Marlies Casier
Biografie
Marlies Casier is a postdoctoral researcher at the department of Social Work, a member of the MigrLaw research group and part of CESSMIR, the Center for Social Studies on Migration and Refugees. Her research looks at how citizen collectives in solidarity with refugees seek to impact policies. She also lectures on international migration and European border policies in the Master of Science in Conflict and Development Studies and the Erasmus Mundus in Global Studies at the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences of the Ghent University.
Marlies obtained her PhD in Political Sciences at Ghent University, researching the transnational political activism of Kurds from Turkey in Europe. She published extensively on her research in scientific journals and books. Following her PhD, Marlies worked as an international policy advisor on sexual and reprodutive health and rights for Sensoa, the Flemish centre of expertise on sexual health, a job she combined with a position as visiting professor at the Master of Science in Conflict and Development studies at Ghent University.
Marlies holds a bachelor in Social Work, a Master in Moral Sciences and a Master in Conflict and Development Studies.
Project
Advocacy for Migrants in European Transit Zones. Analysing Innovative Strategies for Political Change
A rising number of migrants are ‘stranded’ in so-called ‘transit zones’ across Europe. Most governments try to deter migrants from dwelling in these transit zones, by putting in place a series of repressive policies, e.g. by destroying tents and shelters. This does not deter migrants, but pushes them into ever more destitute living conditions. In response, established NGOs and a variety of grassroots collectives try to pressure governments into changing migrants’ living conditions within these zones and the policies that produce these. This project seeks to investigate these grassroots collectives’ advocacy work within European transit zones (Brussels and Calais) and pan-European. We examine which advocacy strategies have been used since Europe’s 2015 ‘long summer of migration’ (Kasparek and Speer, 2015) and if and how these strategies correspond to changes in (a) the living conditions of migrants in transit zones and (b) the laws and policies that produce these transit zones. Through a combination of a focused literature study, extensive document analysis, interviews and in-depth case studies, this project will contribute to scholarly debates on the innovative nature of advocacy strategies used by grassroots collectives, and on their possibilities (and limitations) in contributing to political change in contemporary migration policies.
Promotor(s): Prof. Dr. Robin Vandevoordt en Prof. Dr. Ellen Desmet
Researcher(s)/contact: dr. Marlies Casier en Prof. Dr. Robin Vandevoordt
Period: September 2023-Augustus 2026