COVID-19 has not affected all communities equally, and within the United States, racial and ethnic minority groups have been disproportionately affected by the virus. Reports indicate that immigrants and refugees, who constitute a large portion of the minority frontline workforce in healthcare, agriculture, and food supply chain industry, are at a higher risk of exposure to the virus.
migration
Despite migration restrictions after the ‘refugee crisis’, Sweden’s integration policies are still favourable
Sayaka Osamani Törngren and Henrik Emilsson (of the GLIMER project’s Sweden team) have published a second national report on Sweden as part of the National Integration Evaluation Mechanism (NIEM) project. NIEM is a six-years long, transnational project supporting key actors in the integration field to improve the integration outcomes of beneficiaries of international protection.
Closing borders to refugees is not the answer
In recent weeks, according to the United Nations, at least 167 countries have either fully or partially closed their borders. These travel restrictions seem an important means to help contain the pandemic, but they are also proving to be a way for some countries to forfeit their asylum responsibilities.
Who can be the most hostile to migration in Sweden?
Later this year Sweden will go to the polls for the general election. With the pre-electoral debate in full swing, the political issues receiving the most attention are integration and migration. In this context it appears political parties are competing over which might promote a restrictive integration and migration political agenda.
Local States of Exception
Nasar Meer, Emma Hill and Tim Peace ask why do migration policies fail?
Certainly they may be poorly designed and delivered, but amongst the reasons experts point to is that ‘success’ can be so politically unpalatable that few national level actors are willing to expend the political capital in pursuing them.