Mental health care for irregular migrants in Europe: Barriers and how they are overcome

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From social instrument to migration management tool: assisted voluntary return programmes : the case of Belgium

The return of migrants to their country of origin and the development of efficient return measures have become more prominent on the political agenda of many Western European countries. Since policymakers prefer ‘voluntary’ return, governmental programmes to support the return of migrants – Assisted Voluntary Return (AVR) programmes – were developed as far back as the 1970s and have played an increasingly important role in migration policy over the last three decades. At the same time, general migration policy and welfare systems have undergone profound change, including in the meanings and connotations attached to social welfare, return support and return policy. This raises questions about the implications of these broader societal and policy changes for the widely implemented AVR programmes. In this article, we discuss the interpretation and evolution of AVR programmes by analyzing how one particular European country, Belgium, has developed its AVR programme over time. We explore the evolution of the programme’s content, target group and institutional positioning, which shed light on its changing goals and are closely linked to a broader shift towards a ‘managerial’ approach to migration policy and the welfare state. We argue that return support may become decontextualized when it adopts ‘conditional entitlement’ as a central principle. This leads to strong differentiation, based on personal responsibility, between ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ migrants, the levelling down of the support given to returnees, and a more coercive voluntary return policy in which social support is linked to deportation

Satisfying Labour Demand through Migration in Spain

This National Report analyses the national strategies for addressing labour market needs with third-country national migrant workers. This Report has been developed by the Spanish National Contact Point in the European Migration Network and the researchers Fausto Miguélez and Óscar Molina

Satisfying Labour Demand through Migration in Spain

This National Report analyses the national strategies for addressing labour market needs with third-country national migrant workers. This Report has been developed by the Spanish National Contact Point in the European Migration Network and the researchers Fausto Miguélez and Óscar Molina

Families on hold : how the context of an asylum centre affects parenting experiences

Migration, especially under stressful circumstances, places pressure on parental capacities. At the same time, being part of a supportive family is of prime importance for the well-being of migrating children and parents. In this paper, we highlight the impact of the living conditions in a collective asylum centre on asylum applicants' parenting experiences through in-depth interviews with and participant observations among parents in a Belgian asylum centre. Differentiating between the influences of the organizational and physical environments of the centre, our results reveal that various organizational aspects limit parental agency and well-being and often render parents powerless in raising and protecting their children. Their physical environment, consisting of a dilapidated building, is experienced as a nonwelcoming, dangerous environment that leaves insufficient opportunity to establish a safe and stable home. We conclude that there is almost no attention paid to asylum applicants' parental role within the collective reception facilities. Further, their individual parental responsibility is emphasized, whereas the difficult environment of the asylum centre in which they have to raise their children is not criticized