Conflict Dynamics in the Long Summer of Migration: The Example of Frankfurt/Main

Between the poles of unconditional welcome politics and a policy of partially open borders on the one hand, and conservative-chauvinistic discourse interventions and repressive reactions, on the other hand, a debate begins to show about the discursive and material form and the constitution of present border regimes during the refugee discourse. This paper presents the results of a one-year empirical research project and examines from a discourse-theoretical and historical-materialistic perspective to what extent and along which conflicts a shift can be revealed in the hegemonic forces formation from an unconditional welcoming culture to a conditional welcoming culture in Frankfurt a. M. between summer 2015 and summer 2017. After a brief description of the theoretical and methodological foundations the local conflict dynamics, actors and discourse strategies are reconstructed and classified according to the hegemony theory based on the empirical data basis (FAZ, FNP, FR). The article ends with an outlook on current developments and scopes of action in Frankfurt/Main.