Within care studies, the transnationalisation of care has mainly been understood as drawing on (female) migrant care workers and resulting in a ‘care gap’ in the places such workers leave behind. This project looks at the reverse phenomenon: care relocation, in which the ageing body is relocated to places where care is more affordable. This contested trend, described as ‘grandmother deportation’ or ‘geriatric colonialism’, can be seen as an extreme example of the marketisation of care within Europe.
Our multi-sited anthropological study focuses on care homes in Central Eastern Europe (Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary) that recruit patients from Austria and Germany and offer care at roughly one-third of the cost. We wonder: What does care relocation do to the people and places involved? Most of these care homes are located in regions characterised by a long German or Habsburg-Hungarian history, adding historical complexity to the story. Some only serve German-speaking patients, others serve local wealthier elderly as well. Some are run by former migrant care workers, others by international companies, bringing labour migration and real estate investment into the picture.
ReloCare encompasses all of these aspects in one research project. Alongside in-depth ethnographic studies of the daily life in these care homes, our team investigates the nexus of care entrepreneurs and state insurances, and the histories of places and regional migration, providing an understanding of these new transnational entanglements of welfare states. In perceiving care relocation as both part of future-making as well as a response to the privatisation of care landscapes in the region, we ask what it means to become elderly and in need of care in an increasingly intertwined Europe.
The overall research questions of our project are listed below. Our team will answer these by following all the different actors involved, such as the elderly and their families, entrepreneurs, care workers, middlemen, insurance companies, and state representatives:
How do care relocation and commercialisation influence the people and places involved? What changes do these bring for local care systems?
What kinds of subjectivities and relations are forged through care commercialisation and care relocation in these European care landscapes?
What futures are envisioned and attempted in the entanglement of different welfare states and private and public infrastructures?
Academic Background
Within care studies, the transnationalisation of care has mainly been understood as drawing on (female) migrant care workers and resulting in a ‘care gap’ in the places such workers leave behind.
This project looks at the reverse phenomenon: care relocation, in which the ageing body is relocated to places where care is more affordable. This contested trend, described as ‘grandmother deportation’ or ‘geriatric colonialism’, can be seen as an extreme example of the marketisation of care within Europe.
Our multi-sited anthropological study focuses on care homes in Central Eastern Europe (Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary) that recruit patients from Austria and Germany and offer care at roughly one-third of the cost. We wonder: What does care relocation do to the people and places involved?
Most of these care homes are located in regions characterised by a long German or Habsburg-Hungarian history, adding historical complexity to the story. Some only serve German-speaking patients, others serve local wealthier elderly as well. Some are run by former migrant care workers, others by international companies, bringing labour migration and real estate investment into the picture.
ReloCare encompasses all of these aspects in one research project. Alongside in-depth ethnographic studies of the daily life in these care homes, our team investigates the nexus of care entrepreneurs and state insurances, and the histories of places and regional migration, providing an understanding of these new transnational entanglements of welfare states.
In perceiving care relocation as both part of future-making as well as a response to the privatisation of care landscapes in the region, we ask what it means to become elderly and in need of care in an increasingly intertwined Europe.
The overall research questions of our project are listed below. Our team will answer these by following all the different actors involved, such as the elderly and their families, entrepreneurs, care workers, middlemen, insurance companies, and state representatives:
How do care relocation and commercialisation influence the people and places involved? What changes do these bring for local care systems?
What kinds of subjectivities and relations are forged through care commercialisation and care relocation in these European care landscapes?
What futures are envisioned and attempted in the entanglement of different welfare states and private and public infrastructures?
