Many MMB organised and co-organised events are now online so we are recording them and posting the videos here. Others on this page have taken place in person and have been filmed.
2024
SPAIS Annual/Leverhulme Visiting Professor Lecture: Victoria Hattam: ‘Border Economies / Capitalist Imaginaries’
6th March 2024
How do the contradictory demands of border walls and supply chains co-exist? Each of these political forces pushes in contradictory directions: sovereignty and walls seek to establish territorial limits while globalization, by definition, is a boundary crossing enterprise. Yet, both are flourishing simultaneously: how are the contradictory demands reconciled? Read more about the lecture here and listening to the recording (with slides) here.
2023
A social model of asylum: disablement and resistance in the British asylum system
26th April 2023
In the third webinar in our ‘Health of Migrants‘ series, Rebecca Yeo argues for a ‘social model of asylum’ to bring together the insights and experiences of people in the asylum system, the disability movement and a wider population seeking to resist the hierarchies of human value underpinning current injustices. Just as the social model of disability highlights the disabling impact of barriers imposed on people with impairments, so restrictions imposed on people subject to asylum conditions, result in a system that is actively and deliberately disabling.
Exploring the mental health and psychosocial experiences of asylum seekers, refugees and undocumented migrants in the post migration context
12th April 2023
In the second webinar in our ‘Health of Migrants‘ series, Alessio Albanese and Kate O’Donnell showed the need to rethink the UK asylum process as a social determinant of health. Particular areas of concern for the mental health of these populations include: migration detention, the asylum system, fear of deportation, poverty, destitution, housing issues, language and communication difficulties, and poor access to healthcare.
Illegal Migration Bill – Emergency Discussion
31st March 2023
This emergency discussion outlined key aspects of the Bill, why it matters – for all of us and not only people seeking refuge – and what can be done. It also initiated a conversation about the role of academic research on migration at a time of legitimised hostility to migrants and people who work with them. Chair: Bridget Anderson, MMB Director. Speakers: Ann Singleton, MMB Policy Strategic Lead, Reader in Migration Policy, University of Bristol; Colin Yeo, Immigration barrister and founder and editor of the Free Movement website; Andrew McCarthy, Head of Services, Bristol Refugee Rights.
2022
Migration and Climate Change
ACH/MMB webinar series – ‘Bridging the Gap’
5th October 2022
Climate change is the biggest threat our planet faces and could re-shape global patterns of migration and displacement. It is likely to reinforce pre-existing inequalities, both internationally, nationally and locally. Since 2010, weather emergencies have forced 21.5 million people a year to move (UNHCR, 2021). According to the UNHCR, an estimated 90% of refugees come from countries that are the most vulnerable and least likely to have contributed to global emissions. This seminar will delved into the threats and inequalities faced by people at risk of forced migration due to climate change, as well as those from a refugee or migrant background.
‘New Slavery,’ Modern Marronage and the Multiple Afterlives of Plantations in Contemporary Italy – A Seminar with Irene Peano
Hosted by the Modern Marronage project in association with MMB.
10th October 2022
Dr Irene Peano is a researcher at the Institute of Social Sciences, University of Lisbon. She received her PhD in Social Anthropology from the University of Cambridge and has held post-doctoral positions at the University of Bologna (under a Marie Curie Intra-European scholarship) and at the University of Bucharest. For more than 15 years she has been researching the labour exploitation of migrants, focusing on sex work and agricultural work. She has also been researching and participating in forms of resistance to migratory labour regimes.
Are Immigration Controls Racist? Lessons from History – a public lecture by Nandita Sharma
Co-hosted by MMB, School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies, and Bristol Ideas.
29th June 2022
During her Bristol Benjamin Meaker Distinguished Visiting Professorship Nandita Sharma gave this talk about how racism, as a consequence of nationalism, is organised, practised and resisted in an era of postcolonialism. Charting recent global histories, she showed how state sovereignty has been nearly universally nationalised since the Second World War and, as a result, immigration and border controls have proliferated. Nationalist ideologies were rendered not only legitimate but practically mandatory in politics, leading to the normalisation of distinctions between Nationals and Migrants.
Violent Ignorance: Confronting Racism and Migration Control – book discussion with Hannah Jones
Organised by SPIN in association with MMB and SWDTP
6th April 2022
Hannah Jones discussed her book Violent Ignorance: Confronting Racism and Migration Control (2021) with Chloe Peacock from the University of Bristol. The book sets out to examine how the past persists in the present, how trauma is silenced or reappears, and how we might reimagine identity and connection in ways that counter – rather than ignore – historic violence. In particular Hannah Jones shows how border controls and enforcement, and its corollary, racism and violence, have shifted over time. Drawing on thinkers from John Berger to Ben Okri, from Audre Lorde to Susan Sontag, the book questions what it means to belong, and discusses how hierarchies of belonging are revealed by what we can see, and what we can ignore.
2021
No Recourse to Public Funds – Manufacturing Destitution
ACH/MMB webinar series 2021 – ‘Bridging the Gap’
2nd November 2021
In 2020, nearly 1.4 million people in the UK had no recourse to public funds (NRPF), with the burden of restrictions falling disproportionately on people of colour. With the proposed Brexit legislation and EUSS process putting even more people at risk of NRPF, this number is expected to rise. This is a huge humanitarian issue and may also have major implications for local authorities and the labour market. This seminar explored the mental health, employment and integration affects of NFPF, looking at it in the context of the proposed Nationality and Borders Bill and focusing on implications for local government, the community sector and others at a national level.
Reparations – Meeting Bristol’s Responsibilities
14th October 2021
On 2 March 2021 Bristol City Council passed a resolution on the need for ‘Atonement and Reparations for Bristol’s Role in the Transatlantic Traffic of Enslaved Afrikans’. This issue has been taken up by the University of Bristol and many of those in communities that make up the city: it is still to be resolved. The issue of reparations is also a live one in the Caribbean islands to which many slaves were transported and one strongly supported by Caribbean Labour Solidarity and its members in the UK and internationally. This webinar, bringing together speakers and performers from Bristol, London and the Caribbean, sought to provide an international and cultural context for the recent responses to slavery and racism that were ignited in Bristol by the Black Lives Matter movement last year.
UK Nationality and Borders Bill: An Evaluation with Colin Yeo
21st September 2021
This summer the UK Nationality and Borders Bill passed its second reading. What is new? What is unworkable? What will change? In this online seminar leading barrister and founder of the Free Movement website Colin Yeo discussed these issues and responded to questions from the audience.
Children as Subjects of Control: Interventions in Children’s Mobilities
18th June 2021
The prevailing global north construction of childhood as a period of innocence and dependence means that the independent mobility of those deemed to be children (whether in search of pleasure, earning opportunities, or even safety) is imagined as fraught with danger. The three papers presented at this seminar – by Michael Boampong, Esther Bott and Sam Okyere – addressed different kinds of interventions currently being made into children’s mobility by different actors, opening up questions about how and why lines between legitimate/illegitimate and benign/harmful are drawn in popular, policy, and academic discourse on children’s movement.
Policy, Politics and Research on Migration: A Critical Discussion
15th June 2021
What is the relation between migration research, policy and politics? Is there a role for academics in policy making? Is academic research on migration political, or should it stay away from politics? These were the questions we thought through with our panel, including both academics and practitioners in the field of migration politics and policy. We had Don Flynn speaking about whether academic research helps the defence of migrants’ rights; Leah Bassel on why researchers should learn to listen; and Ann Singleton on whether research can improve policy. Their presentations were followed by a Q&A with the audience.
Marriage, Gender and Refugee Migration by Natasha Carver: book launch
25th May 2021
We were delighted to host the book launch of Marriage, Gender and Refugee Migration: Spousal Relationships among Somali Muslims in the UK (Rutgers University Press, 2021) by Dr Natasha Carver, University of Bristol. A lyrical and genre-defying ethnography, the book provides wide-ranging insights into the lives and relationships of UK-Somali migrants. The event included comments by Professor Katharine Charsley, poems read by Kaltun Duale and Huda Jama and an extensive Q&A with Natasha herself. The launch was chaired by Professor Bridget Anderson, Director of MMB.
Remember and Respond: Child Migrants and the Lives Behind the Data
28th April 2021
This webinar opened the MMB series ‘Childhood on the Move’ by drawing attention to the reality of children’s experience of border crossings and controls. It reflected on the innumerable tragic deaths and disappearances of children travelling illegally around the globe, and the far-reaching, agonising consequences for their families. It considered the gaps in the evidence used to create policies towards child migrants in Europe, and how these gaps perpetuate their dehumanisation. And it focused on cases in the UK where treatment of undocumented minors is becoming harsher once more under the current Home Office regime.
Beyond Integration: Bringing Together Research, Policy and Delivery on Integration
ACH/MMB webinar series 2021 – ‘Bridging the Gap’
19th April 2021
‘Integration’ can be a controversial concept. This event challenged past approaches and looked ‘beyond integration’ to explore how we can ensure that people fulfil their potential and attain their aspirations within the labour market and wider community. The ESRC-funded Everyday Integration project is working to develop an inclusive, bottom-up and local approach to integration in the city. ACH has developed new tools such as Integrass, which assesses ‘integration’ from a bottom up, individually tailored viewpoint. This ACH/MMB webinar – the second in the series on ‘Bridging the Gap’ between research, policy development and delivery – discussed how these new approaches can overcome the limitations of previous policies by focussing on the whole community.
Queer Liberalisms and Marginal Mobility
9th April 2021
This webinar addressed queer migration through the intersectional lens of queer liberalisms, authoritarianism, and marginal mobilities. Globally, LGBTIQ+ rights form an inherent part of human rights discourse and politics. At the same time, this very human rights language is increasingly used by nation-states to defend their borders, control migration flows, and intensify discrimination and prejudice against the ‘other’.
This event is one of four in a speaker series during April 2021 that used a socio-legal lens to examine the interconnectedness of queer mobilities across and within different geographical, social and political contexts. It features contributors to the special issue ‘Queer Liberalisms and Marginal Mobility’ to be published by Ethnic and Racial Studies in Spring 2022.
(Click on the image to play the recording for this webinar and the three others in the series.)
MMB Latin America Dialogue
Protecting Venezuelans in Colombia: Reflections from Across the Region
31st March 2021
The Colombian government announced in February 2021 the launching of a programme to grant 10-year complementary protection and legal status to the approximately 1.7 million Venezuelan migrants and refugees in the country. This decision was considered ‘historical’ by the United Nations and received worldwide attention – it represents a clear shift in how the South American region is managing Venezuelan migratory flows. Bringing together four specialists from around the region, this webinar considered the contextual and technical aspects of this new policy, contrasting it with the practices of other South American countries.
MMB Latin America Dialogue
The UN Convention on Migrant Workers: Assessing its Positive Impacts
25th February 2021
On the 30th anniversary of the Convention, MMB brought together three leading specialists on migration law and Latin America to discuss its impact. In conversation with Diego Acosta – MMB’s International Strategic Lead – Pablo Ceriani and Alvaro Botero discussed the reasons for the Convention’s low ratification, its value as a living instrument, the importance of academics (sometimes negative), civil society and courts, its procedure, the trade-offs with states and examples of all of the above.
2020
MMB Debate
Justice and Labour Migration
10th December 2020
What might a just labour migration policy look like? Is there a trade-off between numbers and rights? Is it possible to have a system of labour migration founded on ideals of justice in an unequal world? Can labour migration move us towards a more just world?
MMB brought together philosopher Chris Bertram and political economist Martin Ruhs to present their differing visions of a fair labour migration system. Chaired by Manoj Dias-Abey from the Bristol Law School, this online debate will interrogated the key principles that Chris and Martin believe should underpin such a system.