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Refugees and asylum seekers' views of legal recognition and its consequences for their integration - Refugee Law Initiative Blog
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a
Refugees and asylum seekers’ views of
legal recognition and its consequences for
their integration
Oct 6, 2020 | General content | 0 comments
Blog post by Basem Mahmud* who holds a Ph.D. in sociology from Free University Berlin.
His dissertation was entitled ‘A Grounded Theory Approach to Understanding Emotions and
Belonging in Forced Migration’. Currently, he is a Marie Sklodowska Curie Fellow at the
University of Granada, and visiting researcher at the Migration Research Center (MiReKoc)
at Koç University in Istanbul where he is conducting research about refugees in the global
economy.
You do not know what that means; [when] you do not have the nationality! Even though I
had many opportunities to travel, I did not ask for asylum, because I have the Syrian
passport of which I dreamed for 27 years! I got it when I was 27 years old. I do not want
to ask for asylum and get another one. I always said to the Syrians who were laughing at
me and saying that it is emotional and utopian; you do not know this feeling. I ate and
drank based on whether I have nationality or not; I learned to draw whether I have
nationality or not. I studied and did my homework based on that. You do not know! You
do not know what it means that a person goes with all his will to ask for asylum; he
submits his passport and gets a travel document instead of it to live with dignity!
– Oula describing the essential role which ‘the stateless’ played in her life
[i]
In a totalitarian regime, all subjects – even citizens – are deprived of most of their rights.
This condition is determinant for their life, and existence in the world. Therefore, legal
recognition becomes the primary objective after fleeing home. In this article, I examine
the views of forced migrants, based on my research with Syrian refugees and asylum
seekers in Germany and Turkey, to answer the following question: How do forced migrants
weigh the advantages and disadvantages of securing recognition in order to make informed
decisions during their mobility and settlement? I combine the results of my research in
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Legal status is one of the four dimensions necessary for asylum seekers to say I can start a
new life here, which I refer to as ‘the new life hope in the place’. The other three
dimensions are dignity-recognition, empathic emotions (such as sympathy, empathy and
[ii]
compassion), and material satisfaction.
Asylum seekers weigh all of their decisions and
establish their relationships with places based on these four dimensions. As such, their
relationship with a place providing them only with the affective elements (empathic
emotions and dignity-recognition) will be temporary because they cannot remain there for
a long time without the instrumental elements (legal status and material satisfaction). On
the contrary, if a place provides only the instrumental, their relationship with it will be
rational-conditional, meaning they will stay because it seems to be the best option for the
moment. Only when they find both the affective and the instrumental elements in the
place, can a feeling of belonging in this place develop. If they do not find any of these
elements, they will view this as a ‘non-place’. A place should provide hope whether it is
based only on the presence of the affective, the instrumental, or both.
The affective dimensions are, mostly, experienced through the social interactions that the
forced migrant establishes in the place. In the case of the instrumental, the forced migrant
obtains information even before starting the journey which affects his ‘migration decision
[iii]
making’.
This information includes waiting-time, material aids during and after the
application of asylum, and the nature and length of the legal status. This also includes the
consequences of the legal status; whether they are allowed to bring their family members
or not and the bureaucratic procedures. This shapes their decision on where to move;
whether Turkey, Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, etc. Moreover, the same could be said
about movement inside the country among different cities. E.g. they may choose the
easiest or fastest province or city in granting the legal status.
The moment when their application is accepted is critical because it is very important for
their entire future. It is usually described as the essential moment of feeling relief,
comfort, and happiness. Now the asylum seeker becomes a refugee and takes a new step by
starting to plan for his new life in the place. Of course, this is not the end; it is a long
process that does not end until obtaining citizenship. With each step, the same feelings are
repeated as a result of the increased stability, empowerment, and protection toward
ending the uncertainty which has accompanied him since losing ‘home.’ As one
participant’s reaction demonstrates:
He [his employer] said: you received a letter; maybe it is your residence permit. I went
there; they gave me the residence permit. I went back to the restaurant, I sat there, and
I started crying. I said to myself; thank God.
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home practices’, by which I mean; learning a language, constructing familiarity with the
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new place, comparing different cultures/societies/states based on individual and collective
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experiences of migration, remembering and restoring feeling at home by mental imagery
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Refugees and asylum seekers' views of legal recognition and its consequences for their integration - Refugee Law Initiative Blog
activities, and bodily movement, buying, cooking, and eating traditional food, seeking
social relations, engaging in group activities, making life plans ‘here’: job, education,
family, and citizenship. That is, legal status determines their access to many of these
practices. An uncertain future not only causes psychological harm but also negatively
affects their relationship with the place.
The experience of Akram shows how this uncertainty affects everyday life in a very
destructive manner, such that the person cannot even make plans for simple things that are
essential for building home:
Yes, I did it. When I came here, I didn’t even think about buying the necessary things for
my home because I was always afraid of deportation. I received a message from the
lawyer telling me that I have won the lawsuit, then I went directly to the school, and
after three months, I was able to communicate a little in German. That was because I
thought that I had won the lawsuit, but after that, I received the third rejection of my
application, and then I stayed one entire month without visiting the school …
All of this raises questions about the public debate on integration, temporary protection,
and the prospect of returning home when the situation improves in the home country. The
question is not only whether refugees want to return or not, but there is a need for more
reflection and insight into the impacts of those declarations and presumptions on the
prospect of a return home, on the forced migrant’s feeling of durable safety and thus his
constructing home practices. Raising questions such as: should I construct a home if I
should leave soon? Is not better to avoid the negative effect of losing home again by
dealing with the new place as temporary and not making a great emotional investment?
The refugees and asylum seekers I met mostly preferred to talk about what integration is
not rather than defining what it is. Even when they gave a specific definition, they quickly
moved to what it is not. This avoidance of a definition could be a kind of protest or
resistance to discourses about integration that fail to understand their everyday lives.
Research on integration should pay more attention to the everyday lives of forced migrants,
rather than searching for extreme cases of integration; those who are either totally
isolated or fully assimilated. In addition, more thought should be given to helping refugees
and asylum seekers establish more contact with locals rather than portraying them as
people who seek to live in isolation or ‘parallel communities.’ While this may be true in
instances where there is a high perception of discrimination (maybe among second- or
third-generation migrants), the more significant and immediate problem is still the lack of
local knowledge and ability to establish such contacts.
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The use of the word ‘refugee’
becomes
significant
will
assume more
that you
are happywhen
with it.used to categorize forced
[iv]
migrants in personal or intimate spheres of interactions.
Its meanings create a sense of
Ok
border maintenance or even discrimination that threatens feelings of belonging. It seems
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that the use of the word ‘refugees’ is tolerated in the economic or political spheres. Still,
its use in intimate spheres may enhance the perception of exclusion or discrimination,
while the forced migrant tries to advance in his home construction process. For many
forced migrants, this word presents a kind of obstacle that traps him as an eternal
‘refugee.’ As a result, many of them try to replace it with a new term; newcomer. This
resonates with their view on integration.
When I in my research asked How do you understand integration?, the answers revolved
around two different fields; personal or intimate (e.g. tradition, values, religion) and the
public, economic, and political (e.g. learning language, mutual recognition and respect,
citizenship and political participation, having work and pay taxes, accepting ‘the Other’).
The first is non-negotiable, whereas the second is negotiable. Therefore, they may accept
their ‘second status of citizenship,’ de facto by which I mean having less political rights and
taking jobs which locals do not like to do. However, they largely do not tolerate any
transgression into their personal sphere due to this status, as one of them explained above;
“I am not a refugee everywhere and all the time. I am also a colleague, friend, guest, and
so on”. Thus, interventions in this sphere in the name of integration is met with strong
defensive reactions, which may interrupt the home building process; this constitutes a real
threat to the new-life hope in the place because it affects their perception of recognitiondignity and empathic emotions in the place.
Migration policy may contribute to enhancing feelings of injustice, especially those related
to border controls, forcing people to risk their lives at sea. A more compassionate migration
policy does not necessarily mean opening the borders. Most refugees demonstrate an
understanding of the challenges that are inherent in balancing different needs and
priorities in migration policies. Based on the views of the research participants, the most
relevant alternatives (those which enhance forced migrants’ subjective well-being and help
to foster engagement in practices of constructing home) toward adopting better migration
policies, can be summarized as follows:
1. Taking more seriously those procedures which guarantee that those who are given asylum
deserve it, strengthening security in the host country and the forced migrant’s safety
during movement.
2. Considering the various levels of forced migrants’ professional skills, expertise, or
education in planning for integration.
3. Coordinating refugee distribution among European countries (always considering family
reunification).
4. Giving more attention to unaccompanied minors.
5. Encouraging the use of words like ‘newcomer’ (as opposed to refugee).
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6.
Designing
ways to encourage
interaction
between
refugees
and locals, and avoiding the
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formation of ghettos.
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7. Improving the living conditions in the camps.
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8. Reducing waiting times, especially after applying for asylum or family reunification.
9. Fighting discrimination earnestly.
Integration and temporary residence permits/protection for the refugee seem to be in
contradiction if we consider the view of forced migrants. Home-building is a process
requiring hard work and great emotional immersion and investment in the new place that is
seen as a place capable of providing the possibility of starting a new life. If the feeling of
home is essential for integration, then reminding refugees that their ‘visit’ may end soon
will likely negatively affect their engagement in practices of constructing home as well as
their well-being in the new place, as my research shows when analyzing differences
between asylum seekers and refugees.
All of this indicates the need for a review of migration policy and its procedures in dealing
with refugees. The findings point out the importance of shortening waiting times, but also
to extend the duration of residency permits. Permanent residency permits facilitate
feelings of stability, safety, welcome, and more engagement in constructing home
practices, compared to a one-year period of temporary protection. Furthermore, and aside
from the issue of time, limitations on geographical movement seem to negatively affect
peoples’ capacity for agency over their own life. Those participants who were obligated to
remain in a small village or a place where they felt that they were not welcome,
considered this time of their life to be ‘lost’ since they were unable to advance toward the
home-building process due to restrictions of movement inside the destination country.
Therefore, it is also necessary to consider the possibility of facilitating their movement to a
place of their choosing as early as possible, which would positively affect their well-being
and engagement in constructing home practices.
To summarise, a migration policy that aims to integrate refugees should enhance forced
migrants’ feeling of belonging and this cannot emerge without considering the four
elements of the new-life hope among them guarantee the legal recognition as soon as
possible.
*Basem Mahmud: basem@ugr.es
[i]
Syria is a country that has a large number of stateless people.
[ii]
With dignity-recognition I refer to human dignity and social dignity. The first, dignity, is
about the principle that every human being has an inherent and inalienable value, and is
worthy
respect.
the second,
recognition
– though
to the first — is
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about
recognition
and
thus
in here:
behavior,
perception.
[iii]
will assume that you are happy with it.
I distinguish between escaping and migrating
during the forced migration context. The
Ok
difference between these two experiences is articulated in three dimensions; time,
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distance, and objective. In escaping, the individual believes that soon he will be able to go
back to his home (time). He moves as close as possible to home (distance). His objective is
to start a new life at home (there is no migration plan). In migrating, the individual
believes that he will not be able to go back home, at least for the next few years. Any
place becomes a possibility. Distance from home is not important. His objective is to start a
new life far from home and he therefore makes a migration plan. This view challenges the
dominant idea or the illusion that talking about asylum seekers’ decisions of migration is a
contradiction, and may have a negative effect on their reception in the destination country.
I argue that though they were obligated to flee home, they make various decisions
afterwards; how, where, when, and with whom we start the journey and stay to start a new
life. Once there, nothing could affect them more negatively than portraying them as
passive people without decisions!
[iv]
This view seems to be contrary to the plans of NGOs, activists, and other stake-holders.
These plans usually focus on mobilizing people and gaining support and therefore portraying
refugees and asylum seekers as people who need help and protection. I would say that this
could coincide with the view of the asylum seekers, but not in the case of refugees who
indeed want to convert the new place into a home.
The views expressed in this article belong to the author/s and do not necessarily reflect
those of the Refugee Law Initiative. We welcome comments and contributions to this blog
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