Expert Workshop on the International Organization for Migration (IOM)

Cathryn Costello’s RefMig project is hosting this small expert workshop on the International Organization for Migration (IOM). The aim is to bring together a group of experts with established expertise and/or demonstrated research interest in the role and accountability of international organisations in the migration and refugee regimes, with a particular focus on the role of the IOM. 

The workshop is part of one strand of the European Research Council funded project Refugees are Migrants: Refugee Mobility, Recognition, and Rights (RefMig). The published outputs will include an edited collection focusing on mandate and accountability reforms that are due, particularly in light of the IOM’s renewed role under the New York Declaration and the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration, and its new ‘UN-related’ status.

This first workshop aims to review the scholarship and evidence base on the organisation (and the gaps therein) and to develop a research framework to inform the collection and further work. It is envisaged that many attendees will contribute to the edited collection.

We are particularly keen to bring established legal scholars to this issue, as there is a significant gap in the scholarship on international legal questions surrounding IOM qua international organisation, now a ‘UN related’ one. While the project is interdisciplinary, and we welcome input from any pertinent discipline, our main disciplinary focus will be international law and international relations. We welcome participation from those with a particular subject-matter expertise relating to IOM’s activities (e.g. ‘assisted voluntary return’, anti-trafficking, fair recruitment); those with expertise relating to other international organisations with overlapping mandates (e.g. UNHCR, ILO, OCHA); and those with expertise on humanitarian assistance, the UN system and the governance of global and regional migration-related processes.

Participants will be selected based on their established expertise on IOM, or the law and governance of the related subject-matter fields. Participants from all regions and career stages are welcome. We have limited funds to support exceptional scholars at an early career stage, or those from institutions in the Global South who may not be able to fund attendance.

If interested, please email bryony.varnam@qeh.ox.ac.uk ideally by Monday, 17 December 2018, with your CV, and a brief cover note explaining your level of expertise and interest.

Download the Call for Participation (pdf 129KB)