Solidarities and migrants' routes across Europe at large

Introduction

Unauthorized migration has always been a contentious issue in the EU. Yet, many of the policies adopted thus far have proved ineffective in containing arrivals and blocking circulations of migrants and refugees within the EU. Furthermore, unauthorized migration has continued to challenge EU borders even during the pandemic.

Research Question

SOLROUTES’ core research question is: how can the turbulence, persistence, and intensity of unauthorized movements and of the production of migrants’ routes across “Europe at Large” – originating from the externalization of EU borders to non-EU countries – be understood?

Methodology

The project addresses this challenge from an innovative angle, through an ethnographic exploration of the nexus between unauthorized movements and the networks of solidarity with migrants in transit. This involves actors and practices that have been addressed just recently in migration studies.

This will be achieved by exploring and observing 50 crucial nodes in migration routes within Europe, in selected countries on its fringes (Turkey, Tunisia, Morocco) and in the Outermost Regions of the EU (French Guiana, Mayotte).

Objectives

SOLROUTES will aim to:

1. Explore the functioning, articulations, and representations of local and trans-local networks which share shelter, knowledge, and resources with migrants in transit.
2. Assess how routes are continuously reshaped by the encounter between unauthorized movements and solidarity networks.
3. Develop a large-scale multi-sited ethnographic approach based on live and collaborative methods and digital research.
4. Develop an innovative theory in migration studies on the nexus between solidarity with migrants in transit and unauthorized movements, contributing to structure the emerging perspective of solidarity studies.
5. Generate Special Features – a web series, an art exhibit, a graphic novel – linked to the research, offering new narratives for policymakers, local communities, and other relevant audiences in the spirit of public sociology.