Alan Gamlen

Alan Gamlen is an Associate Professor of Geography at Monash University in Melbourne, and a longstanding Research Associate at Oxford University's Centre on Migration, Policy and Society. He holds a Doctorate (in Geography) from the University of Oxford, where he studied as a New Zealand Bright Future Scholar.

Alan’s research focuses on the geography and governance of international migration. He lectures frequently about these topics around the world, and publishes widely in academic journals such as Political Geography, Progress in Human Geography, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, and International Migration Review. His work sometimes features in mainstream media such as The UK Guardian, The Vancouver Sun, The Toronto Star, The Advertiser, The New Zealand Herald, The Daily Mail, The Independent, The Evening Standard, and The Economist. As an editor, he has co-published several books and special issues, including Migration and Global Governance  and Diasporas Reimagined, and is the Founding Editor-in-Chief of the journal Migration Studies, published by Oxford University Press, and Co-Editor of the Bristol University Press book series on Global Migration and Social Change (with Nando Sigona).

Alan grew up in New Zealand, completing undergraduate degrees at Victoria University of Wellington, where he received a university award for “most outstanding combination of academic excellence and contribution to the community”. In 2011-2015 he returned to Wellington as a member of the faculty, and in 2016 was appointed successor to the late Professor Graeme Hugo as Director of the Australian Population and Migration Research Centre. He has previously held appointments at Stanford University, Germany’s Max Planck Society, the Japan Centre for Area Studies (part of the Japanese National Museum of Ethnology), and Oxford University. He has worked as a consultant and advisor to the World Bank, the Commonwealth Secretariat, the International Organization for Migration, various United Nations agencies, and numerous national governments, regional agencies and NGOs. Alan’s research has been funded by the Royal Society of New Zealand, the UK Leverhulme Trust, and the UK Economic and Social Research Council, among others, and he is a past recipient of Japan’s Monbusho Scholarship, New Zealand’s Top Achiever Doctoral Scholarship, and Oxford’s Holly Wyatt-Walter Award. In 2014 he received New Zealand’s National Award for Best Emerging Researcher in Geography. Alan's most recent book, Human Geopolitics: States, Emigrants and the Rise of Diaspora Institutions (OUP 2019), won the Distinguished Book Award for Best Book on Ethnicity, Nationalism and Migration from the International Studies Association.

Alan is currently accepting postgraduate students seeking to work on issues of migration, diaspora, transnationalism, and urban diversity. His current PhD students include: Goshu Tefera (Temporal Logics among Ethiopian-Australian Refugees); Lakshmin Mudaliar (Environmental Migration Best Practices in the Pacific); Anh Hung Tuan Nguyen (Using machine learning and virtual reality in human geography visualization of urban diversity); Prabha Arachchige (Immigration, Social Inclusion & Women - primary supervisor R. Wickes); Rida Riaz (Transnational Marriage among Educated Pakistani Women - primary supervisor D. Arunachalam).