Periodic Reporting for period 2 - BECAMP (Beyond the camp: border regimes, enduring liminality and everyday geopolitics of migration in Italy and Spain)
Période du rapport: 2023-04-01 au 2024-03-31
The project BeCAMP is a comparative anthropological study of the reception system for asylum seekers in two European countries of first arrival, Italy and Spain. The starting assumption was that borders, rather than mere geopolitical demarcations separating the territories of different nation-states, are complex systems stretching towards the outside (border externalisation) through the entanglement of the military with the humanitarian. Borders also expand towards the inside of national territories (border internalisation) through the workings of the legal-administrative apparatus managing the lives of illegalised and racialised people. Nonetheless, the latter phenomenon has been understudied in comparison to the former. The project sought to fill this gap by investigating how the border follows the migrants after the crossing, particularly by critically addressing the migrants' reception system as an enactment and a constitutive factor of a more comprehensive border regime.
As the project is now concluded, the researcher's experience on the ground, where she observed the daily workings of the reception system, validated and reinforced the initial idea of the project to look for the metamorphoses of the camp in other modes of containment beyond detention. Showing the effects of different policies on the reception system and living conditions of asylum seekers and illegalised migrants was intended as a way to build a counter-narrative and dismantle the bad image often associated with these groups. This determined the timeliness of this project: it addressed a multi-layered phenomenon that not only affects migrants and the respective national societies but also has profound implications for the endurance of the whole European project.
As the project is now concluded, the researcher's experience on the ground, where she observed the daily workings of the reception system, validated and reinforced the initial idea of the project to look for the metamorphoses of the camp in other modes of containment beyond detention. Showing the effects of different policies on the reception system and living conditions of asylum seekers and illegalised migrants was intended as a way to build a counter-narrative and dismantle the bad image often associated with these groups. This determined the timeliness of this project: it addressed a multi-layered phenomenon that not only affects migrants and the respective national societies but also has profound implications for the endurance of the whole European project.
During the first reporting period, the fellow conducted fieldwork in two different locations, a small provincial town in north-eastern Italy and Barcelona in Spain. In the first case, she volunteered in an organisation managing a reception centre for asylum seekers where she had previously served as a coordinator. In the second, she contacted nine different local organisations providing the same service and interviewed several of their employees; she also volunteered in one of them.
After one year, when Covid regulations finally allowed it, she moved to the partner institution in the US. There, she received the planned training, attended six courses, networked with professors and researchers working on similar subjects, and gave two lectures.
During the second reporting period, the researcher moved to the host institution, where she devoted most of her time to reviewing current literature on the project's subjects, systematising the gathered data and writing conference proposals, articles, and book chapters.
In total, the researcher wrote five articles in peer-reviewed international journals (two forthcoming), three book chapters in collective volumes (two forthcoming), two book reviews, and one web-based publication; she presented eleven papers at international conferences; she organised four panels at international conferences, two workshops, three seminars and one international conference at the host institution.
At the time of submitting this report, she is working on a special issue (already approved by the Visual Anthropology editorial board), a collective volume, and a monograph.
Dissemination of research results among a broader audience has been addressed by organising activities with children (board game on migrations), applying visual methods (photographic workshops and upcoming exhibition) and starting the production of a podcast series with Radio Ca' Foscari.
After one year, when Covid regulations finally allowed it, she moved to the partner institution in the US. There, she received the planned training, attended six courses, networked with professors and researchers working on similar subjects, and gave two lectures.
During the second reporting period, the researcher moved to the host institution, where she devoted most of her time to reviewing current literature on the project's subjects, systematising the gathered data and writing conference proposals, articles, and book chapters.
In total, the researcher wrote five articles in peer-reviewed international journals (two forthcoming), three book chapters in collective volumes (two forthcoming), two book reviews, and one web-based publication; she presented eleven papers at international conferences; she organised four panels at international conferences, two workshops, three seminars and one international conference at the host institution.
At the time of submitting this report, she is working on a special issue (already approved by the Visual Anthropology editorial board), a collective volume, and a monograph.
Dissemination of research results among a broader audience has been addressed by organising activities with children (board game on migrations), applying visual methods (photographic workshops and upcoming exhibition) and starting the production of a podcast series with Radio Ca' Foscari.
The project has expanded current research and literature on the European asylum and reception system by shedding new light on some understudied aspects of it. On the one hand, it focused on what is generally considered an example of good practice in reception: small centres where guests are hosted in private apartments and apparently enjoy a greater degree of autonomy in comparison with the concentrationary model represented by refugee camps and hotspots. Our findings show, on the contrary, that "the camp" is more than a physical space: it is a method based on the production and maintenance of a state of infrastructural uncertainty in aid recipients. Such uncertainty translates into legal, spatial, temporal and material terms, all aspects that have been dealt with in BeCAMP publications and communications.
On the other hand, the research looked at the broader system (known as border regime) of which state reception of asylum seekers is one function among many others. Bureaucracy is another specific function of such a regime that the project BeCAMP has analysed in relation to the filtering, sorting and labelling of humans crossing borders and, more specifically, to how the state weaponises it as a device to keep them at bay by neglect and abandonment. The novel concept of “ghost bureaucracy” has been coined to conceptualise street-level bureaucracy in its acts of absence as much as in those of presence and opens up future possibilities for theorising the absence of the state.
Results achieved during the final reporting period (2023-2025):
- BeCAMP website
- The photographic part of the project (participative workshops with asylum seekers and refugees)
- Publishing articles in peer-reviewed journals and other scholarly
- Designing dissemination activities aimed at communicating the project’s results to the general public
- Organising an international closing conference
At the societal level, BeCAMP has had two main aspirations when it comes to its potential impact:
- By meticulously scrutinising the functioning of the asylum and reception system on the grounds, it has generated a body of knowledge that could help reform the current policies that have proven to be discriminatory and counter-productive;
- By adopting a language addressed to the general public (through non-academic publications and the employment of the visual), it has fostered encounters, dialogues and mutual understanding to counter the dominant narrative that depicts the Other as a danger to the receiving societies.
On the other hand, the research looked at the broader system (known as border regime) of which state reception of asylum seekers is one function among many others. Bureaucracy is another specific function of such a regime that the project BeCAMP has analysed in relation to the filtering, sorting and labelling of humans crossing borders and, more specifically, to how the state weaponises it as a device to keep them at bay by neglect and abandonment. The novel concept of “ghost bureaucracy” has been coined to conceptualise street-level bureaucracy in its acts of absence as much as in those of presence and opens up future possibilities for theorising the absence of the state.
Results achieved during the final reporting period (2023-2025):
- BeCAMP website
- The photographic part of the project (participative workshops with asylum seekers and refugees)
- Publishing articles in peer-reviewed journals and other scholarly
- Designing dissemination activities aimed at communicating the project’s results to the general public
- Organising an international closing conference
At the societal level, BeCAMP has had two main aspirations when it comes to its potential impact:
- By meticulously scrutinising the functioning of the asylum and reception system on the grounds, it has generated a body of knowledge that could help reform the current policies that have proven to be discriminatory and counter-productive;
- By adopting a language addressed to the general public (through non-academic publications and the employment of the visual), it has fostered encounters, dialogues and mutual understanding to counter the dominant narrative that depicts the Other as a danger to the receiving societies.