Ethnographies of (Dis)Engagement

Ethnographies of (Dis)Engagement provides a unique opportunity to unite ongoing research to understand COVID-19 responses through in-depth qualitative methods. To date, this type of evidence has been side-lined in governmental and EU decision-making, in favour of epidemiological approaches driven by statistics and models. Yet, prior experiences during Ebola, Polio, and HIV/AIDS epidemics have demonstrated the need for qualitative social science approaches to inform policymaking. We know that many hard-to-reach communities are excluded from national, and EU COVID-19 evidence bases, and none more so than the populations included within this proposed research.

As such, Ethnographies of (Dis)Engagement will: reverse significant ‘blind’ spots in national COVID-19 responses; raise the profile of ethnographic evidence in epidemic/ pandemic preparedness; and use this evidence to develop urgently needed recommendations to improve vaccine uptake among disenfranchised groups.

• To produce an understanding of the historical and contemporary contexts which lead to vaccine disengagement in specific communities across the G7, reversing chronic ‘blind spots’ in the EU and national COVID-19 response and vaccination campaigns.
• To produce community-specific recommendations for health interventions, including how to enhance understandings of who (dis)engaged communities do trust, to facilitate vaccine engagement across G7 countries
• To facilitate shared learning across diverse communities
• To make findings translatable to future pandemics, and to a broader engagement of communities with national health care systems
• To raise the profile of ethnography in shaping a post-COVID world, in so doing complementing and challenging epidemiological models which have dominated academic analyses of COVID-19 impacts

• Costanza Torre
• Sara Vallerani
• Malith Kur
• Dr Nikita Simpson

• Prof Tim Allen
• Prof Laura Bear
• Tamara Giles-Vernick
• Dr Matteo Galizzi
• Dr Barbara Fasolo
• Dr Ploutarchos Kourtidis 

• PERISCOPE 
• Sonar-Global Network 

Papers

• Storer, E. & Sarafian, I. Principles of Building Trust: Engaging Disenfranchised Communities Across the G7 in COVID-19 Vaccine Campaigns. British Academy, September 2022
• Storer, E., Sarafian, I., Torre, C., Vallerani, S., Franchi, E. COVID-19 vaccination campaigns and the production of mistrust among Roma and migrant populations in Italy. BMJ Global Health, September 2022
• Sarafian, I. Ethnic minorities, social media, and attitudes towards COVID-19 vaccination. The Lancet, 2022

Blogs

• Why better health messaging won’t necessarily alter people’s attitude towards COVID jabs

• ‘If I have had the vaccine, why don’t I get the Green Pass?’ Undocumented migrants and vaccination in Italy

• ‘Protect and punish’: how Italy rolled out vaccines while evicting Roma

• ‘I can’t take the vaccine now, I have to cross the mountains tomorrow’: COVID and migrants trying to cross the Alps

Policy briefs

• Vaccine calculations among diaspora populations: evidence from South Sudanese communities in Canada
• Key Considerations: Equitable Engagement to Promote COVID-19 Vaccine Uptake among Undocumented Urban Migrants
• Key Considerations: Engaging ‘People on the Move’ to Promote COVID-19 Vaccine Acceptance in Italy
• Key Considerations: Tackling Structural Discrimination and COVID-19 Vaccine Barriers for Roma Communities in Italy

Workshop 1

Ethnographies of (Dis)Engagement: Emplacing Vaccine ‘Hesitancy’ in Chronically Neglected Communities across the G7 

10 January 2022
2:00pm 
Zoom link on request : e.storer@lse.ac.uk

This workshop explores research findings from the Ethnographies of Disengagement project. Featuring presentations based on research with Roma Communities, Undocumented Migrants and African Diaspora in Italy and Canada, this workshop explores vaccine disengagement among social groups who have reported some of the lowest rates of COVID-19 vaccine uptake across the G7, and the world. Moving beyond simplistic understandings of vaccine ‘hesitancy’, we ask of the dynamics and structures which produce reluctance to engage with state-led COVID-19 vaccination campaigns.

Workshop 2

‘Vaccines at State Margins: Exploring Italy’s COVID-19 Response from the Margins’, Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa Workshop

January 2022

Workshop 3

Theorising ‘Trust’: Ethnographic Interventions into COVID-19 Vaccine Policies

10 February 2022
3:00pm to 5:00pm

This workshop employs anthropological perspectives to excavate the multiple meanings and mechanics of ‘trust’. Here we cast the net wide, bringing together a diverse group of anthropologists who have theorised trust in relation to rumour and doubt, witchcraft, public authority, faith and NGOs, public institutions and healing. We ask anthropologists to draw from their distinct empirical contexts in order to question, what is trust? The aim of the workshop is to come to come to a more nuanced theorisation of trust that might be deployed beyond the anthropological context, to better understand the issue of vaccine hesitancy as it unfolds unevenly across nations and communities disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. It also aims to question and complicate the place of trust in the models of policy makers, economists, and epidemiologists, as they assess the impact of the pandemic and prepare for future crises. 

Workshop 4

Multi-disciplinary contributions to understanding COVID-19 vaccine mistrust: A conversation between ethnographers, epidemiologists and behavioural economists

15 February 2022
3:00pm to 5:00pm 

The proposed workshop response to an acknowledgement for the need for multi-disciplinary conversations of COVID-19 relations. We recognise that the engagement between disciplines founded on often contrasting epistemological assumptions and methodological approaches is not simple. In this workshop we encourage reflective assessments of what is revealed and concealed through different types of method.

Workshop 5

Translating ‘Trust’: Ethnographic Interpretations of Vaccine ‘Hesitancy’, Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa and LSE Department of Anthropology Collaborative Workshop

March 2022

Workshop 6

The Role of Multi-Disciplinary Collaborations in Vaccine Policy-Making, Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa 

March 2022

Workshop 7

‘Constructing Reality’ Critical Approaches to Misinformation - Policy Workshop, hosted at LSE, in partnership with Prof Itziar Castello Molina, University of Surrey

May 2022