Them & Us

Abstract

In the quest for a better future some unemployed EU-citizens travel to Sweden. Finding a job is difficult and many are instead making a living begging. Cars, tunnels, parks and other shady places of our society become temporary homes. The authorities demolish some of these “camps” and the residents are accused for stealing bicycles, dogs and garden gnomes. Rumours and myths start to grow. In Swedish cities begging is a relatively new phenomenon. What should be done and who is responsible has become much debated. This project investigates and reflects upon begging EU-citizens in Lund. It is focused more on the reactions caused by begging rather than the beggars themselves. The result is a commercial product: a porcelain cup for coffee or tea. It comments the phenomenon in both an aesthetic and conceptual way. The cup is casted from a disposable paper cup that was used for collecting money in Lund. When looking down into the cup you will see a number of coins, 1,15 €, which equals to the World Bank’s definition of extreme poverty. My expectations were to make a project that would help these people, and with help I meant making them stop begging and do something else. The project didn’t reach these expectations. Instead I gained knowledge about the ethical and psychological aspects of giving and begging, and why begging provoked me in the first place. My product will not solve the inequalities within the EU where citizens systematically are oppressed and forced to move because of their ethnicity. Neither will it make begging disappear. The cup serves as a symbol of poverty and reminds the user that injustice exists. I find this project important because it’s an example of how you as a student or designer can work with topics you find important, and use your position and methods to say and do something. In my product I take no clear stand on whether begging is right or wrong, or how you should act. With a simple product, I hope to convey the idea that it could have been you. You being born into a society where your brightest future plans was to travel to a city in the south of Sweden and make your living by asking for money on the streets.