It is not without reason that Southern Italian mayors have been twisting themselves in the strangest ways in recent years to prevent the depopulation of their regions. For example, there are villages where empty houses are put up for sale for 1 euro and villages that provide subsidies to young people who stay. And then there are villages like the Calabrese Camini, noticed Nicola Zolin, an Italian photographer who has been visiting the region regularly since 2015.
When refugees kept washing up on the beaches near the village in recent years, a number of mayors decided to no longer see the people on board as a burden, but rather as a response to the ongoing depopulation. In addition to a lot of grumbling in right-wing Italy, this eventually led to a village where a large number of empty houses have been filled again after years and whose economy has revived a bit. When new refugee boats wash ashore, the residents of Camini no longer speak of a ‘refugee problem’, but of a ‘refugee solution’.