M J Alpes
Dados Biográficos
| ID | 19045 |
|---|---|
| NOME | M J Alpes |
| PRENOMES | M J |
| SOBRENOME | Alpes |
| ASSINATURA | ALPES M J |
| AFILIAÇÕES | Ghent University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-5369-4996 |
| VERIFICADO | Sim |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 18 |
| TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES | 182 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 18 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2007 |
| ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2025 |
| ÍNDICE H | 6 |
Making pushback facts visible
Pushbacks are practices which result in migrants being forced across borders without an individual assessment of their protection needs. Pushback facts, however, often remain invisible in ECtHR case law because judges rely on state evidence, while states do not consistently record their practice and prevent migrants and civil society organisations from producing evidence. Additionally, states have at times failed to submit requested evidence or s…
Truth-Claim Capital at Borders
This article introduces the concept of truth-claim capital to examine positional struggles over representations of the social world as valid. Drawing on Bourdieu, the concept highlights power asymmetries in converting information into evidence and evidence into proof, as well as contestations over competing truth claims rather than the coexistence of multiple truths. State actors have denied pushbacks, during which people are refused access to as…
Smuggling critique into impact
This article introduces critical and actionable migration research as an approach for scholars seeking to mobilize their epistemic resources to resist migration laws and policies that violate human rights principles in the short and medium term. While academia is increasingly shaped by a neoliberal “impact agenda,” violence at physical and administrative borders, as well human rights violations continue to intensify - raising questions about the …
The Politics of Legal Facts
This article analyzes how the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) handles evidence of pushback, where states violently force asylum seekers away from borders. An examination of how the experiences of pushback survivors get translated (or not) into judgments contributes to theoretical discussions about truth, epistemic practices, and law. The article asks why so little of what researchers, journalists, civil society actors, and international or…
Quand les programmes de réintégration interrogent la citoyenneté
Cet article examine l'impact des programmes de réintégration sur la citoyenneté au Nigéria et au Mali - programmes qui font partie des mesures européennes visant à prévenir les départs. Tandis que les campagnes « de sensibilisation » font des « retournés » des « migrants messagers », nous interrogeons l'expérience que les « retournés » ont de leur nouveau statut social et nous demandons comment celles et ceux qui ne sont jamais partis les perçoiv…
Who Owns the Future of Syrians in Lebanon? Intimate Family Explorations of Refugees’ Own Search for Durable Solutions
For both political and ideological reasons, return is the most favoured future imagined for refugees by policy makers and protection actors. This article analyses how humanitarian migrants in a context of limited durable solutions can be supported to reclaim ownership of their futures, as well as how this can result in deeper insights for social scientists and policy makers. For the case of Syrians, this study deploys futures literacy labs as a p…
What is a legitimate mobility manager? Juxtaposing migration brokers with the EU
This article juxtaposes two types of actors who offer migration services: a state-managed EU programme in Cape Verde and two Cameroonian development NGOs run by businessmen. By framing both as managers of mobility, the article contributes to debates on migration management and the migration industry. The article takes the paradox between official narratives and migrant experiences as a starting point to ask why and how both types of mobility mana…
Marriage at the Embassy
Through an analysis of how the French consulate in Cameroon deals with marriage-related visa applications, this chapter seeks to contribute to our understanding of how border security plays out in state practices on the ground. The chapter seeks to trace the socio-cultural norms of relatedness and ethical expectations that are implicit in interviews and other procedures performed by consular staff. These procedures are of limited importance for a…
Les dynamiques sociologiques entre contrôle des migrations et protection sociale
Cet article vise à dépasser les débats accusant les migrants d’abuser des prestations sociales des États, ou les États d’exclure les migrants. Il s’agit d’analyser l’intersection entre la « protection sociale formelle », c’est-à-dire les services sociaux rendus par l’État, et la « protection sociale informelle » désignant les mécanismes de soutien opérant au sein des réseaux familiaux et sociaux. Cet article s’appuie sur l’étude des expériences d…
Papers That Work
State discourses on smuggling and trafficking are regulatory technologies that seek to institute moral hierarchies between institutions by villanizing third-party mediators as dangerous criminals. This article instead studies high-risk migration and illegality through the actions of migration brokers and from the perspective of aspiring migrants in a place of departure. Seeking to overcome the legal/illegal divide by focusing on interactions at s…
Why aspiring migrants trust migration brokers
In the face of restrictive migration policies, migration brokers in emigration countries sell services that are meant to facilitate departure projects. Not all aspiring migrants who give money to migration brokers are able to travel. This article asks how aspiring migrants in Anglophone Cameroon understand and deal with the potential for deceit by migration brokers. The analysis is based on sixteen months of fieldwork conducted between 2007 and 2…
Brokering High-Risk Migration and Illegality in West Africa
Do young West Africans want to go abroad at any cost because they receive too little or erroneous information? Why do they and their families risk large sums of money with migration brokers? How do the risks of illegality and deportation change migration aspirations in West Africa? This book places trafficking and smuggling within a wider framework of high-risk migration and proposes a novel interpretation of how people manage unwanted and uncert…
Airport Casualties
This article analyzes what can happen to forced returnees upon arrival in their country of nationality. Subjective configurations of state agents in the Global South have created return risks, which in turn transform subjectivities of post-colonial citizens. The article contributes to this Special Issue by tracing repercussions of the externalization and internalization of border controls. In the case of Cameroon, these connections have resulted …
Imagining a future in ‘bush’
This article addresses the migration aspirations of young, lower middle-class Cameroonians living in Anglophone Cameroon. Deportations and prevention campaigns portray the negatives of migration, yet often have little impact because they assume that migrants’ aspirations are grounded in the prior success of other migrants. This research takes its lead from the question: Why aren’t aspiring migrants in Cameroon discouraged by migration failure? It…
Payer pour émigrer
Au Cameroun anglophone, les « migration brokers » sont des personnages publics largement admirés ; cependant, les témoignages de tromperies abondent. Comment les candidats à l’émigration qui donnent de l’argent à ces intermédiaires professionnels envisagent-ils le risque d’être escroqués par eux ? Il s’agit ici de conceptualiser autrement la crédibilité de ces professionnels de la migration, en fonction non plus de la nature supposée de leur acti…
Dealing with Law in Migration Control
This article examines how street-level bureaucrats within migration control use their scope for discretionary powers. On the basis of two ethnographic studies of French consulates in Yaoundé and Tunis, we argue that state agents’ practices are significantly shaped by organizational constraints such as how decision-making processes are organized and the bureaucratic habitus, including the fear of fraud. Like other street-level bureaucrats, consula…
Bushfalling at All Cost
Despite high financial costs, deportations and many frustrated departure attempts, young Anglophone Cameroonians maintain high aspirations for migration. In this article, I lay out the social rationalities of aspiring migrants, as well as the economic, symbolic and informational context of their emigration decisions. On the basis of three case studies, I analyze how information on emigration is controlled, processed, and evaluated. While discours…
The Congress and the INA Trials, 1945–50
Whilst during the war the Indian National Army (hereafter INA) could be charged with having been the ‘puppet army’ of a fascist regime, the INA was brought firmly into the realms of anti-colonial and nationalist discourse after the war. Despite its earlier very distanced position, the Congress chose in 1945 to appropriate the trials of the INA soldiers to its own political advantage. Due to its emotive value, the INA became a symbol of national p…
Dealing with Law in Migration Control
This article examines how street-level bureaucrats within migration control use their scope for discretionary powers. On the basis of two ethnographic studies of French consulates in Yaoundé and Tunis, we argue that state agents’ practices are significantly shaped by organizational constraints such as how decision-making processes are organized and the bureaucratic habitus, including the fear of fraud. Like other street-level bureaucrats, consula…
Why aspiring migrants trust migration brokers
In the face of restrictive migration policies, migration brokers in emigration countries sell services that are meant to facilitate departure projects. Not all aspiring migrants who give money to migration brokers are able to travel. This article asks how aspiring migrants in Anglophone Cameroon understand and deal with the potential for deceit by migration brokers. The analysis is based on sixteen months of fieldwork conducted between 2007 and 2…
Bushfalling at All Cost
Despite high financial costs, deportations and many frustrated departure attempts, young Anglophone Cameroonians maintain high aspirations for migration. In this article, I lay out the social rationalities of aspiring migrants, as well as the economic, symbolic and informational context of their emigration decisions. On the basis of three case studies, I analyze how information on emigration is controlled, processed, and evaluated. While discours…
Papers That Work
State discourses on smuggling and trafficking are regulatory technologies that seek to institute moral hierarchies between institutions by villanizing third-party mediators as dangerous criminals. This article instead studies high-risk migration and illegality through the actions of migration brokers and from the perspective of aspiring migrants in a place of departure. Seeking to overcome the legal/illegal divide by focusing on interactions at s…
What is a legitimate mobility manager? Juxtaposing migration brokers with the EU
This article juxtaposes two types of actors who offer migration services: a state-managed EU programme in Cape Verde and two Cameroonian development NGOs run by businessmen. By framing both as managers of mobility, the article contributes to debates on migration management and the migration industry. The article takes the paradox between official narratives and migrant experiences as a starting point to ask why and how both types of mobility mana…
The Politics of Legal Facts
This article analyzes how the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) handles evidence of pushback, where states violently force asylum seekers away from borders. An examination of how the experiences of pushback survivors get translated (or not) into judgments contributes to theoretical discussions about truth, epistemic practices, and law. The article asks why so little of what researchers, journalists, civil society actors, and international or…
Who Owns the Future of Syrians in Lebanon? Intimate Family Explorations of Refugees’ Own Search for Durable Solutions
For both political and ideological reasons, return is the most favoured future imagined for refugees by policy makers and protection actors. This article analyses how humanitarian migrants in a context of limited durable solutions can be supported to reclaim ownership of their futures, as well as how this can result in deeper insights for social scientists and policy makers. For the case of Syrians, this study deploys futures literacy labs as a p…
Smuggling critique into impact
This article introduces critical and actionable migration research as an approach for scholars seeking to mobilize their epistemic resources to resist migration laws and policies that violate human rights principles in the short and medium term. While academia is increasingly shaped by a neoliberal “impact agenda,” violence at physical and administrative borders, as well human rights violations continue to intensify - raising questions about the …
Quand les programmes de réintégration interrogent la citoyenneté
Cet article examine l'impact des programmes de réintégration sur la citoyenneté au Nigéria et au Mali - programmes qui font partie des mesures européennes visant à prévenir les départs. Tandis que les campagnes « de sensibilisation » font des « retournés » des « migrants messagers », nous interrogeons l'expérience que les « retournés » ont de leur nouveau statut social et nous demandons comment celles et ceux qui ne sont jamais partis les perçoiv…
Les dynamiques sociologiques entre contrôle des migrations et protection sociale
Cet article vise à dépasser les débats accusant les migrants d’abuser des prestations sociales des États, ou les États d’exclure les migrants. Il s’agit d’analyser l’intersection entre la « protection sociale formelle », c’est-à-dire les services sociaux rendus par l’État, et la « protection sociale informelle » désignant les mécanismes de soutien opérant au sein des réseaux familiaux et sociaux. Cet article s’appuie sur l’étude des expériences d…
The Congress and the INA Trials, 1945–50
Whilst during the war the Indian National Army (hereafter INA) could be charged with having been the ‘puppet army’ of a fascist regime, the INA was brought firmly into the realms of anti-colonial and nationalist discourse after the war. Despite its earlier very distanced position, the Congress chose in 1945 to appropriate the trials of the INA soldiers to its own political advantage. Due to its emotive value, the INA became a symbol of national p…
Bushfalling at All Cost
Despite high financial costs, deportations and many frustrated departure attempts, young Anglophone Cameroonians maintain high aspirations for migration. In this article, I lay out the social rationalities of aspiring migrants, as well as the economic, symbolic and informational context of their emigration decisions. On the basis of three case studies, I analyze how information on emigration is controlled, processed, and evaluated. While discours…
Payer pour émigrer
Au Cameroun anglophone, les « migration brokers » sont des personnages publics largement admirés ; cependant, les témoignages de tromperies abondent. Comment les candidats à l’émigration qui donnent de l’argent à ces intermédiaires professionnels envisagent-ils le risque d’être escroqués par eux ? Il s’agit ici de conceptualiser autrement la crédibilité de ces professionnels de la migration, en fonction non plus de la nature supposée de leur acti…
Dealing with Law in Migration Control
This article examines how street-level bureaucrats within migration control use their scope for discretionary powers. On the basis of two ethnographic studies of French consulates in Yaoundé and Tunis, we argue that state agents’ practices are significantly shaped by organizational constraints such as how decision-making processes are organized and the bureaucratic habitus, including the fear of fraud. Like other street-level bureaucrats, consula…
Imagining a future in ‘bush’
This article addresses the migration aspirations of young, lower middle-class Cameroonians living in Anglophone Cameroon. Deportations and prevention campaigns portray the negatives of migration, yet often have little impact because they assume that migrants’ aspirations are grounded in the prior success of other migrants. This research takes its lead from the question: Why aren’t aspiring migrants in Cameroon discouraged by migration failure? It…
Airport Casualties
This article analyzes what can happen to forced returnees upon arrival in their country of nationality. Subjective configurations of state agents in the Global South have created return risks, which in turn transform subjectivities of post-colonial citizens. The article contributes to this Special Issue by tracing repercussions of the externalization and internalization of border controls. In the case of Cameroon, these connections have resulted …
Brokering High-Risk Migration and Illegality in West Africa
Do young West Africans want to go abroad at any cost because they receive too little or erroneous information? Why do they and their families risk large sums of money with migration brokers? How do the risks of illegality and deportation change migration aspirations in West Africa? This book places trafficking and smuggling within a wider framework of high-risk migration and proposes a novel interpretation of how people manage unwanted and uncert…
Marriage at the Embassy
Through an analysis of how the French consulate in Cameroon deals with marriage-related visa applications, this chapter seeks to contribute to our understanding of how border security plays out in state practices on the ground. The chapter seeks to trace the socio-cultural norms of relatedness and ethical expectations that are implicit in interviews and other procedures performed by consular staff. These procedures are of limited importance for a…
Les dynamiques sociologiques entre contrôle des migrations et protection sociale
Cet article vise à dépasser les débats accusant les migrants d’abuser des prestations sociales des États, ou les États d’exclure les migrants. Il s’agit d’analyser l’intersection entre la « protection sociale formelle », c’est-à-dire les services sociaux rendus par l’État, et la « protection sociale informelle » désignant les mécanismes de soutien opérant au sein des réseaux familiaux et sociaux. Cet article s’appuie sur l’étude des expériences d…
Papers That Work
State discourses on smuggling and trafficking are regulatory technologies that seek to institute moral hierarchies between institutions by villanizing third-party mediators as dangerous criminals. This article instead studies high-risk migration and illegality through the actions of migration brokers and from the perspective of aspiring migrants in a place of departure. Seeking to overcome the legal/illegal divide by focusing on interactions at s…
Why aspiring migrants trust migration brokers
In the face of restrictive migration policies, migration brokers in emigration countries sell services that are meant to facilitate departure projects. Not all aspiring migrants who give money to migration brokers are able to travel. This article asks how aspiring migrants in Anglophone Cameroon understand and deal with the potential for deceit by migration brokers. The analysis is based on sixteen months of fieldwork conducted between 2007 and 2…
What is a legitimate mobility manager? Juxtaposing migration brokers with the EU
This article juxtaposes two types of actors who offer migration services: a state-managed EU programme in Cape Verde and two Cameroonian development NGOs run by businessmen. By framing both as managers of mobility, the article contributes to debates on migration management and the migration industry. The article takes the paradox between official narratives and migrant experiences as a starting point to ask why and how both types of mobility mana…
Who Owns the Future of Syrians in Lebanon? Intimate Family Explorations of Refugees’ Own Search for Durable Solutions
For both political and ideological reasons, return is the most favoured future imagined for refugees by policy makers and protection actors. This article analyses how humanitarian migrants in a context of limited durable solutions can be supported to reclaim ownership of their futures, as well as how this can result in deeper insights for social scientists and policy makers. For the case of Syrians, this study deploys futures literacy labs as a p…
The Politics of Legal Facts
This article analyzes how the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) handles evidence of pushback, where states violently force asylum seekers away from borders. An examination of how the experiences of pushback survivors get translated (or not) into judgments contributes to theoretical discussions about truth, epistemic practices, and law. The article asks why so little of what researchers, journalists, civil society actors, and international or…
Quand les programmes de réintégration interrogent la citoyenneté
Cet article examine l'impact des programmes de réintégration sur la citoyenneté au Nigéria et au Mali - programmes qui font partie des mesures européennes visant à prévenir les départs. Tandis que les campagnes « de sensibilisation » font des « retournés » des « migrants messagers », nous interrogeons l'expérience que les « retournés » ont de leur nouveau statut social et nous demandons comment celles et ceux qui ne sont jamais partis les perçoiv…
Making pushback facts visible
Pushbacks are practices which result in migrants being forced across borders without an individual assessment of their protection needs. Pushback facts, however, often remain invisible in ECtHR case law because judges rely on state evidence, while states do not consistently record their practice and prevent migrants and civil society organisations from producing evidence. Additionally, states have at times failed to submit requested evidence or s…
Truth-Claim Capital at Borders
This article introduces the concept of truth-claim capital to examine positional struggles over representations of the social world as valid. Drawing on Bourdieu, the concept highlights power asymmetries in converting information into evidence and evidence into proof, as well as contestations over competing truth claims rather than the coexistence of multiple truths. State actors have denied pushbacks, during which people are refused access to as…
Smuggling critique into impact
This article introduces critical and actionable migration research as an approach for scholars seeking to mobilize their epistemic resources to resist migration laws and policies that violate human rights principles in the short and medium term. While academia is increasingly shaped by a neoliberal “impact agenda,” violence at physical and administrative borders, as well human rights violations continue to intensify - raising questions about the …
Political science (16 obras) · Sociology (13 obras) · Law (11 obras) · Migration, Refugees, and Integration (11 obras) · Migration and Labor Dynamics (10 obras) · Politics (10 obras) · Law (9 obras) · Geography (7 obras) · Political economy (6 obras) · Migration, Identity, and Health (5 obras)