Brexit Brits Abroad

For Zoe Adams Green ‘The EU was my oyster’. Joining Michaela down the line from Italy, she describes her love affair with Europe, and her experiences moving around the EU seeking work and latterly starting a family, opportunities that will be out of reach for future generations of British citizens once they lose their rights to Freedom of Movement.  As a campaigner for citizens’ rights through her work for British in Europe, she explains the potential far-reaching consequences of Brexit for the British citizens who have made their homes and lives in the EU-27.    Zoe Adams Green is a translator and a member of British in Europe’s steering group. You can find out more about British in Europe and their legal advocacy work on their website https://britishineurope.org     

British migration to the Spanish coastline is only part of the story about British emigration to Spain. In this episode Michaela is joined down the line by Michael Harris, British in Europe steering committee member, founder of Eurocitizens, who has been living in Madrid for close to 40 years. He shares his migration story, from fleeing Thatcher’s Britain to living in Spain in the 1980s, the conditions and circumstances which shaped this. He draws out his understanding of what it means to be European and how this overlaps with other identities, and the importance of campaigning for and defending the rights of European citizens.

A lesser known story of British migration to the EU is how it interplays with social mobility. In this episode, Michaela is joined by Fiona Godfrey, co-chair of British in Europe, a resident of Luxembourg to bust the myth that British citizens living in Europe are wealthy and originate in the south England. They discuss her migration biography from Barnsley to Luxembourg, an intimate family history of the precariousness of citizenship rights, and the multiple challenges of advocating for the rights of British citizens living in the EU.

We’re travelling to Poland today, as Michaela talks with Steve Davies, who is studying for his PhD in Sociology at the Polish Academy of Sciences. From the fall of the Berlin Wall to Brexit, Steve introduces us to a lesser known story of intra-EU mobility: the migration and settlement of British citizens in Poland. He highlights how Poland’s history, its position within the EU shapes migration and British experiences of life there; and reflects on how British-Polish families, a success of European integration, navigate migration, transnational relationships and Brexit together.     You can read Steve’s reflections on British Experiences of Coronavirus and Brexit in Poland: https://researchingbrexit.wordpress.com/2020/05/26/british-experiences-of-coronavirus-and-brexit-in-poland/ 

Recorded earlier this year, in the episode Michaela talks with Lisa in France. In her thirties and married to a French man, she talks about what the EU has meant for her and her life. Moving within Europe as a student and in the first stages of her career, she eventually settled in France with her husband. But this was never the firm plan, just the outcome of changing jobs and personal circumstances. And there were moments when moving to the UK might also have been on the cards, including in the lead up to Brexit. Living in Europe post-Brexit, Lisa explains that her British identity remains important to her but despite Britain no longer being in the EU, she will always feel European.    *We had some technical difficulties recording this episode, and so the sound quality is not up to our usual standards!

In the wake of the Brexit referendum, British citizens living across Europe started to come together in an unprecedented way, concerned about what Brexit might mean for their future legal status. In this episode, Michaela is joined by Jane Golding, co-chair of British in Europe to talk about the grassroots legal advocacy work on the future rights of British citizens living in the EU26 that they have been doing since the Brexit referendum. They discuss the movements pan-European journey from the Referendum to the present, the struggles for citizens’ rights and ongoing concerns about the implementation of the Withdrawal Agreement.

It’s the second of this week’s double-bill to mark the release of our latest reports! Michaela and Karen discuss the report drawing across three years of researching Brexit in the lives of Britons living in France. They talk about making sense of the ongoing uncertainty that Brexit has introduced to the lives of many Britons in France, and what this might tell us about how the negotiations and their impacts on the human lives at the core of citizens’ rights might have been managed differently. They explore personal experiences of Brexit from the relationships that these Britons have with friends and family in the UK to how British citizens in France found themselves making sense of Brexit for them, their experiences of having nowhere to turn and the uneven outcomes that Brexit has had for their lives.    To read Michaela’s report Brexit and the British in France visit https://brexitbritsabroad.org/reports.

This week we’re bringing you a double-bill to mark the release of our latest reports. In this first episode, Michaela is joined by Karen to talk about her report drawing across three years of researching Brexit in the lives of Britons living in Spain. They discuss the importance of locating Brexit within the context and conditions of British migration and settlement in Spain over time; the ongoing confusion about what Brexit means for their lives and futures; and the ever-present spectre of stereotypes about these British citizens and their lives in Spain. As their experience of Brexit makes clear, from the outset the onus was placed on individuals to make sense of what is happening to their rights, as they internalised an understanding that they were nobody’s responsibility but their own.    To read Karen’s report Brexit and the British in Spain visit https://brexitbritsabroad.org/reports.

Recorded in Berlin in November 2019, in this episode Michaela is joined by Christy Kulz, Technical University Berlin and Christine Barwick, Centre Marc Bloch, to talk about the migration of British citizens to Berlin. We disturb some of the reductive narratives about the British in Berlin, in particular, understandings that see them solely as the young, creative industry workers. We question instead what the migration of these younger Britons reveals about contemporary urban and economic transformations in Europe. Further, we reposition these migrations in a longer history and the context of Berlin as a city past and present.

Sticking with the theme of Brexit and Ireland, Michaela is joined by Vikki Barry Brown, a PhD candidate from Queen Mary, University of London, to talk about Irish passports, English and Irish identities, and Brexit. They discuss the rise in applications of Irish passport following Brexit and how the significance placed on this by those claiming these passports (through ancestry) extends beyond pragmatic and legal issues, into questions of identity, the experience a site for uncovering previously hidden family histories. Turning to Vikki’s PhD research about the English in Ireland, they talk about this hidden population, from the context to the questions of identity, home and belonging at the heart of the project.    You can find out more about Vikki's research here: https://englishinireland.vbarrybrown.com and read her Irish Times article about the rise in applications for Irish passports in the Irish Times: https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/abroad/brexit-irish-getting-an-irish-passport-was-partly-abo

Since the recording of this podcast, the election returned a majority Conservative government in Westminster which has since passed the Withdrawal Agreement for leaving the EU. A transition period, lasting at least until the end of 2020, should mean British citizens in EU countries will retain their current rights until at least that period. If you are worried about your situation, you can get advice from independent organisations such as the Immigrant Council of Ireland (https://www.immigrantcouncil.ie/contact). We’re back to Ireland in today’s episode. Joined by Luke Butterly, a journalist who has focussed on bordering between the UK and Ireland, Michaela explores two prominent dimensions of the Brexit at their intersections: the border and migration. As they discuss, the prevailing imaginings of a frictionless border hide from view the racialised politics of the border made visible in who is questioned for their right to cross this border freely. Repositioning questions of Brexit and the border within this

Our first episode of 2020, and it’s a throwback to a live recording of presentation that Michaela and Karen gave to colleagues at a conference in Umeå, Sweden. They offer some reflections on the practice of doing research with British citizens living in the EU27 over the course of the Brexit negotiations. As they draw out the complex picture of how these Britons navigate protracted uncertainty, they reflect on a set of key themes emerging from the project. In particular, they discuss the sociological importance of the observation that these Britons living in the EU27 seem to be nobody’s responsibility but their own, left to take matters into their own hands by their own government and the EU.

This episode sees Michaela joined by Adrienne Yong, lecturer at City Law School (https://www.city.ac.uk/people/academics/adrienne-yong), to talk legal perspectives on Brexit and citizens’ rights. Adrienne offers her analysis of what case law reveals about shifts within legal understandings of EU citizenship. She charts the trajectory of EU citizenship from its base in market citizenship—where the rights of citizenship are in the service of economic integration within the Union—towards an approach more grounded in fundamental rights which takes as a starting point the citizen. Discussing settled status for EU citizens in the UK and the loss of EU citizenship for UK nationals living in the EU27, the discussion turns to how these legal perspectives can help us to understand how Brexit sits in relation to what has come before.   Read more from Adrienne about the removal of EU citizenship in this article for The Conversation (https://theconversation.com/britons-shouldnt-get-their-hopes-up-about-keeping-eu-citizens

In the latest of our episodes focussed on Brexit in the real lives of British citizens living in the EU27, Michaela is joined over the Internet by Debbie Williams, founder of BrExpats Hear our Voice (https://brexpatshov.com). She explains how she went from never having been involved in politics beyond voting to founding this group that has had an increasing presence in campaigns for citizens’ rights. They discuss her concerns about the ways in which the human cost of Brexit has been overlooked in the negotiations, the difficulties of getting the voices of those who rights are being transformed heard, and the importance of standing up for these rights at this point in time. And on a personal level, she highlights how Brexit has changed her, the way she looks at the world and caused her to question things that she might previously have taken for granted.

In this episode, Michaela is joined by Lorenza Antonucci (University of Birmingham) and Simone Varriale (University of Lincoln). They discuss the conclusions of their recent paper Unequal Europe, Unequal Brexit ( https://research.birmingham.ac.uk/portal/files/69623578/Antonucci_Varriale_Unequal_Europe_Current_Sociology_2019.pdf ). In particular, they focus on their call to recognise that an understanding of the inequalities at the heart of Brexit need to account for Britain’s position within the European project and the different stakes of member states within the European project. Focusing on the case of EU migrants in the UK, they discuss how the relationships between the UK and other member states have shaped EU migration flows—through the demands and opportunities of the labour market—and inspired migrant imaginaries. As they stress, remembering that Brexit is variously located within the relationship between Britain and the EU is an important counterpoint to parochial understandings of Brexit and its im

What does Brexit mean for young British citizens living in the EU who have never known anything other than being European? In this episode, Michaela is joined over the Internet by Molly (in Spain) and Naomi (in Germany), campaigners for Young European Voices (https://twitter.com/youngeuvoices). Both in their twenties, they describe what Freedom of Movement has done for them and their families, their emerging sense of themselves as European in response to Brexit and their increased interest and concern about politics across Europe. As they highlight, Brexit has already had an impact on their lives, influencing their plans for the future and life choices as they face a future without Freedom of Movement.   

This episode sees Michaela and Chantelle return to understanding the racialised exclusions at the heart of Britishness and other European national identities. They talk with Bel Parnell-Berry (https://project-parnell.com) who lives in the Netherlands. Drawing on the work she does as the programme manager for the European Race and Imagery Foundation (https://erifonline.org), Sinterklass and other practices of blackface across Europe, she talks about the exclusion of people of colour from imaginings of who counts as European. Turning to Brexit, she highlights how campaign groups for the rights of British citizens living in the EU overlooked how the removal of their rights sat in relation to migrant rights more generally, their focus on legal rights overlooked the racist treatment of People of Colour within these populations before and after Brexit.    To find out more about Bel’s thoughts on the absence of migrant solidarity in the concerns of British citizens living in the EU in a time of Brexit, read her art

Michaela is joined by Annette Schrauwen, Professor of European Integration at the University of Amsterdam (https://www.uva.nl/profiel/s/c/a.a.m.schrauwen/a.a.m.schrauwen.html?1572365609704), the co-author of the 2017 report commissioned by the City of Amsterdam outlining the possible routes for guaranteeing the future rights of British citizens living in the city (https://www.uva.nl/shared-content/subsites/amsterdam-centre-for-european-law-and-governance/en/news/2017/07/brexit-report-amsterdam). Annette explains what the Dutch authorities have been doing to secure the future rights of their British residents and the court cases raised by British citizens in the Netherlands relating to their loss of EU citizenship. She also draws attention to the ongoing case raised by a young British woman raised the Netherlands, currently living in the UK who was found ineligible for the right to Permanent Residence. As she and Michaela discuss, timing and contingency shape access to future rights for these British citizens,

Ian lives in Sweden and crosses the Öresund Bridge on a daily basis for his job in Denmark. As a cross-border worker what does Brexit mean for him and others like him, now and in the future? And what does it mean for the cross border rights—pensions, healthcare, sick leave, workers rights—based on European citizenship that have been the foundation for so many cross border workers?   This episode is part of a set of episodes that we have released throughout the project that focus on the human face of Brexit and what it means for British citizens living in the EU27. Other episodes in this selection include, Michaela’s interviews with Terri (http://brexitbritsabroad.libsyn.com/brexit-in-the-real-lives-of-britons-living-in-the-eu27-terri-beswick), Paul (http://brexitbritsabroad.libsyn.com/size/5/?search=Paul), and Gill and Clive (http://brexitbritsabroad.libsyn.com/ep011-whats-it-like-to-apply-for-dual-nationality-a-view-from-france). You can also hear from Millie, Jayne and Roy in the about Brexit and what it me

In today’s podcast special, Michaela and Karen get together to reflect on (some of) the sociological takeaways from the project. And it’s a really tour de force!    Get ready to hear them tackle the problems at the heart of the perennial question—why don’t they just go back to Britain?—that has become all too familiar to many Britons living in Europe in a time of Brexit. They return to questions of Britain and Britishness, citizenship and racism. And in their latest discussion of bordering they highlight the need to move beyond legalistic framings, and into understandings that recognise that who is allowed to cross borders and remain in the sovereign territory of a nation is political and constantly negotiated. And Brexit tightens Europe’s borders, some Britons will find themselves squeezed out, its effect unevenly felt.   Further resources relating to the topics of this episode : Toni Haastrup’s analysis of how Britain’s ethnic minorities viewed the EU referendum https://ukandeu.ac.uk/how-do-britains-ethnic-