RTG 2987: Mobility Rights in
the Global Context of Multiple Crises

Selmar Krug M.A.

As part of the RTG 2987 and as a doctoral researcher in Cultural Anthropology, I explore the effects of crimmigration law inside German prisons. My ethnographic research asks how the legal limbo resulting from looming expulsions and deportations is handled on the ground against the backdrop of a hostile populist discourse, diverse and conflicting legal logics, and individual rights. As part of my studies at Humboldt University in Berlin, Concordia University in Montreal, and the University of Göttingen, I earned a Master of Arts in Anthropology (European Ethnology) and a Bachelor of Arts in Cultural Anthropology/European Ethnology and Gender Studies. Before joining the RTG in October 2025, I was part of the EU-Horizon research project MORE: Motivations, Experiences and Consequences of Returns and Readmission Policy: Revealing and Developing Effective Alternatives at the University of Göttingen.

Key Interests
Border and Deportation Studies
Crimmigration
Criminalization and Carcerality
Legal and Political Anthropology
Gender and Sexuality


Research Area 10: Negotiating the Right to Stay in Criminal Justice Institutions
Working Title: Expulsion in Sight – Precarious Prospects Behind and Beyond Bars

My dissertation project examines the impact of criminal convictions on mobility rights. With migration policies increasingly focused on return and deportation, potential and convicted offenders are often treated as the primary target group by a largely hostile populist discourse that thrives on ‘othering’ the figure of the criminal; in practice, deportations following expulsions due to criminal convictions are often preceded by journeys through the criminal justice system. The effects of crimmigration —the close entanglement of migration and criminal law—result in prisoners with precarious legal status being stuck in limbo, in prisons facing uncertainty regarding a significant and growing portion of their inmates, and in rehabilitation being reduced to a mere legal promise on paper. The goal of my ethnographic research is to identify the scope for individual and institutional action and discretion in shaping the precarious legal prospects, and to uncover the diverse, potentially conflicting professional, legal, and moral rationales and interests at play in this process.


Presentations

Publications

  • Krug, Selmar, Schurade, Svenja and Koruyucu, R. Aslı. 2026. „Friction – Spannungen, Spaltungen und produktive Störungen aus Geschlechterperspektive: Tagung der DGEKW-Kommission für Geschlechterforschung und Queere Anthropologie in Zusammenarbeit mit dem Institut für Kulturanthropologie / Europäische Ethnologie und dem Studienfach Geschlechterforschung der Universität Göttingen, Göttingen, 19.–21. Juni 2025“. Zeitschrift für Empirische Kulturwissenschaft 122(1): 177-182. https://doi.org/10.31244/zekw/2026/01.13
  • Schurade, Svenja, and Selmar Krug. 2025. Faktencheck: Quo Vadis Abschiebungen in Deutschland? https://uni-goettingen.de/de/697214.html
  • Krug, Selmar, Svenja Schurade, and Sabine Hess. 2025d. Experiences, expectations and views of migrants and professionals in the field around RR and alternative policies. Case study: Germany. (Executive Summary), More project. September 2025. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.18223326
  • Schurade, Svenja, Sabine Hess, and Selmar Krug. 2025c. RR on the ground: implementation of the RR policy, its impact, and state agents’ assessment and perceptions (Executive Summary), More project. April 2025. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.15174784
  • Schurade, Svenja, Sabine Hess, and Selmar Krug. 2025b. Alternative policy approaches to RR: regularisation and other recognised statuses. Case study: Germany (Executive Summary), More project. January 2025. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.14832974
  • Schurade, Svenja, Sabine Hess, and Selmar Krug. 2025a. Development of the Return and Readmissions policy across Europe: multilevel analysis. Case study: Germany (Executive Summary), More Project. January 2025. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.14832948