Ungoverned Living: Exploring Migrant Residency Practices in Poland

The chapter investigates Poland’s transformation from a sending into a host society for migrants through the lens of housing issues and practices experienced by foreigners. As accommodation constitutes one of the most basic dimensions of migrant living, it was utilised as an indicator of migration policy implementation. We argue that Poland neither opposes nor governs migration, encouraging substantial numbers of people, yet not devoting critical attention to their accommodation or well-being in that matter. Qualitative interviews with foreign nationals (N = 25) were carried out and open-coded as part of an exploratory study. The analysis revealed that amid the lack of institutional support, migrants face precarious living conditions, experience prejudice while searching for accommodation as well as while renting, and―to some extent―respond to these inconveniences by self-organising in a quest to fill the void of housing market and accommodation-related services sector. This paper contributes to the discussion about Polish (effectively non-existent) immigration policy.