The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on Italian mediation services: a focus on mediators’ perceptions in Emilia-Romagna

Sharing the same physical and visual space with the other two participants in the interaction has traditionally been a standard working condition for Italian “mediators” – a profession that entails community interpreting, interlanguage and intercultural communication, and facilitating migrants’ access to public services. This, however, was clearly impossible during the Covid-19 pandemic, when mediators worked mostly remotely. In order to investigate the impact of Covid-19 and Covid-19-related measures on the profession, an online survey was conducted with mediators working in the Emilia-Romagna region about the perceptions of their work during the pandemic. Respondents reported that during the Covid-19 pandemic mediation became more difficult and stressful than in pre-Covid-19 times. A thematic analysis of responses revealed that the main reasons for this were connected with remote mediation, especially with the lack of non-verbal contact that hindered empathy and limited mediators’ agency.