Page Text

The first full account of life inside Europe’s infamous camp for migrants and refugees

216 x 138mm | 200 pages | October 2018 HB | 978-1-5095-3060-1 £50.00 | $64.95 | €65.90 PB | 978-1-5095-3061-8 £15.99 | $22.95 | €20.90 ebook available

The Jungle Calais’s Camps and Migrants MICHEL AGIER ET AL. Translated by David Fernbach For nearly two decades, the area surrounding the French port of Calais has been a temporary staging post for thousands of migrants and refugees hoping to cross the Channel to Britain. It achieved global attention when, at the height of the migrant crisis in 2015, all those living there were transferred to a single camp that became known as “the Jungle.” This book is the first full account of life inside the Jungle and its relation to the global migration crisis. Anthropologist Michel Agier and his colleagues use the particular circumstances of the Jungle, localized in space and time, to analyze broader changes underway in our societies. Starting from the camp’s architecture, the authors describe the transformation of its spaces into an embryonic shantytown, encouraging a wider reflection on urbanism in the context of increasingly mobile populations. They investigate how everyday life operated in the Jungle, raising broader questions about how marginalized communities are perceived and represented. Finally, addressing the mixed reactions to the camp, the authors show our relationship with the Other as part of a wider struggle in the formation of local, national and transnational identities. This comprehensive account of the life and death of Europe’s most infamous camp for migrants and refugees demonstrates that, far from being an isolated case, the Jungle of Calais brings into sharp relief the issues that confront us all today, in a world where the large-scale movement of people has become, and is likely to remain, a central feature of social and political life. MICHEL AGIER is Senior Researcher at the French Institute of Research for Development (IRD) and Professor at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), Paris, France. He is a leading authority on migration and refugees and his previous books in English include Borderlands, Managing the Undesirables and On the Margins of the World.

“In this detailed depiction of life in ‘the Jungle’, Michel Agier and colleagues offer a powerful, poetic argument about the power and value of place. Taking seriously the lives of those in the camp, this work is a much-needed recognition of their experience and acknowledgement of their humanity.” – Michael Collyer, University of Sussex

“An outstanding historical, sociological and political analysis of the Calais camp. This book is a major contribution that will inform broader debates on refugees and migration.” – Marie-Laurence Flahaux, Institut de Recherche pour le Développement and University of Oxford

6 GENERAL INTEREST