Navigating Local Welfare Systems. a Comparative Study of Marginalised Migrants Accessing Welfare Resources in Stockholm, Berlin, London, and NYC.

A growing field of studies has focused on cities’ making their welfare systems available to migrants (e.g. Bruzelius et al., 2023; Homberger et al., 2022; Łukasiewicz et al., 2024). Yet, little is known about migrants' experiences accessing and utilising various urban welfare resources from a comparative perspective. Using cases of four top-immigrant destination cities in the Global North, Berlin, Stockholm, London and New York, and a group of Polish migrants with varying marginalised statuses (being low-income, undocumented, experiencing homelessness), we analyse strategies they use to navigate accessing urban resources and discuss macro, mezo micro-level factors shaping the process. Our article is based on comparative qualitative research, which draws from a subsample of 62 interviews with migrants conducted between 2020 and 2024. All interviews were recorded, transcribed and analysed using the Grounded Theory Approach (Bryant and Charmaz, 2019). Our results indicate that study participants used the assistance of welfare brokers, support of familial ties, or modern technologies to navigate exclusive, punitive, bureaucratised and insufficient social assistance. Urban socio-economic characteristics and the political profile of local leadership, as well as the national-level welfare framework, shaped varying needs to utilise different strategies.