Society / Migration

The urban areas surrounding Paris are often considered a symptom – or cause – of the failure of France’s social policies. Cole Stangler speaks to residents of the banlieues, and finds exploitation and division – but a spirit of resistance too.

At least 500 people have drowned in the Mediterranean in a single incident, just the latest in increasingly normalized disasters. Yet in the Western political milieu, it made barely a ripple. Nanjala Nyabola asks why migration policies have become so deadly, and what it will take to change them.

Decades of deadly border policies have transformed the Mediterranean into a watery grave – an inevitable outcome of project ‘Fortress Europe’. In 2002 Yasmin Alibhai-Brown took on the racism behind the anti-refugee sentiment.

Husna Ara speaks to Dr Samara Linton about The Colour of Madness, her co-edited anthology that brings to life the varied experiences of alienation for migrants and people of colour in the UK.

Borders kill.

Hanna Grześkiewicz reports on the humanitarian crisis on the Polish-Belarusian border.

Jake Bowers argues for the rights of travelling peoples to live and move through the landscapes they call home.

Channel pushbacks?

Call of the wild.

Images from the migrant route through Mexico, where desperate people risk a journey fraught with danger to try to make it to the US. Text and photos: Pablo Allison.

Data-snatching, AI and eye-spy: some of the new technologies undermining migrants’ rights.

Governments are increasingly using surveillance and big data to track immigrants. Gaby del Valle reports from the US, where activists are trying to hold data-mining firm Palantir to account.

Ruben Andersson traces the roots of a Freudian fixation.

Syrian artist Amel al-Zakout nearly drowned in the Mediterranean Sea after her boat capsized en route to Greece. Volunteer lifeguard Gerard Canals was part of the rescue operation. Hazel Healy put the two in touch with each other to speak for the first time since the shipwreck.

The threat of Brexit has caused great anxiety about the return of a ‘hard border’ in Ireland. Yet it’s minority communities who have the most to fear, writes Luke Butterly.

Alex Sager imagines a time when all people are free to move.

Planet earth is not the same size for everybody. This infographic shows where you can travel to without a visa, depending on your nationality.

A network of solidarity exists among and alongside those who move, and stay, without permission. Hazel Healy profiles three initiatives. ‘Is it fair that Europe walks as it wants in Africa but not the opposite?’ ‘Once you help, you cannot close your eyes’ ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’.

People have always moved and cultures have always mingled. So why the myopic obsession with borders, asks Hazel Healy.

Check your passport privilege, writes Nanjala Nyabola.