Viadrina Center B/ORDERS IN MOTION • European University Viadrina

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Viadrina Center

B/ORDERS IN MOTION

Profiles

The Viadrina Center B/ORDERS IN MOTION is a Central Scientific Institution of the European University Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder).

Borders aim to establish or maintain orders, be they specified in law, handed down through history, or expressed through symbols. Orders, in turn, cannot exist in the absence of border demarcations, whether in the form of lines on a map or as patterns for differentiation in people’s minds. The understanding that borders and orders must always be conceived of in dynamic interrelationships guides the work of the Viadrina Center B/ORDERS IN MOTION. It initiates and bundles analyses concerning these interrelationships in the social, cultural, economic, and legal sciences.

Read more about our research profile

Viadrina Center B/ORDERS IN MOTION

European University Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder)

Postal address: Große Scharrnstraße 59, 15230 Frankfurt (Oder)
Scientific Manager: Dr Andrea Meissner
+49 (0) 335 5534 2880
meissner@europa-uni.de
Viadrina Media Portal

Visitor address: Große Scharrnstraße 23a, D-15230 Frankfurt (Oder), Floor 4

Current events

11

Nov

Wednesday 16.15

Nikos Xypolytas: Refugees’ Collective Action in Lesbos, Greece (2015–2020) [EN]

Lecture Series: FORCED MIGRATION, online

25

Nov

Wednesday 14.15

Martina Tazzioli: Unmaking Migrant Life. Technologies of Suffocation in Europe [EN]

Lecture Series: FORCED MIGRATION, online

09

Dec

Wednesday 16.15

S.A. Smythe: Colonial Technologies of Migrant Dispossession across the Mediterranean [EN]

Lecture Series: FORCED MIGRATION, online

06

Jan

Wednesday 16.15

Mohammad Kohistani: Refugee Agency in Context: Afghan Refugees in Poland and Germany [EN]

Lecture Series: FORCED MIGRATION, online

20

Jan

Wednesday 16.15

Jane Freedman: Intersectional Vulnerabilities and the Boundaries of Forced Migration [EN]

Lecture Series: FORCED MIGRATION, online

03

Feb

Wednesday 16.15

Round Table: Welcoming Refugees? Local Reception, Support, and Political Participation [DE/EN]

Lecture Series: FORCED MIGRATION, hybrid: HG 109 & online

News from the Center

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Master’s Thesis on the EU’s Climate Action in the Sahel

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.

04. November 2026

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Call: ERUA Biennale “Arts&Edges”, Lesbos, May 2027 (in-person)

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.

03. November 2026

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New Study Program: Forced Migration - Europe in a Global Context

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.

28. October 2026

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The latest working paper in the B/ORDERS IN MOTION series has been published

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.

24. September 2026

Research | Teaching | Transfer

Research

The insight that borders and orders are inextricably linked guides the work of the Viadrina Center B/ORDERS IN MOTION and is encapsulated in the term “B/ORDERS”. We do not regard borders and orders as being natural and given, but as the result of social practice and the creation of meaning, which is in constant change, “in the making”, “IN MOTION”. Our multidimensional and interdisciplinary approach is designed to capture border and order configurations in their dynamics. In doing so, we focus on the subject areas “borders & boundaries” (understood not only in a territorial, but also in a social and temporal sense) and “migration” as an area defined by multiple border settings and border crossings.

Teaching

The Viadrina Center B/ORDERS IN MOTION attaches great importance to research-based teaching and innovative formats. We view borders as laboratories in which social developments condense and which shape migration. This enables new perspectives on the transformation of cultural, social, economic, legal and state orders. Our courses are designed for BA and MA students as well as doctoral candidates and are offered in German and English.

Transfer

Borders and migration are topics of particular social relevance. As a research institution situated in close proximity to the German-Polish border, we see ourselves as bearing a special responsibility to provide science-based findings for addressing the challenges we face today. We present our research approaches and results in the “Research Factory” series of events and in various publication formats and we seek to engage with the interested public. We collaborate with civil society and public organizations to make our expertise relevant in practice.