Precarious workers on the move the migrantisation of Italian healthcare professionals in Germany

Abstract

This paper explores the phenomenon of ‘everyday xenoracism’ experienced by Italian healthcare workers who migrated to Germany following the 2008 financial crisis. Despite being white and from the EU, these workers face a distinct form of discrimination – ‘xenoracism’ – rooted in microaggressions and boundary-making practices at both the workplace and in daily life. The study highlights how this discrimination becomes internalized, leading to a form of self-precarization among Italian healthcare workers. These workers, typically seen as ‘expatriates’ rather than ‘migrants’, undergo a process of deskilling and downgrading within the broader transformation of the global care chain, which contributes to a phenomenon we named ‘care waste’. This precarization is further reinforced by the new form of manpower recruitment implemented in Germany (the Gastarbeit 2.0 model), which facilitates mobility but also perpetuates inequalities. The paper argues that intra-EU mobility, especially within the context of post-crisis Europe, does not equate to social mobility and instead reflects deeper structural inequalities tied to geographic and economic disparities. Ultimately, it provides a nuanced understanding of how mobility, discrimination, and precarization intersect in shaping the lives of migrant healthcare workers.