Maja Sager
Docent | Senior lecturer
Emerging local solidarities? Local responses to migration to non-urban communities in the south of Sweden
Author
Summary, in English
In a time of harshening border control and public discourses on securitisation and “crisis” at the national as well as European levels, it is of interest to explore local responses to migration, especially in areas outside of the larger cities. Local organising in support of different migrant groups, as well as more hostile or openly racist responses, are not new phenomena. However, we argue that new forms of organising has emerged due to ways in which international migration increasingly has become present at an everyday level in new localities. In a Swedish context, local responses to migration have mainly been centred to cities with reception centres and to transit areas. However, with a larger number of asylum seekers reaching the Swedish border in 2015, migrants encounter communities that historically have had less contact with international migration, and new communities respond to migration. This dispersal in responses to migration is also partly due to new policies that oblige all municipalities to receive asylum seekers.
In this paper, we explore the everyday encounters, responses and forms of organising developed by arriving migrants and locals in the semi-rural areas of Scania, Sweden. In this region, far right parties have presented hostile ideas towards migration long before these issues were introduced in the political discourse at a national level. But there have also been local responses of solidarity, especially since international migration has become present at an everyday level. We therefore aim to explore the everyday labour of solidarity, in a context of dispersal of solidarity – how new forms of organisation emerge in small cities and non-urban areas. We also explore limits to solidarity and more hostile responses that develop in these areas.
In this paper, we explore the everyday encounters, responses and forms of organising developed by arriving migrants and locals in the semi-rural areas of Scania, Sweden. In this region, far right parties have presented hostile ideas towards migration long before these issues were introduced in the political discourse at a national level. But there have also been local responses of solidarity, especially since international migration has become present at an everyday level. We therefore aim to explore the everyday labour of solidarity, in a context of dispersal of solidarity – how new forms of organisation emerge in small cities and non-urban areas. We also explore limits to solidarity and more hostile responses that develop in these areas.
Department/s
- Department of Gender Studies
- School of Social Work
Publishing year
2019-04-26
Language
English
Document type
Conference paper: abstract
Topic
- International Migration and Ethnic Relations
Conference name
Hospitality, hostility and everything in<br/>between in an era of forced displacements
Conference date
2019-04-25 - 2019-04-26
Conference place
Stockholm, Sweden
Status
Published