Two anthropologists domiciled in the global north, Jennifer Riggan and Amanda Poole, through fieldwork from 2016 to 2019 pay close attention to the experiences of Eritrean refugees in Ethiopia. Three refugee camps in Tigray are used—Mai Ainini, Hitsats, and Adi Harush—and other refugees in Addis Ababa. The two countries from the horn of Africa share a common history, that is, geographically, culturally, politically, and economically. In five chapters, the two experienced scholars on Eritrea and Ethiopia engage and debunk the generally assumed view that Ethiopia practices hospitality on its “guests,” that is, refugees.
The book cover captures well on a banner the words of the late South African international icon, Nelson Mandela: “education is the only powerful weapon to change the world.” While South Africa is a country and a geographical location in Africa, the words from Nelson Mandela speak to hope, time, education, life in the camp as well as the future narratives shared by Eritrean refugees based in Ethiopia. Durable solutions have preoccupied the attention of migration studies scholars and the global humanitarian regime with repatriation, resettlement, and local integration at the center in linear ways. The two scholars interrogate the hospitality thesis from the Global South posing the questions: “What are the temporalities of hospitality in highly unstable places?” “How do they engage with temporalities of local integration, migration, and encampment to shape the relationship between refugees and the hosting state?” (46–48).
In addressing these questions, Riggan and Poole offer a nuanced analysis, with the evaluation pointing to the various circumstances that refugees encounter as guests, nature of hospitality in Ethiopia, and the political instability found in Ethiopia. Chapter One explores the concept of teleological violence as it sheds light on how and why policies and projects that seem so aligned with refugee aspirations, such as education and work opportunities, may not only fail to meet intended outcomes but also put refugees in harm’s way (44). Teleological time becomes violent when people believe that hard work, discipline, having a plan, and attaching that plan to broader developmental goals will lead to personal and collective progress and prosperity but also know they will face very specific impediments that will stall their progress and aspirations. As such, teleological violence also manifests through new policies emphasizing how local integration brought into force in response to a perceived migrant crisis in Europe and the crisis be addressed by systemic migration in home, host, and corridor countries in the south (23). Chapter One has a title that fully captures this well, “Migration Deterrence and the Nexus of Humanitarianism, Development, and Security” (27).
In Chapter Two, the notion attached to hospitality and integration in Ethiopia is put to the test with voices pointing out that the country is a transit route due to the animosity between Eritrea, Eritreans, and Ethiopia. The two scholars critically engage with the validity of applying the term hospitality if the people who are hosted as guests are staying indefinitely since according to their interpretation, hospitality by its nature must be temporary or at least impermanent. Again, the assumption of resettlement is interpreted as problematic particularly to those who have thoughts of leaving Ethiopia to Europe. Developmental projects are rather critically explored with a view to demonstrate that they serve European deterrence measures.
Ethiopia has a fair share of its challenges as it produces its own refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs), that tarnishes its image as a regional peacemaker and benevolent host. A common thread on hospitality towards Eritrean refugees is that it serves to depoliticize them while simultaneously claiming a hand of protection, welcoming and offering access to work. In short, hospitality in Ethiopia is arguably exclusionary to refugees as they do not have the capacity to fully belong in the polity.
From Chapter Three to the last Chapter Five, forms of refugee agency are critically explored, focusing on different kinds of time-making, future, and temporality on specific spaces. Chapter Three takes up the paradox of teleological time, which refugees both covet and understand as causing them suffering. Chapter Three, titled “School Time: Teleological Violence and the Pain of Progress,” engages critically with narratives of fading hope particularly from those refugees who pursued tertiary education only to return to camp due to structural barriers (68). Cruel optimism manifests when refugees who worked hard with the hope of a better life find themselves structurally blocked from progressing in their life endeavors. While Chapter Four deals with politics of waiting and bureaucratic limitations faced by refugees, this further unpacks their interaction with camp time and care taking as a form of time-making, making the refugees’ present liveable even in a temporal space.
Chapter Five, “Moving Time: Time-Making toward the Distant Future,” as the title suggests points to the agentive takings from refugees gesturing toward future-making (115). Irregular migration is one such example of the perils of time-making deployed by refugees. Oscillations in time-making are also explored through marriage for those who may have pursued higher education degrees but waiting to find better opportunities, and or waiting to resettle permanently in Ethiopia. The two scholars, Riggan and Poole, conclude that refugee hosting in the Global South, particularly Ethiopia, is precarious and unstable. The book broadly speaks to policymakers on migration studies, anthropologists, historians, and those with research interests in Global South studies.
