Virtual innocence. On the status of the Children of Belgian departees in North-East Syria

Dr Nadia Fadil, University of Leuven

About this event

In the aftermaths of the uprisings in the Middle-East, approximately  5000 European citizens travelled to the region of the Levant. Among those who have left, one third have returned, while others have died or disappeared or are stuck in the camps. Among them 400 Adults and 700 children. European countries have overwhelmingly refused to repatriate these citizens, due to their participation in activities considered terrorist. Since 2014, travelling to the region has been considered an offense, irrespective of one’s activities. This paper seeks to reflect on the situation of these European citizens, in particular through the perspective of the children. Whereas a growing number of studies have attended to the new regimes of exclusion produced by the war on terror, few have attended to the effects on those who haven’t committed any offence but are related – through kinship – to the accused, i.c. their children. I will argue that the status of the children is characterised by a condition of virtual innocence, a condition that stands in between statelessness (as theorized by Arendt) and danger.

Nadia Fadil works as an Associate Professor at the IMMRC (Interculturalism, Migration and Minorities Research Centre) at the University of Leuven. After having obtained a PhD at this same institute, she has been affiliated as a Postdoctoral Jean Monnet Research Fellow at the European University Institute (2008-2009), a Visiting Fellow at the University of California Berkeley (2011-2012), a Fulbright Visiting Fellow at Columbia University (2018) and an FWO Postdoctoral fellow at the KU Leuven (2009-2012).

Her work centers on Islam in Europe (taking Brussels as ethnographic site), both as a lived tradition as well as an object of regulation. She draws on this empirical question to reflect on a vast set of theoretical issues such as subjectivity and power, ethical selfhood, postcoloniality, governmentality, race and secularism. Her most recent publications include Secular Bodies, Affects and Emotions. European configurations (with Monique Scheer and Birgitte Scheplern Johansen, Bloomsbury 2019) and Radicalization in Belgium and the Netherlands. Critical perspectives on Violence and Security (with Martijn de Koning and Francesco Ragazzi, IB Tauris 2019). She has also been active as a columnist and writer in the Belgian press and is a board member of a few organizations working on migration, multiculturalism and social inequality in Brussels.

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The event will take place on zoom. The link will be available upon registration.