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1-2: Migration, (In)Hospitality and Belonging in Uncertain Times
  • ISSN: 2042-7913
  • E-ISSN: 2042-7921

Abstract

The number of asylum seekers housed in hotels in the United Kingdom on behalf of the Home Office is unprecedented and requires specific attention. Utilizing hotels on such a large scale as longer-term accommodation for asylum seekers has brought a new range of actors into this space who have responsibility for the day-to-day care of refugees and asylum seekers, many of whom have experienced high levels of trauma. The involvement of hoteliers and housing companies in hosting asylum seekers, individuals who by definition are guests seeking the hospitality of a nation state, suggests the need to unite two bodies of literature – on the hospitality industry and on the right to seek and enjoy asylum – in a way that sheds new light on conceptions of home and the broader theme of what it means to offer welcome. The concepts of homemaking and home-unmaking have until recently been largely absent from scholarship. We offer a new conceptual framework that brings together concepts of hospitality and home. We apply this framework to two case studies of recent incidents in asylum hotel accommodation to bring insight into the implications of such policies for host and guest communities.

Funding
This study was supported by the:
  • The Economic and Social Research Council (Award ES/P000711/1)
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2025-03-31
2025-05-14
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/content/journals/10.1386/hosp_00088_1
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Exploring hospitality, hostility and (un)home in hotel accommodation for asylum seekers in the United Kingdom
Hospitality & Society 15, 23 (2025); https://doi.org/10.1386/hosp_00088_1
/content/journals/10.1386/hosp_00088_1
/content/journals/10.1386/hosp_00088_1
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  • Article Type: Article
Keyword(s): case studies; conceptual framework; dispersal; forced migration; outsourcing; privatization; refugees

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