Cite as: Cabot, H., 2016, “The Mediterranean Refugee Crisis. A response to Evthymios Papataxiarchis, AT 32(3)”. Anthropology Today 32(5): 26.
"Having spent some time on Lesbos in July 2016, I have seen some of the vestiges of the front line that Papataxiarchis describes. In May, the European Union (EU) struck a deal with Turkey to deport those who do not qualify for asylum back across the Turkish border. The effects of this new policing regime have been swift and palpable. While deportations are not always enacted, and are often resisted even at the level of asylum committees, arrivals have dwindled.
The exuberant – even addictive – socialities of the first response, which Papataxiarchis describes, have dissolved into a disorienting set of remains that mark the landscape and the people. Life jackets and the carcasses of rubber boats have been repurposed to mark property lines, or to create mulch for the garden..."