Hilary Term Update from Border Criminologies

Hilary term has been busy for Border Criminologies. We have organized and participated in events in the UK and abroad, and our research team has been involved in ongoing fieldwork in a number of European countries. 

This term, as part of the Informal Seminar Series, we hosted Luke de Norohna and Andrew Crosby, who presented on their doctoral research and fieldwork. Luke’s research focuses on the lives of men who have been deported to Jamaica as well as their family and friends who remain in Britain, while Andrew explores the daily work practices of staff in Belgian immigration detention centres. Mary Bosworth has presented on her research in British immigration detention centres at a public lecture in Brussels, hosted by VUB, as well as at the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford, with Khadija Carroll.

Our members have produced a number of scholarly outputs, many of which have appeared on the open access SSRN paper series on our website. Of particular note, Border Criminologies member Ines Hasselberg’s book, 'Enduring Uncertainty: Deportation, Punishment and Everyday Life' won Berghahn Books the PROSE Award in Anthropology. The PROSE Awards annually recognize the very best in professional and scholarly publishing by bringing attention to distinguished books, journals, and electronic content in 53 categories.

In May 2016, Mary Bosworth was awarded an ESRC Impact Acceleration Accounts grant to host Dr Hindpal Singh Bhui (Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons) as a knowledge exchange fellow at the Centre for Criminology and work together on understanding the current and future challenges of immigration detention. The project mainly involved comparative research on National Preventive Mechanisms (NPMs) in countries that have had experience of large numbers of migrants to understand how they operate, the difficulties they face and their impact on achieving change in detention. The research team conducted visits to Turkey, Greece and Hungary to meet with the respective NPMs and stakeholders, as well as visit a number of immigration detention centres on different sites and speak with detainees. The team will produce a briefing report and organise a workshop in Oxford next year to bring together representatives from all the countries and present results.

As part of our commitment to outreach, Border Criminologies has recently launched a new initiative: An NGO Reports Series. This series provides an opportunity to enhance the visibility and dissemination of reports written by NGOs on matters related to migration, border control and detention and will complement the existing Criminal Justice, Borders & Citizenship Research Paper Series (CJBC), which includes publishes academic work on the intersections between criminal justice and migration control. The series is open to all related NGOs from around the world, who wish to disseminate their findings to a wider audience. Submit your report to bordercrim@law.ox.ac.uk. For more information, please contact Andriani Fili (andriani.fili@crim.ox.ac.uk).  

The Border Criminologies blog is a particularly important feature of outreach, showcasing original research from around the world, first-hand accounts of border control, and book reviews. In Hilary term we run more than 35 posts, including a special series on writing and researching in difficult times and a themed legal series focusing on legal issues concerning migration and its control, which started by looking at the situation of unaccompanied children in Europe and beyond. We reached readers in more than 100 countries. In addition to the blog, our Twitter account @bordercrim continues to grow with more than 150 new followers every month and to be influential with hundreds of engagements per month. In February  (6-10), as part of our Guest Twitter Project, we welcomed our third guest, Teresa Piacentini, who shared her work, ideas, opinions and news from around the world. If you are interested in participating in this project please contact Andriani Fili (andriani.fili@crim.ox.ac.uk).