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Mygration Story: Longing for the grass fields of Cameroon

‘Savages, monkeys … go back to the jungle!’ was the ghastly woven prose splashed across my door, the day after I arrived in Belgium. It was 23 August 2002. I was living with my cousin in the heart of the Molenbeek district, now sadly famous for other reasons. ...
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Why don’t refugees just stay in Turkey or Greece? We asked them

A joint post by Dr. Katie Kuschminder, EUI / UNU-MERIT and Prof. Khalid Koser, UNU-MERIT. — The European Commission has decided to start returning migrants from other European countries back to Greece, lifting a ban on the practice that was put in place in 2011. The decision is influenced by c...
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Blessings in Disguise? From Mining to Knowledge in Emerging Economies

Many countries with large reserves of natural resources have failed to achieve higher living standards – countries like Brazil, Chile, South Africa and Peru. Can too much of a good thing be somehow ‘bad’ for the wealth and welfare of countries? The debate has raged on for decades. On the one hand, t...
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Paradoxes in Higher Education: Luc Soete at UNU HQ

On 14 December 2016, UNU HQ in Tokyo hosted ‘Paradoxes in Higher Education‘, a conversation with Professor Luc Soete, Chairman of the EU Research, Innovation, and Science Policy Experts High Level Group and former Director of UNU-MERIT. Investments in education are essential for the sust...
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From Silence to Success: How to Serve Four Kinds of E-Learners?

A joint post by Shivani Achrekar and Dr. Mindel van de Laar. In e-learning courses, fully online or blended, the biggest challenge for course providers is to ensure retention, allowing participants to finish their online course. While sign-up rates can look promising, drop-out rates are often high, ...
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Mygration Story: Who is a migrant anyway?

I identify strongly as a migration researcher. So I sometimes feel inadequate next to all my colleagues who can brandish intriguing migration histories from their own lives. My story seems parochial by comparison: I was born and raised in Oslo, Norway, and so were both my parents. I still call Oslo ...
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Gender: A multilayered concept touching all of society

Gender is often seen as an isolated one-dimensional issue, rather than for what it is – a multilayered concept touching all of society, including research and policy. Why are we highlighting this today? Because 25th November is the United Nations’ International Day for the Elimination of Violence ag...
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Why it’s easier for India to get to Mars than to tackle its toilet challenge

In 2013, India became the fourth country in the world (after Russia, the United States and the European Union) and the only emerging nation to launch a Mars probe into space. But it remains part of the group of 45 developing countries with less than 50% sanitation coverage, with many citizens practi...
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Public Policy In-House Conference 2016

The inaugural Public Policy in-house conference, 21 October 2016, was an opportunity for four members of the 2016/2017 MPP cohort to present their analyses of key policy issues from their home countries. The presenters were selected based not only on quality but also on diversity, region, and topic ...
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Even if Clinton Wins, ‘Trumpism’ is Sadly Here to Stay

Trump may lose, but will that be the end of ‘Trumpism’? As I write this in late October 2016, Washington DC is a divided city in a divided country. I am struck by the imminent sense of disaster — and the clearest sign of this is what we DON’T see, just days before the election on 8th November....
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Time to Rethink Migration & Redefine Transnationalism?

By Dr. Özge Bilgili and Veronika Fajth In today’s world, international migration not only affects those who are on the move but the vast majority of the global population. In this new era of hyper-connectedness, many of our actions have transnational ramifications, reaching many other people across ...
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Celebrating 30 Years of the Journal of Population Economics

The Journal of Population Economics, an independent and international quarterly journal that publishes original theoretical and applied research in all areas of population economics, has been hosted by the ‘POP Centre‘ at UNU-MERIT since April 2016. Issue 1/2017, published on 29 October ...
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Mygration Story: Giving back through transnational living

Like most Americans, I have a pretty mixed up immigrant background: in my case from Sweden, Poland, Romania, Ukraine and Russia. My mother’s family emigrated from Sweden during the ‘great wave’ of migration between the 1880s and the 1920s....
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UN Day 2016: New Tools, New Views, But Same Ideals

“We should… recognize the United Nations for what it is – an admittedly imperfect but indispensable instrument of nations working for a peaceful evolution towards a more just and secure world order.” These words, written over half a century ago by Former UN Secretary-General, Dag Hammarskjöld, remai...
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‘Flexibility & Discipline Key to the Future of Healthcare’

This year’s 19th European Health Forum Gastein (EHFG) took the guiding theme of ‘Demographics & Diversity in Europe – New Solutions for Health’. As the leading event of its kind, the Forum aims to develop European health policy with input from national and regional authorities and decisionmaking...
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António Guterres: An SG for All Seasons?

After months of campaigning the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has elected Mr António Manuel de Oliveira Guterres of Portugal to serve as the ninth UN Secretary-General. Much has been made of his personal qualities and professional qualifications — but what can be said of the election ...
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PhD Fellow Wins Best Paper Award at Globelics Conference

Hans-Erik Edsand from Sweden has won the Best PhD Student Paper Award at the 2016 ‘Globelics’ Conference in Indonesia, for his work on ‘Technological Innovation Systems and the Wider Context: A Framework for Developing Countries’. “The Technological Innovation System (T...
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Mygration Story: From destruction to empowerment

I was born in Aachen, a child of a German mother and a Palestinian father. As a German, I am the owner of the most ‘powerful passport’ in the world -- a passport that grants me the freedom to travel and visit the most beautiful places around the globe. Yet, my Palestinian roots were seeded in Gaza, ...
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My Internship at the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs

Master's student Nassim Abba recently completed an internship at the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs. We asked him and his internship supervisor Ms. Nicole Maes how the Master's programme in Public Policy and Human Development prepares students to take up positions as interns, trainees and eventu...
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SDG+1: Turning Words and Plans into Concrete Budgets

The world is an unfair, unequal, insecure and unhealthy place for about half its population. Around 30% of ‘us’ have no access to adequate healthcare when needed, and 40% face a complete or near-complete loss of income security when a personal or a national economic crisis strikes. At least a third ...
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