Citizens & Aliens. Decolonisation & the Origins of the European Migration Order

Migration has become a hotly-contested issue in contemporary politics. In recent years, debates on freedom of movement have contributed significantly to the deepening fractures across the political landscapes in both the United Kingdom and the European Union.

Public discussion is still centred on a conventional liberal narrative, which highlights the European integration after World War II and notions of pan-European citizenship as building the most wide-ranging experiment in the freedom of movement. Tomas Wallenius’s research will provide a new viewpoint on these debates through a historical analysis of how ideas of citizenship and the right of movement have changed.

His contextual study of the origins of the current European migration order will broaden existing understanding which has, until now, been largely ahistorical and Eurocentric.