CBEES Advanced Seminar with Svitlana Odynets, PhD in Ethnology, Project Researcher at the University of Gothenburg, Journalist and Essayist

Speaker: Svitlana Odynets, PhD in Ethnology, Project Researcher at the University of Gothenburg, Journalist and Essayist

Discussant: Maryam Adjam, Ethnographer, Senior Lecturer at the Department of Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology, Uppsala University

Chair: Julia Malitska, Researcher and Senior Lecturer at the School of History and Contemporary Studies, Södertörn University, and Research Coordinator at CBEES

Abstract: Even though the Swedish government has moved to more restrictive migration policies after the refugee wave from Syria in 2014 - 2017 (Ekman, Mattias&Krzyżanowski 2021; Hagelund 2020), and while there were no signs of a new refugee wave coming to Sweden in the nearest future, since March 2022 Sweden found itself in the situation of becoming a shelter for thousands of Ukrainian citizens. During the first months of the Russian invasion, more than 33 643 Ukrainians came to Sweden (Migrationsverket, 23 April 2023), and joined the relatively small community of 11 000 Ukrainian citizens who lived in Sweden before the war. Sweden was in the 17th place in the EU in the number of asylum applications from Ukraine in 2022, while the first three places were occupied by Poland, Germany, and the Czech Republic (UNHCR, 16 January 2023).

Using the analytical concept of alter-geopolitics (Koopman 2011: 280; Cassidy 2023), the purpose of this paper is to consistently trace the process of how Ukrainian migrants are choosing Sweden as a host country, and how they later navigate the social system in the situation when they are not seen as subjects of integration policies by the Swedish government, but still have legal status to stay in the country for at least two years. The analysis is based on my ongoing fieldwork in Ystad municipality. I will focus mostly on actors which make the reception of Ukrainians possible, and consider different factors which allow people to come together to create “alternative, non-violent securities” (Cassidy 2023) even in situation of lacking national policies. 

Svitlana Odynets, is PhD in Ethnology, project researcher at the University of Gothenburg, journalist and essayist. Her main research interests are migrant anthropology, Ukrainian women labour migration, diasporas, and refugee reception. She worked as a researcher and coordinator in two EU-projects financed by Horizon 2020: EURA-NET Länk till annan webbplats, öppnas i nytt fönster. and as an expert from Ukraine for the ITHACA project Länk till annan webbplats, öppnas i nytt fönster.. She is currently conducting her fieldwork with Ukrainian refugees in southern Sweden. In addition, she is writing a book about Ukrainian women migrants in Italy, the transformation of their life strategies and social identities in their long-term migration projects.