‘Not yet Babylon.’ Thinking the asylum system and migration management through the political subjectivity of Gambian migrants

Abstract

This article interrogates the asylum and reception system through the gaze and interpretations articulated by some asylum seekers of Gambian nationality. My focus is on how they understand their experience in light of the  post-asylum trajectories and networks (transnational and otherwise) they have developed within and despite the mobility regime. In the first part of the article, I focus on the description of the elements that connect the Gambian presence in Italy to the conjuncture of to the so-called “refugee crisis”. In the second section, I present and analyze the forms of knowledge that my interlocutors have developed in dealing with the humanitarian/securitarian apparatus, and the conditions of legal, housing and work precariousness they have faced. In the final part, I discuss how these interpretative repertoires act as tools for navigating the “cramped spaces” (Walther, Luthi 2016) of the border regime and express complex subjectivities that exceed and critically reposition themselves with respect to the roles and identities to which are assigned.