Browsing by Author "Jokela, Camilla"

The aim of this thesis is to study Startup Refugees network as a political intervention. Startup Refugees is a non-profit voluntary network, which supports asylum seekers with finding work and starting enterprises in Finland. The purpose is to explore, what kind of profiles Startup Refugees produces of asylum seekers and what factors and structures complicate asylum seekers’ employment and entrepreneurship in Finland. The theoretical framework draws upon postcolonial research tradition that problematises the boundaries and suppositions of modernity, social order and migration flows. The context of this study is the Finnish labour market and the positions of marginal groups in the labour market. This study utilises a mixed methods approach. The data consists of the Startup Refugees’ Profiles which contain information about asylum seekers’ education and professional history and background and their interest in entrepreneurship in Finland. The Startup Refugees Profile is a tool that helps Startup Refugees’ employers to match networks’ possibilities with asylum seekers. These profiles (N = 1021) have been collected in the Finnish reception centres between the years 2015 and 2017. These profiles have been analysed quantitatively. In addition, three Startup Refugees’ employers have been interviewed. These interviews have been analysed with content analysis. As an organisation, Startup Refugees has done things differently from the Finnish public sector. Among other things, Startup Refugees has created a model of fast employment. Outcomes of this network are more influential than Finnish government has done with employing immigrants so far.