Researching Volunteer Interpretation

9 The reliance on volunteer interpretation exists in a particular context. Recent years have seen increasing privatisation of the funding of non-profit organisations (Prouteau and Tchernonog, 2017) and those providing assistance and support to foreign nationals, whose activities are at the heart of asylum policies, struggle to hire employees. Public subsidies from local authorities have decreased and are gradually being replaced by private funding, whether in the form of donations or membership fees. These structures regularly launch campaigns to raise funds and recruit volunteers. Although volunteering is a personal commitment (Vermeersch, 2004; Havard Duclos and Nicourd, 2005), the growing number of skills and responsibilities required for certain activities seems to point to its increasing institutionalisation (Bernardeau-Moreau and Hély, 2007). Volunteers are more often assigned tasks rather than positions, as part of “a gradual shift from occasional, ‘spare-time volunteering’, complementary to salaried employment, to formalised, structural volunteering, on which the success of migrant integration policies depends to a large extent” (Bourgois and Lièvre, 2019: 198). It is no longer a question of assigning occupational and logistical tasks to volunteers, as was previously the case, but rather of assigning longer-term support missions. This especially applies to translation and interpretation activities in the non-profit sector. Organisations that employ salaried interpreters in the medico-social field have been campaigning for the recognition of their status as professional interpreters, in order to improve working conditions and standardise practices (Chambon and Carbonel, 2015). Medical and social interpretation charters [9] define the profession of interpreter through essential duties and ethical rules of impartiality and confidentiality. For example, in order to be recruited by OFPRA, interpreters must declare “the relationships they have or have had with asylum seekers or protected persons, whether these are employment-related, non-profit, or family ties”. [10] This requirement for neutrality and transparency in translation is particularly present at OFPRA and in organisations that manage accommodation facilities for asylum seekers, and it is part of the development of a technical conception of interpretation that emerged in the 1980s. Conversely, some local and activist organisations offer a broader and more social vision of the activity, in which interpreters are mediators who can play a role in the social support of asylum seekers (Trucco, 2020). In general, they are volunteers who have been through the asylum process and are now recognised as refugees by the migration authorities, or they have had their asylum applications rejected and are seeking a residence permit. All Solidarité Asile’s interpreters are former asylum seekers who do not translate “word for word” and who, through their attitudes and missions, promote mediation and act as a relay between applicants and asylum institutions. They accompany people throughout administrative procedures and take part in the drafting of asylum appeals to the CNDA. [11] The table below gives a general overview of the sociological profile of the main interpreters surveyed.

Table 1: Presentation of Respondents

Table 1: Presentation of Respondents

10 Solidarité Asile’s interpreters have several things in common. They are young men from relatively privileged social backgrounds who have been denied refugee status and who have volunteered with Solidarité Asile for several years. In addition to their command of French and other languages spoken in their country of origin, nearly all of them have a level of education equivalent to a high school diploma. In their country of origin, they have more “access to use of the official language, written or spoken, while also speaking the dialect (still used in most private and even public situations), which makes them suitable for the function of intermediary” (Bourdieu, 1982: 30). They also have legal knowledge of asylum law and the law relating to foreign nationals in general. They know how the support system for asylum seekers works, and understand local level institutions. This enables them to give advice and inform newcomers about their rights. Assiatou is the only woman, and the least qualified interpreter I met in the structure. She was approached by the president of the organisation to meet a specific need for mediation in order to create a safe, single-gender space that would facilitate exchanges between the organisation and exiled women who are victims of violence. Assiatou’s presence helps to reassure asylum seekers who have to expose fragments of their intimate lives when writing their biographical accounts. She also supports the volunteers who ask her to interpret when dealing with issues related to prostitution, female genital mutilation, and sexual orientation.

Recruiting Employable Exiles with a Potential for Regularisation

11 According to the organisation’s official discourse, there are two ways of becoming an interpreter. Individuals can offer their services, in which case the offer of volunteer work appears as a response to a request for employment (Simonet, 2010); or a member of the organisation can identify a particular person and ask them to take on a mission. This happens especially when a person has command of a so-called “rare” language, spoken by few people but present among asylum seekers. [12]

12 In theory, anyone can apply to become an interpreter; in practice, recruitment takes place informally. It is possible to get onto the list of interpreters and never be called to work. An address book lists interpreters by name, language and length of service. Dominique, a retired man who has been volunteering with the organisation for a number of years, described the process to me:

13

“When we look for interpreters in a specific language, we take the list, we might have five or six, we start with the one with whom we have the best contact and the best experiences.” (Interview with Dominique, retired and a volunteer at Solidarité Asile, conducted on 14/02/2018)

14 Our observations showed that in practice this list is for information purposes only, since volunteers know in advance who to call for appointments with applicants. They choose them according to their habits and preferences, based on a personal logic that underpins recruitment by co-optation. For each language, there is a contact person who has managed to carve out a place for themself, by making themself available and indispensable to the structure. This is the case of Goran, who is the interpreter for Armenian exiles at Solidarité Asile. He has been closely involved in the organisation for five years and puts as much effort into individual appointments as into reception duties. He told me how he had become the main Armenian interpreter, “benefiting” from the support of David, one of the three employees at Solidarité Asile after having been introduced by the previous Armenian interpreter:

15

“Little by little, I met other Armenians, for example the previous translator. He was leaving because he had found a job, he got legal status, so I replaced him a bit. And then, David [an employee at the organisation] asked me to come with him to write the accounts for asylum applications. To begin with, I had my first appointment with him and then I gradually started to get appointments to do translations. Then he saw that I was good at it, so he trusted me.” (Interview with Goran, volunteer interpreter at Solidarité Asile, conducted on 10/01/2017)

16 As in Assiatou’s case, one of the three employees asked Goran to become a volunteer in order to replace an interpreter who was leaving. These selective recruitments — linked to identities, affinities, and long-standing acquaintances — are based on a strong “personalisation” of working relationships and contribute to greater reliability of the recruited individuals (Jounin, 2009). While asylum experience and knowledge of the legal procedures are essential technical criteria for becoming an interpreter, caseworkers are careful not to call on people who are themselves in the middle of the asylum application process. David, one of the organisation’s employees, considered that this was mainly a matter of confidentiality:

17

“How can asylum seekers trust interpreters who are themselves applying for asylum and who can have access to their case files? Often, interpreters are people we have known for a long time who are at a very advanced stage of the process, applying for a residence permit or, if possible, with refugee status, student status, or something else, but who are no longer applying for asylum.” (Interview with David, employee of Solidarité Asile, conducted on 24/04/2018)

18 Indeed, members of Solidarité Asile considered it essential to recruit trustworthy people who had been accompanied by the organisation throughout the administrative procedures, in order to ensure that the missions assigned to them are respected. The issue of administrative status is a key criterion for selection to limit the confusion of roles and the proximity that the interpreter is likely to have with the asylum seeker. Some might take advantage of this privileged situation to manipulate the claimant’s story in exchange for financial remuneration. In the past, the organisation discovered that some asylum seekers presented themselves in the company of interpreters who were also the providers of the account to be transmitted to the decision-making bodies. Since then, it has been vigilant and keeps an updated list of interpreters to avoid.

19 Developing selection criteria for the recruitment of interpreters enables organisations to work with competent individuals while retaining full control over the management of volunteers. By giving preference to exiles who have completed the asylum procedure, organisations construct a boundary between volunteers and the populations they receive, while giving interpreters a place in the social matrix of work. Usually, interpreters are individuals who have already demonstrated their “employability” (Gazier, 2012) and who are known for their loyalty and capacity to work by carrying out occasional services or more specific undeclared work. With a long-standing presence in the non-profit sector and on French territory, they can mobilise a large network of collaborators. For those who do not have legal status, this also provides them with the possibility of obtaining regularisation. In this way, the non-profit structures are involved less in the production than in the recruitment of a migrant elite, available and waiting to be able to “rent out their services” as a salaried labour force. The condition of employability of exiles therefore determines their recruitment as volunteers in the non-profit sector, rather than the other way round. This contrasts with its typical depiction in activation policies, where volunteering is considered as a stepping stone to employment (Thierry, 2007; Handy and Greenspan, 2009; Manço and Gatugu, 2018; Greenspan et al., 2018).

A World of Work Caught between Allegiances and Resistance

20 The recruitment of volunteer interpreters contributes to the creation of an intermediary body, caught between rationales of allegiance and resistance to institutions and asylum seekers. Interpreters are not simply representatives of the populations to whom they provide services. Instead, they constitute a world of distinct assistants, living off this in-between position. They experience constant conflicts of loyalty that are reflected in their dual role as agents of the state and agents of the public. The selection process gives rise to power relations between the exiled beneficiaries while contributing to a sense among interpreters of having been chosen, thus enabling the organisation to ensure interpreters’ long-term commitment.

21 These phenomena of differentiation and preference between exiles constitute a fertile ground for the development of clientelist-type relationships [13] within the organisation (Jobert, 1983). The creation of a situation of dependence enables the institution to ensure the exiles’ commitment to volunteer work in return for specific favours useful for their survival. This “power of demand” (Simonet, 2010), which is specific to asymmetrical relations and co-optation, partly explains why our respondents did not decline the offer of commitment that was made to them. [14] It is even stronger when exercised by a person with power over another in a precarious situation, as was the case with Jean, a rejected asylum seeker, who had been hoping to regularise his situation for almost ten years:

22

“People in the organisation helped me a lot with the procedures. I said to myself, given that I don’t have the right to work, why not? Because in my life, people have often held out a hand to me, so why not hold out my hand to others.” (Interview with Jean, volunteer interpreter at Solidarité Asile, conducted on 2/11/2017)

23 Jean’s remarks demonstrate the normative dimension of commitment. To be effective, it must take the form of a selfless gesture: a helping hand and non-work. His discourse corresponds to social behaviour that is expected, with varying degrees of awareness of the actors concerned, expressed through the register of gratitude and reciprocity. The metaphor used by Jean of the held-out hand expresses the existence of a moral contract that must be honoured to return the favour. Sociologists studying non-profit work show how the “ethics of community responsibility” (Simonet-Cusset, 2002) and the norm of social utility are at the basis of justifications for the involvement of volunteers, but also how they are at the core of the process of recognition of the non-profit sector by public authorities. The non-profit sector is supposed to be the ultimate space for the fulfilment of individuals in search of meaning and motivation, expressed as social utility offered to others. Thus, for exiles forced into inactivity, volunteering appears to be a way of making oneself useful to society while repaying the help received according to a rationale of gift and counter-gift.

24 While needs and constraints push asylum populations into volunteer work, the payment of an allowance put in place by organisations also contribute to the process of putting to work. Solidarité Asile’s interpreters obtain some benefits that are useful to their administrative and financial survival. [15] This, in turn, places them in a privileged position compared to others. Specifically, they receive a financial allowance of approximately 10 euros per hour when they translate discussions between the non-profit actor and the applicant during appointments to draft the account for the asylum application. Although this is not a salary, it is a form of compensation that enables the organisation to supervise and control the interpreters’ practice as volunteers. Interpreters must adopt a working attitude, arrive on time for appointments, respect the rules of interaction between organisation members and asylum seekers — all while remaining neutral in their positioning. The payment of this financial compensation gives recognition interpreters’ work, while also authorising the organisation to evaluate their work and to control the room for manoeuvre that they can allow themselves. Indeed, interpreters must not take the place of the volunteer in charge of writing the account; nor must they take advantage of their skills and status to peddle accounts that would be most likely to succeed with the authorities in charge of granting refugee status.

25 This financial allowance establishes a working relationship which is relatively formalised between exile interpreters, other volunteers, and the population supported by the structure. It materialises the change in status of the beneficiaries who are now volunteers in the service of asylum policies. Sometimes, this gives rise to jealousy. For example, Tély, a former Lingala interpreter of Congolese nationality, said on several occasions he had been called a “snitch” by asylum seekers:

26

“At that time, I got called a ‘snitch’ a lot because I didn’t sound like most Congolese people. It’s because I didn’t hang out much with that crowd. The more you mix with white people, the more you are frowned on. That’s why I stopped working as a volunteer at Solidarité Asile because I was also pressured and threatened. For example, I interview someone. All I do is translate but the person waits for you and says, ‘Oh, you’re the one who ‘screwed up’ my applicatio’. I say, ‘No, all I do is translate. I only say what you said’.” (Interview with Tély, former volunteer interpreter at Solidarité Asile, conducted on 4/10/2017)

27 The move to the other side of the desk, and the application of institutional rules while interpreting, puts volunteer exiles in a delicate position. This change in status is not always viewed favourably by their compatriots, who may put pressure on the interpreter to obtain preferential treatment, especially when writing their accounts. To protect themselves from this, the volunteers deploy various strategies to distinguish and distance themselves from the institutions or the community group, which may, on rare occasions, as in the case of Tély, lead to the complete termination of the volunteer activity.

28 The discursive registers that frame the processes of putting to work are not greeted in the same way by exiles, depending on their administrative status and their relationship to work. While individuals with a legal status can more easily extricate themselves from the social constraints that underlie volunteering, those in the most precarious situations — especially those seeking regularisation who have been denied asylum — are more likely to give their allegiance to institutions, in the hope of being rewarded with a residence permit. Volunteers’ commitment thus appears to be a way for them to establish themselves as “good citizens” (Yap et al., 2011) by proving their merit through their cultural integration, by adhering to the “culture of volunteering” (Handy and Greenspan, 2009: 976), and through the fact that their labour force is economically useful to French society. Are we witnessing a revival of the rationale of the “bad poor” and the “deserving poor” adapted to asylum populations, with the notions of effort and reward disseminated by the non-profit sector? We shall now discuss the role played by the promise behind unpaid work (Morice, 1999; Chauvin, 2009; Simonet, 2020) — whether it is access to salaried employment for those in a regular situation or to regularisation in the case of rejected asylum seekers — in the discipline of the exiles.

A Financial Contribution as a Substitute for Salaried Employment

30 As a result of private donations and occasional grants, non-profit structures can pay an allowance to interpreters based on attendance and travel time. They are paid by the hour or by the number of words in the case of written translation. The issue of remuneration for interpreters is regularly discussed within the non-profit sector, as it raises questions about labour law relating to foreign nationals and the absurdity of certain situations encountered by organisations. Most of the people who work as interpreters are unpaid because of their administrative status. Whether they have a pending asylum application or they are seeking to obtain legal status, they do not have the right to work. Non-profit structures must therefore circumvent this constraint in order to integrate, on the margins of the labour market, those who are not authorised to work. In such cases, they decide either to provide financial assistance to asylum seekers so that they can afford the services of an interpreter as part of the material assistance in the asylum procedure, or to give the money directly to the interpreters. Solidarité Asile has chosen this second option in order. According to David, an employee of the organisation, this is to avoid “the interpreter asking the asylum seeker for payment and demanding that the person to whom he is providing services pay him something out of his own pocket”. [16] The silence surrounding financial allowances associated with exiles’ volunteer work can be explained partly on legal grounds, but also by the ideology on which the notion of commitment is built, thought of as spontaneous and voluntary. In this sense, just as a promise finds its strength in the fact that it cannot be verified, volunteering cannot be effective if it is paid, at the risk of becoming a job like any other. This is why monetary payment has to take on the appearance of “hidden remuneration” (Di Cecco, 2021: 330), like a variable reward left to the discretion of the person paying it (Morice, 1999: 110).

31 Administrative status is therefore a fundamental variable to assess volunteer interpreters’ condition of dependency on employers in the non-profit sector. Exiles waiting for regularisation are forced to develop a series of tactics to get around the ban on working. Most of them navigate between undeclared work, unpaid work and compensated volunteer work. This is, for example, the case of Goran, an Armenian interpreter, who makes himself available every day for the organisation, looking for the smallest task to do. He is present for all reception duties helping exiles and taking part in every activity on an unpaid basis, in order to be sure to carry out translations that will be compensated. Thus, compensated volunteering rarely exists without an unpaid counterpart that constitutes a prerequisite for obtaining financial rewards. While it is difficult for the most precarious exiles to evade this obligation, interpreters with regular status have more resources at their disposal to extricate themselves from this instrumental approach in that their security is less dependent on clientelist relationships with the structure. Although they do not have a full-time salaried job, they can intervene on an ad hoc basis when needed at the request of a member of the organisation. Assiatou, an interpreter for languages spoken in Guinea Conakry, is in this situation. The compensation paid by the organisation is a financial supplement to her precarious job. Her work as a substitute cleaning lady is her only income and does not allow her to support her family. It is imperative for her to obtain a decent salary quickly so that she does not remain in this situation for long. She does not hesitate to make this known:

32

“I want to continue working with David [the organisation’s employee], but there are very few employees there. They don’t have money. If I work there, it’s without a salary, so it’s not possible, I’m young.” (Interview with Assiatou, volunteer interpreter at Solidarité Asile, conducted on 7/06/2018)

33 In the same way, Fodé — a Guinean rejected asylum seeker who now holds a residence permit — occasionally works for the organisation as a Soussou interpreter. For a long period of time, he worked with the self-employed status of micro-entrepreneur, delivering meals to homes for the companies Uber and Deliveroo. Following a serious road accident, he can no longer perform his tasks. Since he is not entitled to receive sickness benefits because of his self-employed status, he has no income. To compensate for the loss of his job, a volunteer from the organisation who knows him well suggested that he should work more regularly at the organisation to earn some money to live on. Volunteer interpretation thus appears to be a complement to employment for former asylum seekers with legal status who have no choice other than working for little money, as there is no better option. Depending on exiles’ individual situation, volunteer work can be a way of “making ends meet”, as well as a “substitute for employment” (Simonet, 2010).

Putting to Work on a Volunteer Basis through the Promise of Regularisation

34

“When you apply for a residence permit to obtain regularisation, it is expected that you demonstrate your integration, your capacity to obtain resources, your command of the language, and so on. And the fact that you have been made a volunteer can lead to [the exiles] being known to the prefecture as volunteers, which is a bonus. Then there’s the money, which does count for something, but it’s mainly the fact of being a volunteer, they think it will help them. A lot of rejected asylum seekers come to us afterwards and say ‘I’d like to be an interpreter’.” (Interview with David, employee of Solidarité Asile, conducted on 24/04/2018)

35 This interview excerpt shows us the central place held by volunteer work in the long process of regularisation of rejected asylum seekers. There is no indication in the law on foreign nationals suggesting that carrying out such work is a criterion for obtaining a residence permit. Each situation is interpreted differently, on a case-by-case basis, depending on the officer in charge of the application (Spire, 2005 and 2008), and only the prefecture has the discretionary power to assess it. An application can therefore be strengthened if it includes certificates of volunteer work as well as statements confirming the person’s integration. Since it moved from the domestic sphere to that of public interest, volunteering appears to have become “a legitimate vehicle for citizenship much more than an instrument for improving the supply and delivery of services” (Lesemann, 2002: 25). At the intersection of economic performance and cultural integration, volunteer work is a key element of “civic merit” (Chauvin et al., 2013a), and is seen as a way for individuals in an irregular situation to appear “less illegal” (Chauvin and Garcés-Mascareñas, 2014). This idea is even more present in the minds of exiles as it is maintained by actors in the non-profit sector and by those who successfully obtain regularisation after a number of years of volunteer work.

36 Several volunteers at Solidarité Asile, such as Tély and Goran, are success stories in that they were able to access legal status after their asylum applications were rejected. Tély believes that his involvement with organisations enabled him to build up an important relational network and privileged contacts with local elected officials and people holding strategic positions. As an interpreter, he accompanied several asylum seekers to the prefecture and to lawyers’ offices. At the same time, he received training in the medical field thanks to the support of numerous organisations, despite his irregular situation. Through repeated meetings with key players in the field of the law on foreign nationals, Tély was able to have his civic commitment recognised in order to prove his full integration in France and thus obtain a “private and family life” residence permit:

37

“During my time as a volunteer with Solidarité Asile, I accompanied people to a lawyer’s office. We didn’t know each other and then when I received an order to leave French territory I went to see her. [...] I also received the support of a member of parliament, a minister under François Hollande. It was the president of an organisation where I worked who introduced me to her. [...] She wrote me a letter of support and to ensure that there was a follow-up, she asked her deputy to find out whether it could work. Her deputy also wrote me a letter of support. The Emmaüs organisation [where Tély also worked] also supported me.” (Interview with Tély, former volunteer interpreter at Solidarité Asile, conducted on 14/09/2017)

38 It was therefore through multiple volunteer experiences — at Solidarité Asile, in an anti-discrimination organisation and at Emmaüs — that Tély found the support he needed to obtain legal status. This was also the case for Goran, who, from his first steps as an interpreter, benefited from the legal advice of David, the organisation’s employee. After the failure of his asylum application in 2015, Goran discussed with his “employer” various possibilities that would allow him to accumulate evidence of good behaviour: maintaining a strong involvement in organisations, going back to university, looking for an employment offer, etc. David also advised him to keep a low profile and wait until he had accumulated sufficient resources before coming out of the “undocumented closet” (Chauvin and Garcés-Mascareñas, 2014) by applying for a residence permit at the prefecture. Exiles, like welfare recipients, know that the public disclosure of one’s irregular situation can be understood as an act of resistance against legal subordination (Villazor, 2013). As a result, the more applications they file, the more it can work against them. Waiting is seen as “an indicator of perseverance” (Auyero and Ollion, 2019), showing officials that the status they are seeking is deserved. After five years of volunteer work and dedication to the organisation, Goran was finally granted an employee’s residence permit following an employment offer.

39 However, this labour of hope does not always meet the exiles’ hopes. When Jean received a negative response to his asylum application, he decided to multiply his activities as a volunteer in different structures providing personal care services. Still waiting for administrative regularisation, certificates of volunteer work take centre stage in his discourse. He considers them essential to build up a “good case file” for the prefecture:

40

“But why don’t they want to do my certificate? Because I’m not cheating, it’s not work, it’s volunteering [laughs]. It’s just certifying that I am a volunteer. Only one social worker did it for me, she did it personally, but not on behalf of the organisation. […] I agreed to take part in this university project [an action-research project on Africa] because afterwards I can get a training completion certificate for my case file.” (Interview with Jean, volunteer interpreter at Solidarité Asile and other organisations, conducted on 2/11/2017)

41 The need for exiles to provide evidence for administrative procedures led to the development of a testimonial policy in the non-profit sector and among supporters. Although Solidarité Asile does not (yet) produce “volunteer passports” as proposed by France Bénévolat, it does provide certificates confirming an individual’s commitment during reception duties or individual interviews to underline their integration. These documents can constitute proof of the time spent in France and of the steps taken towards integration. They are requested by lawyers in particular, when the person has the possibility of receiving legal support from the moment of submitting an application for a residence permit at the prefecture or, more often, when appealing to the administrative court to contest a decision rejecting the application.

42 We also note that the academic world is not immune to this rationale. Undertaking research projects with people in precarious situations does not always allow researchers to escape from the relationships of domination and the strategic issues present on both sides. Certificates of support can sometimes become a bargaining chip for exiles’ involvement in a survey. These rationales of reciprocity are becoming important in social relations to the extent that they now form the basis of welfare policies (Morel, 2000; Chelle, 2012). An increasing number of organisations managing accommodation facilities are establishing partnerships with charitable organisations in order to promote volunteer work among the exiles accommodated. This was the case in one organisation we surveyed, where approximately “Sixty percent of asylum seekers accommodated participate in volunteer activities”. [17] The head of the service justified this process of putting to work, arguing that it allows for the integration of “people into a relational network, which gives them greater value and allows them to build links, relationships and solidarity”. [18] The signing of an agreement between this structure and Mutuelles de France-Réseau [19] introduces a counterpart to the support granted, since in exchange for renting fitted accommodation, asylum seekers have to provide homework support services to the students housed by this network. [20] The incentive dimension underlying the process of putting to work is exerted with varying degrees of constraint on the exiles depending on their resources and administrative situation. For those who have already obtained regularisation, but who are struggling to find a paid job, the pressure from non-profit organisations is less or even non-existent; whereas for those in the most precarious situations, who have neither documents nor work permits, these incentives to carry out volunteer work constitute a nudge [21] rationale dictated by “benevolent paternalism” (Frenkiel, 2009), as a workfare policy [22] (Morel, 2000; Peck, 2001; Simonet, 2018), forcing exiles to work for low pay in order to benefit from support.

43 Other examples of interpreters could provide infinite illustrations of the construction of a myth around the “working citizen” [23] who, as a result of their volunteer status, is more deserving than the “passive” one who refuses to work on an unpaid basis. However, in each of these situations we observe that it is not so much volunteer work that seems to have been decisive in obtaining regularisation, but rather the clientelist relationship with a non-profit actor. The support given by the structure in producing the application and the legal information provided are “occasional, local, informal protections that create loyalty and go beyond the employment contract” (Jounin, 2009: 224) and contribute to the acceptability of exiles through processes of putting to work. Thus, the situation of forced waiting in which exiles in an irregular situation are caught makes it possible to moderate their demands and discipline their behaviour. The tension between the two injunctions constraining exiles — waiting and putting to work — has the effect of producing their “integration into illegality” (Chauvin and Garcés-Mascareñas, 2014), in segments of invisible work on the fringes of labour law. By participating in the implementation of these two rationales, non-profit actors contribute as much to the production of consent as to the construction of exiles — not as citizens, but as “patients of the state” (Auyero, 2012).