Migration and Racialization in Times of “Crisis”: The Making of Crises and their Effects (Studies in International Development and Globalization) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0776641700 ISBN 13: 9780776641706

Publisher: University of Ottawa Press, 2025

Synopsis

Modern history is marked by a relentless sequence of upheavals—health, ecological, financial, humanitarian, and beyond. Far from being temporary disruptions, these events reveal a paradox: they are not anomalies, but enduring features of a system governed through perpetual instability. This form of governance sustains and reinforces racial and patriarchal capitalism. Examining the mechanisms of crisis sheds light on the necropolitics of power—the ways states exert control over life itself. The language of crisis often obscures the systemic oppression underlying these events, legitimizing the erosion of rights and freedoms while intensifying surveillance, profiling, and arbitrary arrests. Black and racialized people, Indigenous communities, as well as refugees and migrants are frequently among those most impacted. Through an analysis of diverse examples—healthcare, migration, Indigenous rights, academic freedom, and Islamophobia—this work delves into the construction and rhetoric of “crisis.” It explores how populist and supremacist ideologies shape public discourse and perpetuate patterns of visibility and ignorance, with profound sociological effects on marginalized communities. The English and French editions, each with different content and authors, complete one another.

About this title

About the Author

Christina Clark-Kazak (Editor)
Christina Clark-Kazak is Full Professor at the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa, President of the International Association for the Study of Forced Migration and outgoing Editor-in-Chief of Refuge: Canadian Journal on Refugees. She has previously worked for York University, Saint Paul University, the Canadian government and the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers. She has also served as President of the Canadian Association for Refugee and Forced Migration Studies, Director of York University's Refugee Studies Centre and Associate Dean (Research and Graduate Studies) of York University's bilingual Glendon Campus. Her research interests include age discrimination in migration and development; the political participation of young refugees; and interdisciplinary methodology.

Leila Benhadjoudja (Editor)
Leila Benhadjoudja is an Associate Professor in the Institute of Feminist and Gender Studies and at the School of Sociological and Anthropological Studies at the University of Ottawa. Her research focuses on Political sociology, Feminist and Gender Theory, Race and Ethnicity as well as Postcolonialism and Cultural Studies.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

The pandemic, which represents “an organic crisis of capitalism” (McKay, 2023), underscored the need to question the notion of crisis, and more specifically its effects on marginalized, migrant and racialized populations. Indeed, while the world was living through the rhythm of this crisis, other “crises” of different magnitudes were increasing or recurring in the four corners of the globe: political, social and economic crisis in Venezuela; “security” crisis (Grinand, 2021) in Haiti; “mental health” crisis (Colly, 2021) in Lebanon; never-ending migration crises (Carastathis et al 2018; Crawley 2016; Jeandesboz and Pallister-Wilkins 2016), whether in Greece, on the Polish border, in the Mediterranean, in Calais and the English Channel, in Venezuela, or on the roads of Central and South America; an anti-gas pipeline blockade crisis in Canada; economic and humanitarian crises in Afghanistan and Yemen; climate crises; “academic freedom crisis” in the United States, Canada and France.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Ottawa Press
• Publication date: 2025
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0776641700
• ISBN 13: 9780776641706
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 178
• Editor: Leila Benhadjoudja, Christina Clark-Kazak, Stéphanie Garneau