THE ESCAPE PARADOX

Tanja Malle in conversation with Judith Kohlenberger

THE ESCAPE PARADOX
On our contradictory approach to displacement and displaced persons

Fleeing is a contradiction: you want to stay, but you have to leave. Fleeing is traumatising: you seek safety, but have to put your life at risk to do so. And fleeing (to Europe) is paradoxical: you have to break the law, i.e. cross borders „illegally“ in order to gain your right to asylum. Only to have to deal with contradictory demands and unfulfillable attributions of integration once again in the host country.

Refugee researcher Judith Kohlenberger provides a detailed analysis of how we deal with displacement and displaced persons, traces the historical and recent developments, not only since the war in Ukraine, from a legal, social and individual perspective and shows how we can achieve a humane asylum and integration policy if we fulfil our moral responsibility, in short: if we trust in the strength of our institutions, our constitutional state and our civil society.

Judith Kohlenberger is a cultural scientist and migration researcher at the Institute for Social Policy at WU Vienna, where she researches and teaches refugee migration, integration and belonging. In autumn 2015, she was involved in one of Europe's first studies on the large refugee movement. Her work has been published in international journals and was honoured with the Kurt Rothschild Prize 2019 and the City of Vienna Sponsorship Award. In addition to her academic work, she is active on the Integration Council of the City of Vienna and is a founding member of COURAGE - Courage for Humanity, which campaigns for legal escape routes.

Moderation Tanja Malle, Journalist, ORF/Radio Ö1

In co-operation with Kremayr & Scheriau

Judith Kohlenberger: DAS FLUCHTPARADOX
On our contradictory approach to displacement and displaced persons
Kremayr & Scheriau, ISBN: 978-3-218-01345-1; 240 pages, also available as an e-book