Ukrainian Protection-Holders’ Perceptions of Agency, Resources and Welfare Access During Settlement in Berlin and Munich

Abstract National and municipal social and integration policies play a key role in shaping the conditions and opportunities for access to local social provisions, e.g. housing, financial support or institutional childcare. Against this backdrop, my paper explores Ukrainian protection-holders’ subjective perspectives on the social network–based resources that they activate and recombine in order to enhance their agency regarding satisfaction of their everyday welfare needs while settling in Berlin or Munich. The paper draws on in-depth interviews with Ukrainian protection-holders that were repeated in four waves. These interviews, which were conducted in the two cities between September 2022 and March 2023, were complemented by key informant interviews with professionals from welfare institutions and NGOs. Based on an inductively developed typology of in-person and digital resources from the data, findings illustrate the resourcefulness of forced migrants from Ukraine, which is an expression of their agency in action. Such resourcefulness enables them to overcome perceived barriers when accessing welfare after forced displacement. The empirically new and less explored case of Ukrainians residing in Germany under the EU Temporary Protection contributes to scholarship on agency as contextual, relational and dynamic.