Protection in Lesvos during Covid—19: A crucial failure

Admigov Paper, October 2020

What does protection of people on the move and people stuck look like during a pandemic? What happens to protection issues during a pandemic in a situation of systemic neglect? What are the impacts of changes in state policy following the Covid—19 pandemic or other recent developments, such as the ongoing Greek-Turkish border dispute, on the protection of those displaced and with protection needs? To what extent does our understanding of the impact of policy changes on protection depend on how and on whose terms do we understand protection? How does exploring protection from above or from below, in theory or in actual practice, from the perspective of the legislator, the politician, the humanitarian worker or the displaced alter how protection is understood? Does protection in practice differ between what we call the frontstage of entry and arrival sites such as hotspots and the backstage of camps and urban residences with their different temporalities and why? These are some of the key questions under discussion in this ADMIGOV report on the state of protection in Greece during the Covid—19 pandemic.