Introduction

The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine triggered a mass displacement to the EU, with a uniquely gendered character: the majority of those fleeing were women, often travelling alone or with children. Germany now hosts the largest number of Temporary Protection Directive (TPD) holders—nearly 1.2 million Ukrainians and third-country nationals, primarily women and children. This gendered migration has exposed long-standing structural gender inequalities in EU states. Although TPD was activated to offer protection, member states only sporadically addressed gender-specific needs, revealing gaps in support for forcibly displaced women who face overlapping vulnerabilities.

This article critiques how migration policy and discourse often depoliticise refugee women by framing them as abstract symbols of victimhood (Massari 2021), frequently collapsed into the generalised category of “womenandchildren” (Enloe, 1989). Such framing not only ignores the specific risks women face, such as gender-based violence, precarious employment, and restricted access to reproductive healthcare, but also fails to recognise that vulnerability can also be a resource for their agency (Kanal, Rottmann 2021) . In contrast, this article argues for policy and research approaches that recognise refugee women’s subjectivity and decision-making capacity.

Drawing on fieldwork with Ukrainian women in Germany and building on a broader comparative study of labour market integration among women TPD holders in Germany, Italy, and Poland, the article proposes a more nuanced understanding of agency under conditions of temporariness. The article frames “temporariness” as both a policy category and lived experience (Triandafyllidou, 2022), showing how it conditions the forms and limits of agency. An intersectional lens (Crenshaw, 1991; McCall, 2005) highlights how class, age, motherhood, and other factors further shape women’s capacity to act. The article identifies three key spheres where women assert agency: geographical (mobility and place-making), occupational (work and economic engagement), and relational (social and emotional ties). The article focuses on three case studies which show that, within these domains, women can express agency through three forms—action, re-action or non-action—strategies shaped by personal and structural constraints in the face of temporariness that threatens to become permanent. Ultimately, the article calls for a rethinking of agency in forced refugee studies, moving beyond liberal, goal-oriented models to include situated, constrained, and diverse forms of action, and also suggests policy changes to temporary protections.

Re-thinking Agency: Beyond Notions of Purposeful Action

In her iconic book Intersecting Voices (1997), Iris Marion Young states that empowerment is like democracy: everyone is for it, but rarely do people mean the same thing by it. Similarly, migrant women's agency, although commonly seen as positive or aspirational, is nevertheless a very underdefined and even controversial issue. It has been the subject of debate within feminist and migration scholarship for a long time, yet it remains open to misinterpretations and simplifications. Feminist research often critiques agentic theories for being too Eurocentric, too white, and too binary, opposing those women who exercise their agency to those passive victims who need protection (Mahmood, 2005; Minh-ha, 1989; Spivak, 1988; Young, 1997). In migration studies, both functionalists and historical-structuralists portrayed migrants “either as rather soulless individual utility-optimisers or as rather passive victims of global capitalist forces” (De Haas, 2021: 8). Yet, some studies on irregular migration challenge the view of migrants as victims, arguing that irregular migrants exercise their agency through the very decision to migrate despite the state’s constrictions (Squire 2010), trust and cooperation with smugglers (Achilli, 2018), individual and collective acts of non-compliance (Ambrosini, 2018, Ambrosini, Hajer 2023) and every day overcoming challenges imposed by their irregular status (Sigona, 2012).

Discussions on agency and non-agency also manifest in the context of forced migration. Forcibly displaced women are often seen as non-agentic (Kanal, Rottman 2021). Indeed, it is difficult to speak about empowerment and personal agency in the specific context of the forced displacement of women. In her study on the experiences of Ukrainian women forced migrants in Germany, Byelikova (2024) writes about a so-called forced empowerment that is overwhelming on both an emotional and physical level; nevertheless, she underlines that those experiences are examples of both vulnerability and empowerment. Therefore, if we rethink the common attitude toward considering agency as a “self-evident property of personhood” exercised according to a specific criterion (McNay 2015): 41) and place it “in the context of structural, institutional or intersubjective constraints” (McNay 2000: 23), we can see that agentic strategies are applied by those women. Limited agency does not mean the absence of agency. In fact, Hein de Haas identifies agency as the “limited – but real – ability of human beings (or social groups) to make independent choices and to impose these on the world and, hence, to alter the structures that shape and constrain people’s opportunities or freedoms” (De Haas, 2021:14).

Following Hugo (2000), who claims that empowerment can be both a cause and an outcome of women’s migration, I argue that agentic strategies used by refugee women both during displacement and after arrival to the host country can be limited by their circumstances, so agency should be perceived not as a result, but as a process. Understanding the agency of forcibly displaced women in terms of “achieving” and “success” can perpetuate their feeling of liminality, imposing on them certain expectations and denying them subjectivity if those expectations are not met. Valeria Lazarenko (2024), in her paper on Ukrainian women under TPD in Germany, states that some women renounced their agency and put the responsibility on the state, while some opposed the idea of integration as they perceived their stay as temporary. This statement makes sense if agency is seen in terms of achievements. Instead, I look at agency as “both organised movement but also everyday acts of resistance and solidarity” (Christou & Kofman 2022:108) and recognise a variety of different forms of agency as action, re-action and non-action determined by temporariness and intersecting vulnerabilities.

The agency of refugee women, including those displaced from Ukraine to Germany, should be studied in this broader context and seen as a process that is socially determined and shaped by past experiences, challenges in the present and prospects and plans for the future (Evans, 2002). In this case, agency understood as the ability to make independent choices should also include the decision to withdraw or the possibility of non-action. Hein De Haas (2021) identifies five key components of migratory agency that can, to some extent, also be applied to the theorising of the agency of forcibly displaced individuals. The first component shapes women’s ability to move (or to stay) and is based on the combination of their economic situation, networks, health, work and housing prospects, education and legal status. The second aspect reflects their aspirations, which are based on their socially and culturally determined understanding of a “good life”. The third component points to the motivation for their mobility other than economic reasons, such as simple curiosity, a factor normally overlooked in migration research. The fourth aspect highlights the need to understand mobility and immobility as interconnected. The fifth approach eliminates the dichotomy between voluntary and forced migration. In the case of forced migration, the decision to stay or to leave despite safety concerns is also determined by migrants’ economic and health situations (Kosyakova 2025). Refugees’ aspirations depend on their understanding of what a “good life” means, understood as a life before displacement (e.g. their prior occupations, housing or leisure in Ukraine), and a blurred distinction between refugee and economic migration caused by the need to take up any employment to sustain themselves. I will come back to this point when discussing the three spheres of agency.

Temporariness as a Contextual Setting

Legal and existential temporariness is one of the main challenges faced by women under TPD. The temporal nature of protection, which is also understood from the title of the directive, and its purpose “to establish minimum standards [emphasis added] for giving temporary protection” (TPD, article 1) suggests that the activation of the document was rather a crisis management measure thought of as a short-term solution rather than a sustainable long-term strategy, leaving its beneficiaries with the feeling of perpetual temporariness. While asylum seekers initially face lengthy recognition procedures, they then receive, at least to some extent, legal stability; TPD holders were granted this status immediately and as a group. Still, its 3-year expiration date imposed temporariness as an inevitable legal and existential condition. Recently, TPD was extended for another year until March 2027, postponing temporariness without any clear future solution.

Temporariness is the context of forced migration and a source of uncertainty, but it is worth noticing that temporariness, in general, is not always a hostile setting. While agreeing that temporariness in migration is a key element of migrants’ vulnerability, Goldring (2014) claims that it is not necessarily precarious. Indeed, this condition might provide time for decision-making, but only if different options become available. In the case of forced migration, those options are limited; however, they still exist. Influenced by policies and personal circumstances, this temporariness can be addressed and negotiated in different ways.

On the theoretical level, as one of the ways to address temporariness, Latham and co-authors (2014) propose to “liberate” it. They see it as a two-way process. Firstly, such liberation means freeing individuals or groups from temporariness as an assigned condition (through questioning the temporary-permanence binary). Secondly, it requires the liberation of temporariness from the limits imposed by the permanence that makes it harmful. Following this thought, I do not show temporariness as a final goal, often associated with permanence, but rather understand it as an everyday process in which migrants navigate uncertainty.

This article builds on the understanding of temporariness as both political and personal. The first condition is caused by the temporary nature of protection mechanisms, laws and aid programmes; the second is related to existential precarity caused by the impossibility of planning for the future because of the uncertain outcome of the war, as well as the possibility of return and “postponed life”. I argue that Ukrainian women under TPD in Germany address temporariness through various agentic practices. Being forcibly put in a situation of temporariness, they negotiate their place in this temporal legal and existential context.

Framing the Fields: Context and Methods

Germany activated the Temporary Protection Directive on March 8, 2022, under Section 24 of the Residence Act, allowing Ukrainian refugees immediate access to the labour market without going through a traditional asylum process. Beneficiaries of temporary protection (BoTP) in Germany also received access to social services, healthcare, and education. As of September 2024, 1,129,335 Ukrainians were registered as BoTP in Germany, making it the second-largest population group with foreign citizenship in Germany after people from Turkey (Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung 2024). They are entitled to basic income support for job seekers and receive free housing, healthcare, and integration courses. Germany focuses on long-term integration, investing in language courses and pre-employment skills recognition, while other countries (such as Poland) prioritise immediate labour absorption. Unlike Italy, where the transition to a work permit was only introduced in 2024, Germany has always allowed BoTP to convert their status into a work residence permit. Despite these structural advantages, Ukrainian refugees still face significant barriers to labour market integration, including language requirements, bureaucratic processes, and delays in qualification recognition. While Germany provides more comprehensive social support than, for example, Poland or Italy, which allows refugees to focus on integration, this approach significantly delays their entry into employment. Although women under TPD enter the German labour market faster than other refugee groups (Kosyakova 2024), their so-called privileged position and therefore unrealistic expectations become misused by anti-migrant and anti-Ukraine discourses.

My previous research identified that experiences of Ukrainian women in Germany are shaped by gender-specific barriers that complicate their access to employment, financial stability, and long-term prospects. These challenges include childcare responsibilities, limited job opportunities, and economic precarity, which are further exacerbated by the temporary nature of their legal status. Women make up the majority of Ukrainian refugees in Germany, often arriving with children but without partners due to military conscription in Ukraine. This results in female-headed households where women bear full responsibility for childcare​.

Because of the limited availability of daycare and childcare services, women face significant difficulties participating in full-time employment, language courses, or vocational training. Ukrainian women in Germany struggle to find jobs that match their qualifications, especially in regulated professions such as healthcare and education, which require lengthy qualification recognition processes. Although Germany faces a demand for workers in many sectors, especially in healthcare and education, bureaucratic hassles and a slow qualification recognition process delay access to jobs for those who would benefit the country’s economy.

But despite all of these challenges, the biggest obstacle identified by my research is temporariness, causing both legal and existential precariousness. The temporary nature of the TPD and its unclear future are major challenges for Ukrainian refugees in Germany. Uncertainty about their future status affects their ability to plan long-term careers, invest in language acquisition, or make decisions regarding housing and family reunification. Many refugees are caught in a state of limbo, unsure whether they will be allowed to stay or if they will have to return to Ukraine even if the war is not over. Employers hesitate to hire Ukrainian refugees for skilled jobs, as this requires an investment of time and resources, and they are unsure if they will remain in Germany. Women, in particular, face greater instability due to childcare responsibilities and a lack of access to permanent work opportunities (Lashchuk 2025).

This article draws on a broader study on the analysis of labour market integration of Ukrainian women that was part of the project [Access to the labour market and employment strategies in times of crisis]. Building on the results of my previous research, this paper takes temporariness as a contextual framework to analyse different agentic practices employed by women under TPD. Methodologically, the research draws on 18 qualitative in-depth interviews conducted between February and October 2024 in Germany and online, lasting between 30 min and 2 h, and observations. Participants were recruited through personal and professional contacts, as well as through local NGOs working with migrants and refugees. The interviews had a semi-structured format and were conducted in Ukrainian in safe spaces chosen by the participants; all women were informed about the research and its purpose and gave oral consent. One woman asked not to be recorded, so the notes of the interview were taken. The names of the participants were anonymised to protect their privacy, and all sensitive information was removed. My own positionality as a researcher of Ukrainian migration and a Ukrainian woman myself helped me to establish trust and facilitated open communication, but I also recognise the differences in our positions. I am very grateful to all participants for their time.

Although many women from my study spoke about their resilience strategies, in this article, I will specifically focus on the stories of the three women I interviewed in big and mid-size cities in Germany in May–June 2024. Their profiles and stories will be discussed further down. In the next two sections of this article, I will discuss three spheres where different forms of agency are performed, and then, building on concrete case studies, I will illustrate how those forms of agency intersect.

Three Spheres of Agency

Geographical Agency: Movement, Stay and Return

De Haas (2021) states that in forced displacement, movement is already an agentic act. Only in extreme cases, such as slavery or deportation (de Haas mentioned those two) or in the Ukrainian case, the forced abduction of Ukrainian children and deportation of people to Russia against their will, is this initial agency taken away. Exercising their agency through the decision to seek refuge outside of Ukraine, many of the 1.2 million beneficiaries of Temporary Protection in Germany have chosen this country consciously. This decision was impacted primarily by available networks in the country, professional connections, or German language competencies. The image of Germany as a country with a significant migration history and well-established and quite favourable migration and asylum policies also played a role in choosing this country as a destination. Research shows that personal recommendations and networks were the main drivers for women to choose Germany as a destination country (Lashchuk 2025). Well-structured support was also the driver for those who had previously chosen other EU countries to later move to Germany. For example, as of the end of summer 2022, approximately 1.5 million people had temporary protection (regulated by the Special Law) in Poland, but only about 950,000 of them remained by the end of 2022 (Ministerstwo Cyfryzacji, 2023), and the number of TPD holders in Germany increased (Eurostat, 2025). Not all those leaving Poland moved to Germany, but for 43% of those who did, the presence and personal recommendations of relatives, friends and acquaintances who had already settled there were the main reasons to choose this country. Among the reasons for migrating from Poland to Germany were also more attractive social benefits, higher pay, and the possibility of accumulating more savings when living in that country (EWL, 2023). The latter is also evident from the large-scale research carried out by Brücker and co-authors (2023), which shows that Ukrainians under TPD who aimed to return to Ukraine or to move to another country were more likely to be employed than those who had intentions to stay in Germany permanently. My research participants confirmed that those aiming for a long-term or permanent stay invest in language courses more and prefer to postpone labour market integration. The German approach was seen as more human-oriented compared to other countries, as it allows one to choose from those two options — a swift labour market integration or slower competence-based and strategic preparation of a professional future in Germany. Those who were attending integration courses claimed that basic economic security, provided by Germany, helped them dedicate their time to acquiring new knowledge and competencies seen as valuable resources for future professional growth. Investment of time into training was seen as an asset by both those planning to stay in Germany and those aiming to go back to Ukraine when possible.

A few months after the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the percentage of those who were planning to return to Ukraine at some point was more than 80%, with only 4% planning to stay in the EU. Safety concerns and responsibility for dependents were the main reasons for those who did not plan to return: only one-third of those who returned had children.

The current situation looks very different. Because of the prolonged uncertainty, economic needs, personal aspirations and pressure from the host countries, many Ukrainians took up employment and established networks or personal relationships in the new countries. Not all people who were given Temporary Protection in Europe will go back home, similar to other groups, e.g. Syrians (USCRI 2025). It also shows that return is not a monotonic or linear event but an iterative, staggered and circular process (World Bank, 2020).

Besides the nostalgic feeling of homecoming and patriotic sense of duty, the decision to stay or to return to Ukraine involves many factors such as safety, employment and personal circumstances in a new country, but also refugee policies applied by the host countries, reintegration policies adopted by Ukraine, available housing, jobs, and educational facilities in the home country. Despite the full-scale nature of the invasion, Ukraine was affected differently in geographical terms. Regions closer to Russia or occupied by it are less likely to welcome people back.

A geographical closeness (compared to other refugee groups residing in Germany) and TPD as an alternative to asylum create a possibility to integrate a well-established form of economic mobility — circular migration — into the context of forced displacement. This type of mobility is caused primarily by family separation. Although the main reasons for back-and-forth movements are visiting family and checking on property (EUAA, 2024), my research also identified medical, bureaucratic (related to acquiring or renewing documents, selling property), and reasons related to employment or business in Ukraine. Some women were considering or had already moved back to Ukraine with the intention to stay, but then changed their minds due to safety reasons and increased attacks on infrastructure. To address the need for such back-and-forth mobility, social media groups offer a wide range of transportation services (buses or car-sharing) between Germany and Ukraine on an everyday basis. The most common issues discussed are the possibility of returning, eventual problems with border crossing, especially when the resident permit expires, and risks related to losing the status due to absence. Despite all the risks, many decide to circulate, trying to exist in both contexts. An attempt to negotiate temporariness by keeping both contexts is seen as stretching across borders, a situation of a split. Such a strategy of double presence that Ukrainian women apply while circulating between Germany and Ukraine was already discussed in the study of Ukrainian economic migration to Italy (Vianello, 2013). Although this strategy allows for transnational mobility, or, as one of the participants of my research called it, “stretching”, it might sooner or later lead to a “double absence” when women are no longer fully present in either of the two contexts.

Occupational Agency — Labour Market Participation

Research shows that refugee women are the most at risk of poverty. The feminisation of poverty (Pearce, 1978), however, is an unequal process and especially affects single mothers and single, elderly women (Schaffner Goldberg, 2010). Among the factors that contribute to feminised poverty are labour market conditions, equalisation policies, social welfare, and demography (Schaffner Goldberg, 2010:7). TPD was activated by the EU and was implemented differently by each member state, based on previous migration history, including migration from Ukraine, existing migration policies and strategies for the future. The economic situation of refugees also differs from country to country. Despite a high labour market participation, 20% of Ukrainian refugees in Poland were in a desperately poor financial situation, which is the first approximation of the scale of poverty in this group (EAPN, 2023). Germany’s approach was favourable to the needs of forcibly displaced people compared to other countries and helped Ukrainian women, especially those unable to take up employment because of various reasons, to avoid extreme poverty and homelessness. An initial well-structured support helped to effectively address the short-term needs of Ukrainians. Germany, in contrast to many other EU countries (e.g. Poland or Italy, from my research), saw the need for an immediate path towards integration despite the legal temporariness of their stay. Although basic financial support was a person-oriented strategy that allowed people under TPD to avoid poverty and gave them a chance to prepare and look for adequate employment, this decision was often criticised and used in anti-migrant narratives. The relatively low labour market participation of Ukrainians, compared to some EU countries (although already six months after arrival, 18% of working-age refugees were employed (Brücker et al., 2023)), pushed the German government to look for solutions, such as the introduction of the Job Turbo programme or discussions on benefit reduction. This expectation setting, accompanied by temporariness, makes women exercise their occupational agency on three levels: as action, as re-action and as non-action. Some women are actively looking for jobs through various channels, such as job portals, employment agencies, and personal networks. As Germany requires high language proficiency and diploma recognition for most jobs, especially for skilled ones, women invest in the acquisition of necessary competencies and documents and/or engage in mini-jobs, often below their qualifications, to improve their financial situation.

As the future after TPD is unclear and the war in Ukraine is ongoing, employment is seen by many as the only option to deal with temporariness and legal uncertainty. Women react by entering the job market as fast as possible to be able to obtain work-related residence permits that would allow them to stay in Germany even after the end of TPD. Although it might help negotiate legal temporariness, such a strategy often pushes women into low-skilled and low-paid jobs, risking deskilling and brain waste in the future.

Some women exercise their agency through non-action. This strategy, which might not seem agentic at first sight, negotiates conditions of temporariness through the postponement of decision-making about staying or returning. While seeing attendance at the integration course as a requirement to receive social support, those women do not make any strategic plans for the future, claiming that they aim to rely on state support until it lasts and then go back to Ukraine. Therefore, women postpone their labour integration as much as possible or totally withdraw.

Axelsson et al. (2017), discussing the situation of Chinese migrants in Sweden, write about so-called “waiting zones” where migrants intentionally wait to fulfil their larger plans. They claim that acceptance of precarious work-time arrangements may be an intentional practice. For many displaced women from Ukraine, such “waiting zones” are low-sector jobs often performed without proper contracts. In the case of Germany, an integration programme could also be seen as such a waiting zone, allowing the decision-making process to take time.

Relational Agency — Social Networks and Family

The previously discussed geographical and occupational agencies are inextricably linked to the relational agency and often depend on it. Górny et al. (2025) underline the importance of both developed social networks and diversified weak ties for occupational mobility and strong connections with both co-patriots and natives for finding jobs matching their skills and aspirations.

Networks played a crucial role in the economic migration of Ukrainians into the EU before 2022, especially in the case of Poland and Italy, where circular migration was also very common (Górny, 2017). We could observe how networks facilitated the migration process, starting from the decision to migrate, finding jobs, housing, and legalisation to permanent settlement and diaspora formation. The case of Italy showed very clearly the role of networks in migration, representing a snowball migration. Social networks, therefore, were generally composed of those brought from home (family members, old neighbours and friends) and gained at the new place of living (work colleagues, new neighbours, other migrants) (Lashchuk 2020). While pre-2022 migration to Germany was different in terms of number and reasons to stay, there was already a well-developed diasporic network with strong centres in Berlin, Munich and other big cities. The model of brought and gained networks is also visible in the case of the forced migration of Ukrainian women to Germany.

Similarly to voluntary migration, the forced migration of Ukrainians to the EU relied heavily on social networks regarding mediation, translation, housing, and support. Being rather randomised at the beginning, with time, it also turned into snowball migration, where old network members were trying to settle next to each other. Those who did not have such developed networks were creating new ones, actively using social media. Digital networks, created through Telegram and Facebook groups, created space for communication and development of the digital diaspora (Nedelcu, 2018; Nedelcu & Wyss, 2016) and played a very important advisory role before and after arriving in Germany.

Research also indicates the importance of networks in the lives of forcibly displaced women in terms of psychological support and dealing with trauma through diverse activities (women’s circles, art therapy, collective singing, etc.), shared childcare responsibilities, and temporary home reconstruction in a new place of living (Lashchuk 2025). Motherhood, being one of the main obstacles for women under TPD, also appears as an agentic driver. Care and mothering under conditions of legal and existential temporariness, as well as examples of self-organisation and support, represent a form of agency as a reaction and resilience in the situation of family separation.

Tetyana, Inna, and Olena: Negotiating Temporariness Through Three Forms of Agency

In this part, I will discuss three forms of agency — action, re-action, non-action — in the face of temporariness, showing how women under TPD in Germany exercise their agency in three spheres: 1. Geographical, 2. Occupational, and 3. Relational. To do this, I will specifically focus on the stories of the three women I interviewed during my field research. While living in liminal spaces between hopes of returning and uncertainty about staying in Germany, they negotiate the imposed temporariness through action, re-action and non-action. The profiles of all three women, Tetyana, Inna, and Olena, have many similarities: all three are in their late 30s–early 40 s, coming from the central and eastern parts of Ukraine, all three have higher education, and all have dependent children in Germany. They came to Germany in 2022, and all three are beneficiaries of Temporary Protection, but only one is currently receiving unemployment benefits, while the other two are working (one for a Germany-based and one for a Ukraine-based organisation). Although the stories of these women are examples of different forms of agency that appear as dominating, they illustrate how those forms are situational and depend on the life cycle, changing personal situation, and legal context.

Action

Tetyana fled to Germany with her child because of the full-scale invasion and started volunteering almost immediately. This is how she connected to the local organisation, where she now works. Although she experienced severe psychological trauma because of the invasion, she said, “I did not want to sit and wait, I wanted to work and be useful” (9_MIG_DE). Such a proactive position led to the fact that Tetyana, initially being an unpaid volunteer, was invited to join the organisation and is now an important part of it as she links institutions and policymakers with forced migrants and their needs through her personal experience and bureaucratic struggles. This is also how she built her network in Germany. She says: “I am lucky that I could find a job here. Not many people are so lucky” (9_MIG_DE). Yet NGOs working with Ukrainian forced migrants often report struggles with stable financing and therefore sustainability, making their work precarious (Chermoshentseva et al. 2025). Tetyana is aware of it; she is also reporting that although she is happy with her job “with a mission”, she is no longer eligible to receive some social benefits from the state, which would improve not only her financial situation, but also her chances for integration (e.g. language courses, that she is now supposed to cover from her own pocket). Unclear future and potential job seeking scares her as Tetyana reports discrimination in the labour market, resulting in CVs being ignored by employers. Tetyana has previously worked at the so-called mini-jobs, which are normally easy-find-easy-leave types of low-skilled jobs up to 538 euros per month, but she reports that it is not enough to make a living. She wants to go back to Ukraine, but stays in Germany for safety reasons.

Re-action

Inna, a mom of two, came to Germany because she had a friend here. She continues working for a Ukrainian employer while residing in Germany. Because of this, she was never entitled to social support from the German state, which made her financial situation difficult from the very beginning, so she had to take on even more projects. As her professional life and family members stayed in Ukraine, and her children remain in Germany for safety concerns, she tries to be simultaneously present in both countries. Inna says, “It is a situation of a stretch. We are literally stretching between two countries” (4_MIG_DE). Inna reports that it is impossible to plan anything because of the war, but also because of her precarious status in Germany. As she is not employed in Germany, she cannot change her status from Temporary Protection to a work permit. She describes her current and possible future strategy as reactive, depending on circumstances imposed on her, “stretching” for now and waiting for the future after the TPD and the decision of the German state: “If they tell us to go home, then I will see, I will react then” (4_MIG_DE). Personally, she would like to go home as soon as possible, but the situation is very dangerous in her city, so she does not want to bring her children back. Also, her children are attending schools in Germany and are quite well integrated. She also has her support network in Germany — friends from her city in Ukraine and new acquaintances, but almost all of them are Ukrainians. She shares that the fact that she does not work in Germany and does not know German (she has to pay for the course from her own pocket, which is currently out of her family budget) limits her possibilities to expand German contacts, but she is very good at building contacts with her fellow Ukrainians, attending and organising events.

Non-action

Olena is a mom of three, and she was a school teacher before coming to Germany. She tried to find a job as a teacher in Germany, but, as she reports, “It is not only about the language. My Ukrainian diploma means nothing here. To teach here, I would need two subjects recognised, and they recognised me only one” (15_MIG_DE). Olena also reports that even if she finds a job, this would be a junior or low-skilled position with a very low salary that would barely cover the basic needs of her three small children and herself. Being a sole caregiver, she would need to hire a babysitter for her youngest child, a toddler, and pay the rent herself, which would be impossible. For now, she relies on the state support and hopes one day to get back to work. “What job can I find here, in [name of the city]? I want to work! But it is economically more logical for me to wait and be with my children until the youngest one gets older” (15_MIG_DE). The current strategy applied by Olena is non-action: “What can I do? I stopped acting for now” (15_MIG_DE). She is waiting for the war to end, embracing the temporariness of her legal status and relying on the German state until help is available. She does not invest much in her social networks and prefers to concentrate on her children.

Temporariness and Interconnection of Agencies

The experiences of Tetyana, Inna, and Olena illustrate how women under the TPD in Germany exercise different forms of agency in navigating the uncertainties of temporariness. Tetyana demonstrates strong occupational agency, using volunteer work to build a professional path and support network in Germany. However, despite her proactive approach, she faces structural instability and limited access to integration support. Inna’s strategy is reactive, shaped by her transnational ties and lack of eligibility for German support. She is “stretching” by working remotely for a Ukrainian employer while raising her children in Germany, maintaining close ties to the Ukrainian community but remaining legally and socially marginal within Germany. Olena adopts non-action as a pragmatic response to systemic barriers. Unable to find suitable work due to diploma recognition issues and childcare responsibilities, she relies on state support and prioritises caregiving, postponing integration efforts until her situation changes. All three women apply different strategies to address their situation of uncertainty. Moreover, they employ different strategies at different moments of their lives. For example, in the case of Olena, action was her first strategy, but when she encountered a bureaucratic wall, she decided to apply a different strategy. Tetyana’s story is the most promising one because of her proactive position and career development; however, the financial instability of her employment might make her change her approach from action to re-action in the future. Finally, Inna’s strategy lies somewhere in between. Her experience shows how geographical re-action, caused by the need to be present in both countries, overlaps with occupational action in Ukraine and occupational non-action in Germany, and how she envisions future re-action strategy as an outcome of legal pressure. Together, those stories show how different forms of agency (action, re-action, and non-action) are shaped by temporariness as a personal and legal condition.

Conclusions

This paper explored how Ukrainian women under the Temporary Protection Directive in Germany negotiate the constraints of imposed temporariness through different forms of agency used in varied spheres. Departing from a narrow understanding of agency as purely goal-directed action, the analysis adopted a more nuanced, context-sensitive approach that foregrounds the experiences of refugee women and recognises agency as shaped by gender, structural limitations, legal status, and everyday realities.

By examining three case studies, the paper identified how women engage in different forms of agency, action, re-action, and non-action, across geographical, occupational, and relational spheres. Tetyana’s proactive engagement in civil society reflects action-oriented occupational agency; Inna’s strategy of “stretching” exemplifies re-action, and Olena, facing systemic and caregiving barriers, exercises non-action through intentional withdrawal and limited engagement beyond her family. These strategies reflect not passive victimhood, but situated, context-based responses to complex, shifting conditions. The analysis shows that temporariness, as a policy category, directly shapes the temporariness of lived experience. The TPD offers immediate safety but creates legal and social precarity that limits long-term planning, access to integration resources, and recognition of qualifications. This externally imposed liminality significantly influences how agency can be exercised, often forcing women to adapt, wait, or withdraw rather than actively pursue integration or return.

Ultimately, this research contributes to broader debates on agency in forced displacement by illustrating how refugee women do not simply resist or comply with the systems that shape their lives, but instead navigate them in situated, strategic, and often constrained ways. The intersection of temporariness and agency proves the need to rethink integration and protection policies to account for the structural conditions that both enable and limit action, especially for women balancing work, care, and survival in contexts of uncertainty.

Policy Implications

The findings underscore the need for policies that move beyond short-term protection towards more sustainable support systems for displaced women. Temporary Protection, while essential for immediate safety, often reinforces precarity by its temporary nature. Policymakers should consider extending and adapting support mechanisms to better accommodate diverse forms of agency, recognising the complex realities of caregiving, transnational ties, and labour market barriers. It can be achieved by simplifying qualification recognition processes, offering long-term residence options (pathways to permanent settlement, support for voluntary return, or a framework for legal circular migration), and adopting a gender-sensitive approach in policy design and implementation.