Police prepare for a raid at the 'Jungle' camp in Calais, France. Photo by authors, all rights reserved.
What has been called the ‘European refugee crisis’ has been unfolding both across and outside of Europe in the past years. This ‘crisis’ is both political and humanitarian in character in the sense that the (continued) humanitarian predicament of so many displaced people cannot be understood in isolation from the policies and practices adopted by European governments and the EU. Thousands of people have become trapped in border zones and transit points across Europe, both in informal camps such as those in and around Calais and in institutionalised spaces like the hotspots in Italy and Greece (see the ‘read on’ links to the right for more information on this).
