Agency of Migrant Youth in Hostile Sociopolitical Environments: Case Studies from Central Eastern Europe

This paper compares the integration of third-country youth in Poland and Hungary in two Central Eastern European contexts characterized by a hostile sociopolitical environment for migrants, right-wing policies, illiberalism, and regression in various related policy areas. Our article is based on a t...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Social sciences (Basel) 2023-04, Vol.12 (4), p.210
Main Authors: Arendas, Zsuzsanna, Trąbka, Agnieszka, Messing, Vera, Pietrusińska, Marta Jadviga, Winogrodzka, Dominika
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Agent (Philosophy)
Attitudes
Case studies
Coping
embedding processes
Emigration
Emigration and immigration
Everyday life
hostile sociopolitical environments
Immigrants
Immigration
Immigration policy
migrant agencies
Migrants
Migration
NGOs
Nongovernmental organizations
Opportunity structures
Political activity
Political aspects
Politics
Populism
Propaganda
Refugees
Social aspects
Social integration
Sociopolitical factors
Teenagers
Youth
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Summary:This paper compares the integration of third-country youth in Poland and Hungary in two Central Eastern European contexts characterized by a hostile sociopolitical environment for migrants, right-wing policies, illiberalism, and regression in various related policy areas. Our article is based on a three-year EU-funded research project that investigated the integration of migrant youth in precarious circumstances (MIMY). It uses data from qualitative interviews conducted with migrant youth and thus focuses on the migrant’s perspective while exploring how coping and navigating such hostile environments occurs. The analysis is based on the concept of migrant agency in extremely difficult and complex sociopolitical situations. Our findings highlight the particular importance of the latter in these hostile environments. We argue that while the withdrawal of the state from integration has created difficult contexts for migrant youth, they exhibit different forms of agency, enabling them to adapt to opportunity structures. While these forms of agency are important and real, the structural constraints imposed by hostile states’ anti-immigration and anti-integration attitudes significantly limit migrants’ options for coping with everyday life.
ISSN:2076-0760
2076-0760
DOI:10.3390/socsci12040210