Paper short abstract:

In this contribution, we examine what drives EU funding for further research on migration governance when policymakers already have ample evidence to propel change and, what is more, why we, as researchers, continue to seek such funding.

Paper long abstract:

This contribution, emerging from an ongoing EU-funded research project, tackles vital but often-overlooked ethical questions related to the role of funding in a highly politicised research topic. Specifically exploring whether EU-funded research on irregularised migration can tangibly counter existing policies, practices, and discourses that frame irregular migrants as a problem to be addressed. Thereby perpetuating the notion of migrant illegality and justifying the violence of the current migration regime. We examine what drives EU funding for further research on migration governance when policymakers already have ample evidence to propel change and, what is more, why we, as researchers, continue to seek such funding. Thus, we interrogate our position as anthropologists, in a field that is generously funded but where results are often disregarded in the revision and drafting of policy (Kalir & Cantat, 2020), questioning whether our position is merely self-reproducing, as its only actual impact is to promote our careers as migration scholars.

Without disregarding any of these concerns and acknowledging that most of our work will not effectively contribute to change -or not to change as desired-, we seek to bring together radical critique and relevance by an approach to anthropological work that focuses on scientific rigor and “small” impact. Through a series of examples from previous research experiences, we address how we hope to abandon our eagerness to ‘do good’ (Fischer, 1997; Cabot, 2019) using our position of authority as scholars to do what is needed from us.