Exile to Poverty: Policies and Poverty Among Refugees in Poland
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12356 |
| Published date | 01 December 2017 |
| Date | 01 December 2017 |
Exile to Poverty: Policies and Poverty Among
Refugees in Poland
Karolina Lukasiewicz*
ABSTRACT
Poverty is a well-known short-term outcome of migration in general and a long-term outcome
of forced migration in a global context. Surprisingly, this outcome appears among refugees in
welfare states which provide various asylum and social policies facilitating integration. The
article aims to explore the relationship between asylum and social policies and poverty among
refugees. The research results are drawn from two studies conducted among refugees, NGOs,
national and local administration representatives, and case workers in Poland between 2006
and 2014. The results show that asylum policy contributes to the material and symbolic hard-
ship experienced by refugees, and social policy is ineffective in its prevention. If refugees are
settled in regions with high levels of poverty, unemployment and ethnic-based prejudices, then
they experience and continue to live in poverty. In such a context, and due to its weaknesses
in addressing discrimination, social policy cannot successfully integrate refugees.
INTRODUCTION
Despite the formation and implementation of various asylum and social policies for refugees
1
in wel-
fare states, some forced migrants experience poverty and social exclusion. Yet little attention is given
to these experiences and how they relate to policies (asylum and social) in welfare states (for excep-
tions see: Phillimore, 2011; Mulvey, 2010, 2015; Tang, 2015; UNHCR, 2013; Quintiliani, 2009;
Valenta and Bunar, 2010). Even less is known about the impact of policies on the situation of refu-
gees in welfare states which have little experience in immigration, such as Poland. This article aims to
fill this gap using the Polish case and focusing on housing and labour market conditions. It examines
the experiences of poverty among refugees and answers how they relate to the way policies operate
on the ground, based on the opinions of the different categories of actors involved. The latter include
refugees, NGO representatives assisting refugees, national and local administration representatives
involved in developing these policies and case workers implementing them in local agencies.
STUDIES OF POVERTY AMONG REFUGEES
Poverty is usually defined based solely on the ”material core”and lack of resources (Townsend,
1996), or, additionally, based on the symbolic dimension (Lister, 2004). The material core is under-
stood in terms of income or living standards. Amartya Sen (2006a) defined the material core using
concepts of ”functioning”(everyday life activities and a person’s characteristics) and ”capabilities”
(structurally determined choices). Poverty, according to Sen, derives from the failures of
* New York University, McSilver Institute for Poverty Policy and Research.
doi: 10.1111/imig.12356
©2017 The Author
International Migration ©2017 IOM
International Migration Vol. 55 (6) 2017
ISS N 00 20- 7985 Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
”capabilities”. The symbolic aspects of poverty, not exclusive to these conditions, include disre-
spect, humiliation, feelings of shame, stigma, assault on dignity and self-esteem, othering, denial of
human rights, diminished citizenship, lack of voice and powerlessness (Lister, 2004: 8). In this arti-
cle, poverty is defined based on the material criterion of income (living below the national poverty
line), but it goes beyond and includes the symbolic aspects related to experiencing poverty.
Poverty as a short-term outcome of immigration is a well-known and extensively researched
topic. Many factors contribute to this condition: discriminatory hosting country/society practices,
low language skills, limited access to having formal education recognized, limited knowledge of
the functioning of the local labour market, limited social networks and the perceived temporary
character of immigration (resulting in short-term occupational strategies) (Ballarino and Panichella,
2015). These factors push immigrants to take low-skilled and low-paid jobs and, as a result, force
some of them into poverty. Policies addressing these factors can facilitate integration and prevent
poverty. Some of these factors may, however, disappear over time and allow immigrants to pro-
gress beyond their parents’generation (Alba and Nee, 1997; Ballarino and Panichella, 2015). In
this case, second-generation immigrants can ”exceed their first-generation parents in educational
attainment, occupational achievement and economic status”(Farley and Alba, 2002). Other US-
based studies, however, argue that some immigrant groups can experience poverty as a persistent
condition, mostly due to structural factors such as prejudiced social reception, lack of access to
established co-ethnic communities, indifferent or hostile government reception and the absence of
mobility ladders (Portes and Zhou, 1993). In this case, migrants can experience so-called downward
assimilation to the bottom segments of the hosting society. Policies either fail to create the condi-
tions allowing migrants to progress or directly contribute to the downward assimilation.
Studies of poverty among refugees are quite new and deliver little evidence on the factors contribut-
ing to it. Cases in the United Kingdom and the United States refer to poverty expressed in housing
insecurity, inability to pursue basic material goods (such as clothes or medicines), dependency on wel-
fare and other support networks, food insecurity and hunger, living on a day-to-day basis and being
unable to establish plans for the future (e.g. Allsopp, Sigona and Phillimore, 2014; Carter, Polevychok
and Osborne, 2009; Phillimore and Godson, 2006; Tang, 2015). Like other individuals impacted by
poverty, refugees also reported being stigmatized for using different forms of welfare (Mulvey, 2010).
Pre-migration factors (including trauma and torture experiences) contribute to poverty (Allsopp, Sig-
ona and Phillimore, 2014). Poverty also depends on the length of the residency, language competence
and contacts with religious and co-national groups (Bollinger and Hagstrom, 2011; Carter, Polevy-
chok and Osborne, 2009; Cheung and Phillimore; 2013). Refugees are strongly dependent on the
structural conditions defined by asylum and the social policies they rely on. Evidence from the UK
suggests that the asylum system itself can be ”a poverty producing machine”(Allsopp, Sigona and
Phillimore, 2014). Some authors suggest that pushing into poverty can be a deliberate strategy used
by governments to decrease or prevent future asylum claims (e.g. Allsopp, Sigona and Phillimore,
2014; Bloch and Schuster 2002; Spencer 2011). Several policies in the UK have been identified as
contributing to poverty among refugees: the lack of the right to work for asylum seekers combined
with insufficient support rates to meet basic needs (Edwards, 2005; Allsopp, Sigona and Phillimore,
2014), the dispersal policy of settlement of asylum seekers in excluded urban areas (Phillimore and
Godson, 2006) and exclusive citizenship policies (Stewart and Mulvey, 2013). Some elements of asy-
lum policy can also indirectly contribute to poverty. The stay in refugee centres reinforces the psycho-
logical damage of forced migration and has a negative impact on refugees’well-being, independence
and future coping skills (Vrecer, 2010; Szczepanikova, 2013).
Similarly, some evidence from the United States suggests that the foreign policy in Southeast
Asia, refugee resettlement into hyperghettos followed by systematic inequalities and limiting access
to welfare can produce poverty among refugees (Tang, 2015). According to Fix and Tumlin
(1997), the limited funding of social programmes after the welfare reform of 1996 contributed to
poverty among Cambodian refugees by neglecting the long-term consequences of short-term pushed
Exile to Poverty 57
©2017 The Author. International Migration ©2017 IOM
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