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We are delighted to announce that this year’s Best Thesis Prize has been awarded to Diletta Lauro

Each year, the Examiners for the MSc in Refugee and Forced Migration Studies have the discretion to award a prize for the best thesis submitted by one of the students on the course. Dilatta Lauro won the award for her thesis on ‘The underlying conceptions of membership of anti-deportation campaigns in the United Kingdom’, which was written under the supervision of Matthew Gibney.

Diletta uses a study of the Roseline Akhalu case to explore the underlying conceptions of political membership within UK anti-deportation campaigns. The Examiners felt it was an ambitious and original piece of work which uses the novel angle of community-based articulation to investigate concepts and practices of citizenship in the context of deportation. In addition to setting out a clear research question, Diletta showed a sound understanding of a very thorough range of political theory literature and used appropriate methodology to derive original conclusions. The work is analytically sophisticated and empirically compelling throughout, and the Examiners felt it makes a strong contribution to forced migration studies and recommended it for publication as a journal article.

All students on the MSc in Refugee and Forced Migration Studies who receive a distinction in their dissertations are encouraged to revise their work for publication in the RSC Working Paper Series. This year, eight candidates in all have been invited to publish.

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