This article explores how Black African asylum seekers in an eastern German state experienced living conditions and the forms of agency they exhibited to redress the stressful circumstances of everyday life. The article draws on 12 in-depth interviews with rejected Black African asylum seekers and ethnographic research. Participants experienced various socio-environmental stressors and the absence of resources that affected their well-being and were injurious to their human rights. Their responses were embedded in different practices tied to the accumulation of capital that buffered stress and contested repressive asylum laws. The implications of the study for policy and advocacy are discussed. © 2018, © 2018 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

Agency Asylum seekers stressors human rights Black Africans discrimination Living conditions

living standard immigration policy Germany asylum seeker ethnography human rights black population quality of life socioeconomic conditions advocacy