Migration Law
The Faculty of Law has a strong migration law research environment. The migration law initiative was launched in 2010. In 2011 the research network Lund / Uppsala Migration Law Network, L/UMIN, (now GL/UMIN) started, which is a collaboration between the law faculties at Uppsala, Lund and Gothenburg as well as the Department of Philosophy, Uppsala University. The research network is today one of the largest in the field of migration law in Sweden and Scandinavia. The migration law research environment at the Faculty of Law in Uppsala acts as a hub for the network.
Researchers in the migration law environment engage in various forms of interaction with other parts of society, for example by participating in different types of debates, giving lectures, and by contributing expertise to government agencies and inquiries. In the years since its inception, the migration law environment at Uppsala University’s Faculty of Law has been granted additional funding for research both internally at the university and from external research funding bodies.
Current research
Our ongoing research includes among others Nordic Refugee Determination: Advancing Data Science in Migration Law (Nordasil), which is a multidisciplinary research project aimed at investigating which factors influence asylum decisions and why asylum decisions in similar cases may differ as much as is the case today between different countries and different regions. Nordasil is funded by Nordforsk, runs 2021-2024, and is managed by the University of Copenhagen. Uppsala is responsible for the subproject dealing with medical evidence. The subproject involves researchers from the Department of Law (Rebecca Thorburn Stern and Isa Cegrell Karlander) as well as from the Department of Public Health and Caring Sciences. More information about Nordasil can be found here https://www.nordforsk.org/sv/projects/nordic-refugee-determination-advancing-data-science-migration-law-nordasil.
Furthermore, we would like to mention the research that takes place within the framework of the interdisciplinary research network "Migration as a Legal and Political Process", funded by CIRCUS (Center for Integrated Research on Culture and Society) at Uppsala University 2020-2022. The network brings together researchers active at Uppsala University in law, history, philosophy, social sciences, and theology with the aim of developing research on migration as a movement not only geographically but also in time. The research network has, among other things, initiated projects on family-related migration and has recently started a project on statelessness.
Additionally, we have an ongoing project called "The Convention on the Rights of the Child as a national law: any difference for children seeking asylum?" (2016-2021) funded by the Ragnar Söderberg Foundation (project manager Rebecca Thorburn Stern, see https://ragnar.soderbergs.org/anslagsdatabas/).
Researchers
Daniel Hedlund, post-doc researcher with a focus on migration 2019-2021. Hedlund's post-doc project has focused on unaccompanied children's conditions in relation to asylum testing and goodwill, and is also interested in integration issues related to social law and methodological discussions about multidisciplinary. Hedlund is affiliated with Uppsala Forum and the Center for Research on Religion and Society (CRS). See profile here https://katalog.uu.se/profile/?id=N19-1924.
Isa Cegrell Karlander, post-doc researcher within the Nordasil project (see above) 2021-2023. Cegrell Karlander has a PhD in administrative law and defended her dissertation "The Migration Court's investigative duty" in 2021. See profile here https://katalog.uu.se/profile/?id=N12-2089.
Rebecca Thorburn Stern, Professor of Public International Law. Thorburn Stern's research is mainly in the fields of asylum law and human rights. See profile and CV here https://katalog.uu.se/profile/?id=N1-386.
Maria Bexelius, doctoral student in Public International Law. Bexelius is active in migration law and international law as well as human rights. Her ongoing research project (dissertation) is "Refugee law, power and the (re) production of inequality". Bexelius is also active at Enskilda Högskolan Stockholm See profile here https://katalog.uu.se/profile/?id=N12-2087.
Lina Melén, doctoral student in Private International Law and International Civil Procedure. Melén's dissertation highlights the interplay between international private and procedural law and migration law, with a focus on issues of recognition of foreign marriages and other status relationships. https://katalog.uu.se/profile/?id=N19-1903
Contact person
Rebecca Thorburn Stern
Networks
The Gothenburg Uppsala/Lund Migration Law Network, GL/UMIN (the website is being restructured)
Migration as a Legal and Political Process/CIRCUS
The Centre for Multidisciplinary Research on Religion and Society, Uppsala University (CRS)
The Nordic Institute for Migration (NIM)
The Children's Rights Centre, Stockholm University
Odysseus Academic Network for Legal Studies on Immigration and Asylum in Europe
Isa Cegrell Hedlund