Research: Beyond borders

BEYOND BORDERS

Dr Patrycja Rozbicka, Dr Amanda Russell Beattie and Dr Jelena Obradovic-Wochnik

The trauma of the Covid-19 pandemic has diverted attention from other urgent crises, including the plight of hundreds of millions of refugees and migrants who have been forced to leave their homelands due to violence and economic hardship. Academics from the School of Social Sciences and Humanities have been working to change conditions for the better.

Photographs: Jelena Obradovic-Wochnik In 2015 Dr Jelena ObradovicWochnik was conducting research in Serbia, when migrants began entering the country. Soon The Guardian was reporting a “big river of people”, fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East, and heading through Serbia on their way into Croatia. Later, it was estimated that 600,000 migrants had entered the country; the Croatian, Slovenian and Hungarian governments responded by closing their borders, causing Serbian and Greek refugee camps to overcrowd. Dr Obradovic-Wochnik, who is a senior lecturer in politics and international relations at Aston University, became interested in the plight of these people, and, more broadly, conditions in European refugee camps. For a few years she conducted research on her own before discovering synergies with Aston colleagues Dr Amanda Russell Beattie (who was working on ethics and migration, particularly discourses of citizenship and deportation), Dr Gemma Bird (now at the University of Liverpool) and Dr Patrycja Rozbicka.

All four went on a research trip to Greece and Serbia and what they found was illuminating, namely that the EU’s response to the migrant crisis had been to outsource refugee settlement and care to states such as Serbia, Greece and Bosnia, who were previously described as ‘transit’ countries. This was leading to overcrowding and poor

Even before Covid-19 emerged in Europe, January and February 2020 saw terrible violations of human rights... As Turkey opened its borders, and Greece denied any asylum claims, life for individuals who were seeking safety in Europe was increasingly fraught. ”

conditions for the migrants and aidworkers were struggling to cope. The research methods used by the group were qualitative, based mainly on interviews and focussed on NGOs (i.e., grassroots organisations and activists). The researchers spent time in their offices and shadowed them on trips to speak to people on certain routes through Europe. They also conducted interviews with camp officials and policy-makers in Brussels, Greece, Serbia and Bosnia. The team did not focus on interviewing refugees.

“We’ve tended to try to avoid that kind of research because these are obviously vulnerable communities,” explains Dr Obradovic-Wochnik. “During 2015 there was quite a lot of emphasis on individuals and journalists were going to these different camps and informal settlements, taking pictures of them and publishing them. A lot of ethical concerns came out of that.”

“From the very beginning of the project we had to pay extra attention to the narrative linked to our work and the extremely sensitive topic that we work on,” agrees Dr Rozbicka. “All our media engagement had ‘do no harm’ at its heart – but we also had to make sure our messages were clear and could not be misinterpreted. While sometimes that meant heated debates with editors, we aimed at staying true to our guiding ethical principles.” Gradually, the focus of Dr ObradovicWochnik’s research turned to the migrants’ experience of violence and she joined with Dr Arshad Isakjee (University of Liverpool) and Dr Thom Davies (University of Nottingham) to examine the borders themselves. These inhospitable, often dangerous, places are sites of violence where people regularly risk their lives to reach safety. The reasons for migration, too, were not always obvious.

“Pretty much everyone that we spoke to indicated that people were fleeing various kinds of violence,” says Dr Obradovic-Wochnik. “That could be a large-scale conflict, such as in Syria, or instances of localised violence that have regional patterns. I think the ways in which violence affects different communities is quite broad-ranging. For instance, somebody living in parts of Damascus in Syria will have a very different experience of somebody living in a rural part of Afghanistan. Not all forms of violence are warrelated. People living in parts of the country where the Taliban is resurgent might experience kidnappings. And people having worked for the US military in Afghanistan are being targeted by other members of their community. So there’s all kinds of things; the stories are just endless.” New ways to raise awareness of these stories emerged. In 2018, through Dr Bird’s work, the group launched a photographic installation at Tate Liverpool and held walking tours, explaining the background behind their fieldwork. These activities were enhanced with additional research photographs and a presentation by Karolina Augustova, whose PhD research at Aston focuses on refugees’ experiences of borders and violence. True to their purpose, the group avoided picturing individuals but investigated the geographies of migration: the landmarks people used to navigate through the so-called Balkan Migration Route and the infrastructure of the camps. In 2019 a British Parliamentary committee called on evidence from academics to help shape policies around dealing with migration post-Brexit. The whole group was well-placed to highlight injustices and to make recommendations; meanwhile, the project on border violence attracted funding to work with activists in the field. As a result more public engagement is planned, including an animation. Yet, with the outbreak of Covid-19 still a big concern, is there a danger that the plight of refugees will sink under the radar again?

“Even before Covid-19 emerged in Europe, January and February 2020 saw terrible violations of human rights,” explains Dr Beattie. “As Turkey opened its borders, and Greece denied any asylum claims, life for individuals who were seeking safety in Europe was increasingly fraught.

“Covid-19 has only heightened this challenge. Boats arriving on the shores of Greek islands are being quarantined, but not in any recognisable spaces. We hear stories of individuals inverting their boats into makeshift shelters. We also hear stories of boat arrivals simply not being reported thus skewing arrival numbers. As we have written in our latest report to the Government, the lockdown across European countries is exacerbating the instances of border violence, public health crisis, and delaying, even further, asylum proceedings.”

You can follow progress on the research on Facebook (@ACEIRAesthetics) and Twitter (@IR_Aesthetics) Meet the academics:

Dr Patrycja Rozbicka is a Lecturer in Politics and International Relations. Her research circulates around the participation of interest groups in European and national policy-making as well as the regulation of the live music industry in the UK and EU.

Dr Amanda Russell Beattie is a Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations and Fellow of the Aston Centre for Europe. Her research cuts across political theory and international political thought, exploring her experience of the deportation regime in the UK.

Dr Jelena Obradovic-Wochnik is a Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations and Deputy Director of the Aston Centre for Europe. She is an expert in the politics of the Western Balkans, Serbia and Kosovo.