A few weekends ago, volunteers from Cid decided to organise an event to rise awereness about refugee' s situation in Macedonia, as well as to improve their lives in the Tabanovce camp by donating books, which were collected during the event (you can read article about it below).
Being curious what local people really think about migration and refugees. I decided to do a small research and interview several people different age. Overall I gathered 27 people including 18 man, 9 woman, most of the people were around 20s, some teenagars (the youngest person was 16) and one older woman (61). A few interviews were conducted during the event and in Multikulti, but most of them took place in bars, which explains higher number of interviewed men.
Macedonian part
Let's consider how a situation between Macedonians and Albanians looks in Kumanovo. Most of the respondents answered that relation between those two nationalites is neither good nor bad. Although, according to them nowadays the situation looks better. However the city is still divided, which indicate that definitely the situation should be improved. Some of the people mentioned that, conflicts from the past have still impact on current circumstances along with a bad education and integration system, which sustain touchy relation between Macedonians and Albenians.
Talking of migration, almost all respondents agree that the main reason of migration in Macedonia are economical and political. The low income force people to go to other countries and cities to find better job. However, there is no offical datas how many people migrated since 2005 of international migration and 2013 of urban migration. It is quite surprising and almost all my interviewees didn't know the exact number. Even though, people in Macedonia migarate, the migration itself by 3 respondents were consider as a threat to culture or nationality. Others thought that it has only negative aspects (6 respondents), 8 people said that only positive. Nevertheless the majority claimed that migration is not a clear-cut issue and have both positives and negatives. According to them, small groups of migrants will not cause problems but bigger might if the country's immigration policy is not good.
Although, what does it mean to be a migrant and what is the difference between migrant and refugee?
Refugee part
According to modern definition drafted by UN's 1951 Convention, refugee is a person who is unable to return to their country because of fear to be presecuted. The international law only recognizes the people who flee because of conflicts nad violence. A migrant is a person who leave their country not related to persecution but mostly connected to searching for better economical opportunities. Most of the respondets were able to distinguish those two terms. Only teenage respondets didn't know the differences, the woman 61 years old and two people around twenties (age 20,23). However, even though rest of the interviewees could answer the question, sometimes they had some difficulties.
What is a knowledge about refugees in Kumanovo? First of all, nearly all respondets were aware that there are still refugee camps in Macedonia. However, most of them could just point out that refugees are from Syria or Aganistan or say generally that come from Middle East. Only women age 61 and 23 didn't know completly anything about refugees, 5 people new more than the avarage person.
The most confusing questions were about sources of stereotypes about refugees, and if media are based when they write about refugee crisis. First of all, most of the people didn't know how to answer the question about stereotypes. Only 10 people mentioned, that media, fear of the unknown and lack of education are the sources of common misperception. Obviously, education and contact with other cultures is a key to avoid stereotypes as interviewees claimed. Another difficult question was related to based media, again only 7 people answer the question simultanieously agreed that media are predujest while showing image of refugees.The last question was related to integration refugees in a society. Almost all respondets agreed that, we should put more effort into integration because they are the same human as we are. Some of them graduated from the university and have professional-skilled jobs, unfortunately persecution forced them to leave the country. Despite that, some of the interviewees said that, in "richest" countries integration would be easier and for sure not in Macedonia.
Off the record
Overall I think the interviews went very well, however sometimes I got the feeling that some respondets don't understand questions or give me the "right answer". In spite of that, I'm really glad that I had the opportunity to talk to those people and see different points of view.
Being curious what local people really think about migration and refugees. I decided to do a small research and interview several people different age. Overall I gathered 27 people including 18 man, 9 woman, most of the people were around 20s, some teenagars (the youngest person was 16) and one older woman (61). A few interviews were conducted during the event and in Multikulti, but most of them took place in bars, which explains higher number of interviewed men.
Macedonian part
Let's consider how a situation between Macedonians and Albanians looks in Kumanovo. Most of the respondents answered that relation between those two nationalites is neither good nor bad. Although, according to them nowadays the situation looks better. However the city is still divided, which indicate that definitely the situation should be improved. Some of the people mentioned that, conflicts from the past have still impact on current circumstances along with a bad education and integration system, which sustain touchy relation between Macedonians and Albenians.
Talking of migration, almost all respondents agree that the main reason of migration in Macedonia are economical and political. The low income force people to go to other countries and cities to find better job. However, there is no offical datas how many people migrated since 2005 of international migration and 2013 of urban migration. It is quite surprising and almost all my interviewees didn't know the exact number. Even though, people in Macedonia migarate, the migration itself by 3 respondents were consider as a threat to culture or nationality. Others thought that it has only negative aspects (6 respondents), 8 people said that only positive. Nevertheless the majority claimed that migration is not a clear-cut issue and have both positives and negatives. According to them, small groups of migrants will not cause problems but bigger might if the country's immigration policy is not good.
Although, what does it mean to be a migrant and what is the difference between migrant and refugee?
Refugee part
According to modern definition drafted by UN's 1951 Convention, refugee is a person who is unable to return to their country because of fear to be presecuted. The international law only recognizes the people who flee because of conflicts nad violence. A migrant is a person who leave their country not related to persecution but mostly connected to searching for better economical opportunities. Most of the respondets were able to distinguish those two terms. Only teenage respondets didn't know the differences, the woman 61 years old and two people around twenties (age 20,23). However, even though rest of the interviewees could answer the question, sometimes they had some difficulties.
What is a knowledge about refugees in Kumanovo? First of all, nearly all respondets were aware that there are still refugee camps in Macedonia. However, most of them could just point out that refugees are from Syria or Aganistan or say generally that come from Middle East. Only women age 61 and 23 didn't know completly anything about refugees, 5 people new more than the avarage person.
The most confusing questions were about sources of stereotypes about refugees, and if media are based when they write about refugee crisis. First of all, most of the people didn't know how to answer the question about stereotypes. Only 10 people mentioned, that media, fear of the unknown and lack of education are the sources of common misperception. Obviously, education and contact with other cultures is a key to avoid stereotypes as interviewees claimed. Another difficult question was related to based media, again only 7 people answer the question simultanieously agreed that media are predujest while showing image of refugees.The last question was related to integration refugees in a society. Almost all respondets agreed that, we should put more effort into integration because they are the same human as we are. Some of them graduated from the university and have professional-skilled jobs, unfortunately persecution forced them to leave the country. Despite that, some of the interviewees said that, in "richest" countries integration would be easier and for sure not in Macedonia.
Off the record
Overall I think the interviews went very well, however sometimes I got the feeling that some respondets don't understand questions or give me the "right answer". In spite of that, I'm really glad that I had the opportunity to talk to those people and see different points of view.
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