Welcome to the latest COMPAS Update

Please find below the latest COMPAS Update on all our recent research activities, events and publications, as well as plans for the future.

This email contains hyperlinks which are highlighted in blue and will open in new windows. If you have difficulty following the links, please visit our online version at:
http://www.compas.ox.ac.uk/publications/updates/
 

RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS

Report on undocumented migrant children

The COMPAS project  "Undocumented Migrant Children in the UK" has been completed. This project aimed to advance knowledge on the experiences and everyday lives of irregular migrant children in the United Kingdom, to cast light on the challenges facing the communities in which they reside and to explore services and resources available to them in relation to health, education and employment. The report will be launched in the coming months. 

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Migration in the Media and Public Opinion in Britain

Scott Blinder has begun a new project, funded by the Fell Fund, that will look for connections between media coverage and public opinion. He will analyse how media portrays migration and how those portrayals influence public perceptions and attitudes. 

This will be done by analysing newspaper coverage on migration, looking at the language used to describe (im)migrants, refugees and asylum seekers and monitoring media trends in "real time".

The Migration Observatory will be a key medium for dissemination of the results of this project. 

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COMPAS and Migration Observatory Impact

COMPAS and the Migration Observatory will undertake an ESRC Knowledge Exchange project to develop and strengthen impact of user engagement activities. The project aims to promote a more evidence based migration debate, strenghten migration policy making, establish strategic knowledge exchange partnerships, and improve understanding of how migration is covered by the media.  The funds will enable improved web functionality for the Migration Observatory, policy and user events, media monitoring and knowledge exchange visits. 

It will also tie in with a pilot project led by Michael Keith - “Reshaping the United Kingdom: Migration and the New Agendas in the Social Sciences”. This project will involve the commissioning of reports to lay the foundation for user events that will identify and analyse the emergent agenda for the social sciences in the UK. Three key areas will be investigated: rethinking wellbeing and behavioural changes, austerity politics and social division, and economic growth in the wake of the 2008 crisis.

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FORTHCOMING EVENTS

A chrysalis for every kind of criminal? Mobility, crime and citizenship

COMPAS Seminar Series Hilary 2012
Convened by the COMPAS Welfare Cluster

The seminars are held every Thursday at  14.00 - 15.30 in the Pauling Centre, 58a Banbury Road, Oxford and the series will conclude with a panel discussion.

All are welcome to attend and there is no need to register. Podcasts will be available shortly after each seminar.

Please add your comments to our facebook discussion around the seminars.

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COMPAS Breakfast Briefings

Topical, cutting edge research on migration and migration related issues is provided in an accessible format for policy makers and other research users.

These events are by invitation only, but podcasts of previous presentations are available now.

Next Briefing: Friday 9 March 2012

What is the impact of new migration on cohesion and integration?
Speakers: Will Somerville, Migration Policy Institute, Shamit Saggar, University of Sussex, and Robert Ford, Manchester University

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The Criminal, the Pauper, and the Foreigner in the Production of Citizenship

Public Lecture, Monday 12 March 2012, 18:30 -20:00, Town Hall, Oxford
Speaker: Loïc Wacquant, University of California, Berkeley and Centre européenne de sociologie, Paris

The social and symbolic silhouette of the modern citizen is defined through contraposition with three deviant figures: the criminal, who violates the law and imperils the physical integrity of civil society from within; the pauper, who shirks the obligation of work and corrodes the moral integrity of the wage-labor compact from within; and the foreigner, who threatens to breach the membrane of national membership from without and is suspected of being prone to turning into a criminal or a welfare recipient. Wacquant will seek to bring the three modern definitions of the ‘deviant’ citizen under a single analytic framework

The lecture is open to all and will be followed by a reception. To attend, please register by e-mailing: communications@compas.ox.ac.uk

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Call for Papers: Turkish Migration in Europe

TurkMiS is one of three partners organising the international conference "Turkish Migration in Europe: Projecting the next 50 years."

TurkMiS (the Turkish Migration Studies Group, COMPAS), together with the Regent's Centre for Transnational Studies and the London Centre for Social Studies, is calling for papers and session proposals for the conference.

The deadline for submissions is Tuesday, 15 May 2012.

The conference aims at elaborating the patterns of Turkish migration, future prospects, and potential challenges in a changing Europe. It also aims to open up the discussion by including the internal and international migration nexus as well as diverse and potentially competing destination countries as part of the broader Turkish transnational migration experience. Hence it aims to bring new perspectives on mobility and possibilities of (re-)configuration of policies.

For more information visit www.turkishmigration.net

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PREVIOUS EVENTS

The Politics & Practice of Justice, Immigration & Crime: Practitioners' Perspectives

This workshop was the culmination of the COMPAS organised seminar series "A chrysalis for every kind of criminal? Mobility, crime and citizenship".

This series explored the relationships between immigration and criminality. The workshop facilitated discussion between academics and those more directly engaged in political and the practical responses, and between those engaged in issues and theory on crime, and those engaged in issues and theory on immigration. It explored what considering the two together means for the politics of immigration, crime and citizenship.

Listen to the podcasts

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Turkey and the current reform of the migration and asylum legislation. Too good to be true?

This lecture, held on 9 November 2011, was organised by the Turkish Migration Studies Group who welcomed as speaker Professor Kemal Kirisci, Bogazici University, Istanbul.

Professor Kirisci discussed how over recent years, Turkey has liberalised its visa regime and now permits easy entry of the citizens of many Mediterranean, Middle Eastern and CIS countries. Also the new (draft) asylum and immigration law some claim, would be amongst the most humane and liberal in Europe. Finally, the invitation to academics and NGOs to becoming stakeholders in this process implies a significant change of Turkish policy making processes.
 

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Van Hear and Walker speak in Lebanon

Nick van Hear and Iain Walker recently presented at the Lebanese American University's conference on diasporas.

The conference "Relationship between Diasporas and Their 'Homelands' and Their Impact on the State, National Identities, and Peace and Conflict" was held at the Lebanese American University on 2-4 February 2012.

Nick Van Hear was a keynote speaker at this conference and Iain Walker presented on "One diaspora, two homelands? Comorians and Hadramis in the western Indian ocean”. The conference saw the gathering of a number of international scholars and prominent academics active in the migration field.

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Bridget Anderson speaks on illegality and definition

On 5 December Bridget Anderson presented the paper "Troubling Illegality: the ("illegal") immigrant in law and public debate" at a conference hosted by the Johannes Kepler University, Linz. The conference "Un(ter)dokumentiert Arbeiten in Europa" (Undocumented work in Europe) sought to explore how undocumented migrant work can be understood as a social as well as political phenomenon. Bridget's paper argues that researching and conceptualising "illegality" goes far beyond the establishment of just good and robust definitions, but must also include serious look at the politics of immigration.

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NEWS & NOTICES

COMPAS Blog

The COMPAS Blog provides information and discussion points about work taking place at COMPAS. It will focus on what researchers are thinking about, working on, and reactions to migration issues taking place globally.

Recent topics have included Migration and Economic Growth, They say the truth hurts – well, it’s given me a headache, Where do you call home, A snapshot of urban dynamics, and Irregular migration and fundamental rights in the EU.

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Prestigious appointment reflected at COMPAS

Sarah Spencer has been awarded the prestigious OSI Fellowship by the Soros Foundation. She will carry on with various COMPAS work whilst on this Fellowship, but in order to fulfil her new commitments she has stepped down as Deputy Director at COMPAS, a role that will be filled by Bridget Anderson.

As of January 2012 Sarah Spencer will focus on work involved with the Open Society Institute Fellowship. She will investigate the provision of essential services to irregular migrants across Europe. Her aim is to identify the economic and social imperatives that lead governments—at the national or local level—to provide access to services, which she believes will strengthen the case for inclusion at a time when these arrangements are increasingly under threat. She will look to the US experience for insights into the contentious politics of this issue.

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COMPAS Vacancy

COMPAS is seeking to recruit an experienced researcher in transdisciplinary diaspora studies. This is a Marie Curie Fellowship post.

Applications are invited for this 13-24 month full-time post on The Marie Curie Initial Training Network “Diasporic Constructions of Home and Belonging” (CoHaB) The post holder will be funded by COMPAS for the first 12 months and the Marie Curie fellowship for the following 12 months. The successful candidate will be expected to develop work that links to one or other (or both) of two clusters of research at the Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS) at the University of Oxford: ‘flows and dynamics’ and ‘urban change and settlement’.

For further details and how to apply, please visit COMPAS vacancies. Please note that applications must be made electronically via the University of Oxford.

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COMPAS Social Media

COMPAS is these days offering a more interactive element to our website via our Facebook page. This involves general updates about events, a discussion forum for our seminar series an posts about COMPAS news and publications.

Do visit and 'like' the COMPAS facebook page. Please let us know whether this online forum is worthwhile and what you would like from it.

COMPAS is also available to follow on Twitter as compas_oxford.  

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Turkish Migration Study Group newsletter

The Turkish Migration Study Group (TurkMis) provides a newsletter focused on current issues, events and meetings, publications, and other activities related to migration issues in, from, and/or through Turkey. To subscribe to the TurkMis mailing list or send the group any relevant items to be included in the next TurkMis newsletter please email turkmis@compas.ox.ac.uk.

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Franck Düvell will advise on new border checks research

Franck Düvell has been invited as special advisor to the project ‘Treatment of third-country nationals at the EU’s external borders: Surveying border checks at selected border crossing points’. The project is conducted by the EU Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA) and the International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD).

The project focuses on the land border crossing points between Poland and the Ukraine, Slovakia and the Ukraine, Hungary and Serbia, Bulgaria and Turkey, Greece and Turkey, as well as between Spain and Morocco. It also looks at the airports Heathrow, Frankfurt, Amsterdam and Paris/CdG. Whilst arrivals on the external air and land borders are thoroughly controlled the controllers are not normally surveyed; thus this project contributes to improving the balance between the two.

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Ben Gidley speaks to HRH Princess Anne on citizenship

On 8 December Ben Gidley spoke at the NIACE event 'Making a difference: Learning for citizenship in the 21st century' in the presence of HRH Princess Anne, patron of NIACE. 

The National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (NIACE) conference highlighted the role of learning - both formal and informal - in shaping how and why we can become active citizens in the 21st century.  Ben Gidley spoke on "Who are the UK's new citizens?", presenting research conducted with Birkbeck, University of London on the Integration and Citizenship project.

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New from the Migration Observatory

New Commentaries

Migrant workers: Taking our jobs - or not?
Three reports about the impact of immigration on the UK labour market, from Migration Watch, the National Institute for Economic and Social Research (NIESR) and the government’s Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) were all published in the week beginning on Monday 9 January. The Migration Observatory comments on the apparent contradictions in these three reports.

New migrants, ‘new’ jobs, old confusion…
A flurry of reports about immigration, unemployment and benefits suddenly filled Britain’s news media in January. The Migration Observatory comments on the difficulty in calculating what proportion of new jobs in the economy are being taken up by migrants.

In the News
Immigration and benefits: Dr Scott Blinder was quoted in a number of news sources, including BBC News, the Financial Times and BBC Radio 5 (20 Jan)

Immigration Policy: Who is it for?: our press release on the MAC report on the impacts of migration generated stories in BBC News, the Financial Times, the Telegraph, the Independent  and TNT Magazine (10 Jan)

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PUBLICATIONS

Migration Studies: A new journal is launched

Current and former COMPAS researchers, in conjunction with researchers in other institutions, have just launched a new multi-disciplinary refereed journal to be published by Oxford University Press - Migration Studies. 

The journal will publish work that significantly advances understanding of the determinants, processes and impacts of human migration in all its manifestations. The journal will published for the first time in the Spring of 2013.  It is edited by Alan Gamlen of the Victoria University Wellington, formerly a doctoral student at COMPAS.  The Associate Editors are Carlos Vargas-Silva and Nando Sigona (both from COMPAS), Alex Betts (RSC), Thomas Lacroix of the University of Poitiers and Emanuela Paoletti of the Office of the UNHCR.

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Martin Ruhs proposes independent expert commission for EU immigration policy

Martin Ruhs has contributed a chapter to a new book on "Moving Beyond Demographics: Perspectives for a Common European Migration Policy".

The book is edited by Jan O. Karlsson, Former Swedish Minister for Development Aid, Migration and Asylum and Co-Chair of the Global Commission on International Migration and Lisa Pelling, Programme manager for migration at Global Utmaning. It was published by Global Utmaning ("Global Challenge"), a Swedish think-tank. The book was discussed with European Commissioner Cecilia Malmström at a meeting in Brussels on 30 November 2011.

Drawing on the UK's experience with the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC), Martin's chapter discusses the potential role of an independent expert commission in future EU immigration policy.The publication itself is the result of a two year project carried out by Global Utmaning, funded by the Swedish Ministry of Justice.

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Yemen: The Resurgent Secessionism in the South

Iain Walker has contributed the chapter, “Yemen: The Resurgent Secessionism in the South,” in the "Ashgate Research Companion to Secession" (edited by A. Pavkovi and P. Radan).

The research companion offers an overview of the current theoretical approaches to secession in the social sciences, outlines the current practice of international recognition of secession and offers an account of major secessionist movements - past and present - from a comparative perspective.

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Diasporic Generations: Memory, Politics and Nation among Cubans in Spain

Mette Louise Berg has published "Diasporic Generations: Memory, Politics and Nation among Cubans in Spain", Berghahn Books.

The book gives voice to diasporic Cubans living in Spain, the former colonial ruler of Cuba. By focusing on their lived experiences of displacement, the book brings to light imaginative, narrative re-creations of the nation from afar. Drawing on extensive ethnographic fieldwork, the book argues that the Cuban diaspora in Spain consists of three diasporic generations, generated through distinct migratory experiences. This constitutes an important step forward in understanding the dynamics of memory-making and social differentiation within diasporas, and in appreciating why people within the same diaspora engage in different modes of transnational practices and homeland relations.

The book was launched in Oxford on February 9, 2012.

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