Human migration and (im)mobility in the light of violence and conflict

Human movement from one place to the other – or occasions of non-movement and stuckness – can lead to various forms of social conflicts and can cater potential for both explicit and implicit forms of violence. In order to pinpoint some of these issues, this DEMIG Online Talks Series aims to provide a nuanced and multifaceted view on conflict, violence, and crime in the context of human migration from a diversity of research perspectives and academic backgrounds. The series is intended not only to present current research but also to inspire us to develop adequate solutions that guarantee safe pathways in accordance with human rights protocols. 

The next talk will take place on November 27 at 2 p.m. Social anthropologist and geographer Soledad Álvarez Velasco from the University of Illinois Chicago will discuss migration dynamics in America. We cordially invite you to this lecture entitled ‘Inhabiting the Transit: Migrant Spatial Struggles from Global South America to the U.S.’.

"Inhabiting the Transit: Migrant Spatial Struggles from Global South America to the U.S." 

Soledad Álvarez Velasco, University of Illinois Chicago-UIC

Wednesday, 27 November 2024, 14:00-15:30 CET | online (registration)

At the end of the first quarter of the 21st century, transit migration across the migratory corridors of the Americas has turned into a salient and political feature. Based on the combination of multi-sited and digital ethnography, enriched by historical research and a migrant-centered approach that reconstructs the transit journeys of 14 migrants from Syria, Iraq, Nigeria, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Haiti, Cuba, Colombia, and Venezuela whom I met in Quito, Meteti, and Houston between 2016 and 2023, in this talk I will examine the transnational journeys of forcibly displaced migrants from Asia, Africa, the Caribbean, and the Andes as they navigate South American countries and traverse the Andean Region-Central American migratory corridor en route to the U.S. The talk examines why their mobility towards first initial South American countries transforms into a relentless experience of inhabiting the transit. It confronts how their transnational movements are shaped by, and collide with, the forces of contemporary violence, uneven geographical development, and racialized, exclusionary border regimes.

Trapped at the crossroads of (im)mobility and structures of oppression, migrants are compelled to inhabit a state of perpetual transit, ceaselessly resisting through spatial and digital struggles for survival. This is the heart of their flights and fights—and an essential part of what this lecture will discuss.

Bio: Dr. Soledad Álvarez Velasco is a social anthropologist and human geographer whose research analyses the interrelationship between mobility, control and spatial transformations across the Americas. She combines a multi-scale and historical analysis with multi-sited ethnography and a digital ethnography based on a migrant-centred perspective to reconstruct migrants’ spatial and temporal trajectories. She was an Assistant Professor at the Heidelberg Center for Ibero-American Studies at the University of Heidelberg in Germany (2022-2021) and a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Houston (2020-2021). She holds a PhD in Human Geography from King’s College London. As of January 2023, she joined the University of Illinois Chicago as an Assistant Professor in the Departments of Anthropology and Latin American and Latino Studies. Her research has been published in Geopolitics, Studies in Social Justice, Antipode. A Radical Journal of Geography, Migration and Society, ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Journal of Latin American Geography (JLAG). She founded and co-coordinated the transnational digital project (Im)Mobilities in the Americas and COVID-19 and co-directed the digital humanities project Children On The Move An Ethnographic Mosaic Of The Americas funded by the National Geographic Society.  She is the author of the book Frontera sur chiapaneca: El muro humano de la violencia (Mexico: CIESAS-UIA, 2016).  

"Staying put by staying in motion? The multiple effects of environmental conditions on (im)mobilities in Tajikistan’s Pamir Mountains" 

Suzy Blondin, University of Neuchâtel and Lausanne

Thursday, 12 December 2024, 14:00-15:30 CET | online (registration)

This lecture examines the relation between disaster risks and human (im)mobilities through a case study in Tajikistan’s Pamir Mountains and touches upon issues of post-Soviet transition, livelihood sustainability, environmental hazards, and risk perceptions. The presentation is structured around two main research topics: involuntary immobility induced by physical inaccessibility and voluntary immobility enhanced by place attachment. Hazards impact the state of roads and vehicles and impair rural-urban mobilities, which are essential to the livelihoods of the Pamiri people. Frequent mobility disruptions reduce the accessibility of the Valley and can lead to involuntary immobility, which puts into question the habitability of some villages. Despite these risks and low accessibility, place attachment is deep among residents who generally express strong bonds with their Valley. Many remain in their villages or return after years spent working in other parts of Tajikistan or in Russia. Place attachment, immobility, and adaptive capacity are envisioned as mutually reinforcing phenomena, and the mobility-immobility and voluntary-involuntary continuums are explored in their dynamic and fluctuating dimensions. Through an analysis of individual place attachment and risk perceptions, this work also reaffirms the importance of cultural geography for the field of environmental mobilities. 

Bio: Dr. Suzy Blondin is a geographer based in Switzerland (University of Neuchâtel and Lausanne) whose work mostly examines the intersections between im/mobilities and climate change. Her current research project addresses car-dependence, motion-harming and anti-car movements. She also specializes in the didactics of geography and sustainability. Her recent work has been published as chapters in edited volumes by Routledge and Springer, and as articles in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Mobilities, and Geoforum. 

"Racism and Refuge: Understanding Sanctuary Policies in the United States and Beyond" 

Benjamin Gonzalez O’Brien, San Diego State University

Thursday, 16 January 2025, 15:00-16:30 CET | online (registration)

In this talk, Dr. Gonzalez O’Brien weaves the narratives of his two books together, revealing how the racialized narrative of “migrant crime”, born out of the eugenics movement of the 1920s, has shaped modern immigration policymaking and rhetoric, including sanctuary policies. Undocumented immigrants, he argues, are at once part of the political and social spheres in America, but also perpetual outsiders as a result of their legal status. This marginalization has negative impacts, both for the communities themselves and the spaces in which they move, reducing trust in local institutions and law enforcement. Cities, counties, and states have responded by drawing on the nation’s tradition of immigration federalism through the passage of sanctuary policies, which remove local officials and law enforcement from the equation by prohibiting cooperation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). These policies have served as models for localities in other countries looking to signal a more welcoming environment for irregular migrants based on the community’s interest in their incorporation. This has prompted a counterreaction, pitting national government against those localities that pass these policies and is representative of a larger international debate on how undocumented or irregular migrants should be treated, as well as the competing interests in their incorporation or exclusion.

Bio: Benjamin Gonzalez O’Brien is an Associate Professor of Political Science at San Diego State University. He is the author of two books on U.S. immigration policy, as well as numerous articles on the same topic. In his first book, Handcuffs and Chain Link: Criminalizing the Undocumented in America (University of Virginia Press, 2018) Dr. Gonzalez O’Brien examines the roots of modern parallels between immigration and crime policy, arguing this can be traced to S. 5094, also known as the Undesirable Aliens Act, a law passed in 1929 that formally attached criminal penalties to undocumented entry for the first time. In his second book (with Loren Collingwood), Sanctuary Cities: The Politics of Refuge (Oxford University Press, 2019), Dr. Gonzalez O’Brien builds on his earlier research with an examination of American sanctuary cities. This book represents the first comprehensive analysis of U.S. sanctuary policies, which forbid local officials from inquiring into immigration status or participating in enforcement operations. Dr. Gonzalez O’Brien served as an expert witness in the United States vs. Gustavo Carrillo-Lopez, the first federal court case to find that the criminalization of undocumented reentry to be unconstitutional due to the racial animus underlying the passage of the Undesirable Aliens and McCarran-Walters acts. 

Information on further talks will follow shortly.

"It’s Not the Economy: The Effect of Framing Arguments on Attitudes toward Refugees" 

Lamis Abdelaaty, Syracuse University

19 November 2024, 15:00-16:30 CET | online 

Which arguments for refugee admissions are most persuasive to publics in receiving states? This question has given rise to a heated debate among refugee scholars and advocates. Some insist that the way to maximize support for refugee admissions is to emphasize their instrumental economic benefit to receiving states. Others prefer arguments based in legal or moral obligations, arguing that economic arguments risk undermining support for the most vulnerable or needy refugees. In this talk, I explore whether and how economic, legal, and moral arguments affect Americans’ support for refugee admissions, and which types of refugees they prefer to admit.

The talk is based on the results of a nationally representative survey in the US (N=1,219), with an embedded survey experiment and conjoint decision task. This study shows that the moral argument led to more support for refugee admissions, while the legal argument increased support only among non-Republicans, and the economic argument had no discernible impact. In the conjoint task, the economic argument increased preferences for economically productive potential refugees, but with a focus on lower-status occupations. The findings speak to the factors influencing policy support and have important implications for policymakers, advocates, and the broader scholarly community. Although there may be reasons to promote the economic argument, our evidence suggests that other approaches are more likely to increase Americans’ support for refugees. 

Bio: Lamis Abdelaaty is an associate professor of political science at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. Her research deals with refugees in international relations. She is the author of the award-winning book, Discrimination and Delegation: Explaining State Responses to Refugees (Oxford University Press, 2021), and her articles have appeared in American Political Science Review, Annual Review of Sociology, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, and other journals.