Turbulent migrations in turbulent times. The case of the orbiters in Rome

Since 2015, when the so-called migrant crisis exploded in Italy, Rome has become a transit crossroads for a huge number of people who arrived in Europe through the Mediterranean route (Lendaro et al. 2019). This phenomenon determined the development of a heterogeneous network of solidarity supporting migrants in transit (Giliberti & Potot 2021). Over the years, following the transformations of Italian and European policies for the management of migration processes, the solidarity networks have begun to meet other subjects in addition to migrants in transit: ‘orbiters’ around the city, awaiting access to international protection or recently expelled from the Italian reception system, forced to live in a state of stasis that allows them to be defined as ‘lifelong in-betweener’ subjects and representing the concept of ‘turbulence migration’ (Papastergiadis 2000). This article focuses on the transformation of the solidarity practices and on the new mobility strategies acted by migrants, both linked with the social/juridical features of those we defined ‘orbiters’. From a methodological point of view, this paper is based on different moments of ethnographic observation in some key sites for solidarity to migrants in Rome.