Ilke Adam

Ilke Adam is an Associate Professor in Political Science at the Brussels school of Governance at Vrije Universiteit Brussels, where she leads the Research Centre for Migration, Diversity and Justice at the Brussels School of Governance (BSoG) (with Omar Cham). Adam also directs the Brussels Interdisciplinary Research centre on Migration and Minorities (BIRMM) at VUB, which unites over 130 researchers from 12 disciplines.  

Her research interests include immigration, immigrant integration, anti-racism and anti-discrimination policies, focusing on the multi-level governance of these policies and EU-Africa relations on migration. She studies local, regional, national and European policies, as well as the interactions between governance levels. Beyond research on public policies, Adam's research interests extend to the study of multiculturalism, citizenship, anti-racist activism and sub-state nationalism.   

Ilke Adam currently leads two FWO research projects: the SBO ENGINE project on the ethno-racial gap in higher education in Flanders (consortium with KULeuven and UHasselt), and the CIVIBRUS project on the production of belonging in civic integration policies in Brussels. She was a consortium partner in two recently finalized Horizon 2020 projects: BRIDGES on the production and impact of migration narratives (with a focus on West-Africa) and WHOLE-COM on integration policies for post-2015 migrants in small and medium-sized towns (focus on Belgium). A recent research project on the Pioneers of Anti-Racism in Belgium resulted (e.g.) in the creation of the firstwaves.be website, an open-source collaborative webplatform that shares the often silenced struggles for dignity of the Black and Maghrebi diasporas in Belgium.    

Professor Adam currently prepares publications on anti-racist activism in Europe and Belgium, EU-Africa migration relations on migration and cities' immigrant integration policies. She is the co-editor of the forthcoming edited volume, A New Wave of Antiracism in Europe? Racialized Minorities at the Centre (with Jean Beaman and Mariska Jung, IMISCOE Series). Recent books include : Intergovernmental Relations on Immigrant Integration in Multi-Level States (Routledge 2021, co-edited Eve Hepburn) and Migration,Equality and Racism. 44 Opinions (Academia Press 2021, co-edited with Tundé Adefioye, Serena d’Agostino, Nick Schuermans and Florian Trauner). With Omar Cham, she won the 2024 Regional Studies Association Best Paper Award for their article on the politicization and framing of migration in West Africa in the journal Territory, Politics, Governance.    

For more information on publications, research projects, and other activities, click here.