Everyday exile. Gendered trajectories, family recompositions and the settlement process of Ukrainians in France
This research on the exile of Ukrainian men and women is structured around four axes: Dynamics of settlement and evolution of the migration project; Selectivity of arrivals in France; Gender and migration; Making and remaking families.
Context, humanitarian and social issues, and challenges
Despite a relatively small number of refugees from Ukraine on French territory at the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, their numbers have increased over the months. The activation of the European directive to welcome Ukrainian refugees, and the organization set up in France, has enabled reception conditions to be broadened and improved. The number of people benefiting from temporary protection is estimated at around 100,000.
It is against this backdrop that we set out to investigate the nature, and even the specific nature, of the migration and settlement trajectories of Ukrainian refugees in Paris and the Paris region:
- What are the determinants and characteristics of the migratory trajectories of Ukrainian exiles arriving in France?
- How is their daily experience of exile organized, between here and there, and what are their spatial practices and daily anchoring?
- How do their migration plans evolve as they settle in, in a context of precariousness and uncertainty?
- How are intimate, transnational family practices constructed in the context of exile and in situations of accommodation and, more broadly, unstable settlements?
- What is the impact of the gender variable on the dynamics of exile and the transnational social dynamics observed?
Research field and method of investigation
This research is based on biographical interviews and focus groups. The survey language is essentially Ukrainian. As the project is being carried out by a geography laboratory, particular attention is being paid to the spatial dimension of the refugees’ trajectories and daily lives. The project has a cartographic dimension, and involves the creation of mental maps with the refugees. The team includes exiled researchers hosted by the Géographie-cités laboratory and EHESS.
The benefits of this study for humanitarian and social actors and for research
The aim of this research is to provide a detailed analysis of the situation of Ukrainian exiles in France, and to inform public decision-making in terms of the reception and integration of exiles into the school and university system, access to physical and mental health, and the job market.
In a context of ever-changing crisis and war, the study of constantly reconfiguring exile situations is of great scientific and societal interest. Research into Ukrainian exile offers a unique opportunity to understand the ways in which an essentially female collective, whose permanence is strongly conditioned by international geopolitical developments, has settled down.
In recent years, work on migration from a gender perspective has gained new momentum (see, for example, the seminar led by Camille Schmoll at EHESS https://enseignements.ehess.fr/2021-2022/ue/77). The issues raised by questions of gender and migration have been reactivated by the essentially female and family exile of Ukrainians since 2022, which follows a history of migration that is also gendered. Economists have begun to investigate the micro and meso consequences of war and exile (https://new.cepr.org/voxeu/columns/forced-displacement-gender-identity-norms-and-marital-stability-wake-war-ukraine), while international organizations are multiplying studies on the gendered dimensions of the exile crisis and the specific vulnerabilities they engender.
Biography
Camille Schmoll is a geographer, Director of Studies at EHESS and member of the UMR Géographie-cités. Her work focuses on European and Mediterranean migration, gender and migration, different forms of mobility and their intersections, urban transformations induced by mobility, reflexive approaches in migration studies and qualitative survey methods in geography.