No German, no service: unequal access to welfare entitlements in Germany

While existing research has analysed the intersecting migration and social security law, which stratifies migrants’ formal social entitlements, less work has been done on the informal stratifications beyond the law that determine substantive social rights. This article illustrates the informal barriers to de facto benefit receipt that intra‐EU migrant citizens may experience when claiming social assistance in local German job centres, regardless of their manifest legal entitlements. Focussing on informal, yet commonly institutionalised practices of language discrimination, analysis of 103 qualitative, in‐depth interviews reveal recurring patterns of administrative exclusion beyond individual instances of discriminatory behaviour. The unwritten rules and everyday practices shaping administrators’ claims‐processing routines often go against what the law or administrative procedures proscribe, and could be considered as forms of discrimination. The former may be explained by institutional constraints, such as a performance‐orientedmanagement culture, legalistic claims‐processing, or superficial diversity policies. By shedding light on how inequalities in access are constructed in daily administrative practice, this article adds to existing empirical knowledge on how informal inequalities in access emerge at different stages of the benefit claiming process, in contrast to formal social rights on paper, as well as social administrations’ handling of diversity in a context of transnational social protection

EU migrants' experiences of claims-making in German job centres

The paper describes intra-EU migrants’ experiences with (transnational) social security in Germany, showcasing their sense-making of the claims-making process to basic subsistence benefits in local job centres. The analysis of 48 qualitative interviews with intra- EU migrants and key informants illustrates how they are not merely passive recipients but may actively assert their rights, based on their degree of familiarity with German welfare bureaucracy, their pre-existing welfare expectations, and their available cultural and social capital. Whether EU migrant citizens decide to claim relates to their cost-benefit analyses on the accessibility to benefits and to alternative means of support, as well as their perceived social legitimacy to draw on German public social support. As a general trend, EU citizens first tried to exhaust all other means of generating an income, seeking to remain financially independent from state-provided welfare, before seeking to claim social assistance-type benefits as a last resort. The data also shows how some applicants are less able than others to pay the hidden costs imposed onto them during the claiming process. The paper finally highlights how, in the light of the inequalities of access they face, intra-EU migrants have developed a variety of strategies to satisfy their social protection needs, relying on a mix of formal and informal welfare arrangements

Extended solidarity? the social consequences of covid-19 for marginalised migrant groups in Germany

The Covid-19 pandemic has resulted in sweeping changes across European societies. But what has it meant for the most vulnerable? Cecilia Bruzelius and Nora Ratzmann present an assessment on the impact on marginalised groups of migrants in Germany and identify some potential long-term trends that may result from the crisis

Conceptualising the role of deservingness in migrants’ access to social services

This ‘state-of-the art’ article on the role of deservingness in governing migrants’ access to social services situates our themed section’s contribution to the literature at the intersection between the study of street-level bureaucracy and practices of internal bordering through social policy. Considering the increasing relevance of migration control post-entry, we review the considerations that guide the local delivery of social services. Among others, moral ideas about a claimant’s worthiness to receive social benefits and services guide policy implementation. But while ideas of deservingness help to understand how perceptions of migrants’ claiming play out in practice, we observe limited use of the concept in street-level bureaucracy research. Drawing on theorisations from welfare attitudinal research, we demonstrate the salience of deservingness attitudes in understanding the dynamics of local social service delivery to migrant clients

Caught between the local and the (trans)national EU citizens at the front-line of German welfare policy

Immigration has changed the composition of Germany's resident population, turning the country into one of the most ethnically diverse European countries. The pressure of changing demographics have brought to the forefront of public debate questions about who belongs, and who should get access to public resources. Against this backdrop, the research explores how administrative practices in local job centres construct inequalities in access to basic subsistence benefits. The study focuses on European Union migrant citizens who constitute one of the largest, yet overlooked immigrant groups in Germany. So far, scholarship has identified the various inequalities that shape EU migrant citizens' entitlements in law and policy, but has focussed less of how processes of implementation shape substantive access to benefits and services. To that end, the analysis explores the interplay between front-line bureaucrats as gatekeepers, who interpret and potentially subvert eligibility criteria, and EU migrants who engage or do not engage in a claim-making process, and how understandings of deservingness and belonging play into EU claimants' benefit access in practice. To address these processes, the research comprises of 119 qualitative interviews with key informants, job centre staff and EU migrant claimants, along with participant observation in three Berlin-based job centres. The data revealed how claims to benefits and services of EU migrant citizens are filtered at street-level. This happens through administrative practices of enabling or blocking access, entailing processes of bureaucratic discrimination against EU claimant groups when observed in marginal or no employment, especially if of Eastern European origin. The study explains the inequalities in access through the interplay between, first, streetlevel perceptions of EU citizens' social legitimacy in claiming German social-assistance type benefits or lack thereof, and, second, institutional constraints, such as the prevailing economic accountability logic, legal uncertainties or token diversity policies. The analysis unravels the implicit normative 'cultural conditionality' logic, which contributes to shaping the inequalities in access observed at the local level. Such ideas about socio-cultural adaptation find their expression in expectations of EU migrants to demonstrate belonging to substantiate their social entitlements, in the form of German language skills and acquiescence to dominant societal and bureaucratic norms. The findings contribute to an enhanced understanding of the links between social protection regulation and internal governance processes of EU migration, by highlighting how welfare administrators are involved in shaping the settlement of EU migrants in a borderless European space

Caught between the national and the transnational: EU claimants at the frontline of welfare policy

My doctoral project opens the black box of social service provision in Germany. The research draws attention to the politics of belonging: onto why and for whom formal rights might not map onto substantive benefit take-up, and thus on who remains (un)intentionally excluded from European social citizenship

Delegating migration control to local welfare actors: reporting obligations in practice

Most research on the social policy–migration control link focuses on indirect control, that is, denying access to welfare. This article instead draws attention to how welfare institutions are made directly involved in migration control through duties to report certain categories of migrants to migration authorities. We ask how these obligations are put into practice and how local governments shape this process. In so doing, we place special emphasis on local organisational fields – that is, the close horizontal connection between public and non-public actors involved in basic needs provision. The article builds on exploratory research across four German cities, drawing on 61 interviews conducted in 2019–2020 with welfare actors catering to basic needs (housing/shelter, healthcare, social assistance, social counselling) and document research. Based on this, we, first, explore patterns of reporting practices and provide a typology of different responses, ranging from elaborate circumvention strategies to over-compliance. Second, we analyse the domino effects of reporting obligations, namely how welfare actors that are exempted from reporting adopt their practices too, with consequences both for migrants' welfare access and for other authorities' ability to report. Finally, we discuss how local governments can shape reporting practices, demonstrating how some cities actively sanction circumvention strategies. The last part identifies venues for further research

What impact do information initiatives have on migration from Africa to Europe?

European countries have funded several migration information initiatives aimed at dissuading people in Africa from pursuing irregular migration to Europe. But how effective is this approach? Drawing on a new study, Katerina Glyniadaki, Nora Ratzmann and Julia Stier examine the impact of such initiatives through the eyes of the migrant returnees who implement them