Canadian Consortium on Human Security
Fellow Profile: Heather Johnson
Heather Johnson is a doctoral candidate in International Relations with the Department of Political Science at McMaster University. Her PhD work emphasizes her commitment to interdisciplinary approaches and engaged dialogues of critical inquiry. This reflects her academic background: a BA (Honours) in Development Studies and an International Study Certificate from Queen’s University, and an MA in Globalization Studies from the Institute of Globalization and the Human Condition from McMaster University. She is also an external researcher with the York Centre for International Security Studies at York University.
Heather’s dissertation, tentatively entitled “Borders, Asylum and Agency: Towards a Theory of Non-Citizenship”, begins to examine the ways in which the politics of borders and border control shape global regime(s) of asylum and our understanding of political agency for non-citizens. She examines the challenges and changes in the international refugee regime with an emphasis on global power relations and interconnections. She does this by exposing how patterns of refugee migration interact with discourses of stability and security. Despite the differences in context, her guiding hypothesis is that the border practices of the “developed” world are translated into the practices of humanitarianism in the “developing” world in refugee protection. Further, these translations influence state practices in the developing world in the areas of immigration, asylum and border security in a policy cycle with roots in global power hierarchies.
Guided by these hypotheses, three key research questions emerge: How do global power dynamics, particularly between developed and developing states, operate to control and manage the movement of people across and through borders and to what purpose? How is political agency defined, expressed and challenged within the politics of asylum, and what impact do these constructions have on the lived lives of both refugees and citizens? How do class, gender, race, ethnicity and religion impact the politics of asylum and thus the politics of non-citizenship?
In 2007-2008, Heather was awarded a CCHS Doctoral Dissertation Award, which will provide support for the second phase of her field work at the border between Spain and Morocco. At this site, Heather will focus on the tensions and conflicts that have emerged in an area where the global North and South come into direct contact. She will be interviewing members of the migration policy community, including policy makers and implementers in Spain and Morocco, as well as at the EU level. Interviews will also be conducted with the NGO and advocacy community and, where possible, with refugees and migrants themselves. Heather will complement these interviews with participant observation at key border sites, including Ceuta and Melilla.
This field work builds upon research conducted at Heather’s first site in Tanzania, and will be followed by additional research at a third site in Australia. Her field work at each site focuses on patterns of policy change and leadership, and works to gain a ground-up understanding of the consequences of migration and asylum policies that are becoming increasingly restrictive. Her findings thus far reveal important tensions in the global asylum regime between a very sincere commitment to “durable solutions” that will return refugees to a state of security, and an international environment of increasing suspicion of migration and heightened restrictions that may limit access to protection when needed. Most interestingly, these two divergent patterns seem to be mobilized in tandem with one another and to be converging in policy discourses.
In addition to her dissertation work, Heather also has research interests in development studies and policy and in visual representation practices in refugee studies. While these interests inform her dissertation, she is also pursuing additional projects in these areas. These include a project that examines the gap between development and humanitarian aid, with particular regard to the incorporation of migration, and another that works to develop a framework for understanding the ways aesthetic pieces such as visual images and refugee art inform the global politics of asylum.
Heather currently holds a Canada Graduate Scholarship with the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. In winter 2008, she is also the recipient of a research scholarship with the Institute of Globalization and the Human Condition at McMaster University.
Heather can be reached at: johnsohl (at) mcmaster.ca .
Publications:
“Borders and Citizenship: Voluntary Repatriation and Development” in Huque, Ahmed Shafiqul, ed. The Enigma of Development. (volume forthcoming).
“Subsistence and Control: The Persistence of the Peasantry in the Developing World.” Undercurrent 1:1 (2004). pp. 55-64.
Conference Papers:
“Let us start from that: Aesthetics in International Relations” Presented at the International Studies Association Annual International Convention. San Francisco, March 2008.
“Changing Borders: The European Migration Framework” Presented at the International Association for the Study of Forced Migration. Cairo, January 2008. (with support from CCHS Human Security Fellowship)
“Placement and Agency: Repatriation and Returning Home.” Presented at the International Studies Association Annual International Convention. Chicago, March 2007.
“Representing Victims: Imagining the Female Refugee.” Presented at International Association for the Study of Forced Migration. Toronto, June 2006.
“Constructing Victims: Refugees, Political Agency and Politics of Citizenship.” Presented at the International Studies Association Annual International Convention. San Diego, March 2006.
“Refugee Representations: The Female Victim and Political Agency” Presented at Annual Feminist Research Group Conference “Inter-Actions: Exploring diverse feminist perspectives.” University of Windsor, May 2005.
