Roundtable: Refugee Protection Amid Global Displacement and Asylum Contestation
A BSA Diaspora, Migration & Transnationalism Study Group and School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Leeds Event
19 June 2025 (10-11.30am BST)
Online
Roundtable Guests
- Dr Eiko Thielman, London School of Economics
- Dr Gaja Maestri, Aston University
- Dr Tesfalem Yemane, The University of Liverpool
- Chair: Dr Roxana Barbulescu, BSA and University of Leeds
About the Event
We are witnessing an intensifying contestation of the right to asylum and refugee protection, as states across the globe adopt increasingly restrictive and deterrent-based approaches to forced migration. This roundtable brings together scholars from sociology, migration studies, and international law to critically examine the shifting terrain of refugee protection in the context of rising displacement, securitisation, and the erosion of international norms.
The discussion will explore how contemporary refugee regimes are being reshaped by geopolitical interests, racialised border practices, and the externalisation of asylum responsibilities. It will also consider the lived experiences of refugees navigating these hostile environments, and the forms of resistance, resilience, and solidarity that emerge in response. By foregrounding the structural inequalities and power relations that underpin displacement, the roundtable seeks to move beyond legalistic framings and towards a more sociologically grounded understanding of protection and mobility. Taking place during Refugee Week, this event offers a timely opportunity to reflect on the role of sociological scholarship in responding to one of the most urgent humanitarian and political challenges of our time. It invites critical engagement with the ethical and practical implications of current asylum policies, and asks how academic research can contribute to more just and inclusive approaches to displacement.
- Dr Eiko Thielman is Associate Professor in Political Science and Public Policy in the Department of Government and the European Institute at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Amongst Dr Eiko Thielman’s recent publications you are invited to read Solidarity challenges in EU refugee policymaking: a comparison of the Yugoslav, Syrian, and Ukrainian Crises. (2025) and Why courts are the life buoys of migrant rights: anti-immigrant pressure, variation in judicial independence, and asylum recognition rates (2023).
- Dr Gaja Maestri is Lecturer in Sociology and Policy in the School of Social Sciences and Humanities at Aston University, Birmingham, UK. Amongst Dr Maestri’s recent publications you are invited to read Between Charity and Protest. The Politicisation of Refugee Support Volunteers (2022) Who deserves compassion? The moral and emotional dilemmas of volunteering in the ‘refugee crisis’ (2020).
- Dr Tesfalem Yemane is Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Department of Geography at the University of Liverpool where he is part of the team of the ESRC -funded project Channel Crossing. Dr Yemane’s recent publications include ‘Bringing order to the border’: liberal and illiberal fantasies of border control in the English channel (2024) and Eco-coloniality and the violent environmentalism of the UK–France border (2024).
- Dr Roxana Barbulescu is Associate Professor in the School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Leeds and BSA Diaspora, Migration and Transnationalism convenor. Amongst Dr Barbulescu’s recent publications you are invited to read Still a Beacon of Human Rights? Considerations on the EU Response to the Refugee Crisis in the Mediterranean (2017) and Unaccompanied minors, migration control and human rights at the EU’s southern border: The role and limits of civil society activism (2016).
Registration
This event is free to attend but registration is required.