Carceralities and State Approved Gender Violence: The Case of Direct Provision in Ireland

Direct Provision is a system of processing asylum seekers in Ireland where they are temporarily provided accommodation while they wait for a decision on their refugee status claim (Murphy 2021). Started in 2000 as a temporary solution, it forces asylum seekers to stay in shared accommodation in carceral conditions, without any right to work or ability to cook their own food for years (Dalekani 2022). We argue that Direct Provision is a state approved form of carcerality which intentionally harms people. The essence of carceral practices is layered (Repo 2019). These layers are related to power relations, regimes and spatio-temporalities. The layers accumulate differently (for example, related to gender) in different bodies and spaces, causing injustice and inequality and making some spaces and bodies more carceral than others (Repo 2019). The carceralities increase institutional burden which agglomerates in human bodies and influences their everyday lives. Through a review of the strategies adopted by the government in relation to migrants, undocumented workers and asylum seekers, this paper will bring together the areas of gender studies and carceral geography to examine how bodies of migrant survivors become the location where the politics of the state, citizenship, violence, and carceralities come to fore. The bodies of certain asylum seekers like mothers and domestic violence survivors become not only the political site but also the intersection of linguistic, cultural and ideological representations and mis-representations. The paper will conclude with some suggestions about concrete immediate changes which can make a difference in their lives. References: Dalikeni, Colleta. 2022. Child Protection Social Workers and Asylum-Seeking Families in Ireland . Oxford, United Kingdom: Peter Lang Verlag. Retrieved Feb 24, 2023, from 10.3726/b19062. Murphy, Fiona. 2021. Direct Provision, Rights and Everyday Life for Asylum Seekers in Ireland during COVID-19. Social Sciences 10: 140. Repo, Virve. 2019. Carceral layers in a geropsychiatric unit in Finland. Geografiska Annaler: Series B, Human Geography 101:3, 187-201.