The Politics of Mobility, Displacement and Asylum

The course consists of Part 1 and Part 2 (six credits) supplemented by Part 3 (9-credits course only).

For PPPA students: 6 credit is the norm, the 9 credits option is available only as "Free credits".
For Philosophical Sciences, Erasmus or other MA courses: both options, 6 or 9 credits, are available if allowed by your study plan.

Lectures will take place in the first semester (from September to end of November) according to this scheme: Monday and Tuesday at Scienze Politiche' classrooms (Via del Conservatorio), focused on Part 1 and Part 2, and, in parallel, Thursday at Studi Umanistici's classrooms (via Santa Sofia) focused on Part 3 (check on UNIMI website precise dates and venues).

Overall, the course presents a reflection on the contemporary tensions between globalization, human mobility, nation-states, and the creation of borders, considered at the heart of the current production of political identities and forms of citizenship. Its basic aims are to give a solid introduction to the global processes of human mobility, displacement and asylum and to offer, in part 2, a thorough analysis of specific case-studies from the perspective of political anthropology and ethnographic field-research.

Part 1. An introduction to the main elements and debates related to contemporary global migration dynamics: South-North migration; categories, theories, policies, global dynamics; refugees and asylum; forced and irregularized migration.
Part 2. Understanding irregular migration and containment policies, from Africa to Europe: through a series of case studies, this part will analyze the forms and motivations of irregular migration from Africa to Europe in an anthropological and historical perspective. In the background, this section addresses the dynamics related to forced displacement, refugees, and irregular migrants on the borders of Europe, analyzing the forms of containment and governance of forced displacement, with particular attention to cases of protracted crisis and the transformation of the regimes of mobility over time, between asylum and irregular mobility.


Part 3 (9 credits only). A Political Anthropology of Asylum, Refugees and Citizenship: This seminar-style section will reflect, this year, on the production of political identities within the context of nation-states, on their colonial legacies, on postcolonial political violence and its possible way-outs, on the recurrent production of mass displacement and minorities. Specifically, it will provide a reflection on how the categories of citizen, foreigner, settler and native are made in contemporary political global panorama by analyzing the book of Mohammed Mamdani "Neither Settler nor Native: The Making and Unmaking of Permanent Minorities". Students are asked to study Introduction and Conclusion (chapter 6) and on of the case studies presented in the book (Chapter 1 The Indian Question in the United States; Chapter 2 Nuremberg: The Failure of Denazification; Chapter 3 Settlers and Natives in Apartheid South Africa; Chapter 4 Sudan: Colonialism, Independence, and Secession; Chapter 5 The Israel / Palestine Question). Classroom lectures will follow a similar structure.