Co-ethnic Boundaries and Labour Stratification among Italian Migrants in Luxembourg: A Qualitative Study of Intra-ethnic Inequality

This article examines intra-ethnic relations within the Italian migrant community in Luxembourg, focusing on the social and labour dynamics between recently arrived migrants and established co-nationals. Drawing on 42 qualitative life-story and semi-structured interviews conducted between 2024 and 2026, the study explores how inequality, labour vulnerability, and social differentiation are experienced and negotiated within a shared national category. The findings show that co-ethnic labour relations are embedded within a segmented moral economy shaped by occupational stratification and migration trajectories. Recently arrived migrants frequently report precarious working conditions, informal labour arrangements, and forms of perceived exploitation within co-ethnic workplaces. These experiences are accompanied by narratives of conditional support, selective exclusion, and symbolic differentiation within established migrant networks. The article argues that these dynamics reflect broader processes of intra-ethnic boundary making operating within highly stratified labour markets. Co-ethnic solidarity emerges as conditional, unevenly distributed, and mediated by occupational status, symbolic hierarchies, and migration timing.