The Jungle camp in Calais has challenged the indifference of official Europe to the plight of refugees for close on two decades. It has survived previous attempts at demolition. As long as the grievances that gave rise to remain it will come back to haunt the conscience of the continent.
Category: Don Flynn
Migrants’ Rights Network: [UK]Government agenda – Roll back the rights of all migrants
The policy pronouncements at the Conservative conference show how far the government is prepared to go to turn migration into a rights-free zone. Both EU and the third country migrants will lose out under these plans. We need a campaign that unites them all if rights are to be preserved.
Migrants’ Rights Network: Byron Hamburgers: When employers fail to do right by migrant employees
What else could Byron’s have done? The social media world was awash with attempted defences of the hamburger chain after it collaborated in the arrest of 35 of its migrant workers earlier in July. Our answer is they didn’t have to go along with the shabby act of entrapment of its staff, and they could have done so much more to push back against punitive, anti-worker rules.
Migrant’s Rights Network: The referendum vote – what will happen to the rights of migrants?
We respond to the outcome of the referendum on the UK’s membership of the European Union.
Migrants’ Right Network: Saving the gains of the Schengen agreement requires European solidarity on protection for refugees
Much of the news commentary on Europe seems to assume that the Schengen open borders arrangement will vanish in the next few months. That would be a disaster. Saving it will require a reversal of the current refusal of solidarity with countries at the frontline of the refugee flows.
Migrants’ Rights Network: 2015 – The year when immigration became an indissolubly European issue
Halfway through December seems like a good time to sketch out some ideas on what 2015 might come to mean in a history of immigration which has yet to be written.
Migrants’ Rights Network: Why do migrants suffer exploitation? – Some thoughts on vulnerability and globalised labour markets
Don Flynn* Migrants are bad news because they worsen wages and working conditions for the rest of us we are so often told. A new book says we have to pay far more attention to the conditions we impose on those who arrive looking for jobs if we really want to tackle…
Migrants’ Rights Network: Lessons of Paris – Borders won’t protect us: Solidarity with refugees remains the best hope
The Friday 13th attacks in Paris are being interpreted by many commentators as politicians as a watershed moment in public attitudes towards refugee policies in Europe.
Migrants’ Rights Network: Frontier anxiety: Living with the stress of the everyday border
What happens when we bring the anxieties of life at the border into the heart of our all our communities? How can we contend with life in a space where identity is constantly checked and people subjected to the question: Why are you really here? MRN director Don Flynn asks this in an article published this month in Soundings, a journal of cultural politics and simultaneously on the website of Eurozine. The full article can be accessed here.
Migrants’ Right Network – Mrs May’s speech: An ugly intervention that at least clarifies for campaigners what needs to be done to defend the rights of all migrants
Don Flynn* Mrs May set out her stall on immigration during her speech to the Conservative conference. Its dismissal themes have already been challenged, often from surprising quarters. But we need a campaigning perspective to defeat her plans to roll back the rights of refugees and migrants. Read full opinion piece here. Home Secretary Theresa…