Theme issue  

Taking the infrastructural turn in the social sciences, geography, and geographical migration studies as a starting point and based on the observation that migration as a socio-spatial phenomenon is closely linked to infrastructure, this issue addresses the nexus of migration and infrastructure. Conceptualizations of infrastructures that were previously understood as distinct are brought together in a three-fold focus and made fruitful for the investigation of migration. (1) Infrastructures serve as institutional infrastructures to structure and organize migration; technical infrastructures are used to monitor and control migration. Infrastructures enable, impede, and thus prevent migration, and the investigation of infrastructures for guiding and/or preventing migration sheds light on the dynamics of power and the negotiation of rights in the nexus of infrastructures and migration. (2) Infrastructures are relevant as (socio-)material structures, such as camps, arrival centres, or urban infrastructures, which are discussed as arrival infrastructures. They mobilize and immobilize in equal measure and refer to the tension between state power and the individual agency of migrants. (3) People themselves are effective as infrastructures, for example where material/technical infrastructures are missing, and in the sense of the people as infrastructures perspective, they can create a minimum of stability, reliability, or security through the exchange and sharing of resources.