Call for papers on environmentally induced migration - special issue on
forced migration and mobilities research
Submission are invited for a special issue of an academic journal looking at
Forced Migration and Mobilities Research. We are looking for a theoretically
informed and empirically rich paper analysing environmentally induced
migration from a mobilities perspective.
By environmentally induced migration we understand human displacement
related to global warming, long term environmental stress and disasters such
as floods, fires, tsunamis and earthquakes.
Potential contributors will have to comply with a strict editorial schedule
and be ready to submit a first draft to the editors of the special issue by
May 2010 and a final draft by early August 2010.
For more information about the general outlook of the special issue see
below.
Please direct expressions of interest by the 8th of February to Nick Gill
n.m.gill@lancaster.ac.uk and Javier Caletrío j.caletrio@lancast er.ac.uk
General outlook of the special issue
Forced migration is a chronic reality and a pending threat in some parts of
the so called Global South and is set to become increasingly central for
rich industrial nations too in the 21st century due to growing political and
environmental instabilities. Forced migration studies have already made a
significant contribution in understanding a complex phenomenon that demands
ever more sophisticated transnational, interdisciplinary and theoretically
oriented analytical perspectives. But, as Stephen Castles (2003) has noted,
the policy driven agenda of forced migration studies still has to make
explicit such demands and contribute more substantially to social theory.
'Critical mobilities' is a new direction in social theory with also clear
post-disciplinary and global aspirations. The analytical potential of its
post-disciplinary outlook is already evident in recent works of synthesis
that have fruitfully brought together studies on migration, tourism,
business travel, social mobility, inequality, urban infrastructure,
complexity and reflexive modernization (Canzler et al. 2008; Urry 2000,
2008). 'Critical mobilities' is a distinct if eclectical approach with
moving boundaries. Yet, its development as a cosmopolitan perspective (Beck,
2006) still awaits new synthesis that incorporates forms of mobility, bodies
of research, problematics, and social and political contexts that are
relevant beyond North Atlantic rim societies.
This special issue therefore seeks to contribute to ongoing efforts to
expand the social-theoretical basis of forced migration studies and
cosmopolitan outlook of mobilities research by encouraging a dialogue
between both bodies of research. A focus on forced migration promises to
make more explicit and further develop the critical outlook of mobilities
research, offering one way in which the approach can begin to fulfill is
cosmopolitan aspirations. Moreover, the methodological and conceptual
frameworks being developed by mobilities research can illuminate new areas
of concern facing forced migrants, especially regarding the relationship
between diverse forms of mobilities; social and infrastructural networks;
different forms of state power and the role that mobilities play in
governance; 'natural' disasters and infrastructural resilience and collapse;
the convergence of physical and digital space; global complexities; and
senses of place and belonging.
