From Acts of Care to Practice-Based Resistance: Refugee-Sector Service Provision and Its Impact(s) on Integration

Emmaleena Käkelä (), Helen Baillot, Leyla Kerlaff and Marcia Vera-Espinoza
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Emmaleena Käkelä: Institute for Global Health and Development, Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh EH21 6UU, UK
Helen Baillot: Institute for Global Health and Development, Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh EH21 6UU, UK
Leyla Kerlaff: Institute for Global Health and Development, Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh EH21 6UU, UK
Marcia Vera-Espinoza: Institute for Global Health and Development, Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh EH21 6UU, UK

Social Sciences, 2023, vol. 12, issue 1, 1-18

Abstract: The UK refugee sector encompasses welfare provision, systems advocacy, capacity development and research. However, to date there has been little attention on refugees’ experiences of the support provided by these services or on the views of the practitioners who deliver them. This paper draws from interviews and workshops with thirty refugee beneficiaries of an integration service in Scotland and twenty practitioners to shed light on how refugees and practitioners perceive and provide meaning to the work of the refugee sector. We identify refugee sector organisations as crucial nodes in refugees’ social networks and explore the multiple roles they play in the integration process. Firstly, we confirm that refugee organisations act as connectors, linking refugees with wider networks of support. Secondly, we demonstrate that the work of the refugee sector involves acts of care that are of intrinsic value to refugees, over and above the achievement of tangible integration outcomes. Finally, we demonstrate that this care also involves acts that seek to overcome and subvert statutory system barriers. We propose to understand these acts as forms of “ practice-based resistance ” necessitated by a hostile policy environment. The findings expand on understandings of the refugee sector, its role in integration and the multi-faceted nature of integration processes.

Keywords: refugee-sector; refugee integration; practice-based resistance; care; hostile environment; welfare restrictionism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A B N P Y80 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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