Manifestations of Social Exclusion in Qualitative Interview Material

Abstract

In this article I examine manifestations of social exclusion in qualitative interview material that was gathered in Finland. In the focus are people with a foreign background whose experiences I study with a decolonising approach. Social exclusion manifests itself in diverse ways in the narratives of the interviewees and can be discerned, for example, as related to discriminative and racist attitudes, people’s appearance, colour of the skin, language skills, religion, study skills, work skills, gender, cultural norms, access to education, social class, future perspectives, transactions with the authorities, questions related to the right to stay in the country, or possibilities to obtain citizenship. The experiences of the interviewees embody a need of further examination of colonialist legacy in the Finnish context, a call for more monitoring and control of institutional structures involved in discriminative measures imposed on people with a foreign background, as well as wider societal debate when it comes to stereotypes and bias that can lead to social exclusion.