Gender and asylum seekers- The case of Greece

Abstract

The present paper focuses on the living conditions in temporary accommodation centers during the period of 22/11/2011 till 20/03/2012 and on the nature of the existing social relationship structures, being shaped at such centers, with special emphasis placed on the dimension of gender (single women or mothers).The existence of gender differences among asylum seekers’ groups cannot be clearly verified due to great social and economic problems, rendering them indistinguishable, while significant contradictions led to different conclusions in the past. Because of the lack of comparative data this research may contribute to the: a) provision of a clear cut picture of the gender dimension within the asylum seekers context, b) identification of the female asylum seekers population needs and the detection of the problems they encounter, c) the evaluation of the effectiveness of services and structures supporting asylum seekers and d) exploitation of results and findings for policy design.