stigmatization, and they end up resorting to different techniques to cope with their situation, and they even change their identity and go through identity negotiation process with the surrounding new society. This thesis examines the self-esteem of Syrian migrants in Sweden after establishing it as the internal and personal factor leading the migrants to cope and change identity. It examines the changes, and the factors causing them, in self-esteem levels starting from the war in Syria, to help as a comparison point, until the integration in Sweden. To this end, this thesis uses Terror Management Theory to examine and analyze the results and outcomes of the research. The research main conclusion is that the loss of the two components of self-esteem, value and meaning, according to the Terror Management Theory. Value being the migrants ability to produce or have any real effect on their surroundings, and meaning being the world-value system that the migrants use to draw value and sense of worth. These two loses are the main reasons behind the huge drop in self-esteem levels among Syrian migrants in Sweden during their stay in the camps. At the end, this work gave recommendations for future studies, and a suggestion for an improved integration plan based on providing migrants with opportunities to have value and produce valuable contributions to the society during their stay in the camps, and also suggested the establishment of a new “trans” and basic world value system to help ease the transition of the migrants between their old system and the new one in Sweden.