Section: Staff Profiles

Alistair Hunter

Name
Dr Alistair Hunter
Title
Research Fellow
Organisation
School of Social and Political Science
University of Edinburgh
Address
2.13 Chrystal Macmillan Building 15a George Square Edinburgh UK EH8 9LD
Telephone
+44 (0)131 651 3997
E-Mail
URL
http://www.pol.ed.ac.uk/staff_profiles/alistair_hunter

Qualifications

  • BA (Hons) Middle Eastern Studies, Leeds
  • MSc by Research (Politics), Edinburgh
  • PhD by Research, Edinburgh (viva passed December 2011)

Biographical Sketch

As of September 2011 Alistair is working as a Research Fellow on the DIAMINT project (see Research Interests for more details).

Prior to taking up this post, Alistair was a research student in Politics at the University of Edinburgh, finishing a PhD on processes of integration and return decision-making among older migrants of North and West African origin living in France. In 2010, he took time out from his PhD to work as a Research Associate at the David Hume Institute in Edinburgh, contributing to an EU-funded study entitled Moving Societies towards Integration. The project focused on the integration of young adult migrants in seven European countries and public services' intercultural 'openness' to their needs.

Publications

(2011) 'Theory and practice of return migration at retirement: the case of migrant worker hostel residents in France', in Population, Space and Place, 17: 2, pp179-192. http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/123270714/abstract

(2010) 'Intercultural Opening and Young Migrants / BME Youth: the case of the health system in Scotland', in Moving Societies Towards Integration, Eutin: CJD Eutin, pp122-144 (with Sarah Kyambi).
http://www.davidhumeinstitute.com/images/stories/publications/Full_Report-All_EU_partners.pdf

Research Interests

DIAMINT project

The social sciences have played a key role in shaping public understanding of immigrant integration. The DIAMINT project assesses how research-policy dialogues on this topic have developed into much more complex science-society dialogues. Assuming the perspective of the changing role of science in the contemporary risk society, scientific knowledge is no longer accepted as objective knowledge. Citizens are increasingly reflexive in terms of their acceptance (or criticism) of knowledge claims. Furthermore, the contextuality of knowledge claims has become increasingly manifest as science-society dialogues have opened up and internationalized. Finally, there has been a growing recognition of the uncertainty of scientific knowledge. This research provides an in-depth analysis of how these social transformations contributed to a reconfiguration of science-society dialogues on immigrant integration in a number of European countries (Austria, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom) as well as on the EU level. Coordinated by Prof. Han Entzinger and Dr Peter Scholten at Erasmus University Rotterdam, the project brings together partners from the Universities of Amsterdam, Bamberg, Edinburgh, Sheffield, Turin and Vienna.

  

PhD: Retirement Home? France's migrant worker hostels and the dilemma of late-in-life return.

Alistair’s ESRC-funded PhD addresses a paradox of immigrant integration. Older men of North and West African origin, living alone in hostel accommodation (constructed in the 1960s and 70s by the French state with the aim of impeding the integration of immigrant workers) do not return home definitively at retirement to be with their wives and children who have remained in the country of origin. Beyond affective ties, older migrant hostel residents also remain unmoved by the financial incentives of a return homewards, where their French state pensions, paid in euros and fully transferable, would have far greater purchasing power. Alistair’s research question, in its most succinct form, interrogates the reasons behind this preference for late-in-life mobility over definitive return. More broadly, by examining an extreme case of state attempts to limit the integration of labour migrants in post-WW2 Europe, his research seeks to contribute to the wider debates on what it means for immigrants to belong and achieve inclusion in society.

 

Migration & Citizenship Research Group

As of September 2011, Alistair takes over from Dr Laura Jeffery as Co-coordinator of the Migration & Citizenship Research Group. The research group brings together staff and postgraduate research students from across the social sciences: Human Geography, Law, Politics, Sociology, Social Anthropology, and Social Policy. The Research Group has an international focus, with members conducting research on global issues such as migration, displacement, cultural diversity, integration, citizenship, transnationalism, rights and development in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Europe. Research Group members also deal with key local issues including devolution and national identity in Scotland, the dispersal of asylum seekers to Glasgow since the Asylum and Immigration Act 1999, and A8 migration from Eastern Europe to Scotland since the expansion of the EU in 2004. For more details, see http://www.sps.ed.ac.uk/jwi/research/migration_and_citizenship

 

Teaching Experience

Alistair has lectured and tutored on the undergraduate honours course Politics of the Middle East (2005-7).

A second honours course he has tutored on is Europe and International Migration (2009).

In 2010-11, he tutored on Democracy in Comparative Perspective, a core course for 1st year undergraduate students taking Politics and International Relations.

In 2011-12 Alistair is tutoring a first year course on Human Geography in the School of GeoSciences.


Other Responsibilities and Affiliations

Co-coordinator, Migration and Citizenship Research Group, (SSPS, University of Edinburgh).

Member, IMISCOE Research Network (Immigration, Integration, and Social Cohesion in Europe).

Departmental Representative for postgraduate researchers (Politics, Edinburgh, 2006-7).

Alistair is also the founder and convenor of the School's Staff/Research Student football team, SSPS FC. https://www.wiki.ed.ac.uk/display/SSPSFC/Home

This page was published on 6 February 2012


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