Aristide Zolberg argued that international migration is a political phenomenon: every crossing brings sovereign states into contact with each other and with individuals. This course looks at those politics (the theories, the institutions and the current debates) through three lenses: migrants, refugees and diasporas.
You don't have to read this site in order. Use the Weekly Syllabus to see what's due, and the other tabs as a toolkit you can come back to at any point in the term.
Each week's topic, the readings to finish beforehand, and anything due.
The course's theories, grouped by the question each one tries to answer rather than by date. Use this to place a reading within the wider debate.
An interactive timeline of refugee and asylum instruments from 1921 to today, including temporary protection. Click an entry for a short explanation and the official text.
A searchable glossary. "Refugee", "asylum seeker" and "migrant" are not interchangeable, and the differences matter legally and politically.
A migration simulation: draw one of nineteen lives and see how passports, policies and chance shape where people end up.
Türkiye's different roles in migration, plus the data sources you'll need for the podcast's data-analysis step.
What we cover each week. Each card gives the topic, the in-class activity, the reading due before class and any deadline. The full reading pack is on MS Teams.
Migration theories are easiest to understand as competing answers to a small number of questions. Each card names the idea, the key authors and the week where it comes up. The teal box on each card is a question to take into class discussion.
How the protection of refugees and asylum seekers was built over a century: from the League of Nations' group-by-group arrangements and the Nansen passport, through the 1951 Convention and regional treaties, to human rights law and today's temporary protection regimes. Each dot is one instrument or event, coloured by strand, and the larger dots with a year are landmarks. Hover over a dot to see what it is, and click it for a short explanation and links to the official text.
Filter by strand. The Türkiye strand brings together every entry that concerns Türkiye: its own laws and practice, its place in the international instruments, and its temporary protection regime for Syrians. The purple Temporary protection strand follows how TP has been designed and applied, from UNHCR's 1981 mass-influx standards to Ukrainians in the EU. Türkiye's own temporary protection regime is in the Türkiye strand. Each entry is marked as a binding treaty, a non-binding instrument, an institution or national/EU law. Show as list gives the same entries as a list to read through.
The vocabulary of migration is contested: the choice between "irregular" and "illegal", or between "refugee" and "migrant", is itself political. Definitions here are written in plain language and follow IOM and UNHCR usage where one exists. Filter by lens or search.
Türkiye is often described as a country that moved "from emigration to immigration" (Kirişci 2007). It is more accurate to say it plays all of the roles below at the same time. Each card sets out one role, the policies and institutions attached to it, and a question for debate.
How the final grade is made up. Rubrics for the Pecha Kucha and for each podcast sub-task are shared on MS Teams, and each task's instructions say what level of AI use is allowed.
The podcast is built up over the term. Each step is a piece of individual work that feeds into your group's final episode, so choose your theme early and keep to each deadline.
Where to find reliable migration statistics, one card per institution, listing its different datasets. Filter by topic or search by name, and use each card's Try this exercise to get started.