Migration panic
How isolationist policies are promoting authoritarianism

War, displacement, climate crisis, pandemic, artificial intelligence and international armament – the major geopolitical upheavals of our time are creating fear, uncertainty and loneliness. In an increasingly confusing world, there is a growing desire for a ‘strong hand’ at the borders and a tightly knit ‘us’ within. Judith Kohlenberger's latest book traces the beginning and, in some cases, already completed authoritarian shift that has also taken hold in middle-class circles, using the rampant migration panic as an example. And it shows that there is only one crystal-clear way out.

Judith Kohlenberger is a migration researcher at the Institute for Social Policy at the Vienna University of Economics and Business, a senior researcher at the Austrian Institute for International Affairs (oiip) and an affiliated policy fellow at the Jacques Delors Centre Berlin. Her research interests include flight and displacement, the integration of refugees in European host countries (with a focus on education, health and gender) and cultural crisis narratives.

She is a member of the Integration Council of the City of Vienna, co-editor of the Journal for Refugee and Migration Studies, and host of the podcast Aufnahmebereit (Ready to Welcome). Her work has been recognised with the Kurt Rothschild Prize and the Anas Schakfeh Prize for services to human rights, democracy, and the promotion of the rule of law. Her book Das Fluchtparadox (The Refugee Paradox) was named Austrian Science Book of the Year in 2023 and nominated for the German Non-Fiction Prize.

Lisl Ponger photographed actions by Otto Muehl, Hermann Nitsch and other representatives of Viennese Actionism, among others. She spent extended periods in Mexico and the USA. She began filming in 1979. In 1998/99 and 2001/02, Lisl Ponger was a visiting professor at the University of Applied Arts Vienna. In 2002, Lisl Ponger was invited to Documenta11 and was represented in the film programme of documenta 12 in 2007. In 2024, the Diagonale film festival dedicated a retrospective to her.

Lisl Ponger's work deals with stereotypes, racism and the construction of the gaze. She moves at the interface between art, art history and ethnology in the media of photography, film, installation and text. (press release)