Politics & International Studies » News

Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams interviewed in World Finance

Tue, 21 Jan 2020 18:52:00 GMT

Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams was recently interviewed for an article published in the Winter 2020 edition of World Finance. Entitled 'The true cost of the EU's border security boom', the piece examines the EU's plans to spend €34.9bn on border security in its next budget cycle (2021-27). Findings of the Leverhulme 'Border Narratives' project suggest that many EU citizens may prefer more accurate information about migration than greater investment in tougher deterrent border security.

Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams gives keynote lecture

Fri, 17 Jan 2020 20:26:41 GMT

On 16 January 2020, Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams delivered the keynote lecture for the 4th British International Studies Association (BISA) European Security Working Group Workshop. Hosted at Birmingham City University, the theme of the workshop was "Managing EU Internal and External Security Threats". The title of the keynote lecture, based on the findings of the Leverhulme Border Narratives project, was "Border Anxieties: Vernacular Narratives of Europe's 'Migration Crisis'".

Visiting Research Fellow - Dr Cecilia Vergnano

Fri, 04 Oct 2019 10:00:08 GMT

Dr Cecilia Vergnano is a Social Anthropologist from the University of Barcelona, with a PhD dissertation on forced (im)mobilities of Roma migrants in Europe. She is currently a Marie Slodowska-Curie Research Fellow at the Amsterdam Institute for Social Sciences Research (AISSR) of the University of Amsterdam, with a research project about the social and political impacts of the reintroduction of border controls within the Schengen area and the policing of asylum-seekers autonomous mobility through pushbacks at internal EU borders. In particular, her research focuses on the social life of the French/Italian and Austrian/Italian borders, with a particular attention to the evolution of everyday border practices by security actors, undocumented asylum seekers, local residents and informal border-crossing facilitators. Her research interests are borderization processes, forced (im)mobilities, racialization processes, border-crossing facilitation practices, territorial stigmatization, forced evictions. She will be based in PAIS from 24 October to 7 November 2019 working with Nick Vaughan-Williams in connection with the 'Border Narratives' project and can be contacted at vergnanocecilia@gmail.com.

Visiting Research Fellow - Dr Heri Pontes

Fri, 04 Oct 2019 09:58:00 GMT

Dr Heri Pontes will be working on borders and developing some aspects of her research project Resemiotinsing borders, conflict and identity in Brazilian online news reporting on immigration. Her research interests focus on the analysis of political and discriminatory discourses, border and identity politics, immigration, representation, rhetoric and argumentation studies, especially in South America. Heri is an Associate Professor in the Department of Arts and Communication at Universidade Federal de Pernambuco, Recife, Brazil. She holds a PhD in Linguistics. She teaches modules in Discourse Analysis, Applied Linguistics and Cross-cultural Aspects in Language Teaching and Learning at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. In 2016, she was a Visiting Fellow at The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) at The Department of Media and Communications. She will be based in PAIS working with Nick Vaughan-Williams in connection with the 'Border Narratives' project for term 1 of the 2019/20 academic year and can be contacted at heribr@yahoo.com.br.

New book based on project under contract with Oxford University Press

Fri, 31 May 2019 11:58:00 GMT

The full findings of the 'Border Narratives' project are to be presented in a new book forthcoming with Oxford University Press. The research monograph, authored by Nick Vaughan-Williams, is entitled Vernacular Border Security: Citizens' Narratives of Europe's 'Migration Crisis'. The volume draws on the original findings of 24 focus groups with diverse EU citizens across 11 EU cities to address the question: 'Why is it that, instead of satisfying calls for tougher borders, the intensification of walling and deterrent security appears to have heightened populist demands to "take back control" across Europe'?

Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams gives lecture at Oxford Brookes University

Tue, 12 Feb 2019 21:20:00 GMT

On Monday 11 February 2019 Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams delivered a public lecture on the findings of the 'Border Narratives' research project at the Centre for Global Politics, Economy, and Society, Oxford Brookes University:

'“Taking back control” in an age of walling: Border narratives of crisis and desire in Europe’

Nick Vaughan-Williams, University of Warwick

The overwhelming governmental response to what has retroactively been packaged as Europe’s 2015-16 ‘migration-’ and/or ‘refugee-’ crisis was to turn to tougher border security. While the EU Commission expressed humanitarian concern for the 1,000s of people who died in the Mediterranean Sea, the 2015 ‘European Agenda on Migration’ reflected a deterrent approach. Many EU Member States resorted to physical walling amounting to 1,000 KM in direct response to the perceived threat of ‘irregular migration’. At the same time, widespread public perceptions of weak border control were reported by opinion polls, politicians, and news outlets. Populist movements with anti-immigration slogans at their core – and incantations to ‘take back control’ of borders and sovereignty – began to spread across the continent in a widespread politics of backlash. This begs the question: Why have populist calls to ‘take back control’ of borders flourished precisely when border security and walling have intensified? The talk offers a preliminary response by drawing upon the findings of the ‘Border Narratives’ project funded by the Leverhulme Trust at the University of Warwick, which held group interviews with citizens in 2016-17 across 11 EU cities. Vernacular narratives of the ‘crisis’ offer in-depth insight into the concepts and categories used by citizens to understand migration and border security, their fears and desires in relation to mobile populations, and actually-existing alternatives to dominant fantasies of control.

Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams gives keynote lecture at University of Jyvaskyla

Tue, 27 Nov 2018 20:59:49 GMT

On 27 November 2018 Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams delivered the keynote lecture at the 'Crises Redefined' workshop at the University of Jyvaskyla, Finland. The lecture, entitled '"Taking Back Control" in an Age of Walling: Crisis, the Desire for Borders, and Everyday Immunization', presented the findings of the Leverhulme 'Border Narratives' project and was discussed by Dr Tuija Saresma. 'Crises Redefined: Historical Continuity and Societal Change' is a four-year profiling area funded by the Academy of Finland and Prof Vaughan-Williams is a member of its international scientific advisory board.

New research article published in European Journal of International Security

Wed, 15 Aug 2018 16:50:27 GMT

A new full-length research article by Georg Lofflmann and Nick Vaughan-Williams has been published online by the European Journal of International Security (EJIS) - a new journal supported by the British International Studies Association (BISA) and published by Cambridge University Press.

The article, entitled 'Vernacular imaginaries of European border security among citizens: From walls to information management', is based on two years of underpinning research into how diverse publics construct the so-called "migration crisis", conceptualise border security, and narrate their own identity in relation to it.

The online first version of the article can be accessed here.

'Border Narratives' featured in 2017 Leverhulme Trust Annual Review

Sun, 29 Jul 2018 13:05:14 GMT

The 2017 Leverhulme Trust Annual Review features the 'Border Narratives' project and an interview with Professor Nick Vaughan-Williams (see p.78).

Interview on tbs radio Seoul

Wed, 20 Jun 2018 10:22:00 GMT

Dr. Georg Löfflmann was interviewed for South Korean radio station tbs Seoul on the 'Border Narratives' project. The interview was part of a larger segment on global migration and the situation of refugees in Europe. A podcast of the interview can be found here: http://cdn.podbbang.com/data1/tbsadm/thism180620002.mp3 (the interview begins at ca. 07:42min)