Poland

​The 2021 EU-Belarus border crisis was preceded by a rapid deterioration of the already strained European Union (EU)-Belarus relations, in most part due to the Ryanair 4978 incident and the concomitant wide-ranging sanctions imposed by the EU on the authoritarian government of the Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, who has often been referred by the media as "Europe's last dictator."

​New article in the journal Migration Studies analyses why migrants vote from abroad in elections in countries of origin, based on 80 interviews with Polish and Romanian migrants in Barcelona and Oslo. Whereas analyses of external voting patterns offer insights into the results of external voting compared to origin populations, there is a lacuna of knowledge about why migrants choose to vote, or not, when they have the right to do so. 

​Kelly Fisher has successfully defended his thesis "Moving masculinities: Polish men's migration experiences in Oslo".

Congratulations Kelly!

​In a recent episode of the PRIO Peace in a pod, Marta Bivand Erdal and Lubomiła Korzeniewska share insight from their research with nurse migrants in Norway. They also reflect on how the experience of the pandemic sheds new light on their previous analysis of deskilling in the context of nurse migration.

​Why do migrants vote? How do they compare countries of origin and residence? This new PRIO paper summarizes findings from 80 semi-structured interviews and offers insights from Polish and Romanian migrants living in Barcelona and Oslo. These interviews were conducted as part of the DIASPOlitic project “Understanding the Political Dynamics of Émigré Communities in an Era of European Democratic Backsliding”. The project is funded by the Research Council of Norway and led by the University of Oslo, in collaboration with SWPS University in Warsaw and the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO).

Why do migrants want vote in country of origin elections? Do they seek to drive change? And what are the reasons why some migrants also feel they ought not to have the right to vote in their origin contexts? Through 80 semi-structured interviews with Polish and Romanian migrants in Barcelona and Oslo the DIASPOLitic team sought to find out.

It is a paradox that anti-immigration movements, whose key concern is opposing mobility across borders and who advocate isolationism, nationalism and cultural traditionalism, often work transnationally.

​The project Reaching Out to Close the Border: The Transnationalization of Anti-Immigration Movements in Europe (Anti-Mig) has today been granted 4-year funding from the VAM programme of the Research Council of Norway.

Congratulations to project leader Kristian Berg Harpviken and his researcher colleague at PRIO, Marta Bivand Erdal. In addition, the project has three external members (see below).

​On Wednesday May 22 Natasza Kosakowska-Berezecka and Magdalena Żadkowska, together with Anna Fedas,  Jarosław Józefczyk and Ewa Patyk promoted a review report 'Zaufanie Ponad Granicami: Przegląd Literatury Badawczej Dotyczącej Kwestii Zaufania Społecznego, Migracji, Oraz Instytucji Pomocy Społecznej i Ochrony Praw Dziecka' [a Polish language version of 'Trust across Borders: A Review of the Literature on Trust, Migration and Child Welfare Services'] at the VIII Integration and Migration Forum in Gdańsk, Poland.