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Hansen, Peo, ProfessorORCID iD iconorcid.org/0000-0002-0497-473X
Publications (10 of 102) Show all publications
Hansen, P. (2023). "The colonial origins of European integration" (London School of Economics, European Politics and Policy Blog). London
Open this publication in new window or tab >>"The colonial origins of European integration" (London School of Economics, European Politics and Policy Blog)
2023 (English)Other (Other academic)
Place, publisher, year, pages
London: , 2023
National Category
Social Sciences
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-200551 (URN)
Funder
Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, P18-05951
Available from: 2024-01-30 Created: 2024-01-30 Last updated: 2024-02-16Bibliographically approved
Hansen, P. (2022). Decolonization and the spectre of the nation‐state. British Journal of Sociology, 73(1), 35-49
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Decolonization and the spectre of the nation‐state
2022 (English)In: British Journal of Sociology, ISSN 0007-1315, E-ISSN 1468-4446, Vol. 73, no 1, p. 35-49Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

Gurminder Bhambra's Annual Lecture points the way to aparadigm shift in how the social sciences should approachthe nation-state,both historically and in our own times.That is to say, perceiving of Britain historically as a nation-stateor as an imperial state will make all the difference;and, as Bhambra demonstrates, it is precisely the failureto grasp the imperial fact that prevents us from grasping‘the shared histories that have configured our present’.This article reflects on the crucial imperial fact outlined byBhambra, and it applies its radical consequences for ourapproach to the broader Western European scene andthe world at large in the postwar period. Our contemporarynation-statesystem, it is argued, is not the inventionof Westphalia and European objectives, but rather theproduct of decolonization and thus a reaction and alternativeto the European designs for the modern world order,in general, and the postwar order, in particular. In relationto this, the article also explains how Bhambra's work helpsestablish a historically informed critique of methodologicalnationalism, as opposed to the many misconceptionsperpetuated by our current theoretical consensus of what‘methodological nationalism’ entails.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
John Wiley & Sons, 2022
Keywords
decolonization, Gurminder Bhambra, imperial state, nation-state, postwar European integration
National Category
Political Science History
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-181869 (URN)10.1111/1468-4446.12909 (DOI)000724320600001 ()34851530 (PubMedID)2-s2.0-85120348213 (Scopus ID)
Funder
Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, P18-05951
Available from: 2021-12-16 Created: 2021-12-16 Last updated: 2022-02-28Bibliographically approved
Hansen, P. & Jonsson, S. (2022). Eurafrique: Aux origines coloniales de l'Union Européenne (1ed.). Paris: La Découverte
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Eurafrique: Aux origines coloniales de l'Union Européenne
2022 (French)Book (Other academic)
Abstract [fr]

Alors que l’Europe, jadis triomphante, se trouve ravagée, appauvrie et divisée au sortir de la Première Guerre mondiale, un concept prometteur se diffuse dans les milieux dirigeants et intellectuels du Vieux Continent : l’Eurafrique !Faire du continent africain le ferment de l’unité européenne : tel est le projet de Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi, chantre du mouvement paneuropéen, et de nombre de ses contemporains dans l’entre-deux-guerres. Le salut de l’Europe, affirment-ils, repose sur sa capacité à exploiter en commun les richesses des colonies africaines. Rivalisant avec la puissance montante des continents américain et asiatique, l’Eurafrique deviendra ainsi le pôle dominant de la géopolitique mondiale.Le projet eurafricain, un temps caressé par les régimes fascistes, renaît de ses cendres après 1945 et inspire les « fondateurs » de l’Europe : Jean Monnet, Robert Schuman, Paul Henri Spaak, Konrad Adenauer. La France, principale puissance coloniale d’Europe continentale, joue alors un rôle essentiel. Malmené en Indochine puis en Algérie, Paris s’accroche à ses possessions africaines et fait de leur inclusion dans le marché commun européen une condition sine qua nonà sa participation à la construction européenne.C’est ce dossier qu’ouvrent Peo Hansen et Stefan Jonsson. Proposant une analyse inédite des négociations qui aboutiront à la signature du traité de Rome en 1957, ils dévoilent un pan méconnu de l’histoire de l’Union européenne : ses origines coloniales.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Paris: La Découverte, 2022. p. 363 Edition: 1
Keywords
History of European integration, EEC/EU, Rome Treaty negotiations, Africa, colonialism, decolonisation, geopolitics, postcoloniality, global history
National Category
History International Migration and Ethnic Relations Globalisation Studies
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-185314 (URN)9782348055560 (ISBN)9782348055652 (ISBN)
Note

Revised edition translated into French of Eurafrica: The Untold History of European Integration and Colinialism.

Translation by Claire Habart

Preface by Étienne Balibar

Available from: 2022-05-23 Created: 2022-05-23 Last updated: 2022-08-23Bibliographically approved
Hansen, P. & Jonsson, S. (2022). European Integration as a Colonial Project. In: Sadia Hassanen; Charles Westin (Ed.), Migration and State Formation After Colonialism: (pp. 23-54). Trenton, New Jersey: The Red Sea Press Inc.
Open this publication in new window or tab >>European Integration as a Colonial Project
2022 (English)In: Migration and State Formation After Colonialism / [ed] Sadia Hassanen; Charles Westin, Trenton, New Jersey: The Red Sea Press Inc., 2022, p. 23-54Chapter in book (Other academic)
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Trenton, New Jersey: The Red Sea Press Inc., 2022
Keywords
Internationella relationer, Europa, Afrika
National Category
History Political Science (excluding Public Administration Studies and Globalisation Studies)
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-184250 (URN)9781569027653 (ISBN)
Available from: 2022-04-10 Created: 2022-04-10 Last updated: 2022-09-29Bibliographically approved
Hansen, P. (2022). "Refugees Are Not Fiscal Burdens: The Real Economic Lesson of Sweden’s Refugee Crisis”. The SAIS Europe Journal of Global Affairs, 25(1)
Open this publication in new window or tab >>"Refugees Are Not Fiscal Burdens: The Real Economic Lesson of Sweden’s Refugee Crisis”
2022 (English)In: The SAIS Europe Journal of Global Affairs, Vol. 25, no 1Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

Today both researchers and policy-makers agree that refugees and low-skilled migrants admitted to the European Union constitute a net cost and fiscal burden for the receiving societies. Whereas researchers draw this conclusion from a seemingly neutral accounting exercise – refugees contribute less in taxes than they receive in welfare assistance – politicians eagerly use this economics to justify increasingly restrictive asylum policies. The welfare state, they claim, simply cannot afford to absorb refugees. To be sure, politicians and researchers may judge low-earning and low-skilled labour migrants to be both useful and affordable, but only on the condition that their access to welfare provisions is restricted. Researchers conceive of this as the inherent trade-off between migration and the welfare state, also expressed as the "numbers versus rights trade-off".1 Put simply, a country either has high levels of immigration or it has a sustainable welfare state, but it cannot have both. Or, in a different scenario, it either admits many migrants whose access to the welfare state is restricted, or it admits very few migrants who all receive equal treatment in terms of welfare state access. Of course, given the household budget accounting involved, if a country admits many high-skilled, high-earning migrants, these will, in contrast, impact positively on the public purse.

In this article I will show that this consensual cost-perspective on migration builds on a flawed economic conception. Much of it is due to the heavy imprint of the orthodox "sound finance" doctrine on migration research and policy – the assumption that central governments face a budget constraint and solvency requirement much in same way as households, municipalities or businesses. As economists Huixin Bi and Eric Leeper establish, "like the household, the government must satisfy a budget constraint each period."2 In the Oxford Dictionary of Economics, moreover, the "budget constraint" is described as "[t]he limit to expenditure. For any economic agent, whether an individual, a firm, or a government, expenditure must stay within limits set by the ability to finance it".3 By shifting perspective to instead examine migration through the macroeconomic lens offered by Modern Monetary Theory (MMT), the article will not only demonstrate sound finance's detrimental impact on migration policy and research, including the doctrine's instrumental role in stoking the toxic debate on migration in the EU. It will also show why MMT offers the tools with which both migration research and migration policy could be modernized and put on a realistic footing.

Empirically, I bring these tools to bear on the case of Sweden, the country that, proportionally speaking, has received the most refugees in the EU. The specific focus is placed on the consequences of the large increase in government spending following the refuge reception in 2015. From the perspective of policy-makers' certainty about the fiscal unsustainability of large numbers of refugees and scholarship's assurances concerning refugees' negative fiscal impact, the Swedish situation in 2015 should provide the ultimate worst-case scenario. Sweden, one of the most comprehensive welfare states in the EU, admitted 163,000 asylum seekers in one year, the majority of whom were given permission to stay, which meant that they were incorporated into what orthodox economics already takes to be a bloated welfare state. In other words, all the conditions for a perfect storm were in place. By the same token, so were all the conditions for a perfect natural experiment to test the literature's assertions about fiscal burdens and trade-offs.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Bologna: The SAIS Europe Journal of Global Affairs, 2022
National Category
International Migration and Ethnic Relations Economics
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-185565 (URN)
Available from: 2022-06-07 Created: 2022-06-07 Last updated: 2022-06-14Bibliographically approved
Hansen, P. (2021). A Modern Migration Theory: An Alternative Economic Approach to Failed EU POlicy. Newcastle upon Tyne: Agenda Publishing
Open this publication in new window or tab >>A Modern Migration Theory: An Alternative Economic Approach to Failed EU POlicy
2021 (English)Book (Refereed)
Abstract [en]

The widely accepted narrative that refugees admitted to the European Union constitute a fiscal burden is based on a seemingly neutral accounting exercise, in which migrants contribute less in tax than they receive in welfare assistance. A “fact” that justifies increasingly restrictive asylum policies.

In this book Peo Hansen shows that this consensual cost-perspective on migration is built on a flawed economic conception of the orthodox “sound finance” doctrine prevalent in migration research and policy. By shifting perspective to examinemigration through the macroeconomic lens offered by Modern Monetary Theory, Hansen is able to demonstrate sound finance’s detrimental impact on migration policy and research, including its role in stoking the toxic debate on migration in the EU. Most importantly, Hansen’s undertaking offers the tools with which both migration research and migration policy could be modernized and put on a realistic footing.

In addition to a searing analysis of EU migration policy and politics, Hansen also investigates the case of Sweden, the country that has received the most refugees in the EU in proportion to population. Hansen demonstrates how Sweden’s increased refugee spending in 2015–2017 proved to be fiscally risk-free and how the injection of funds to cash-strapped and depopulating municipalities, which received refugees, boosted economic growth and investment in welfare. Spending on refugees became a way of rediscovering the viability of welfare for all. Given that the Swedish approach to the 2015 refugee crisis has since been discarded and deemed fiscally unsustainable, Hansen’s aim is to reveal its positive effects and its applicability as a model for the EU as a whole.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Newcastle upon Tyne: Agenda Publishing, 2021. p. 238
National Category
Economics Political Science (excluding Public Administration Studies and Globalisation Studies) International Migration and Ethnic Relations
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-179074 (URN)9781788210553 (ISBN)9781788210546 (ISBN)9781788210560 (ISBN)
Available from: 2021-09-09 Created: 2021-09-09 Last updated: 2021-12-23Bibliographically approved
Hansen, P. (2021). "Migration ist keine Kostenfrage". Jacobin Magazine
Open this publication in new window or tab >>"Migration ist keine Kostenfrage"
2021 (German)In: Jacobin Magazine, ISSN 2158-2602Article in journal (Other (popular science, discussion, etc.)) Epub ahead of print
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Bronx, NY, United States: Jacobin Press, 2021
National Category
International Migration and Ethnic Relations Economics
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-179079 (URN)
Available from: 2021-09-09 Created: 2021-09-09 Last updated: 2021-09-17Bibliographically approved
Hansen, P. (2021). Migrationsmyten: Sanningen om flyktinginvandringen och välfärden – ett nytt ekonomiskt paradigm. Stockholm: Leopard Förlag
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Migrationsmyten: Sanningen om flyktinginvandringen och välfärden – ett nytt ekonomiskt paradigm
2021 (Swedish)Book (Refereed)
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Stockholm: Leopard Förlag, 2021. p. 368
National Category
Economics International Migration and Ethnic Relations
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-181870 (URN)9789189145542 (ISBN)
Available from: 2021-12-16 Created: 2021-12-16 Last updated: 2021-12-22Bibliographically approved
Hansen, P. (2021). The True Economics of Migration. Discover Society, 1(1)
Open this publication in new window or tab >>The True Economics of Migration
2021 (English)In: Discover Society, Vol. 1, no 1Article in journal (Other academic) Published
National Category
International Migration and Ethnic Relations Economics
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-179078 (URN)10.51428/dsoc (DOI)
Available from: 2021-09-09 Created: 2021-09-09 Last updated: 2021-09-17Bibliographically approved
Jonsson, S. & Hansen, P. (2020). Eurafrika: Die Geschichte der europäischen Integration als "Entkolonialisierungskompromiss". ARCH+: Archplus, 53, 16-23
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Eurafrika: Die Geschichte der europäischen Integration als "Entkolonialisierungskompromiss"
2020 (German)In: ARCH+: Archplus, ISSN 0587-3452, ARCH+ Zeitschrift für Architektur und Urbanismus, ISSN 0587-3452, Vol. 53, p. 16-23Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [de]

Die Europäische Wirtschaftsgemeinschaft (EWG), die Vorläufer organisation der Europäischen Union, wurde im selben Jahr gegründet, in dem Ghana seine Unabhängigkeit verkündete – als erster zuvor kolonisierter Staat in Afrika südlich der Sahara. Beide Ereignisse fanden sogar im selben Monat statt, im März 1957. In der offiziellen und halboffiziellen Geschichte der EU werden sie gerne in Zusammenhang gebracht. Gemäß der gängigen Erzählung waren beide Ereignisse Manifestationen der neuen Weltordnung, wie sie sich in den Jahrzehnten nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg entwickelte: Dem zufolge hätten die westeuropäischen Staaten ihre Ansprüche auf imperiale Dominanz aus freien Stücken begraben. Sie hätten nach innerkontinentaler Kooperation gesucht und ihre nationalen Rivalitäten beigelegt, welche in zwei Weltkriege gemündet waren, um ihre nach dem Krieg am Boden liegenden Gesellschaften und Volkswirtschaften wieder aufzubauen. Dazu hätten sie ihre nationalen Ressourcen miteinander koordiniert und die Mobilität von Waren, Geld und Arbeit innerhalb der Gemeinschaft gesteigert.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Berlin: ARCH+ Zeitschrift für Architektur und Urbanismus, 2020
Keywords
Eurafrica, History of European Union, Colonialism, Imperialism, histoiry of Africa, International relations, geopolitics
National Category
History Globalisation Studies Social Sciences Interdisciplinary International Migration and Ethnic Relations
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-168146 (URN)
Available from: 2020-08-18 Created: 2020-08-18 Last updated: 2020-09-11Bibliographically approved
Organisations
Identifiers
ORCID iD: ORCID iD iconorcid.org/0000-0002-0497-473X

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