News from the Center

Leonie Oechtering examines the main drivers behind the EU’s climate action in the Sahel, and how climate, development, migration and security concerns are balanced in this process. Her Master’s thesis at the Future Lab Social Metabolism and Impacts was supervised by Prof. Dr Kira Kosnick from the European University Viadrina and Dr Julia M. Blocher from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK). The Master’s thesis is available on the PIK’s website.

The ERUA Biennale ‘Arts & Edges’ invites researchers, lecturers, PhD students and Master’s students to submit proposals for its second edition. From 28 to 30 May 2027, the event will bring together art, academia and society on Lesbos (Greece). We welcome, amongst other things, workshops, exhibitions, performances and research presentations on topics such as migration, sustainability, democracy and cultural diversity.

The Joint Master program PATHS Forced Migration: Europe in a Global Context will start in the winter semester 2027/28. It offers you three paths, from which you select one, focusing on different dimensions of forced migration in and around Europe. The paths take place at six different locations and universities across Europe that will allow you to engage deeply with different contexts which are highly relevant for understanding current dynamics around forced migration.

Maria Klessmann (Hg.) (2026): Grenzen in Szene setzen: Zur visuellen Repräsentation nationalstaaticher Grenzen - Borders in the Spotlight: On the Visual Representation of National Borders. Working Paper Series B/ORDERS IN MOTION, Nr. 14.

The lecture series is organised by the Viadrina Center B/ORDERS IN MOTION and brings together interdisciplinary perspectives on forced migration, borders, asylum and the reception of refugees. It examines how experiences of displacement are shaped by immigration and asylum regimes, legal insecurity, racialisation, gendered and intersectional inequalities, and changing infrastructures of border control and reception.

We are delighted to announce that the DFG network ‘Un/Gewisse Grenzen’ has been successfully approved. From the end of this year, an interdisciplinary working group comprising 15 researchers will spend three years conducting joint research into the relationship between borders and uncertainty.

Spatialities, Temporalities and Materialities of Border Complexities, edited by Falk Bretschneider, Sylvie Grimm-Hamen, Hedwig Wagner, Carolin Leutloff-Grandits and Christian Wille. Baden-Baden: Nomos, 1st edition 2026, 292 pages. (Border Studies. Cultures, Spaces, Orders, Vol. 13). ISBN 978-3-8487-7827-0. Also available as an e-book.

On May 13, 2025, the Viadrina Center B/ORDERS IN MOTION welcomed a group of 25 diplomats from the Federal Foreign Office’s “16th International Diplomats Programme” (IDP16).

Kira Kosnick: Postmigrant Counterpublics. Racialised Leisure and Sexual Dissidence in Urban Europe. Berlin: Transcript, 2025. open access

The report [available in German] provides a concise overview of research projects, third-party funding, publications, teaching, outstanding events, and other transfer activities, as well as the national and international network of the Viadrina Center B/ORDERS IN MOTION.

ŻYCIE, NAUKA lub PRACA w niemiecko-polskim regionie przygranicznym

Regional and municipal cooperation in the German-Polish border region, challenges and dynamics of cross-border cooperation using the example of Brandenburg-Lubuskie, ed. by Peter Ulrich and Martin Reents, Potsdam: Universitätsverlag Potsdam, 2025.

Social rights for Ukrainian refugees – the legal framework and practical implications of the activation of the Mass Influx Directive in Poland and Germany. By: Jonathan Härle, Jessica Holka, Natalia Radziwinowska and Ole Weitermann. Working Paper Series B/ORDERS IN MOTION No. 13

Deadline: 15 September 2025

The volume, edited by Centre members Peter Ulrich, Norbert Cyrus and Jarosław Jańczak, comprises 18 contributions and is aimed at both practitioners and researchers. The volume was presented to the public on June 25, 2025.

The annual report of the Viadrina Center B/ORDERS IN MOTION for 2024 is now available online (in German).