WELCOME to our second quarterly migration newsletter of 2014, keeping you up-to-date on our migration activities, events and publications at UNU-MERIT and its School of Governance. | ||
Launch of UNU Migration Network Website In February 2014, the United Nations University (UNU) announced the launch of the UNU Migration Network website. Responding to the need of policymakers and scholars to better understand and cope with migration-related issues, the new network — coordinated by the UNU Institute on Globalization, Culture and Mobility (UNU-GCM) —integrates research on migration from within the UNU system. The UNU Migration Network seeks to contribute to evidence-based policymaking by presenting information on research publications, current events and activities of the global UNU system relating to migration. At launch, the portal encompasses information on 37 research projects and provides access to more than 200 publications (reports, policy briefs, books, articles and working papers). The UNU Migration Network currently covers the work of five UNU institutes. More than 50 UNU experts are working in the five focus areas of the network: (i) forced migration, (ii) migration and health, (iii) migration and culture, (iv) migration governance and policy, and (v) migration and development. We kindly invite you to visit the website. |
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TRAINING PROGRAMMES |
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New Migration Management Diploma Programme Begins On 31 March 2014, we welcomed our second cohort of government officials and international staff to Maastricht. Governmental officials and international staff will spend the next three months intensively studying different aspects of migration management instructed by a wide range of experts. The Management Diploma Programme (MMDP) is sponsored by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who offer scholarships to government officials from 40 developing countries with at least three years’ experience in the field of migration and/or asylum procedures. For more information please download the brochure here. Watch testimonials from past participants. |
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Online Courses For those who are interested but do not have the time to take a full time course, UNU-MERIT and its School of Governance have specially designed a number of online courses to suit the needs of busy professionals interested in pursuing migration studies. Currently we offer three courses that can be started at any time: 1) Introduction to Migration Studies; 2) Migration and Remittance Effects; and 3) Comparative Migration Policy. Keep your eye on our website for the launch of two new online courses later in 2014 on Forced Migration by Khalid Koser and on Internal Migration by Ronald Skeldon. |
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PROJECT ANNOUNCEMENTS |
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Assisted Voluntary Return and Reintegration (AVRR) Return migration is an area receiving much attention by policymakers and researchers alike. Funded by the Government of Australia and supported by IOM, this project aims to inform policies and programmes for assisting the voluntary return and reintegration of migrants, including irregular migrants and unsuccessful asylum seekers. This aim will be achieved via three project components.: (1) analysis of the migrant return decision, including factors that motivate or impede irregular migrants from returning voluntarily; (2) development of a framework for defining and measuring sustainability of approaches to voluntary return and reintegration; and (3) an assessment of what factors determine sustainable return and reintegration. |
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Migration and Health The Migration Group at UNU-MERIT and its School of Governance is currently developing a new research line on Migration and Health. As the world accelerates discussions about the Millennium Development Goals and the post-2015 agenda, health issues once more emerge as an essential aspect for development. Despite the wide existing literature on health and migration, little has been done to bring these two areas together in a comprehensive and encompassing manner. The new Migration and Health research line aims to develop a framework for future research on the field by creating a compendium of previous research which will enable to identify and challenge assumptions on the topic, as well as highlight research gaps. |
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UPCOMING EVENTS |
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MACIMIDE Kick-Off Conference On 4 April 2014, the Maastricht Centre for Citizenship, Migration and Development (MACIMIDE) will hold its first conference in cooperation with the Dutch Association for Migration Research (DAMR). The conference will be organized in four sessions along the MACIMIDE Research Themes: (1) Migration and Development; (2) Transnational Families; (3) Cross-border Mobility; and (4) Citizenship and Immigrant Incorporation. The preliminary programme can be found here. The event is preceded by a PhD/Postdoc Workshop on 3 April which will provide an opportunity for doctoral and postdoctoral researchers working in the areas of citizenship, migration and development to present their research and gain feedback from their peers and more senior scholars. |
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International Conference: Innovation & Governance in Development: 26 November To mark a quarter century of UNU in Maastricht, and to provide an outlook for the next 25 years, UNU-MERIT will organize an international conference, “Future perspectives on innovation and governance in development”, from 26-28 November 2014. The conference will feature a number of thematic parallel sessions and a plenary programme including speakers who have played a key role in the institute’s evolution. Paper proposals are welcomed in all of UNU-MERIT’s seven research themes including migration and development. Abstracts should be submitted before 31 May 2014. For more information, please visit our website. |
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Inaugural Lecture: Hein de Haas On 27 June at 2 pm, Professor Hein de Haas will give his inaugural lecture at the Aula Minderbroedersberg in Maastricht. Hein de Haas is the Co-Director of the International Migration Institute (IMI) and University Lecturer in Migration Studies within the Department of International Development at the University of Oxford. De Haas holds a professorship in Migration and Development at UNU-MERIT and its School of Governance and has taught migration theory at Maastricht University for several years. He has written extensively on Migration and Development and is the co-author of the fifth edition of ‘Age of Migration’, a leading text in the field of migration. |
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Graeme Hugo |
Migration Seminars The Migration seminar series provides a platform to present new research findings and facilitate discussions on topics relevant to migration studies. To join our mailing list and receive invitations to future seminars please email: katie.kuschminder@maastrichtuniversity.nl. Migration Seminar Series
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PAST EVENTS |
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IS Academy Final Conference In January we held the concluding conference for the IS Academy project. The conference was the culmination of a five-year research project funded by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and implemented by Maastricht University and its partners. The project involved survey data collection in five sites – Afghanistan, Burundi, Ethiopia, Morocco and the Netherlands – and focused on the key themes of remittances, return migration, the highly skilled and the external dimension of EU mobility policy. For more information on the IS Academy Migration and Development project and for links to all IS Academy publications please visit our project page. For more information on the conference, including video recordings of the keynote addresses, visit the conference page. For some reflections on the IS Academy project please see our new Policy Brief. |
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Fortress Europe Debate Migration flows into Europe are changing. A decade ago most migrants entered Europe via North Africa, straight across the Mediterranean; but the main route is now through the Eastern Mediterranean, with many trying to cross through Greece. The violence suffered by asylum seekers in Greece is well-documented in international media and constitutes a growing cause for concern. This was the background to a Maastricht Studium Generale debate, “Knocking at the Doors of Fortress Europe: Migration Flows from the Maghreb to Europe: Is there a Long-term Solution?” held on 15 January 2014 and attended by Phd Fellow, Katie Kushminder. Read her reflections here. |
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Refugee Diasporas in Development At what point do people start identifying themselves as refugees? What are the differences between refugee and migrant diasporas? Should we even make a distinction? Use of the terms “refugee diasporas” and “migrant diasporas” is shaped by various academic, funding and political issues. In academia, we investigate the different linkages between diaspora populations and their homelands in order to provide more context-specific and nuanced insights. The next question is, how far do labels help or hinder these groups? To look in-depth at the role of “Refugee Diasporas in Development”, Maastricht University co-hosted a seminar in Brussels on 18 March 2014. Held in partnership with the European Council on Refugees and Exiles (ECRE) and the Danish Refugee Council (DRC), the event was followed by a round-table with various NGOs. Read reflections from Katie Kuschminder here. |
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PUBLICATIONS |
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IS Academy Research A number of publications are still coming out of our IS Academy project. In a recent Policy Brief, PhD fellow Katie Kuschminder reflects on her research in Ethiopia and comments on the Government of Ethiopia’s decision in 2013 to officially ban the emigration of domestic workers In her working paper (WP2014-004), former visiting researcher Lisa Andersson explores the effect of international remittances and migration on household welfare in Ethiopia. The study finds that remittances have a significant impact on subjective household economic well-being and on the accumulation of consumer assets. PhD fellow Craig Loschmann and Dr. Melissa Siegel use the IS Academy survey data from Afghanistan to consider migration intentions. By looking at household vulnerabilities in a multidimensional way they find that it is not the ‘most vulnerable of the vulnerable’ who aspire to move. Building on work done through the IS Academy project, and with the support of a UNHCR PDES research grants, PhD fellows Sonja Fransen and Katie Kuschminder reflect on Burundi’s Rural Integrated Villages and offer insights in the Refugee Return Settlement Policies. |
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Ethnic Segregation PhD fellow Cheng Boon Ong has recently published two working papers. In a paper co-written with Kristof de Witte (WP2014-008), Boon Ong looks at the movement of primarily ethnic minority children from three schools in Amsterdam that were closed down due to poor performance. From schools to neighbourhoods, her second paper (WP2014-011) looks at how neighbourhood composition has changed over time as a result of choices made by households. Contrary to other studies which identify ‘white flight’ (or the departure of native or advantaged households) after the ethnic composition of a neighbourhood reaches a ‘tipping point’, this phenomenon is not observed in data from Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague in the Netherlands. |
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Climate and Human Mobility For those interested in the impacts of climate on human mobility, the Climate and Development Journal has recently released a special edition entitled ‘Connections between (changing) rainfall patterns, food and livelihood security, and human mobility: Evidence and a new analytical framework’. GPAC PhD fellow Andrea Milan makes two contributions to the special edition based on his work in Latin America. His first paper looks at rainfall variability, food insecurity and migration in Cabricán, Guatemala, and the second at livelihood and migration patterns at different altitudes in the Central Highlands of Peru. |
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Photo Credits : UN Photo: T. Jones; H. Pijpers; S. Fransen; H. Hudson; S. Brodin; UN Photo UNHCR P. Behan; UN-Photo-Isaac-Billy | ||
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