Paper short abstract:

The author presents the lives and resistances of asylum seekers living after the second half of 2015 in Berlin's emergency shelters, usually located in sport halls, previously unused buildings etc.

Paper long abstract:

Especially since the September 2015, when for few months between 500-800 people were arriving to Berlin, Germany, to claim asylum, the authorities of the German capital reacted by putting the latter into the improvised forms of accommodations. The so called emergency shelters for refugees were thus a temporal 'solution' to prevent homelessness of asylum seekers waiting to register at the State Office for Health and Social Affairs. A number was and continues to be located in sport halls hosting up to 200 asylum seekers sleeping on bunk beds, but other emergency shelter locations are found in schools, partly renovated previously unused buildings etc. Even thought these locations should only be used up to 6 months, the government of Berlin extended their existence until summer 2017, while not providing visible alternatives.

Conducting a yearlong thorough research in some emergency shelters, while also simply hanging out with asylum seekers living or social workers working in such dwellings, the author presents his findings on how housed asylum seekers make sense of their limited space and shifting temporalities. He is also interested in why, when and how resistances against such dwellings of ambiguous and temporal control emerge. What common needs and demands emerge from people living in different emergency shelters? Finally, the author asks if we can think of small acts of refusal, like not to eat provided food, or collective protests against the controlled environment of such shelters as political acts, even though they are not labeled as such by their actors?