Crossing Boundaries:
Migration and the Shaping of Global Political Theory
The Mid Conference Reimagining Justice in the 21st Century: Normativity, Politics, and Society is organized in partnership with the Project “Crossing Boundaries: Migration and the Shaping of Global Political Theory” (FAPESP Grant number 24/12506-0), Brazil.
The project establishes a new research agenda in global political theory in Brazil, addressing the normative challenges of international migration. It asks: What normative demands emerge within national border regimes-political spaces shaped by the unequal distribution of vulnerabilities and the enduring legacies of colonialism-when confronted with the movement of undesirable migrants? Structuredaround three interrelated axes, the project first examines how colonial legacies inform the normative obligations of border regimes in the Global North, focusing on Brazilian migrants in the European Union. This analysis highlights the tension between reparative justice and state sovereignty in border control.
The second axis exploresmigration policies in Global South countries, such as Brazil, as instruments of social and racial exclusion. It interrogates their normative implications for border legitimacy through ethical dilemmas such as brain drain, labor market dynamics, and the rights of climate-displaced persons.
The third axis argues for a contextual and critical political theory of migration, one that accounts for the historical and territorial afterlives of colonialism and slavery. It seeks to formulate a Latin American ethics of migration,offering a normative perspective that departs from dominant frameworks in contemporary political theory.
The central hypothesis is that Latin American migration experiences present distinct normative challenges inadequately addressed by existingtheories, necessitating a context-sensitive framework for international migration. By integrating these axes, this study advances a global political theory of migration thatforegrounds perspectives systematically marginalized in canonical political thought. It expands the normative and analytical scope of migration justice, proposing new criteria for evaluating border regimes in a world persistently shaped by structures ofdomination and exclusion.