By  Krystlelynn Caraballo and Volkan Topalli

Research suggests undocumented immigrants are vulnerable to
robbery, burglary, and car theft, but studies have focused exclusively on victims’ perspectives rather than those of street offenders. This study draws from in-depth, semi-structured inter views of 25 active street offenders from a major southeastern US city to understand offenders’ perspectives and motivations for
deciding whether to target immigrants. Our findings support that some street offenders explicitly select targets based on perceived individual and socio-structural risk factors and the assumption of undocumented status. These include objective and subjective assessments of immigrants’ reliance on cash-intensive employment, fear of deportation, and inability to access formal justice systems. Our interviews with offenders reveal they and their acquaintances rely on mainstream stereotypes of immigrants (documented and undocumented) and of Latinx populations to determine vulnerability, select targets, and to a lesser extent.

Justice Quarterly, 40(1); 2023, 31p.

By Daniil MENSHYKOV, Tetiana PRODAN, Halyna LUTSYSHYN, Maksym IATSYNA, Arzu HADZHIIEVA

The aim of the study is to assess the impact of migration indicators on the crime rates in selected countries. The research employed cluster, correlation and regression analyses as the main methods. The analysis established that the impact of migration on crime in different countries differs significantly in terms of strength and direction. In particular, it was found that the increased share of refugees in the population of Egypt, Mauritius and the USA is associated with the decreased Crime Index. The obtained results indicate that the degree and direction of the influence of migration on crime depends on the specific situation in the country, which covers various aspects of social, political, economic and other dimensions. The conclusions of the research can be useful for shaping migration policy and preventing bias in this process

Revista Jurídica Portucalense nº 36 (2024) - Transnational Law

By Luisa Feline Freier & Leda M. Pérez

This article examines how Venezuelan forced migrants in Peru experience xenophobic discrimination, which has become increasingly linked to their criminalisation as thieves and murderers. Based on 12 months of qualitative fieldwork, including 72 in-depth interviews, five focus groups, and a survey (N116) in five Peruvian cities, we explore how Venezuelans experience, and make sense of, discrimination and criminalisation in everyday life. First, we discuss how criminalisation compares to general xenophobic discrimination, and other types of discrimination experiences. Second, we juxtapose the prevalence of xenophobic discrimination and criminalisation experiences across the five cities of our study, and between public spaces and the workspace. We then move to the qualitative discussion of the criminalisation experience in these different spaces. Fourth, we discuss how Venezuelan migrants perceive this criminalising discrimination as linked to their villanisation in the media and political discourses. Finally, we discuss our findings and make suggestions for further research. The paper contributes to the literature on migrant criminalisation by exploring how criminalisation processes play out in the context of large-scale intraregional forced displacement in the global South.

European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research

Volume 27, pages 113–133, (2021)

By Brian G. Knight and Ana Tribin 

This paper investigates the link between violent crime and immigration using data from Colombian municipalities during the recent episode of immigration from Venezuela. The key finding is that, following the closing and then re-opening of the border in 2016, which precipitated a massive immigration wave, homicides in Colombia increased in areas close to the border with Venezuela. Using information on the nationality of the victim, we find that this increase was driven by homicides involving Venezuelan victims, with no evidence of a statistically significant increase in homicides in which Colombians were victimized. Thus, in contrast to xenophobic fears that migrants might victimize natives, it was migrants, rather than natives, who faced risks associated with immigration. Using arrests data, there is no corresponding increase in arrests for homicides in these areas. Taken together, these results suggest that the increase in homicides close to the border documented here are driven by crimes against migrants and have occurred without a corresponding increase in arrests, suggesting that some of these crimes have gone unsolved.  

Working Paper 27620

Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research, 2020. 34p.

By Dinu Ostavciuc, Gina Aurora Necula

The Art. in question is dedicated to the specificity of detecting the evidence of an offence and its prosecution, particularly referring to the organised illegal migration, both from the point of view of criminal science and from the point of view of the criminal lawsuit. The subject under investigation here is both practically and legislatively sensitive. The aim of the research is to establish and elucidate the legal interactions, as well as to develop a practical algorithm for law enforcement authorities to detect evidence of organised illegal migration. The study comes with recommendations for law enforcement and prosecution bodies applicable both to the stage of establishing reasonable suspicion of committing the crime of organised illegal migration and to the stage of criminal prosecution initiation. At the same time, we aim at pointing out those features of the initial actions of the law enforcement bodies to which attention should be drawn and the indicated actions should be carried out in order to decide whether or not the conditions of the specified crime are met. The research comes up with findings, recommendations and proposals of lex ferenda, in order to reach the top effectiveness of the organised illegal migration investigation, implicitly that the investigating and prosecuting authorities detect the evidence of organised illegal migration crime within a reasonable extend of time and expeditiously start the prosecution, with respect to the principle of formality of the criminal process.

Fiat Iustitia, Issue Year: 2/2023, 16p.

By Olivier Marie and Paolo Pinotti

In the late 1920s, President Herbert Hoover appointed a National Commission on Law Observance and Enforcement to address rising concerns about crime. The Commission dedicated one of its final reports to the issue of “Crime and the Foreign Born,” which begins by noting that “[t]he theory that immigration is responsible for crime . . . is almost as old as the colonies planted by Englishmen on the New England coast” (National Commission on Law Observance and Enforcement 1931, p. 23). Almost a century later, concerns about crime remain one of the most frequently expressed reasons for public opposition to immigration in countries around the world. Figure 1 plots the share of respondents in OECD countries worried that “immigrants increase crime” against the share of respondents worried that “immigrants take jobs away from natives,” which is another prominent public opinion concern (for example, Mayda 2006; Haaland and Roth 2020). Most countries lie  well above the 45-degree line, meaning that more people worry about the crime effects of immigration than about its labor market effects. This pattern holds especially for countries with a higher share of migrants over total population, indicated by larger circles. Evidence on the evolution of beliefs concerning immigrants and crime over time can be documented using survey evidence from the United States. For the past 30 years, Gallup has regularly surveyed a representative sample of Americans, asking them to consider various topics and “say whether immigrants to the United States are making the situation in the country better or worse, or not having much effect.” 1 When the topic is “the crime situation,” half or more of the Americans surveyed have answered “worse” in almost every wave. If these views have lately somewhat improved, with 42 percent of respondents choosing “worse” in 2019, this answer was still 18 points higher than the proportion answering that immigrants worsen their job opportunities in the same year. Perhaps surprisingly, economists have only recently begun to investigate the links between immigration and crime in a systematic way. Advances in methodology and data quality during the past few decades have made it possible to go beyond simple correlations and to assess the causal impact of immigration on crime. This evolution has had much in common with the study of the labor market effects of migration depicted in this journal by Peri (2016). In this paper, we first describe recent international trends in immigration and crime, exploring why migrants may at first appear much more criminally active in certain countries. We then discuss the theoretical framework and methodological tools that economists have used in thinking about the relationship between immigration and crime. We assess what these approaches have produced in various contexts as to the causal impact of immigration levels on crime rates. We review the evidence on this point so far, which overwhelmingly suggests that immigrants do not increase crime levels in the communities where they settle, and confirm this overall null-effect conclusion using newly collected international data. Finally, we consider the evidence on the links between access to legal work and the crime propensity of different kinds of immigrants, including refugees and those with irregular legal status. The relatively few papers that have probed this issue all conclude that legal status and work permits strongly decrease the probability that immigrants will become involved in crime.      

Journal of Economic Perspectives—Volume 38, Number 1—Winter 2024—Pages 181–200 

By Dany Bahar; Meagan Dooley; Andrew Selee

The sudden, large-scale movement of nearly 5.2 million Venezuelans out of their country, most since 2014, with more than 4.2 million of them settling in other countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, has raised concerns about how this is affecting receiving communities, with some politicians and pundits claiming that these new arrivals are leading to a rise in crime. Yet few studies have been conducted in the region that examine whether and what type of link may exist between immigration and crime, in part because immigration at this scale is a relatively new phenomenon in most Latin American countries, and this particular mass migration is so recent.1 This issue brief explores data in the three countries with the largest number of Venezuelan migrants and refugees as of 2020—Colombia, Peru, and Chile, which together host more than 2 million Venezuelan nationals—to better understand whether and what sort of relationship exists between this immigration and crime rates. Some of the datasets used are publicly available, while others were obtained by the authors through direct requests to government agencies. For each country, this study analyzes crime data, when possible disaggregated by nationality, and data on the presence of Venezuelans at the subnational level (though the available data do not allow for this to be done in exactly the same way in all three countries). For the most part, analysis of data from 2019 suggests that Venezuelan immigrants commit substantially fewer crimes than the native born, relative to their share in the overall population, signaling that public perceptions on newcomers driving up crime rates are misleading. In Chile, for example, only 0.7 percent of people indicted for crimes in 2019 were Venezuelan nationals, even though Venezuelans made up 2.4 percent of the population. Similarly, in Peru, where this analysis uses imprisonment data as a proxy for crime rates, 1.3 percent of those in prison were foreign born—of any nationality—as of 2019, whereas Venezuelan nationals make up 2.9 percent of the country’s overall population. For the most part, analysis of data from 2019 suggests that Venezuelan immigrants commit substantially fewer crimes than the native born. In Colombia this relationship holds true for violent crimes, as Venezuelan nationals comprised 2.3 percent of arrests for violent crimes in 2019, while they represent 3.2 percent of the population. For crimes overall, however, the picture is more mixed, as 5.4 percent of all arrests were of Venezuelans, a rate higher than their share of the population. Most of these crimes were reported in border regions, perhaps a reflection of the illicit smuggling networks that operate across the Colombian-Venezuelan border. In exploring plausible explanations for crime rates in different parts of the country, it appears that the regions in which Venezuelans were responsible for higher shares of crimes are also those where Venezuelans face higher rates of unemployment. This finding is consistent with the literature that suggests granting migrants and refugees formal labor market access can reduce the incidence of crime among this population. The data in this study provide strong evidence that the presence of Venezuelan immigrants is not leading to increased crime in the region—certainly not in the three countries that have received the largest number of Venezuelan migrants and refugees. Indeed, in most cases they tend to commit a smaller share of crimes than their proportion of the population. Even in the one case where the results are more ambiguous—Colombia—they are more involved in minor crimes and far less involved in major crimes than their population share. These results suggest that fears about Venezuelan newcomers driving up crime are simply misplaced. Sudden mass migration certainly presents challenges to receiving societies, but, at least in this case, a major crime wave is not one of them. 

Washington, DC; Brookings Institute, 2020. 27p.

By Abdihakim Hussein, Emily Nye

Forced migration is an increasingly common feature in international relations, and the mass migration of Venezuelans to Colombia provides an opportunity to analyze how strategic narratives can support a welcoming migration and integration policy. Because Colombia is a country with no history of immigration and no established anti-immigrant group, its experience provides unique insight into the impact and limitations of positive migration narratives. While Colombia's migration policy and humanitarian narrative have garnered praise internationally, this praise has not been matched by a sense of urgency for action, attention, or funding. Domestically, the policy response to mass Venezuelan migration has met international standards. Moreover, the country has experienced relatively little unrest compared to other host countries in Latin America. There is, however, ample evidence that Colombian perceptions of increased Venezuelan migration are negative and that tension and scapegoating are on the rise. Given these contradictions, this article reviews and discusses how and why Colombia's positive, humanitarian narratives have succeeded, as well as these narratives' limitations and need for adjustments. Together, these insights can help other host nations craft more effective and truthful migration strategic narratives.

Global Policy. 2024;15(Suppl. 3):83–92

By Robert M. Adelman , Yulin Yang , Lesley Williams Reid , James D. Bachmeier & Mike Maciag

The debate about undocumented immigration and its potential relation to crime continues to boil in the United States. We study this relationship by using two sets of estimates for the 2014 undocumented foreign-born population in U.S. metropolitan areas acquired from the Pew Research Center and the Migration Population Institute, 2013-2015 FBI Uniform Crime Report data, and 2011-2015 American Community Survey data from the U.S. Census Bureau, to model the association between undocumented immigration and violent and property crime. Findings are consistent across all estimates of metropolitan undocumented populations. Net of relevant covariates, we find negative effects of undocumented immigration on the overall property crime rate, larceny, and burglary; effects in models using violent crime measures as the outcomes are statistically non-significant. Although the results are based on cross-sectional data, they mirror other research findings that immigration either reduces or has no impact on crime, on average, and contributes to a growing literature on the relationship between immigration and crime.

Journal of Crime and Justice, Volume 44, Issue 4 (2021)

By American Immigration Council

Over the past decade, an increasing number of states, counties, and cities have adopted a variety of policies intended to promote a greater level of trust and cooperation between local law enforcement and communities with sizeable immigrant populations, regardless of immigration status. These policies include offering English-language classes; issuing municipal identification documents and driver’s licenses to all residents; ensuring that immigrants have equal access to bail; establishing policies to make it easier for noncitizen victims of crime to obtain necessary documents from law enforcement agencies in order to pursue certain immigration relief; and training criminal prosecutors and public defenders on the immigration consequences of convictions and plea deals.  

One subset of these policies concerns a state’s or locality’s role in cooperating with federal authorities to enforce immigration law. These laws, policies, or resolutions are sometimes referred to as “sanctuary” policies, although no legal or standard definition of the term exists. There are many reasons jurisdictions adopt sanctuary policies, such as: a desire to protect public safety by allowing immigrants to work with police in reporting and investigating crimes without fear of retribution or potential deportation; allowing state and local governments to determine how they will prioritize and allocate their resources; and shielding local law enforcement agencies from liabilities resulting from local enforcement of federal immigration laws. 

Despite the nationwide debate, there is no one clear definition of what it means for a state or local government to adopt sanctuary policies. Sanctuary policies take many forms and generally fall into the following categories: 

• policies restricting the ability of state and local police to make arrests for federal civil immigration violations, or to detain individuals on civil immigration warrants;  

• policies prohibiting “287(g)” agreements through which Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deputizes local law enforcement officers to enforce federal immigration law; 

• policies that prevent local governments from entering into a contract with the federal government to hold immigrants in detention; 

• policies preventing immigration detention centers; 

• policies restricting the police or other city workers from asking about immigration status; 

• policies restricting the sharing of certain information on immigrants with the federal government; 

• policies restricting local police responses to federal immigration detainers; and 

• policies refusing to allow ICE into local jails without a judicial warrant. 

The common theme behind these categories is that under a sanctuary policy, state and local officials will limit their cooperation with federal immigration officials but do not actively prevent federal officials from carrying out their immigration enforcement duties. 

One of the most common forms of sanctuary policy is a restriction on holding immigrants in state or local jails following a “detainer” issued by ICE. A detainer is an official but nonbinding request from ICE that a state or local law enforcement agency maintain custody of an individual for up to 48 hours beyond the time the individual otherwise would have been released so that ICE can arrange to take over custody.  

Washington DC: American Immigration Council, 2025. 9p.

By Sasha Jesperson, Henrik Alffram, Lisa Denney and Pilar Domingo

 Labour migration and trafficking in persons: a political economy analysis Key messages Multiple scam centres have been identified in Southeast Asia, where recruits are often forced to groom victims online and encourage them to invest in fraudulent schemes, such as cryptocurrency. Targeting more highly skilled and educated individuals seeking work opportunities, recruitment is more organised than other forms of labour exploitation, with individuals trafficked into forced criminality. Scams challenge the existing counter-trafficking response in several ways: The profile of recruits as more highly educated and skilled workers. The existence of two sets of victims – the recruits and their targets. The presence of scam centres, often in poorer countries, reversing conventional labour migration flows. The location of scam centres in Special Economic Zones, which are beyond conventional national jurisdictions.

London: ODI, 2023. 29p.

By Humanity Research Consultancy

In early 2023, campaigners in Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia lodged a formal complaint with the ASEAN Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights, the region’s main human rights institution, regarding potentially thousands of victims of trafficking in persons (TIP) for forced criminality in scam compounds, from every single ASEAN country.  A 2023 United Nations report also estimates that hundreds of thousands have fallen victim to this growing trend of human trafficking for forced criminality, trapped in scamming compounds across the Asia region and beyond.  According to media reports and previous investigations undertaken by Humanity Research Consultancy (HRC),  Thailand has been an important hub for this type of crime, acting as a transit, destination and source country due to its geographical proximity to scamming compound hotspots across the region. Nevertheless, the extent of Thailand and its citizens’ involvement in these crimes, namely Thai authorities’ responses to the issue, remain unclear to the public, as well as to counter-human trafficking organisations. This research aims to address this gap, forming a valuable contribution to the current body of knowledge in order to enhance understanding and develop effective strategies, by identifying best practices, to combat human trafficking for forced criminality in Thailand. This report provides an overview of trafficking for forced criminality involving Thailand, covering the trafficking routes, modus operandi and trends related to TIP for forced criminality. It also outlines the legal frameworks in Thailand to address forced criminality at the domestic, bilateral and regional levels. Additionally, the report encompasses a breakdown of demographics and characteristics of vulnerable groups targeted by traffickers, including disaggregated data of Thai and non-Thai victims of TIP for forced criminality in Thailand. Finally, the report outlines the challenges and obstacles faced in addressing trafficking for forced criminality, particularly with regard to the actions of Thai law enforcement and government bodies, as well as local nongovernmental organizations working to counter these crimes in the region    

Little Rick, AR: Winrock International, 2024.   38p.

By Felipe Gon ̧calves Elisa and J ́acome Emily Weisburst

We study the role of victim reporting in the production of public safety. We examine the Secure Communities program, a crime-reduction policy that involved police in
detecting unauthorized immigrants and increased deportation fears in immigrant communities. We find that the policy reduced the likelihood that Hispanic victims report crimes to police and increased offending against Hispanics. The number of reported crimes is unchanged, masking these opposing effects. We show that reduced reporting drives the offending increase and provide the first elasticity of offending to victim reporting in the literature, calculating that a 10% decline in reporting increases offending by 7.9%.

Unpublished paper 2025. 95p.

By Aase Villadsen, Nicolás Libuy, Emla Fitzsimons 

This project examined whether adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), positive childhood experiences (PCEs) and the levels of violent crime in children’s neighbourhoods are associated with children’s involvement in violence. Previous research suggests that ACEs are associated with involvement in violence, while PCEs are associated with decreased risk of involvement in crime and violence. There is some evidence that the relationship between ACEs, PCEs and involvement in violence is affected by the amount of violent crime in the local area. This study explored whether these factors are associated with three violence outcomes, measured at ages 14 and 17: assault perpetration, the carrying or using of a weapon and gang involvement. It primarily used data on around 14,000 children from the Millennium Cohort Study (MCS), a study that is tracking a cohort of children born around the millennium. It also used police-recorded crime data to understand the amount of violent crime in the local area. The ACEs examined by this study were: having a single parent; experiencing parental breakup; domestic violence; verbal abuse; physical abuse; parental alcohol abuse; parental drug use; parental mental health issues; poor parental relationships; poor parent-child relationship; and, having a parent with a long-term disability/illness. The list of PCEs included: having low-risk peers; positive peer experiences; good school connectedness; positive teacher-child relationships; participation in activities and hobbies; living in a safe neighbourhood; and feeling safe in the playground. Key findings : A higher number of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) is associated with an increased risk of children engaging in violence. Having two or more ACEs compared to none increased the risk of assault perpetration by 19%, weapon involvement by 57% and gang involvement by 61%. Having six or more ACEs increased the risk of assault perpetration by 45%, weapon involvement by 150% and gang involvement by 154%. The combination of ACEs associated with the highest risk included parental drug use, single parenthood, domestic violence, physical abuse and long-term parental disability or illness. A higher number of positive childhood experiences (PCEs) is associated with a decreased risk of children engaging in violence. Having three to four PCEs compared to zero to two PCEs reduced the risk of assault perpetration by 12%, weapon involvement by 33% and gang involvement by 28%. Having six to seven PCEs reduced the risk of assault perpetration by 35%, weapon involvement by 66% and gang involvement by 59%. The combination of PCEs associated with the lowest risk included low-risk peers, good school connectedness, positive teacher-child relationship and positive peer experiences. The link between ACEs and violence was reduced when children also had a high number of PCEs. Having high numbers of PCEs partially offset the risks associated with ACEs. Children who had both a high number of ACEs and PCEs, compared to those with a high number of ACEs and low PCEs, had a lower risk of involvement in violence. For example, among children with three or more ACEs, the risk of assault perpetration fell by 22%, weapons involvement by 49% and gang involvement by 39% for those who also had five or more PCEs. ACEs and PCEs better explain violence involvement than neighbourhood crime rates. Children growing up in high-violence neighbourhoods were more vulnerable to involvement in violence. For example, the likelihood of weapons involvement was 62% higher for children growing up in the 20% most violent areas. However, neighbourhood crime levels were no longer associated with violence perpetration once characteristics, including ACEs and PCEs, were taken into account. There is some evidence that differences in experiences of violence by ethnicity can be explained by family socioeconomic characteristics and exposure to ACEs and PCEs. Black children had higher rates of assault perpetration (53.3% and 47.6%, respectively) than White children (41.7%). This difference in assault rates disappeared after controlling for socioeconomic family characteristics and ACEs and PCEs, suggesting much of the difference can be explained by differences in exposure to these family factors. However, this analysis was limited by a small sample size of children from individual ethnic minority groups and is, therefore, not as secure as some of the other findings. Interpretation and implications This study provides valuable information about the relationship between ACEs, PCEs, neighbourhood safety and children’s involvement in violence. It is one of only a few studies to present evidence from an English or Welsh context. Insights from this study should be combined with findings from other research to identify and support the children who are most vulnerable to involvement in violence. These findings should be interpreted carefully. Although the study looked at whether factors are associated with violence, it cannot confirm whether these factors caused violence. For example, children who experienced physical abuse were more likely to commit violence, but we can’t rule out the possibility that this relationship is explained by another factor. Perhaps children who experienced abuse are also more likely to experience other hardships, which are the real drivers behind their involvement in violence. While this study used statistical techniques to try to rule out some other potential drivers, it was not able to capture all of these. The strengths of this study included its use of a large nationally representative sample, the use of statistical methods that deal with missing data and maintain a representative sample and the fact that it found similar results across several additional analyses and robustness checks. The results of the study should be considered alongside its limitations: • Sexual abuse and the involvement of household members in crime are commonly described as ACEs but were not available in the MCS data set and were not examined in this study. • The study relied on police-reported crime data to measure neighbourhood violent crime. However, much crime goes unreported to the police, especially in deprived areas. The findings on neighbourhood violence are less secure as a result. • The analyses examining more serious types of violence in smaller subgroups of children, such as children from smaller ethnic groups, have smaller samples and are less precise 

London: Youth Endowment Fund, 20225. 227p.

By Bali Process RSO and MMC

Highlights

85% of respondents did not consider regular migration, primarily because regular pathways were not accessible to them.

The Rohingya face specific problems: their statelessness effectively bar them from regular pathways. 92% of Rohingya respondents—the highest among all respondents— reported that they did not consider regular migration pathways. 91% reported encountering protection incidents, compared to 47% of other Myanmar ethnic groups.

Overall, a notable portion of respondents indicated that they did not actively seek information before migrating. A higher proportion of women (41%) reported not actively seeking any information before migration, compared to men (29%).

Despite the presence of various formal awareness programs, only 4% of respondents received information from a formal programme before their journey. There appears to be a large disconnect between formal information channels and the informal networks that refugees and migrants actually rely on for advice.

Decision-Making Patterns: Awareness of risks doesn’t always deter irregular migration—98% of Indonesian respondents would still choose the same pathway, even though 45% recognize its negative aspects.

Bangkok, Regional Support Office of the Bali Process : Geneva, Mixed Migration Centre, 2025. 67p.

By Adriane Sanctis de Brito

The treaties to suppress the slave trade were the subject of intense legal battles in the first half of the 19th century. This book explores the legal disputes about the Anglo Brazilian treaty to highlight the political importance of what initially looks like mere argumentative hurdles over the rules and proceedings regarding the search and capture of ships. It reveals the complex legal translations of state inequality, abolition and slavery, as well as war and peace.

Frankfurt am Main: Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory, 2024.

Edited by Lorenzo Guadagno and Lisette R. Robles

Forced population movements are a defining feature of almost any humanitarian crisis, shaping the design, targeting, and delivery of emergency responses. This book investigates how the evolving situation of different forced migrants is accounted for and addressed in humanitarian action in order to improve their access to support and assistance. Bringing together case studies from Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Pacific, this book focuses on a diversity of operational modalities and types of assistance provided by both traditional and non-traditional humanitarian actors to address the specific needs of displaced children, women, people with disabilities and older people, as well as trafficked migrant workers. This book adopts a broad perspective on humanitarian action, acknowledging how its boundaries are challenged and expanded in forced migration contexts. Its operational and theoretical insights will be useful for a range of readers, from humanitarian and migration researchers and students to practitioners and policymakers.

London and New York: Routledge, 2025. 205p.

By Asha Jeffers

Human trafficking has generated intense global concern, with stories of sex slavery and images of women forced into prostitution so persuasive that states have raced to respond ahead of empirical data and clear definitions of the crime. In Trafficking Rhetoric, Annie Hill analyzes the entanglement of state veneration and state violence by tracking how the United Kingdom points to the alleged crimes of others in order to celebrate itself and conceal its own aggression. Hill compares the UK’s acclaimed rescue approach to human trafficking with its hostile approach to migration, arguing that they are two sides of the same coin—one that relies on rhetorical constructions of “trafficked women” and “illegal migrants” to materialize the UK as an Anglo-white space.Drawing from official estimates, policy papers, NGO reports, news stories, and awareness campaigns and situating them in the broader EU context, Hill accounts for why the UK’s anti-trafficking agenda emerged with such rhetorical force in the early twenty-first century. Trafficking Rhetoric reframes controversies over labor, citizenship, and migration while challenging the continued traction of race-baiting and gender bias in determining who has the right to live, work, and belong in the nation.

Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press, 2025.

Edited by Maurizio Ambrosini, Marilisa D’Amico, Emilia Perassi

In an era marked by rising securitarian policies and contested human mobility, Borders, Migrations, and Human Rights offers a rigorous and interdisciplinary examination of the complex relationship between state sovereignty, migration, and fundamental rights. Edited by Maurizio Ambrosini, Marilisa D’Amico, and Emilia Perassi, this volume brings together leading scholars to analyze the resurgence of border enforcement as a central political priority, often at the expense of international legal obligations and human dignity.Drawing from sociology, law, history, psychology, and literary studies, the book interrogates the evolving functions of borders—not only as physical demarcations but as sites of legal, political, and social contestation. Contributors explore topics such as the securitization of migration, the constitutional rights of migrants, EU border policies, the criminalization of solidarity, and the narratives of border-crossing in literature and cultural discourse. Through this multi-faceted lens, the volume reveals how contemporary border practices reshape democratic societies, challenge human rights principles, and expose the persistent tensions between national security and universal justice.A product of the CRC “Migrations and Human Rights” initiative at the University of Milan, this book is essential reading for scholars, policymakers, and advocates engaged in the urgent debates on migration governance and human rights in the 21st century.

Milano – Italy : Ledizioni - LediPublishing, 2025. 253p.

By Zechariah Chafee Jr.

Zechariah Chafee Jr.'s "The Inquiring Mind," published in 1928, stands as a seminal work in the discourse on civil liberties, particularly focusing on freedom of speech within the United States. He delves into the intricacies of freedom of speech providing a comprehensive exploration of the legal and philosophical foundations of free expression. The book emerged during a period marked by intense debates over civil liberties, especially in the aftermath of World War I and the accompanying "Red Scare." Chafee's work played a pivotal role in shaping modern First Amendment jurisprudence, influencing both legal scholars and judicial opinions. His defense of free speech contributed to a broader understanding of its essential role in a democratic society, challenging prevailing notions that favored repression over open discourse. The work is a cornerstone in the study of civil liberties, offering enduring insights into the complexities of freedom of speech. Its significance, rich content, and original perspectives continue to inform and challenge modern interpretations of free expression in democratic societies.

Main themes relevant to the modern era are::

• Social Media and Free Speech: The role of platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube in shaping discourse, including issues of content moderation, algorithmic bias, and "cancel culture."

• Misinformation and Fake News: The rise of deepfakes, conspiracy theories, and propaganda, and their impact on public perception and democracy.

• Censorship vs. Safety: The balance between preventing harmful speech (hate speech, extremist content) and protecting the right to express controversial opinions.

• Government and Corporate Influence: The role of states and tech companies in controlling or amplifying speech through regulations and policies.

• AI and the Future of Expression: How AI-generated content, chatbots, and automated censorship tools impact free inquiry.

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