Originally published in Malmö magazine
A report by Amnesty International about the initial reception camp for refugees in Traiskirchen confirms what refugees and anti-racist initiatives have been emphasising for some time: Austria’s treatment of refugees violates basic human rights. Indeed, the degrading treatment of people in Traiskirchen has worsened since the summer of 2015: Considering that there are now 1500 homeless refugee seekers, for whom there supposedly are no accodomations, the situation is significantly more alarming than in 2012, when refugees did a protest march from Traiskirchen to Vienna. There is a surge of help and practical support against these conditions. The living conditions in Traiskirchen have made headlines for the past few weeks. At the same time, reports are often based on the wrong premise that the nation state is „overstrained“ by the „mass influx“ of refugees. This „state of emergency“ is politically intended and reproduced by the competent bodies of the state. If refugees need to be lucky to get a roofed place to sleep and if meeting the requirements for basic human needs becomes an act of mercy, a shift from justice to arbitrariness occurs and the most basic provisions of Traiskirchen become the normal condition.
For the ministry of the interior, this „emergency state“ is a proven tool for political pressure in order to further tighten laws on asylum. This happened in July of 2015, when the „smuggling“ of migrants was increasingly criminalised and deportations were accelerated. Austria’s also exerting political pressure within the European Union by demanding a consequent realisation of „Dublin“-deportations and an additional armament of European internal and external borders, as well as an EU-wide „distribution“ of refugees based on national quotas as a new form of limitation of freedom of movement.
Overall, we can witness a restructuring of the nation state and society in the context of the asylum- and border regime. Where the state is focussing on regulating the „crisis“ repressively, control reproduces itself as domination of a state of emergency, in which there are no stable living conditions for refugees. If we assume that the overall condition of a social system manifests itself in a condensed form in its margins, then the radical changes in the Austrian asylum system fit into the paradigm of a neoliberal control state that is increasingly established in an antidemocratic and extreme right-wing way.
Hence, it is necessary to act in solidarity with refugees and not just to focus on acts of helping out. As important current initiatives are, it is inacceptable that the responsibilty for the basic needs of people is passed on by the state to bourgeois engagement and that human rights violations are set as the norm. (see: „Der schmale Grat der Hilfe“).
Thus, it is essential to stand up with refugees for their autonomy, suable rights and social particiaption on equal footing. To demand the right to freedom of movement for refugees is especially important – to use the words of refugees at the demonstrations in Traiskirchen: „If you don’t want us here, erase our fingerprints and let us move on!“. This has already been demanded by the Refugee Protest Camp Vienna 2012/2013.
It is a fundamental understanding of political antiracism that refugees are not helplessly at the mercy of asylum- and migration regimes, that they rather challenge these systems with their individual and collective actions on a daily basis: If hundreds of refugees march for their rights in Traiskirchen; if a third of all deportation flights in Austria are stopped by the resistance of the affected; if people in Macedonia, Calais or Ceuta break through border installations in spite of brute police violence, then these are acts of resistance against a system that we need to fight together. (see: „We are here because you destroy our countries“).
The initiative „Freedom not Frontex: Vienna“ is a collective of solidary allies for demands, protests and autonomy of refugees; increased visibilty is a main focus. To respond to the human rights violations in Traiskirchen, a report on the accounts of refugees has been made and will be translated in various languages.