Ethics Guidelines for Forced Migration Studies Published
Research | 27/10/2024
Ethics Guidelines for Forced Migration Studies Published
The German Network for Forced Migration Studies has developed ethics guidelines for conducting forced migration research. The documents were published open access in English and German in September 2024.
Forced migration studies, as a multidisciplinary and multi-methodological field, demands rigorous ethical standards. Researchers must safeguard the dignity, rights, and well-being of all participants, especially those with lived displacement experiences. The Ethics Guidelines provide a practical framework for conducting research in an ethically responsible manner throughout the research process.
The Ethics Guidelines of the German Network for Forced Migration Studies place the respect for human dignity and safeguarding the rights and well-being of all research participants, especially but not exclusively those with lived experience of displacement, at the heart of all research processes. The aim is to support ethical considerations, reflections, and practices in Forced Migration Studies scholarship regardless of the chosen research methods. The Guidelines provide a practical framework for academics to make ethically informed decisions throughout the research process.
The Ethics Guidelines are based on long-standing debates and build upon existing codes of ethics. They were finalised in 2024 following a participatory process that involved researchers from diverse disciplines, both with and without lived experience of displacement. GIGA expert Dr. Christiane Fröhlich played a key role in the development of the guideline as spokesperson of the network.
The Ethics Guidelines of the German Network for Forced Migration Studies place the respect for human dignity and safeguarding the rights and well-being of all research participants, especially but not exclusively those with lived experience of displacement, at the heart of all research processes.
The 5th conference of the Network for Displacement Research brings together researchers to shed light on the global, regional and local contexts of flight and displacement, including the causes and trends that force people to be mobile, but also immobile.
Approximately 80 million people worldwide are currently displaced due to war or political violence. Millions more have fled their homes because of environmental disasters and socio-economic marginalisation. As there is no immediate end in sight, forced migration is one of the most pressing challenges facing world politics today. We focus on the causes of this phenomenon in our study regions.
