SMARTPHONES FOR SAFETY: DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES AND THE REFUGEES’

JOURNEY

Anamaria TopanUniversity of Innsbruck, Austria

Introduction

- the importance of the research focusing on the journey of the refugees

- giving space to the voices, needs and aspirations of refugees

- Focus on the Balkan route in the context of the current ‘refugee crisis’ in Europe

- The critical importance of communication technologies for refugees to manage the journey, keep contact with loved ones, staying abreast of developments

Percentage of Syrian refugees in the main receiving countries

EU Turkey Lebanon Jordan

0

5

10

15

20

25

percentage of total popu-lation

First contact: Smugglers• Smartphones and access to internet were crucial in getting

the necessary information to plan the journey• smuggling with consent of authorities: complex transnational

networks• Risks: trafficking - robbing, death threats, forcing into sexual

exploitation and drug dealing• Plus: provide services, facilitating mobility of refugees due to

lack of legal routes• Need for a change of paradigm: form a discourse of law and

order to one centering on persecution and flee• Central role of refugee’s agency

The Balkan Route (August 2015-March 2016)

Main developments along the Balkan routes

• 1. Route - the shortest and the cheapest - Greece, Serbia, Hungary, Austria, Germany

• mid-September 2015: Hungary closes its border• 2. Route: Greece, Macedonia, Serbia, Slovenia, Austria and Germany• November 2015:

- free train services from Serbia to Croatia- transit limited to war refugees from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq

• February 2016: • - direct transport corridor from Macedonia to Austria

- Austria introduces a daily limit of 3200 refugees, Croatia: 580- Macedonia stops Afghans at the border

• March 2016: - complete closing of the Balkan route (March 8)- EU-Turkey deal comes into force (March 20)

Communication technology• The crucial importance of communication for refugees: smartphones as an

indispensable tool to find assistance, communicate with family and friends, organizing the travel at each stage, keeping with the news, reuniting with family etc.

• Governments, international NGOs, UN bodies, companies came together to provide technical infrastructure along the route, i.e. NetHope, Emergency Telecommunications Cluster (ETC), Google, Télécoms Sans Frontières (TSF)- Wi-Fi connectivity- charging stations- public TV setsEx.: TSF data- 269.814 devices connected to the Wi-Fi; an average of 150 WhatsApp messages sent/phone, GB used: 23.946

New Aesthetics • The omnipresence of images in the media and

social media: witnessing what happens in real time

New Aesthetics

• Production of AmbivalenceI. The ‘Willkommenskultur’, especially in Germany, Austria, Greece

II. The flourish of the extreme right political spectrum

• ‘visually frustrating’• The New Year’s Eve attacks of women in Köln• The recent terrorists attack in Paris and Brussels• Instrumentalising the debate for political gain:

- offering simplistic explanations of a complex phenomenon, providing anchors- exploiting people’s fatigue with intellectual arguments, their need for peace and safety

Main consequences of the refugee crisis

I. The EU-Turkey Deal- Turkey declared a safe country =>refugees

crossing the sea from Turkey into Greece are now illegal

- ‘one for one scheme’ - EU Commission agreed on 72.000 refugees

- 6 billion aid for Turkey- Visa-free travel for Turkish citizens to EU

Problems:

• Turkey is not a safe country: at war with Kurds and IS• Huge number of refugees, with pressure on the local

population: social tensions, affected tourism• High corruption of the political elite and unreliability of

the President Erdoğan • Massive infrastructure needed for implementation of

return and resettlement of refugees• Unwillingness of EU countries to implement visa-free

travel for Turkey• Reluctance of many EU members to resettle refugees

II. Security and Protection

• Double the staff and increasing the budget of Frontex• Creating of a European Border and Coast Guard

Agency• Increasing security, border control, militarization of the

borders • Increasing support for Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey –

pressure to liberalize their health and work market for refugees

• Political pressure for the Syrian peace negotiations to work

Conclusions

• Inability of EU to find a a different approach to the refugee crisis: focus on burden, criminalizing => protection and border closures, detention and forced deportation

• the importance of digital management in allowing the refugees to remain ‘sane’ and negotiate their environment of barriers and obstacles

• smartphones and internet access (social media) are vital components in articulating refugee voices, in catalyzing their agency and marking their diversity

• signal the need for a paradigm shift from viewing refugees as passive, dependent and homogenous to seeing them as a resource of agency, in(ter)dependence and innovation