REMESO scholars comment

The Institute for Research on Migration, Ethnicity, and Society (REMESO), IKOS, Linköping University, will organize an international conference from the 3rd to the 5th of September 2024. The conference, titled “Legal Status, Temporality, and Integration – Changing Migration Regimes and Precarization of Citizenship,” is being organized by REMESO, Linköping University, in collaboration with The Canada Excellence Research Chair in Migration and Integration (CERC) at Toronto Metropolitan University. The event, which will take place in Norrköping,  aims to gather approximately 30 migration researchers from Sweden, the EU, and Canada. The project is financially supported by the Research Council for Health, Working Life, and Welfare (FORTE – Decision No: GD-2023/0034).

The primary responsibility for organizing the conference lies with Professor Zoran Slavnic of REMESO, Linköping University, who, alongside Professor Anna Triandafyllidou of CERC, Toronto Metropolitan University, oversees the academic content of the conference.

The conference is planned for four sessions. The first two sessions will focus on the structural roots of new restrictive immigration policies and how policymakers in receiving countries deal with these problems (Session 1), and the ability of individual and collective agency of migrants to act independently despite these structural limitations (Session 2). Sessions 3 and 4 will address empirical cases from Sweden and Canada in this context.

Each session will open with an introductory keynote speech by leading scholars in these fields, followed by the presentation of four papers per session. The conference will conclude with a panel discussion featuring all keynote speakers.

Filmed Interview, The Market Exit.
I’m Andres Acevedo and this is The Market Exit. During the migration crisis of 2015, the small country of Sweden admitted a very large number of refugees. What effects did this surge of migrants to Swedish have on the Swedish economy? To find out, I met professor Peo Hansen, author of the book “A Modern Migration Theory” and from our conversation, I realized that many of the economic models we use for assessing our economy and society are deeply flawed. In the conversation, we talk about the field of research called the fiscal impact of migration. We talk about the difference between real resources and financial resources. We talk about the so-called brain drain within the European Union. We talk about why politicians are so afraid of speaking the truth about migration.

Filmed interview with Neutrality Studies, Chaired by Pascal Lottaz, ​Kyoto University, Faculty of Law.
“The EU to this day treats Africa as a colonial backyard that must be ‘managed’ rather than engaged with on equal footing. At the same time, Josep Borrell begs China to recognise the EU as a fellow great power—something no self-respecting power would ever even dream of. All of this is symptomatic not only for the EU commissions current mental state, but the history of the Union, a history it often downplays or forgets about all together. My guest today is a Swedish academic; Professor Peo Hansen of Linköping University. His research focuses among other things on European integration, migration, political economy, and geopolitics. Dr. Hansen is the author of several books, including “Eurafrica: The Untold History of European Integration and Colonialism” of which there is also an academic article and recently he wrote a short magazine article as well.”

We are happy to announce the presentation and discussion of two topical volumes on migration and racism, border regimes, and politics of solidarity co-organised by DEMOS, Aalborg University, and REMESO, Linköping University:

Contending Global Apartheid: Transversal Solidarities and Politics of Solidarity, edited by Martin Bak Jørgensen & Carl-Ulrik Schierup, Haymarket 2023

The Crisis Mobility Nexus, edited by Leandros Fischer, Palgrave Macmillan 2024.

Information on the event online:

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Filmed Seminar, Migration Policy Institute, European University Institute, Florence

The seminar discussed the merits of Modern Monetary Theory, showing how it offers a realistic approach to migration. Speaker: Peo Hansen (Linköping University). Chair: Stephanie Acker (Migration Policy Centre (MPC) of the EUI’s Robert Schuman Centre).

A blogpost introducing the Horizon Europe Project at REMESO. The project MORE critically examines policies on return and readmission and attempts to develop viable alternatives, across eight EU member states, the UK, and at the EU level.

Panel, Neutrality Studies, Chaired by Pascal Lottaz , Kyoto University, Faculty of Law.
“Since Sweden and Finland decided to join NATO, there is an unprecedented militarization going on all over the Scandinavian countries with the most insane political developments taking place in Sweden that is now selling out some of its sovereign territory to the US military. This use of the Nordic countries for NATO purposes and geared against Russia is unprecedented in either the 20th or 19 centuries. To discuss what this means I have got with me three fantastic experts: Two from the region and one fellow neutrality researcher. From Sweden we are joined by Professor Peo Hansen, from Linköping University. From Finland we’ve got Dr. Tapio Juntunen from Tampere University And finally we are very delighted to be joined by Ambassador Nasir Andisha, who is Afghanistan’s Ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, and also the author of “Neutrality and Vulnerable States – An Analysis of Afghanistan’s Permanent Neutrality”

The EU is often presented as a “peace project” that emerged in opposition to nationalism, war and the turbulence of geopolitics. Peo Hansen argues that while this narrative continues to shape perceptions today, it overlooks the role that geopolitical concerns have always played in the integration process.