Members of the MIGREC team Violeta Marković, Danijela Pavlović and Sanja Polić Penavić participated at the conference „Neuchatel Graduate Conference of Migration and Mobility Studies“ organized by the University of Neuchatel with presentation „Protection of Migrants and Refugees during COVID-19 in the Republic of Serbia – perspective of professionals in the social protection system“ on July 2, 2021.
The conference was structured around six topics:
- Borders – securitization
- (Non)essential mobility and unequal migration management
- Normative accesses to migration, mobility and citizenship
- Family spatial configurations in new mobility framework
- Social protection of movable population
- Future of asylum
In order to analyze and understand changes in the system of social security of migrants and refugees in the Republic of Serbia during the COVID-19 pandemic, the authors carried out a qualitative research with professionals working in the system of social protection of migrants. Violeta Marković pointed out that professionals faced with multiple challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Health crisis caused worries among the respondents for lives of their families and friends, their own life and lives of their dependants. She stressed that the research results showed that professionals faced many challenges deriving from 24/7 lockdown of refugees and migrants in the Republic of Serbia during the state of emergency and even after it. The lack of information for refugees and migrants, lack of appropriate cooperation with health, educational and legal systems have been the most frequent challenges; in addition, the respondents encountered aggravation of public perception of refugees and migrants in Serbia, Marković said.
She further underlined that the COVID-19 pandemic did not influence new arrivals into the Republic of Serbia, but again underlined the lack of capacities for adjustment of the social protection system and lack of readiness for critical situation – starting from the challenges in consistent and even supply of protective equipment to the lack of supervision for professionals.
