FoDiRa-Project: Discrimination experiences during the arrival process

Experiences of discrimination are often part of everyday life for people who are perceived as “different”. Studies show, for example, that people from other countries receive lower wages than Germans for comparable jobs in the labor market (Koopmans et al. 2020, Bernhard and Bernhard 2016), that Turkish-sounding names are a disadvantage when looking for housing (Horr et al. 2018, Auspurg et al. 2017), or that people with migration experience feel discriminated against in Germany, especially migrants from Arab and Muslim countries (Tucci et al. 2014). There is no area of life in which immigrants are safe from discrimination, from the municipal administration to the private barbecue party to carpooling (Liebe and Beyer 2021). Newly arriving refugees, such as those who fled to Germany between 2014 and 2016, experience discrimination twice: as personal denigration and as uncertainty in the particularly vulnerable phase of life in which they have to find their way in a new country.

Against this backdrop, the project "Discrimination Experiences during the arrival process (DiPA)" investigates, firstly, which discrimination experiences refugees have in various everyday areas of life. The focus is on the perspective of the researched individuals: their experience, their sense-making and their positioning within and vis-à-vis the host society. To this end, we conduct group discussions with refugees in the tradition of the documentary method (Bohnsack et al. 2013) and participatory research (Unger 2013). The project does not understand discrimination as random events that can be traced back to situational misconduct ("That just slipped out!") or to the tendencies of individual perpetrators ("He's just a racist."). Rather, they are understood as manifestations of structurally anchored practices and discourses that are part of a system of discrimination and racism that is institutionally, habitually, and cognitively anchored in the host society (Reskin 2012). The research interest of the project is therefore, secondly, directed at the collective experience stocks of the refugees. It is interested in commonalities in the experiences of study participants as well as systematic differences, such as those between refugee women and men. In doing so, the study also has interviewees' goals and resources in mind, as refugees are not understood as passive victims but as interpreting and acting agents who consciously and unconsciously grapple with and situate themselves in relation to contextual circumstances.

Research questions

  • What experiences of discrimination do refugees have in everyday life?
  • What conclusions can be drawn from these experiences regarding the structure of discrimination and racism against refugees?

Scientists involved in the project

Project management

Staff members

  • Dr. Evelyn Wladarsch

Contact

Evelyn Wladarsch

evelyn.wladarsch(at)arbeitsagentur.de