“It is a thin line to walk on”: Challenges of staff working at Swedish immigration detention centres

Abstract

Detention of irregular migrants awaiting deportation is widely practiced in many countries and has been shown to have profound negative impact on health and well-being of detainees. Detention staff, an integral part of the detention environment, affect and are affected by detainees’ health and well-being. The objective of the study was to explore experiences of staff working at Swedish immigration detention centres. Fifteen semi-structured interviews were conducted with staff in three Swedish detention centres and were analysed using thematic analysis. The results indicate that the main challenge for the staff was to manage the emotional dilemma entailed in working as migration officers and simultaneously fellow human beings whose task was to implement deportation decisions while being expected to provide humane service to detainees. They tried to manage their dilemma by balancing the two roles, but still found it challenging. Among the staff, there was a high perception of fear of physical threat from detainees that made detention a stressful environment. Limited interaction between the staff and detainees was a reason for this. There is thus a need to support detention staff to improve their interaction with detainees in order to decrease their fear, manage their emotional dilemma, and provide better service to detainees. It is important to address staff challenges in order to ensure better health and well-being for both staff and detainees.

Ecology of Sites of Confinement: Everyday Life in a Detention Center for Illegalized Non‐citizens

“…The detention environment also negatively affected staff members and external civil‐society actors, whose wellbeing was highly interdependent with that of detainees (cf. Bosworth, ; Puthoopparambil, Ahlberg, & Bjerneld, ). The emotional burden of working at a custodial site was frequently addressed in the interviews and conversations held with these actors.…”

“…Therefore, to manage the daily challenges that they faced, staff often attributed their actions to regulations handed down by higher authorities (i.e., the state), while also setting boundaries to control their emotional involvement with detainees and detaching themselves from their suffering (cf. Bosworth, ; Puthoopparambil et al., ). The lack of training and supervision further complicated the picture, making their accumulated and shared experiences the only resource available to them, at times.…”

Quality of life among immigrants in Swedish immigration detention centres: a cross-sectional questionnaire study

“…Detention staff constitutes a major part of the detention environment ( 13 ). The impact of staff behaviour on detainee health and well-being has been discussed in earlier studies ( 9 – 13 , 29 ).…”

“…In addition to the WHOQOL-BREF questions, participants were asked four questions that measured their satisfaction with the services provided at the centres (service satisfaction scores). These questions were developed from qualitative studies conducted by the authors ( 13 , 29 ). Table 1 shows the main outcome variables and their scoring scale.…”

“…Detainees might be entering detention with pre-existing risk factors such as exposure to trauma and torture ( 5 , 7 , 8 ). In addition to this risk, the detention environment can negatively affect the health and well-being of detainees due to factors such as limited access to healthcare services ( 6 , 9 , 10 ), limited availability of information pertaining to their situation ( 11 ), and unfavourable staff behaviour ( 12 , 13 ). Several studies show a high prevalence of mental illness among detainees ( 4 , 5 , 7 , 14 ).…”