Aila Spathopoulou
Biographic Data
| ID | 270760 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Aila Spathopoulou |
| GIVEN NAMES | Aila |
| FAMILY NAME | Spathopoulou |
| SIGNATURE | SPATHOPOULOU A |
| AFFILIATIONS | Kings College University, London |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-6563-5232 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 8 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 66 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 8 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2018 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
The criminalisation of freedom of movement: An abolition feminist analysis
In EU policy debates and mainstream discourses, the criminalisation of migration and its facilitation are framed as necessary for the protection of ‘vulnerable victims.’ Building on abolition feminism as a critical epistemological and political foundation, we propose a critique of the criminalisation of facilitation and migration which synthesises border abolition with prison abolition, and which conceptualises it as part of global border aparthe…
Imaginaries of ‘Refugee journeys’ into Europe and practices of inhospitality pending return
Employing journey as a critical lens of inquiry, this article interweaves theoretical analysis of anti-migrant narratives with empirical observation to examine hostile policies towards forced migratory journeys into Europe and the UK as an enactment of fear-based imaginaries of the ‘refugee journey’. The paper develops the concept of inhospitality pending return, with focus on practices of inhospitality in places traditionally associated with lei…
Vulnerable Refugees' and 'Voluntary Deportations: Performing the Hotspot, Embodying Its Violence
In this paper, we intervene in naturalised distinctions based on problematic assumptions about agency and choice that underpin the global regime of migration management: namely, that categories of human mobility can be ontologically and juridically distinguished from one another in terms of the degrees or forms of freedom they embody, and that different rights legitimately adhere to each. Focussing on the ‘hotspots’ instituted on 5 islands in the…
Turning Refugees into Migrants: Transit, Dependency and Technological Disruptions in the Greek Asylum System
Outsourcing Hotspot Governance within the EU: Cultural Mediators as Humanitarian-Border Workers in Greece
Responding to the self-declared 'Mediterranean migration crisis' in 2015, the European Commission launched a Hotspot Approach to speed up the handling of incoming migrants in the 'frontline states' of Greece and Italy. A key element in this operation is the identification of those eligible for asylum, which requires effective communication across cultural and linguistic difference between the asylum system and the migrants, facilitated by officia…
Hotspots of resistance in a bordered reality
In this paper, we examine how bordered reality is being imposed and resisted in the context of where we are placed right now, 'Greece'. Drawing on ethnographic research and discourse analysis, conducted in Lesvos, Samos, and Athens (from March to September 2016), we examine how resistance to a bordered reality took place, as islands in the north Aegean, as well as Greek and European territories, were being remapped according to the logic of the h…
New Borders: Hotspots and the European Migration Regime (Radical Geography). By Antonis Vradis, Evie Papada, Joe Painter and Anna Papoutsi
New Borders focuses on the trajectories of the imposition of the hotspot approach in Greece. By way of context, five ‘registration and identification centres’ started operating in Greece in March 2016, on the islands of Lesvos, Chios, Samos, Leros and Kos. The hotspot approach was presented by the European Commission in May 2015 as part of a larger policy push termed the ‘European Agenda on Migration’ (EC 2015). Taking the hotspot as a specific i…
Crisis, What Crisis? Immigrants, Refugees, and Invisible Struggles
Different evocations of “crisis” create distinct categories that in turn evoke certain social reactions. After 2008 Greece became the epicentre of the “financial crisis”; since 2015 with the advent of the “refugee crisis,” it became the “hotspot of Europe.” What are the different vocabularies of crisis? Moreover, how have both representations of crisis facilitated humanitarian crises to become phenomena for European and transnational institutiona…
Vulnerable Refugees' and 'Voluntary Deportations: Performing the Hotspot, Embodying Its Violence
In this paper, we intervene in naturalised distinctions based on problematic assumptions about agency and choice that underpin the global regime of migration management: namely, that categories of human mobility can be ontologically and juridically distinguished from one another in terms of the degrees or forms of freedom they embody, and that different rights legitimately adhere to each. Focussing on the ‘hotspots’ instituted on 5 islands in the…
Hotspots of resistance in a bordered reality
In this paper, we examine how bordered reality is being imposed and resisted in the context of where we are placed right now, 'Greece'. Drawing on ethnographic research and discourse analysis, conducted in Lesvos, Samos, and Athens (from March to September 2016), we examine how resistance to a bordered reality took place, as islands in the north Aegean, as well as Greek and European territories, were being remapped according to the logic of the h…
Crisis, What Crisis? Immigrants, Refugees, and Invisible Struggles
Different evocations of “crisis” create distinct categories that in turn evoke certain social reactions. After 2008 Greece became the epicentre of the “financial crisis”; since 2015 with the advent of the “refugee crisis,” it became the “hotspot of Europe.” What are the different vocabularies of crisis? Moreover, how have both representations of crisis facilitated humanitarian crises to become phenomena for European and transnational institutiona…
Outsourcing Hotspot Governance within the EU: Cultural Mediators as Humanitarian-Border Workers in Greece
Responding to the self-declared 'Mediterranean migration crisis' in 2015, the European Commission launched a Hotspot Approach to speed up the handling of incoming migrants in the 'frontline states' of Greece and Italy. A key element in this operation is the identification of those eligible for asylum, which requires effective communication across cultural and linguistic difference between the asylum system and the migrants, facilitated by officia…
Turning Refugees into Migrants: Transit, Dependency and Technological Disruptions in the Greek Asylum System
Crisis, What Crisis? Immigrants, Refugees, and Invisible Struggles
Different evocations of “crisis” create distinct categories that in turn evoke certain social reactions. After 2008 Greece became the epicentre of the “financial crisis”; since 2015 with the advent of the “refugee crisis,” it became the “hotspot of Europe.” What are the different vocabularies of crisis? Moreover, how have both representations of crisis facilitated humanitarian crises to become phenomena for European and transnational institutiona…
New Borders: Hotspots and the European Migration Regime (Radical Geography). By Antonis Vradis, Evie Papada, Joe Painter and Anna Papoutsi
New Borders focuses on the trajectories of the imposition of the hotspot approach in Greece. By way of context, five ‘registration and identification centres’ started operating in Greece in March 2016, on the islands of Lesvos, Chios, Samos, Leros and Kos. The hotspot approach was presented by the European Commission in May 2015 as part of a larger policy push termed the ‘European Agenda on Migration’ (EC 2015). Taking the hotspot as a specific i…
Hotspots of resistance in a bordered reality
In this paper, we examine how bordered reality is being imposed and resisted in the context of where we are placed right now, 'Greece'. Drawing on ethnographic research and discourse analysis, conducted in Lesvos, Samos, and Athens (from March to September 2016), we examine how resistance to a bordered reality took place, as islands in the north Aegean, as well as Greek and European territories, were being remapped according to the logic of the h…
Turning Refugees into Migrants: Transit, Dependency and Technological Disruptions in the Greek Asylum System
Outsourcing Hotspot Governance within the EU: Cultural Mediators as Humanitarian-Border Workers in Greece
Responding to the self-declared 'Mediterranean migration crisis' in 2015, the European Commission launched a Hotspot Approach to speed up the handling of incoming migrants in the 'frontline states' of Greece and Italy. A key element in this operation is the identification of those eligible for asylum, which requires effective communication across cultural and linguistic difference between the asylum system and the migrants, facilitated by officia…
Vulnerable Refugees' and 'Voluntary Deportations: Performing the Hotspot, Embodying Its Violence
In this paper, we intervene in naturalised distinctions based on problematic assumptions about agency and choice that underpin the global regime of migration management: namely, that categories of human mobility can be ontologically and juridically distinguished from one another in terms of the degrees or forms of freedom they embody, and that different rights legitimately adhere to each. Focussing on the ‘hotspots’ instituted on 5 islands in the…
Imaginaries of ‘Refugee journeys’ into Europe and practices of inhospitality pending return
Employing journey as a critical lens of inquiry, this article interweaves theoretical analysis of anti-migrant narratives with empirical observation to examine hostile policies towards forced migratory journeys into Europe and the UK as an enactment of fear-based imaginaries of the ‘refugee journey’. The paper develops the concept of inhospitality pending return, with focus on practices of inhospitality in places traditionally associated with lei…
The criminalisation of freedom of movement: An abolition feminist analysis
In EU policy debates and mainstream discourses, the criminalisation of migration and its facilitation are framed as necessary for the protection of ‘vulnerable victims.’ Building on abolition feminism as a critical epistemological and political foundation, we propose a critique of the criminalisation of facilitation and migration which synthesises border abolition with prison abolition, and which conceptualises it as part of global border aparthe…
Migration, Refugees, and Integration (6 works) · Political science (5 works) · Law (4 works) · Migration, Health and Trauma (4 works) · Economic geography (3 works) · Economics (3 works) · Geography (3 works) · Global Security and Public Health (3 works) · Refugee (3 works) · Sociology (3 works)