Events

The summer school offers an intensive, interdisciplinary and participative approach to the study of forced migration. It aims to enable people working with refugees and other forced migrants to reflect critically on the forces and institutions that dominate the world of the displaced.

Now in its 22nd year, the three-week course combines the very best of Oxford University’s academic excellence with a stimulating and participatory method of critical learning.

At the end of November, the RSC hosted a two-day experts workshop on conflict and forced migration in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The event  was generously funded by the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (DRC office) and DFID.

Fifty practitioners, academics and policymakers from the DRC and beyond explored the relation between conflict, displacement, the return of populations and the interaction between armed actors and civilians. Policy suggestions to end the vicious cycle of violence, including sexual and gender-based violence and displacement emanating from FMR 36 and the workshop have been presented and discussed in a visit of RSC affiliates to the DRC in February 2011.

The Refugee Studies Centre, Oxford Department of International Development, University of Oxford, is pleased to announce that Professor Saskia Sassen will give the Annual Elizabeth Colson Lecture on 26 May 2010.

The lecture will take place at the Bernard Sunley Lecture Theatre, St Catherine's College, Manor Road, Oxford (0X1 3UJ). The event will start at 5pm and will be followed by a drinks reception.

Saskia Sassen is the Robert S. Lynd Professor of Sociology and Member, The Committee on Global Thought, Columbia University (www.saskiasassen.com). Her latest books are "Territory, Authority, Rights: From Medieval to Global" "Assemblages" (Princeton University Press 2008) and "A Sociology of Globalization" (Norton 2007). She has recently completed a five-year project for UNESCO on sustainable human settlement, the results of which have been published as one of the volumes of the "Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems" (Oxford: EOLSS Publishers).

The lecture will be entitled "The complexity of Powerlessness: What makes human rights law perform?" Saskia Sassen will speak about the limits of power and the complexities of powerlessness – the direct or mediated resistances that the powerless can deploy knowingly or not. Immigration and human rights help to explore these more abstract issues – especially in powerful countries vis-à-vis undocumented workers, who are among the most vulnerable subjects in those same countries. And yet, under certain conditions, the powerless can make history, even if they do not gain power in this process. She will discuss two institutional domains where powerlessness can become complex and the powerless have made history.

For more information or to reserve a seat, please contact Wouter te Kloeze: wouter.tekloeze@qeh.ox.ac.uk, +44(0)1865 281726

The Refugee Studies Centre and the Las Casas Institute on Ethics, Governance and Social Justice are organizing an international conference on ‘Faith-based humanitarianism: the response of faith communities and faith-based organisations to people affected by conflict, crisis and forced migration’.

The conference aims to consider the motives, role and impact of faith-based organisations in their responses to people affected by conflict, crisis and forced migration and how faith-based approaches differ from the responses of secular humanitarian organisations. The conference will discuss the role faith plays in the lives of forced migrants. It will touch on the occasional culpability of faith-based institutions in generating conflicts leading to forced displacement while also considering the role of faith communities and faith-based organisations in conflict mediation and resolution. The conference will convene academics, humanitarian practitioners, policymakers, theologians and inter-faith representatives. Southern scholars, practitioners and forced migrants will also be involved in debates on these issues which directly affect their work and lives.

The Call for Papers and Expression of Interest Form are now available on the Refugee Studies Centre website.

International Summer School in Forced Migration Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford.

5 – 23 July 2010

Applications are invited for this year’s International Summer School in Forced Migration, to be held at Wadham College, Oxford. Apply by 1 March (bursary applicants), 1 May (self-/employer-funded applicants). Now in its 21st year, the course offers an intensive, interdisciplinary and participative approach to the study of forced migration. It aims to enable people working with refugees and other forced migrants to reflect critically on the forces and institutions that dominate the world of the displaced.

Participants

Practitioners involved with assistance and policymaking for forced migrants. Graduate researchers specialising in the study of forced migration.

Fees

£3,025. Early-bird fee (apply and pay by 31 March): £2,850.

Applications

By post, fax or online. For further information and an application form, please visit the RSC website or contact