Dr. Sara Bellezza

• Zwangsmigration und Grenzabwehr
• Ermessensspielraum in der Grenzgovernance und Rechtsordnungen
• Technologisierung und Datafizierung von Grenzabwehr und Migrationshaft
• Zirkulierende Technologien
• Soziale Bewegungen und Widerstand gegen Migrationskontrolle
• Rechenschaftspflicht/ Accountability, internationales Strafrecht
• EU und Mexiko-USA Grenzregime
• Ethnografische Forschung in Bürokratien und Recht, Rechtsanthropologie
• Partizipative und aktivistische Forschung

Ausgewählte Publikationen

Bellezza, S. (2027a). From Pre-Clearance to Self-Deportation at the Mexico-U.S. Border: How the CBP One App’s Function Creep Reconfigured the Techno-Humanitarian Border. Movements. Journal for Critical Migration and Border Regime Studies, (forthcoming)

Bellezza, S. (2027b). Illegal Policies or “Illegal” People? Truth and Evidence in the Courts under the Trump administration. Focaal. Journal for Global and Historical Anthropology. Submitted as part of a special issue on Brokering evidence: Truth claims and (Non)citizens’ Quests for Rights, eds. Flávio Eiró, Sophie Andreetta, and Jill Alpes (under review)

Pereira, A., & Bellezza, S. (2026). Technologies on the Move. In S. Pollozek, K. Leurs, S. Perret, P. Seuferling, A. Fill, A. Meloni, V. Nagy, & Z. Uhde (Eds.), Migration Data Matters: A Keyword Approach to the Datafication of Migration and Border Control. Liverpool University Press, (forthcoming)

Bellezza, S., & Sadik, H. (2021). Humanitarian Engagement in Maritime Rescue and Migrants’ Relocation. In G. Bevilaqua (Ed.), Human Security in Navigable Spaces: Common Challenges and New Trends. Editoriale Scientifica

Monographie

Bellezza, S., Calandrino, T., Küffner, C., Borghi, L., Biondo, A., Gleitze, J., & Maniatis, G. (2017). Criminalization of Flight and Escape Aid (S. Bellezza, T. Calandrino, & Borderline-Europe - Menschenrechte ohne Grenzen e.V, Eds.). Tredition.

Sara Bellezza is a postdoctoral researcher at the Chair of Social- and Cultural Anthropology and research associate at the B/orders in Motion Center at European University Viadrina. She holds a Ph.D. in Social and Cultural Anthropology from Freie Universität Berlin. Her dissertation is titled Projecting Accountability, Denouncing Border Violence: Legal Counter Practices in and beyond the Mexico-U.S. Borderlands. As a legal anthropologist and critical border studies scholar, she conducted ethnographic research on border policies in the Mexico-U.S. border region, examining the denial of asylum rights and its relation to border violence, as well as efforts to challenge these through accountability politics and litigation. Her current research focuses on the technologization of global border control mechanisms and the resistance they provoke. Currently, she is developing a project on Traveling Confinement Technologies and Counter-Resistance. She is been part of the No Border Movement in EUrope and is a member of borderline-europe: Human Rights Without Borders.

Akademische und berufliche Tätigkeiten

Seit September 2026

Postdoktorandin am Lehrstuhl für Vergleichende Kultur- und Sozialanthropologie, Europa-Universität Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder)

April 2026 – September 2026

Postdoc-Fellow an der European New School of Digital Studies, Europa-Universität Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder)

April 2023

Lehraufenthalt am Institut für Politik- und Rechtsanthropologie, Universität Buenos Aires, Argentinien

2015–2022

Forschung und Projektkoordination bei borderline-europe: Menschenrechte ohne Grenzen e.V.

September 2021 – April 2022

Gastwissenschaftlerin am Center for Comparative Immigration Studies, University of California San Diego

Wissenschaftlicher Werdegang

April 2020 – Juli 2026

Promotion am Institut für Interdisziplinäre Lateinamerikastudien in der Sozial- und Kulturanthropologie, betreut von Prof. Dr. Stephanie Schütze und Prof. Dr. María Dolores París Pombo. Finanziert von der Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung.

Titel der Dissertation: Projecting Accountability, Denouncing Border Violence: Legal Counter Practices in and beyond the Mexico-U.S. Borderlands (summa cum laude)

Oktober 2015 – September 2019

Master of Arts, Interdisziplinäre Lateinamerikastudien, Freie Universität Berlin

Januar 2017 – Juli 2017

Gaststudentin (Graduiertenprogramm), University of the West Indies, Mona Campus, Jamaika

Oktober 2011 – September 2015

Bachelor of Arts, Sozial- und Kulturanthropologie, Lateinamerikastudien, Italienstudien, Freie Universität Berlin