Direct and vicarious administrative burden: Experiences of UK public services as Homes for Ukraine host

Abstract

This article shows, through a study of hosts’ experiences of the UK’s Homes for Ukraine scheme, the ways in which sponsoring refugees can impose burdens on sponsors by virtue of the state’s administrative processes. Specifically, it shows how sponsors incur learning, compliance, and psychological costs from administrative burdens and that these burdens are encountered both directly, through their own engagements with public bodies, and vicariously, through the experiences of their guests. The article thus makes a significant contribution to the understanding of the ground-level experience of refugee sponsorship while also expanding the burgeoning theory of administrative burden by demonstrating the relevance of burdens experienced vicariously.