The asylum–child welfare paradox: unaccompanied minors in Austria

Abstract

Abstract Existing research shows that right-wing populist imaginaries and discourses on “bogus asylum seekers” mobilise feelings of fear and panic and serve to legitimise increasingly restrictive asylum policies in Europe. In light of this ongoing development, this paper addresses a more intrinsic and structural aspect of asylum, which requires balancing the inclusion and exclusion of persecuted third-country nationals. This paradox is most evident with unaccompanied minors who are caught between state norms and practices that are both exclusionary and repressive (asylum) and inclusive and caring (child welfare). In order to tackle this dilemma, we explore how the asylum–child welfare paradox is organised and formalised by the state and how it affects unaccompanied minors. Based on interviews with unaccompanied minors in Austria and experts who work with them, the findings show that child and youth welfare norms and practices that are formalised as part of the asylum procedure improve unaccompanied minors’ living conditions without dismantling asylum norms and practices of surveillance, conditionality, and scarcity. Judging by their simultaneous implementation, the state preserves and reinforces exclusionary and repressive asylum norms not despite but through child welfare norms and practices.