State Sovereignty, Asylum and Migration: New Trends and Persistent Challenges

People and Sovereignty Series #2:

“State Sovereignty, Asylum and Migration: New Trends and Persistent Challenges”

Speaker: Saskia Sassen, Professor of Sociology, Columbia University
Discussant: Ferruccio Pastore, Director of FIERI (Forum Internazionale ed Europeo di ricerche sull’immigrazione)
Moderator: Ugo Mattei, Professor of Private Law, University of Turin

What is the interplay between Mediterranean migrations and the right to asylum? We welcome Columbia University Sociology Professor Sassia Sasken, Ferruccio Pastore, director of FIERI, and Professor Ugo Mattei, Professor of Civil Law University of Turin and Comparative Law at University California Hastings Law, to engage in a critical dialogue of migration before harsh neoliberalism and growing waves of nationalism. For Professor Sassen, bare life stands for the treatment inflicted against migrants attempting to cross the seas or terrestrial frontiers fleeing climate change, capitalist plunder, and land grabbing in their territories. Pastore Ferruccio will build the discussion presenting the implications of asylum on legal grounds for the European Union, how Frontex operates and how to enforce a right transcending the frame of political persecutions. Professor Mattei will articulate Professor Sassen and Ferruccio’s arguments with his insights on future generations’ environment and common goods. This interdisciplinary approach attempts to examine the causes and the structures under the surface of capitalism in a broader comprehension.

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