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Moro MR, Heidenreich F. The meagreness of contemporary hospitality. L'autre, Cliniques, Cultures et Sociétés 2003 ; 4(3) "Cliniques des Amériques" : 325-8.

The meagreness of contemporary hospitality

Marie Rose MORO, Felicia HEIDENREICH

"As far as our memories can go there has been war. The Iliad narrated one of them. After the war : the Odyssey. The ones who did not return to their countries, neither alive nor dead, have been wandering through the whole world for a long time. (…)
"What shall we become ?" say those who left their name, their family, their roots very far behind, those who we call "refugees", "clandestine", "without papers", "immigrants" and who, nobly, call themselves "travelers". Brutally, they traveled "contained" in holds and trucks, sneaking across borders, without knowing where and when their dangerous journey will end, this journey that makes them measure from port to coast and from door to door the meagreness of contemporary hospitality. (…)
And we, sitting in our relatively moderate countries, who are we ? Their fellows ? Their witnesses ? Their enemies ? Their friends ? Former travelers who have forgotten ? Or people for who travel is waiting around the corner ?

Extracts from the presentation of the theatre play
"Le dernier Caravanserail (Odyssées)"
Collective creation of the Théâtre du Soleil

The murmuring of the world reaching the Andalusian landscape spreading in front of me carries the stories of refugees, of travelers, of immigrants, of utopists and adventurers of modern times. Here in Spain, on the Mediterranean coast of Almeria and not far from the mythical Grenada, every morning fragile boats arrive, the famous "pateras", which run aground having on board young Moroccans who "try their luck" coming trough this narrow and dangerous gate. Some of them lose their lives in this dangerous adventure with multiple ingredients : illusion, misery, toughness of everyday life, death of children and the irrepressible need to go elsewhere, further… Every morning we read in the newspapers about the number of people brought back to Morocco by the Guardia Civil, the Spanish Police and, sometimes, about the number of lifeless bodies found - more than seventy since the beginning of the year. In addition to this tragic enumeration there are thousands of immigrants without papers found by Police in the main lands and directly taken to prison. The Iberian radios are touched by individual stories : tonight it was the turn of a woman with her two young children to be stranded on the Andalusian coast, the children hadn't eaten for the past forty-eight hours ! As for the other stories, the more day-to-day ones, they're regarded, by the fatalists of this country, as the price to pay for modernity. As I'm writing this editorial, sixty young Moroccans including one woman are being intercepted on the coast of Almeria. There has been over the range of fifty to a hundred per day during August, and this estimation goes only for the coast of Andalusia. The debate centers around the necessary severity on one hand and on the other hand on the necessity to decently welcome them and to engage actions that they won't be forced to leave their countries under these conditions. Not a lot of voices are being raised to remind people that these refugees have always existed, whether it's here or elsewhere and that not so long ago Spain itself was nourishing the lines of refugees during and after the civil war, as well as the immigrants who were escaping dictatorship and everyday hardship. As we turn towards other regions, only very few admit that these travelers are part of the modern societies "in motion" and that we need to welcome them and learn from them so as to live altogether in order to constitute tomorrow's world : manifold and bearing the signs of multiple political or economical ruptures.

This is what is happening to the gates of Europe, to one of it's entrances in the South. In France, the murmur, still persistent, reaches me : the politicians, the decision makers, the civil society itself, each one on their own level, are tempted to reconsider what was achieved in order to welcome refugees with an open and generous spirit. The President in his July 14th 2002 speech announced a reform of the asylum law of July 25th 1952. A bill concerning this was officially diffused by the government on the 18th of April 2003 after having been examined by the Cabinet on April 15th. Associations working with refugees are familiar with this texte and it is consultable on the Internet (1). It did generate comments and recommendations coming from limited circles but without carrying a public debate. Yet it engages our whole society, all of us who are former or future travelers or nomads. This text contains important threats regarding the minimal rules of hospitality, as it considerably modifies the definition and the nature of refugees as well as the bonds that unite us with them, as pointed out in the text of CFDA "Ten minimal conditions for a real asylum law in France". Let us analyse some of the aspects denounced by human rights associations and associations for the defense of asylum law - asylum as we conceived of it till now and as France was proud of it.
In our country, the OFPRA - "French Office for Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons" - exclusively attached to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was up to now the one to be in charge of the procedures that allow for the granting of the refugees status. Even though OFPRA remains a public institution, still autonomous within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, its independence is being compromised in terms of assuring the full application of international conventions on refugee protection since the text of the law insists on a reinforcement of control of the ministries and more specifically of the ministry of Interior regarding this organism. The increasing in significance of the ministry of the Interior as well as the systematical transmission of documents to this same ministry suggest that this bill tends to control the migration flows instead of protecting them. Furthermore, the relations between OFPRA and the associations - and in extension with civil society - are also being threatened since the bill puts an end to the presenceof representatives of organizations in charge of welcoming refugees and asylum seekers. Same goes for the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) whose role is being weakened within the OFPRA Council. Up to now, a person whose asylum request was rejected could appeal to the Commission of appeal of refugees, an independent organism being mainly composed by judges and the representants of the UNHCR. This commission's independence is being threatened both by its new composition and by the weakening of the role of the UNHCR. Within this project, the important idea of "threat against the freedom of a person" is no longer regarded as a motive likely to be considered for the application of the new protection ; this, by the way, sets us in contradiction with the article 3 of the European convention of human rights. All of this demonstrates the spirit of this bill introducing suspicion and doubts regarding the motivations of refugees. In addition, the motives for which one is excluded from this protection, are more numerous than the ones that the Convention of Geneva makes provision for, placing France in a position of manifest land locking, mistrust and inhospitality.

The priority objective of this reform, as announced by the French president in a speech he gave on July 14th 2002, is to shorten the investigations concerning applications for asylum. According to the written statement of the CFDA, we could be delighted about this "well-thought" measure, provided that "the result is not reduced to an expeditious treatment of certain files with less guaranties and to an excessive acceleration of rejections that would force numerous applicants to be subject to measures of removal. The Ministry of the Interior wishes to reinforce these measures through the bill concerning immigration adopted by the the Cabinet on the 30 April 2003." (p. 6).
But what about the guaranties of the procedure ? The possibility for an applicant or a dismissed person to speak in front of the commission of recourse in his mother language assisted by an interpreter as well as by a councellor of his choice or by a third person ; to be able to assist to the interviews and the audiences, which implies being able to afford the means of transportation and, if necessary, to get legal assistance ; to be able to talk and to defend oneself, which requires a certain time and often psychological help in order to recover from tortures or other violent events one had to endure ; and, finally, to be able to read the report of the interviews, to add, if necessary, any written explanations and to sign it as an approval of a narrative made at a precise moment. All of these conditions require a period of time, which can vary according from one individual to another ; they demand that the applicants or the applicants to recourse live in decent and human conditions including minimal possibilities of socialization and encounters that would free them from the fear and the isolation caused by what they went through before exile. Even though this period of time should be short, a minimal time and certain conditions a priori are essential in order to allow for the construction of a narrative.

A recent study (2) in centers hosting asylum seekers (CADA and AUDA) made us aware of the conditions necessary to allow for the emergence of a narrative under circumstances of forced exile and absence of relationships which make refugees suffer even after their arrival in their supposed "host land". The individual and collective Odyssey of these asylum seekers as well as of their families, once they have succeeded in narrating it even partially, reveals the obscure side of this modern, fragile, and violent world. These anonymous travelers question our capacity of empathy and hospitality and our collective choices, not only regarding the refugee - or even foreigner - status, but also involving the type of society we wish to build and the importance we want to give to the relation to the other. Hospitality is the theme of the upcoming colloquium organized by the AIEP (International Association of Ethno Psychoanalysis) in association with the review "L'autre". It will take place at the University of Paris 13, Bobigny (France) on Saturday, June 12th 2004. The program of this colloquium is available on our website.

Translation by Helena Zervopoulou et Felicia Heidenreich

(1) Cf. for example, the websites of “Forum refugees” or the CFDA (“French coordination for asylum right”) which assembles numerous associations interested in refugees' status in France such as Amnesty International, GISTI, and AVRE… The French delegation of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees is associated with the work of the CFDA. The CFDA and “Forum refugees” data were used as a basis to write this editorial.

(2) Cf. Heidenreich F, Bouville JF, Atlani L, Moro MR. Processus d'inscription dans la société d'accueil des familles en attente d'un statut de réfugiés et de leurs enfants. L'autre, Cliniques, Cultures et Sociétés 2003 ; 4(3) "Cliniques des Amériques" : 471-4.