Research Conference: migration, refugees and security in the Eurasian context

During Maastricht School of Management’s 6^th Annual Research Conference, a special session focused on the Migration, Refugees and Security in Eurasia.

Three papers were presented and discussed. The first paper was on ‘Refugee Crisis and Divergences in Europe: The Russian Connection’ and was presented by Hasan Selçuk Türkmen from the Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey. In his paper Mr. Türkmen focuses on how Russia has used the refugee crisis and conflict in Syria in its relations with the EU, arguing “The refugee crisis was a breaking-point for international politics in a number of ways, but most significantly for Russia-EU relations”.

The second paper, on ‘Migrants’ Location Choice: the Role of Migration experience’ was presented by Eugenia Chernina, from the Centre for Labour Market Studies (CLMS) at Higher School of Economics, Moscow. Ms. Chernina studied why many laborers migrate from Tajikistan, and why they largely chose Russia as destination. Using 2007 and 2009 waves of Tajikistan Living Standards Survey combined with Rosstat regional statistics she found substantial inertia in migrants’ choices: previously chosen destinations largely define future ones.

The third paper in this session was by Dr. Derya Buyuktanir, Abdullah Gül University, Turkey, and focused on ‘Increasing Multi-stakeholder Initiatives and Cooperation in Private Sector: The Case of the Syrian Refugee Crises’. This paper starts out by noting that the conflict in Syria has resulted in devastating consequences: more than 250,000 Syrian people dead, almost 8 million, and almost 5 million migrating into neighboring countries. The latter has gave rise to various ‘refugee crises’, which the paper argues the need for “collaborative partnerships” in particularly cross-sector partnerships as an alternative to the traditional belief that the governments are the only problem solvers in conflict and post-conflict areas. The number and the quality of these partnerships and projects should be increased to support social, economic, and cultural integration, rehabilitation, and relief of the Syrian refugees and migrants. The paper point to some directions in how these could be achieved.

This session on migration, refugees and security was chaired by MSM Assistant Professor Nora Stel. Nora is an expert on protracted refugee crises and has written much on topics such as the plight and governance of Palestinian refugees, the European notion of ‘shelter in the region’, and the interaction between politics and entrepreneurship in Lebanon. In the following short video, Nora provides a summary of this session of the conference, and links it to the broader research and policy advocacy agenda of the Maastricht School of Management on the migration-security-entrepreneurship nexus.

See below the video of MS. Nora’ Stel talking about the session on migration, refugees and security at MSM’s 6^th Annual Research Conference:

MSM 6th Annual Research Conference took place on 9 September 2016 in Maastricht, and was on the topic ‘The Rise of Eurasia: New Perspectives on East-West Business and Economic Relations ’.

This conference was organized in collaboration with a number of MSM’s partner institutions, namely ADA University, Azerbaijan, Nanjing University Business School, China, ALMA Management University, Kazakhstan, the Graduate School of Corporate Management of the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), Russia and Abdullah Gul University, Turkey.