Nuovi immaginari dell’accoglienza. Strategie e progetti di ricerca-azione nei centri minori del Mezzogiorno

The reception of migratory flows in the small Towns in the south of the country is part of a context of population decrease that, since the late 1990s, has tried to experiment with tools and methods to contain the phenomena of depopulation of entire communities. Mitigating the phenomena of depopulation, initiating demographic and economic growth, and triggering the redevelopment and transformation of abandoned urban fabrics in small Towns are some of the goals of the LabCity Architecture (DARCH-UNIPA) action-research project conducted with intensive project exploration in Valledolmo (Pa), a Sicilian town with an economy rooted in agricultural and livestock traditions. Within this framework, a selection of virtuous cases directed the research and distance themselves from emergency residential experiences, which have accentuated the phenomena of marginalization of new inhabitants. The definition of new ways of socio-occupational integration of future third-country nationals led to the definition of a program of a Social Housing Community intended to accommodate a small community of migrant families and temporary visitors, within the Roccafanara neighbourhood that is in a state of abandonment. The load of the reception of the small Towns can become a strategic potentiality capable of providing answers for the reception of migrants and for the whole community that stays there. Overcoming the current scenario of depopulation of small Towns is a possibility to be experimented in the Southern Italy to reactivate economies and new sensitivities on the unstoppable phenomenon of migration.