Zygmunt Bauman: Strangers at Our Door

Abstract

Refugees from the violence of wars and the brutality of famished lives haveknocked on other people's doors since the beginning of time. For thepeople behind the doors, these uninvited guests were always strangers,and strangers tend to generate fear and anxiety precisely because they areunknown. Today we find ourselves confronted with an extreme form of thishistorical dynamic, as our TV screens and newspapers are filled withaccounts of a 'migration crisis', ostensibly overwhelming Europe andportending the collapse of our way of life. This anxious debate has givenrise to a veritable 'moral panic' - a feeling of fear spreading among a largenumber of people that some evil threatens the well-being of society.