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Mig02b


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The post-return knowledge gap - epistemological implications and featured realities II 
Convenors:
Judith Altrogge (University of Osnabrueck)
Kwaku Arhin-Sam (Friedensau Adventist University)
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Format:
Panel
Stream:
Flight and migration
Location:
Room 1231
Sessions:
Thursday 9 June, -
Time zone: Europe/Berlin

Short Abstract:

This panel addresses knowledge creation about return migration from Europe to Africa, focusing on how and why post-return processes are sidelined in many debates. We discuss dissonances between various interests and capacities in knowledge creation along theoretical and empirical contributions.

Long Abstract:

Rising immigration to Europe over the past decades has moved return migration to the political attention of European policy stakeholders, African immigration being no exception. Migrants returning voluntarily could contribute to development in Africa, while returned irregularized migrants strengthen European migration control. Although the so-called 'success' of returns unfolds after return, most European debates revolve around before and during return. Although demands for evidence-based policy making have recently increased empirical attention on post-return, the role of migrants' agency in knowledge production is questionable.

In this panel, we discuss knowledge creation on return migration in a reflexive manner, assuming dissonances between interests and capacities to create post-return knowledge. We seek to address this knowledge gap from theoretical and empirical directions. Theoretically, the gap represents a research subject in itself, considering reasons for the limited focus on post-return, and what the recent attention implies. The panel seeks to discuss which kind of knowledge about (post-)return is and which is not produced by whom and with which consequences. The debate will include postcolonial reflections that question European biases in (post-)return knowledge production.

Meanwhile, the knowledge gap also demands for more and diversified empirical studies that also uncover epistemological limitations of existing understandings. Here, imaginaries of return and the role of post-return therein both in Europe and in Africa are key. How is post-return incorporated in such imaginaries, both by policy and management actors, migrants and their networks alike? The panel seeks interdisciplinary contributions addressing the depicted limitations of return migration knowledge.

Accepted papers:

Session 1 Thursday 9 June, 2022, -
Panel Video visible to paid-up delegates