IMI is pleased to announce the appointment of Robin Cohen as Director from 1 September 2009, while Stephen Castles continues to be involved in the institute’s work as Associate Director. Robin has been working closely with colleagues at IMI over the last few months in his role as Senior Researcher and is well known in the migration studies community internationally. He remarks ‘I’m not quite as much of a veteran as Stephen, who published a major work on migration as early as 1973. I worked first on African trade unions and labour history and it was not until 1987 that I published The new helots, a global study looking at unprotected labour migrants.’
Robin’s background in Africa (he was born in South Africa and held his first academic position at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria) and his global perspective, fits well with IMI’s evolving profile. In addition to The new helots, Robin has published a number of books in the field, including Contested domains: debates in international labour studies (1991), The Cambridge survey of world migration (edited, 1995), Frontiers of identity: the British and the others (1994), Global diasporas: an introduction (1997, rev. edition, 2008) and Migration and its enemies (2006).
Robin has always been interested in how the identities and cultures of host and newcomer populations are altered through migration and he will add this element to IMI’s strengths in the processes, drivers and consequences of international migration. ‘It will be a great pleasure’, he adds, ‘to join such a talented group of colleagues who are initiating pioneering work in the field.’