The Integration Program: Power Relations and Epistemic Violence: no subtitle

The Integration Program: Power Relations and Epistemic Violence

Biróne Nagy, Katalin

4. term

Global Refugee Studies, Master

2016

2016-05-31

61

Når en asylansøger får flygtningestatus, skal vedkommende hurtigt finde sig til rette i et nyt sprog og en ny kultur og leve op til ofte uklare forventninger. Samtidig skal værtsbefolkningen tilpasse sig nye medborgere, som både kan berige og forstyrre det fælles sociale rum. For at gøre mødet så smidigt som muligt har den danske stat udviklet et treårigt Integrationsprogram med faste regler for både kommuner og flygtninge. Flygtninge fordeles til kommunerne, hvor integrationsteam koordinerer forløbet. Afhandlingen undersøger, hvordan Odsherred Kommune, en mindre dansk kommune, arbejder med dette treårige program, baseret på feltarbejde, interviews og deltagerobservation. For at forstå de tidlige integrationsforløb bruger afhandlingen en sammenligning med koloniale/postkoloniale forhold. Det er ikke en moralsk dom over Danmarks praksis, men en analytisk måde at belyse magtforhold, sociale og kulturelle skel, kommunikation og identitet. Spørgsmålet er, hvilke problemer i den tidlige integration denne parallel synliggør, og hvilken relevans ligheden har i den aktuelle proces. Analysen kortlægger aktører og magtforhold i et eksklusionsfelt for ikke-borgere og viser, hvordan hegemonisk magt opretholdes gennem styrende tekster (love og retningslinjer), positionalitet (den plads man tildeles i systemet), overvågning og straf. Afhandlingen undersøger også virkningen for flygtninge, som kan blive udsat for epistemisk vold (skade gennem kontrol over viden og definitioner) og othering (at blive gjort til den Anden). De fastholdes som ikke-borgere, forskellighed indskrives i en kollektiv identitet, og oprindelse og historicitet forsvinder ud af forståelsen af den enkelte. Dermed fremmedgøres flygtninge fra rum, hvor mening og identitet skabes, og de gøres til ‘terra nulla’ (ingenmandsland). For at klare sig i det treårige program anvender subalterne flygtninge (i underordnede positioner) strategier til selvopretholdelse: at hybridisere et ellers homogeniseret fællesrum, mimicry (at efterligne forventede normer), othering og at skabe et hybridt ‘Third Space’ (et tredje rum) for dialog og integration.

When an asylum seeker is granted refugee status, they must quickly navigate a new language, a new culture, and often unclear expectations. At the same time, the host community adjusts to newcomers who can both enrich and disturb the shared social space. To smooth this encounter, the Danish state has designed a three-year Integration Program with clear rules for both municipalities and refugees. Refugees are allocated to municipalities, where integration teams coordinate the process. This thesis examines how Odsherred Kommune, a small Danish municipality, works with the three-year program, drawing on fieldwork, interviews, and participant observation. To make sense of early integration, the thesis compares it to colonial/post-colonial conditions. This is not a moral judgment of Denmark’s approach, but an analytical lens to illuminate power relations, social and cultural divides, communication, and identity. The key question is what problems in early integration this parallel brings into view and how that resemblance matters in the current process. The analysis maps actors and power relations in a field of exclusion for non-citizens and shows how hegemonic power is maintained through ruling texts (laws and guidelines), positionality (the position assigned within the system), surveillance, and punishment. It also examines the effects on refugees, who may experience epistemic violence (harm through control over knowledge and definitions) and othering (being cast as fundamentally different). Kept at a distance as non-citizens, difference is fixed in a collective identity, and refugees’ origin and historicity are removed from how they are understood. This alienates them from spaces where meaning and identity are formed, rendering them as ‘terra nulla’ (no one’s land). To cope within the three-year program, subaltern refugees adopt self-preservation strategies: hybridizing an otherwise homogenized common space, mimicry (adapting to expected norms), othering, and creating a hybrid ‘Third Space’ for dialogue and integration.

[This abstract was generated with the help of AI]

integration, colonialism/postcolonialism, power relations, epistemic violence, ‘othering’

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