Migration as a social, cultural, political and legal phenomenon has been at the forefront of the debate in the last two decades. Migration as a crisis is a powerful legal and political narrative that dominates the discussion on movement of people and that ultimately shapes policies and regulations at EU, national and international level.
The concept of migration, in its broadest sense, is strictly intertwined with the one of borders. Borders are, in our society, one of the oldest ways to separate and draw distinctions between different societies. From the Roman limes to the Congress of Vienna, the idea of drawing and protecting borders between people and societies has been a powerful concept for law and policy makers. The very same concept of border is worth to be explored: what is a border and how has been designed, and how people on one side and on the other live their different condition as well as the different regulatory framework are questions that should be answered with an interdisciplinary approach, that borrows inter alia from anthropology and legal research. The management of borders is an equally fundamental concept and even more so within the context of a supranational organisation - like the EU - where such a border is shared by 27 Member States. On the other side, within this border EU citizens live in a borderless area where the movement of people, goods, services and capitals is free from traditional limitations, and are unaware of the implications of the reintroduction of such a border, as recent events, like Brexit, clearly showed.
This Conference wants to gather together researchers and fieldwork experts from different backgrounds to reflect in an interdisciplinary perspective on the questions that the interaction between borders (and its management) and migration pose to our societies.
