MiReKoc is pleased to invite you to MiReKoc-BROAD-ER Wednesday Seminar Series organized under the BROAD-ER Project and in collaboration with Koç University College of Administrative Science and Economics’ International Relations Seminar Series.

This year, the Seminar Series welcomes a group of researchers and stakeholders under the themes of the BROAD-ER Project (Bridging the Migration and Urban Studies Nexus). BROAD-ER is an EC-funded Twinning Project that primarily intends to lay the foundations of strategic networking and collaboration in the themes of migration and urban studies.

The Schedule of the Webinar is as followed:

• Ricard Zapata-Barrero 29 MARCH “Urban resilience, Migration Governance and Mediterranean Region-building”
• Aylin Yardımcı 5 APRIL “Istanbul’s international vision in practice: Pay It Forward”
• Anja van Heelsum 12 APRIL “Addressing the quality of migration governance, the ADMIGOV approach”
• Gerasimos Tsourapas 3 MAY “Migration Diplomacy & Greek-Turkish Relations: A Three-Level Game Approach”
• Özgün Topak 10 MAY “Capture and evasion at Africa-Euro migrant journeys”
• Claire Dorrity 17 MAY “Migration and the City: Perspectives from Tunisia”

The Seminar Series will take place in a hybrid format. Registration is required for ALL PARTICIPANTS via the link: https://kocun.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_2E5nrL40RTqbV0yzTH-Bew

For in-person participants, the webinar will take place at CASE 127, CASE Faculty Lounge on Wednesdays at 12pm. For participants not affiliated with Koç University and wishes to attend the seminar in person, please register and send an email to mirekoc@ku.edu.tr . 

Short-bios of the Participants:

Ricard Zapata-Barrero is a full Professor in the Department of Political and Social Sciences, Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF-Barcelona). His main lines of research deal with contemporary issues of liberal democracy in contexts of diversity, especially the relationship between democracy, citizenship, and immigration. He conducts theoretical and empirical research on migration and in the Mediterranean area. He is the Director of GRITIM-UPF (Interdisciplinary Research Group on Immigration), and of the Master’s Program in Migration Studies at UPF . He is a member of the Board of Directors of the largest research network on Immigration in Europe IMISCOE and Chair the External Affairs Committee. He coordinates EuroMedMig (Euro-Mediterranean Research Network on Migration). Webpage: https://www.upf.edu/web/ricard-zapata/

Aylin Yardımcı is currently the Foreign Relations Coordinator at IBB’s Mayor’s Office. She was the producer and presenter of This Week in Turkey, Medyascope’s weekly English-language news show covering the latest developments in the country and the wider region between 2016-2019. She is also doing her PhD studies on Political Science and International Relations at Koç University.

Anja van Heelsum is an associate professor at the Department of Political Sciences and Project Coordinator of EU funded H2020 research consortium Advancing Alternative Migration Governance (AdMiGov). With partner institutes in Greece, Poland, Spain, Belgium, Denmark, Turkey, Lebanon and Ethiopia, the consequences of migration policies on the ground are studied, with the intention to suggest alternatives.

Gerasimos Tsourapas works on the international relations of the Middle East and the broader Global South, with a particular focus on the politics of migrants, refugees, and diasporas. He is currently the Principal Investigator of a five-year European Research Council Starting Grant project on migration diplomacy, and the Chair of the Ethnicity, Nationalism, & Migration Studies (ENMISA) Section of the International Studies Association (2023–25). Dr Tsourapas is the author of “The Politics of Migration in Modern Egypt – Strategies for Regime Survival in Autocracies” (Cambridge University Press, 2018) and “Migration Diplomacy in the Middle East and North Africa – Power, Mobility, and the State” (Manchester University Press, 2021). He co-edited, with Prof Maria Koinova, a special issue on “Diasporas and Sending States in World Politics” for International Political Science Review.

Özgün E. Topak is an Associate Professor at the Department of Social Science at York University, Canada. He is an Associate Editor of Surveillance & Society, and an Executive Committee Member & Resident Scholar at York’s Centre for Refugee Studies (CRS). Dr. Topak is an interdisciplinary social scientist interested in topics of migration, surveillance, authoritarianism, social theory and human rights.

Dr. Claire Dorrity is a lecturer in social policy at the School of Applied Social Studies, University College Cork (UCC). Her main research interests include Migration Policy; Critical Multiculturalism; Border Securitisation; and Migrant Integration. Her most recent research project EMBRACE, an IRC funded research project focused on border securitisation practices on the US /Mexican Border and North Africa/EU Mediterranean border. Her teaching interests include migrant policy and practice in the EU; anti-racist and anti-discriminatory practice; cultural awareness and cultural competence in professional practice; and ethnocentrism and power hierarchies in cross-cultural settings.