Research at COMPAS is organised around five thematic research programmes: 1. Sending Contexts, 2. Infrastructures of Migration, 3. Integration and Social Change, 4. the Migration-Asylum Nexus, and 5. Migration Management. These programmes function primarily for the allocation of resources, operation of research projects and supervision of staff. The actual data, concepts, policy issues and theoretical implications of specific projects at COMPAS cross-cut and inform work in more than one programme.

Migration/Asylum Nexus

Senior Researcher and Programme Head: Nicholas Van Hear
Senior Research Officer: Liza Schuster; Senior Adviser: Stephen Castles

It is increasingly difficult to distinguish between forced and voluntary migration, two categories often cast as asylum-seeking versus economic migration. This research programme examines the empirical, conceptual and policy bases for this distinction and addresses its implications for the everyday lives of migrants and for the policies that affect them.

This programme aims to:

Deepen understanding of the relations between voluntary and forced migration
Explore how those relations shape migration policies and the everyday lives of migrants

Projects:

i) The migration-asylum nexus: the Somali and Tamil diaspora (MAST)

By investigating particular diaspora communities in the UK and Europe (currently Somalis and Sri Lankan Tamils), this project explores relations among people who have arrived at different times, from different socio-economic backgrounds, and through different migration channels.

The project seeks to explain why migration takes the forms it does at particular times, and why changes occur, by taking account of wider shifts in policy, economy and society.

It explores how categories of migration (labour, asylum, refugee, family reunion etc) are formed and used by the state and migrants.
It investigates how different migrant groups engage transnationally and can influence the homeland.
It points to the extent to which different types of migration are susceptible to influence by policy instruments.

Researchers: Nicholas Van Hear, Stephen Castles, Anna Lindley (doctoral researcher)
Timeline : 2004-2006
User group s: UNHCR and other IGOs, EU institutions, UK government, NGOs, refugee and migrant community groups
Planned Outputs: academic journal articles, book, practitioner journal articles, practitioner workshops, articles for Forced Migration Review, Forced Migration Online and other relevant websites. Click here for background paper (.pdf)
Funder: ESRC core funding

ii) A new asylum paradigm: rhetoric or reality? (NAP)

The project explores whether a ‘new asylum paradigm’ is emerging around the current (or resurgent) debate on ‘in-region asylum processing’, ‘regional protection zones’ and other measures that seek to address what are perceived as unmanageable mixed flows of asylum seekers and irregular migrants, ‘secondary movements’, and so on.

Although similar ideas have been around in various forms for some time, there appears currently to be a convergence of thinking, seen in debate within the EU, the UNHCR’s Convention Plus, the British government proposal on ‘new’ approaches to asylum seekers, and other recently aired approaches.

To assess whether or not a ‘paradigm shift’ is under way in this field, the project will

map the policy proposals that have been floated to date, and compare them with earlier policy developments
investigate the interventions that have been piloted so far that attempt to manage mixed migration in regions of origin.

Researchers: Liza Schuster, Nicholas Van Hear. Collaborating Individuals: Heaven Crawley, Stephen Castles, Alexander Betts (doctoral student),
Timeline : 2004-2007
User groups: UNHCR and other IGOs, EU institutions, UK government, ngos, refugee community groups
Planned Outputs : policy paper, academic journal articles, practitioner journal articles, practitioner workshops, articles for Forced Migration Review, Forced Migration Online and other relevant websites
Funder : Compas core seed money plus external funding

3. Migrants’ Decision Making

This project explores migration as an evolving process in which decisions and choices are continuously revised as people travel through various social networks, localities and legal regimes. Among the issues to be examined are the factors that lead people to choose particular routes, channels and destinations; the strategies that are adopted in the face of changing realities; and the way in which networks can help or hinder journeys and entry. Current work in North Africa will link up with related work in currently being developed in France, Turkey and Italy.

Researcher: Liza Schuster. Collaborating individuals/institutions: Smain Laacher (UNHCR/Université Sorbonne/Panthéon) refugee and local community organisations, CIMADE
Timeline: 2004-2006
User groups: NGOs, refugee and local community groups, UNHCR, UK and French governments
Planned Outputs: Literature review, working papers, project briefings and academic journal articles
Funder: Compas core seed money plus external funding

Commissioned works:

1. ‘UK-based diasporas to development and poverty reduction’

This project explores the actual and potential role of UK-based diasporas in development and poverty reduction in their homelands. Although private remittances constitute the most sizeable and tangible form of diaspora contribution this report focuses on collective transfers of various kinds by diasporic associations for development and/or welfare purposes, as well as upon broader forms of collective support among diaspora non-governmental organisations, churches and other bodies, such as social and political lobbying.

Researchers contracted: Nicholas Van Hear (lead person), Frank Pieke and Steven Vertovec
Timeline: Jan to Apr 2004
Funding Body: Department for International Development
Outputs: Policy report - Click here for summary and to download the full report.

2. Informal Remittances Systems

It is often observed that remittances between the developed and the developing world are larger than aid transfers, and monies transferred through formal channels represent only a fraction of the total. This project looks at the informal remittance channels to African, Caribbean and Pacific countries and the role that these play in development.

Researchers contracted: Nicholas Van Hear, Frank Pieke and Steven Vertovec Timeline: July-September 2004
Funding Body: European Community’s Poverty Reduction Programme (EC-Prep), DfID and Deloitte and Touche
Outputs: Click here for summary and to download the full report.

3. ‘Developing DfID’s policy approach to refugees, asylum seekers and internally displaced people’

This study explores current patterns of forced migration in low and middle-income countries, and examines responses by humanitarian actors, including governments, intergovernmental agencies and NGOs. The study is designed to provide a navigation guide to this policy field and to recommend options to help DFID to refine its policy position, as well as to inform thinking in the UK government as a whole.

Researcher contracted: Nicholas Van Hear, Stephen Castles and others, RSC leading
Timeline: May 2004 to February 2005
Funding Body: Dept. for International Development (DfID)
Planned Outputs: Click here for summary and to download the full report.

Other Research Interests and Activities:

Asylum Policies within UK and EU

Dr Schuster has an on-going interest and considerable expertise in UK and EU asylum and migration policy developments, which includes comparing developments in France, Germany and Italy.

Researcher – Liza Schuster
Current Status : Ongoing
Timeline: 2004-2008
User groups: NGOs, refugee community groups, campaign groups, media, UNHCR and other IGOs, EU institutions, UK and other governments
Planned Outputs: academic journal articles, practitioner journal articles, workshops, seminars, media, conferences (inc. PRAXIS conference on EU asylum policy December 2004, and ‘ Fortress Europe and Its "Others": Cultural Representations in Film, Media and the Arts’ University of London, April 2005).