Autori
Cellini, Erika
Bulli, Giorgia
Milani, Stella

Titolo
In nome della vulnerabilità. La configurazione del welfare controintuitivo nel sistema italiano di accoglienza dei richiedenti asilo
Periodico
Politiche Sociali
Anno: 2025 - Fascicolo: 3 - Pagina iniziale: 619 - Pagina finale: 634

The concept of vulnerability has gained increasing centrality in political discourse and social policies over recent decades, emerging as a key criterion for access to social rights. This article critically analyses how vulnerability is conceptualised, operationalised, and communicated within the Italian asylum reception system, regarded here as a paradigmatic case of «counterintuitive welfare»: a model that, while proclaiming universalistic principles, produces selective and exclusionary effects. Through a qualitative approach combining content analysis and critical discourse analysis, the article explores three dimensions: the normative evolution of the category of vulnerability, the classification and management practices within administrative procedures, and the political-institutional rhetoric in parliamentary debates on the conversion into law of reception-related decrees between 2018 and 2023. The study highlights how vulnerability is mobilised to legitimise selective and unequal practices, as well as moral hierarchies among migrants, functioning as a lever of moralisation and a device of both symbolic and material control, thereby reinforcing logics of selective compassion. In this perspective, the article contributes to a critical reflection on the ambivalent role of vulnerability in contemporary welfare systems, increasingly oriented towards the differential management of access to protection.



SICI: 2284-2098(2025)3<619:INDVLC>2.0.ZU;2-1
Testo completo: https://www.rivisteweb.it/download/article/10.7389/120041
Testo completo alternativo: https://www.rivisteweb.it/doi/10.7389/120041

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