Lothar Smith
Lothar Smith holds the position of assistant professor with the Human Geography department at the Institute for Management Research, Radboud University, The Netherlands. In both research and education (undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate levels) Lothar takes a special interest in the globalization- development nexus for the global south, notably where this concerns human migration.
Current research interests go out to processes related to changing social configurations coming out of migration such as gender role changes, institutional arrangements of local resources, and post-conflict situations and how these impact on rural and urban configurations. To that end he is involved with the Centre for Poverty Analysis (CEPA) in Sri Lanka, looking at role of diasporas in redevelopment of post-conflict regions. In Indonesia Lothar is part of the Dutch-Indonesian New Indonesian Frontiers Programme transnational team. This programme focuses on the impact on local populations of changing economic-ecological situations in Kalimantan subject to external influences. In Ghana affiliations with Centre for Migration Studies (Accra), and the Dombo University for Business and Integrated Development Studies (Wa) have led to long term research engagements on livelihood and mobility questions (linked to climate change, gender and youth aspirations). This expertise is now being extended to research supervision in Nigeria.
Similar questions on internal mobility, identities and what this implies for governance questions around livelihood configurations but also planning of rural and urban areas are the subject of research efforts with the University of Fort Hare (Alice) and the African Centre for Migration & Society (Johannesburg) in South Africa. A new research project explores the role of land rights, human mobility and citizenship for refugees in north-western Uganda.
Lothar is a member of the Nijmegen Centre for Border Research (NCBR), the TransMobilities & Development research network, a recent coordinator of the Global–Local Divides and Connections (GLOCAL) research group, and advisory board member to the African Studies Centre Leiden, The Netherlands. He is also a research associate of the African Centre for Migration & Society, The University of the Witwatersrand and coordinator of the Human Geography master programme at Radboud University.