Guest Contributor

Dr. Simona Zavratnik, Sociologist, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ljubljana

#StayHome. A privilege not afforded to refugees and migrants on the route

How to maintain the physical distance of two meters or personal hygiene in a refugee camp made for 1,000 people but housing 7,000? What happens when you don’t have a home or your “home” is not compatible with the currently desired manner of living? How does the world we are living in look like if the principle #stayhome is extended beyond dominant society to marginalized social groups? And most importantly, what kinds of solidarity and help characterize the Corona crisis and whether they will be carried on beyond it? These are the issues to which a group of researchers and students devoted the blog #Ostanidoma: Migracije, Begunci in Covid-19 (#StayHome: Migrations, Refugees and Covid-19) – a platform for critical thoughts on social margins which primarily aims to draw attention to the vulnerability of people who cannot afford #lockdownbaking, #lockdownart or #lockdownfun because they simply do not have such an option. Apart from the local Slovenian perspective on those issues, we also analyse the issues of European borders and migrations in an attempt to encompass the global-local conglomeration of issues relating to vulnerable migrants on the route.

Others, contagious: people from the margins of society during the Covid-19 crisis

At the time of the universal call to #stayhome, this trendy motto should be supplemented with a warning that not all social groups have the luxury of isolating in a safe place sheltered from the pandemic. In late March 2020, some were calling attention to the homeless people in Ljubljana, the Slovenian capital, who had no option but to remain in the streets but were chased away from the doorsteps of certain shops even during the week preceding the imposition of quarantine, when the war for toilet paper started raging. It took the city council and NGOs some time before they managed to find a (temporary) solution for them.

Similarly, migrant workers from Serbia stuck in Ljubljana gathered in the street, in front of the embassy where they spent several nights in the cold before they could move to a more comfortable accommodation provided for them in a sports hall. The convoy of people shunned by everyone – even their own country – was a sad sight: the tired and restless crowd maintaining barely any physical distance, only few wearing face masks. It was obvious that their main goal was to go home, to overcome a few remaining borders, a few hours separating them from their homes … so that they could start to think about issues such as the virus, health, quarantine, the future. It is not possible to say who extended help, it looked like many of them did – relatives, the Orthodox Church, individuals, city council – anyone trying to reduce somewhat the shame of leaving probably hungry people to queue in the cold in front of the bureaucratic outpost of their country in the town centre.

Like homeless people, the stuck migrant workers could not make it without solidarity. As simple as that.

But what to say about #stayhome if you’re a refugee? A refugee in an overcrowded camp which is a “quarantine” in its own right for the socially excluded people whose visibility is often disturbing for society. Humanitarian organizations and medical workers (e.g. Doctors Without Borders) have been warning about a pending catastrophe in refugee centres, for example in Bosnia-Herzegovina or in Greece. We spoke to a nurse working for a medical centre on the Greek island of Chios, who warned about the traps of the global shortage of care workers. Once the refugee centres run out of them, especially if medical workers become infected too, who will replace them and how will medical care on isolated islands be provided at all? It’s not enough to say to people “wash your hands”. If you live in a refugee camp, there is a strong possibility that you don’t have access to clean water or soap.

Migrant workers: who will harvest the hops, who will pick the fruits?

At the beginning of the corona crisis, many migrant workers were trapped in foreign countries, or between borders. Some were left without jobs. But this is one aspect of the crisis. As a matter of fact, many frontline workers fighting the pandemic are members of the migrant population: nurses, doctors, cleaners, drivers … it is thanks to these people that a complete shutdown of society could be avoided. It is thanks to their relentless work that we could breathe as a society. Yes, these are the people who we applauded from many balconies across Europe over the past weeks and months, starting with Italy.

Undoubtedly, migrant workers are exceptionally important for the functioning of contemporary societies. This is nothing new, but the pandemic and the accompanying social crisis should be seen as an opportunity to seriously reconsider the (re)evaluation of their work. It is necessary to look deeply into the model of “triple-D” jobs (difficult, dirty, dangerous), usually performed by migrants. In the last crisis that affected food supply chains in Europe, this issue transpired in Slovenia as the question of “who will harvest the hops if the borders are closed for migrant workers?”

In this case, borders are closed for everyone, not only migrants. The consequence was the emergence of the paradigm of non-mobility, which societies confronted with the Corona virus crisis fully accepted. What is needed above all in this situation is to accord the migrants and refugees the same treatment as accorded to citizens. If we respect that simple rule, all social actors will be winners. Some practices have been pointing to this direction. It is clear what needs to be done: the procedures for obtaining international protection should be simplified and shortened, deportations should be stopped (not only temporarily!), temporary residence permits should be issued to enable refugees and migrants to access public healthcare, and their statuses should be regularized. The reason is not only the shortage of workers in agriculture in Western Europe. The Corona crisis clearly showed how unstable and vulnerable the food supply system is. This should lead to more just and more decent working conditions for those on whom the food on our plates largely depends.

The fact is – we are safe when everyone is safe. The volunteers helping refugees on their routes through Bosnia and Serbia have been pointing out that for refugees, the period of pandemic is especially difficult. Being removed from the public eye even before the pandemic, they became even more invisible and more ghettoized. It’s a well-known fact that once they’re invisible, the governments (and the media) do not need to deal with them, or the treatment of refugees is subordinated to the present goals of populist politics along the Balkan migration route or their destination country (for example in Italy).

Pandemic, migrants and new breeds of racism

But it is not only about the refugees and migrants from the classical group of “contagious Others.” The current pandemic has opened, in addition to many social issues, also the question of racism and particularly the emergence of new breeds of racisms – against the Chinese or generally Asian people, or even Italians, all of which reinforce classical racism. To be sick and dark-skinned can easily turn into a “fatal combination” in the USA, where the most affected groups are precisely ethnic minorities. This undoubtedly shows that we are not all in the same boat and that social inequalities matter! The question of which new racisms and nationalisms will emerge from the pandemic and become entrenched on the global map and in local practices is definitely multi-dimensional, but the fact is that they should be considered in unison with public health policies. New breeds of racism in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic have been observed on both the individual and systemic levels. They involve individual perceptions and responses to “contagious Others” but also the impacts of health policies in individual countries. The latter is very worrying, including from the perspective of the health of refugees.

Therefore, let me repeat once more: we are safe only when everyone is safe.