Call for papers: “Unpacking Migration in the Caucasus and Beyond” Regional Online Conference
Call for papers: “Unpacking Migration in the Caucasus and Beyond” Regional Online Conference
Caucasus Research Resource Center-Armenia Foundation (CRRC-Armenia) is pleased to announce a call for papers for “Unpacking Migration in the Caucasus and Beyond” regional online 2-day conference to take place on September 27-28. The conference is implemented in partnership with CRRC Georgia as part of the “Unpacking migration in the Caucasus: Evaluating what we know for action” project funded by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.
Conference scope:
In the light of the ongoing geopolitical transformations, security and healthcare crises, migration is again becoming a key challenge in global affairs. Many post-Soviet states with high levels of outmigration flow face similar challenges. General lack of organized national communication, no centralized data, minimal online databases or digital tracking tools, and poor presentation and public availability are all common themes in gathering migration data in the South Caucasus region.
Additionally, the transient and poorly documented nature of short-term labor and conflict-affected migration pose not only administrative issues in collecting proper comparable statistics, but also create national and economic security challenges in the region, making data dissemination particularly difficult. While research in general shows that access to data is critical in understanding migration, disseminating such data must be done with caution and understanding of its implications. How to study migration in times of uncertainty? What can promote collaboration for networked action towards understanding migration? Can research and policy align to resolve challenges posed by migration?
The goal of the “Unpacking migration in the Caucasus and Beyond” conference is to bring together regional and international migration scholarship, expertise and practice to address issues related to data collection and evidence-driven policy making on migration. With the main geographical focus being the South Caucasus, the conference aims at ensuring knowledge exchange between the regional and the wider Eastern Partnership and global domains. The conference is to serve as a call for informed action advocating for a more efficient synchronization of migration research and data-driven decision making.
Conference structure:
The conference will consist of panel discussions with participation of migration-related regional officials and experts, as well as presentation of research and policy papers on the general theme of studying migration. We welcome quality scholarship on a variety of topics including but not limited to:
- Challenges and opportunities of migration in global crises;
- Problems of research ethics in studying people on the move;
- Collaborative and innovative research methodologies;
- Evidence-based action and dialogue on migration.
The conference will take place entirely online, through Zoom platform, and will be broadcasted on Facebook and Youtube. The working language of the conference is English. The preliminary agenda of the conference can be found here. Follow the Facebook event for updates.
How to apply?
To present a paper at the conference, we kindly ask all interested early-career and experienced scholars, policy practitioners, academics from various social science disciplines dealing with migration studies to submit abstracts (max. 2000 characters) via this form by 18:00, September 11, 2022. Final notification of selection results will be communicated in mid-September. Participation in the conference is completely free of charge.
Important dates:
Submission of paper abstracts: 18 September, 2022
Selection results: 22 September, 2022
Conference dates: 27-28 September, 2022
Publication of book of abstracts: mid-October, 2022
The Call for Papers can be downloaded HERE.
About CRRC centers:
The Caucasus Research Resource Centers (CRRC) is a network of research and research support centers in the capital cities of Armenia, Georgia, and Azerbaijan. CRRC’s goal is to strengthen social science research and public policy analysis in the South Caucasus. Over the past seventeen years, the CRRC offices have become a nexus of activity for the social science community in the South Caucasus by providing open access to data, scholarly literature, and professional training for social science researchers. For more information about CRRC and the upcoming conference, please visit the respective country websites at crrc.am, crrc.ge, crrc.az.