Dr Ben Lampert

Development Policy and Practice
Faculty of Maths, Computing and Technology
The Open University
Walton Hall
Milton Keynes
MK7 6AA
Phone number: + 44 (0)1908 55019
Fax number: + 44 (0) 1908 654825
Email: b.lampert@open.ac.uk

Position: Research Fellow

Biography:

Ben has a background in Human Geography, with a BA from the University of Oxford and a MSc from the University of Bristol. Ben spent a year as a Commonwealth Scholar in the Department of Geography at the University of British Columbia, Canada, before undertaking his PhD research in the Department of Geography at University College London.

Research:

Ben’s research interests are primarily in the fields of migration, development and African studies. Ben has had a particular research interest in Nigeria since teaching at a university there in 2000. His MSc research examined the everyday practices of British colonial civil servants in Nigeria and his PhD research explored the role of London-based Nigerian diaspora organisations in development in Nigeria.

Ben joined DPP in 2010 and is currently working with Dr Giles Mohan as the Research Fellow on the ESRC-funded project ‘The social and political impacts of South-South migration: A comparative analysis of Chinese migrant integration in West Africa’. In the wider context of China’s heightened involvement in Africa in recent years, this project is analysing the patterns, processes and outcomes of increasing Chinese migration to the continent. Focussing on Ghana and Nigeria, the project is centrally concerned with subjecting to greater empirical scrutiny claims made about the possible development impacts of this greater Chinese presence in Africa. More information about the project can be found here: http://asiandrivers.open.ac.uk/china.html

Publications:

Lampert, B. (2009) Diaspora and development? Nigerian organizations in London and the transnational politics of belonging, Global Networks 9(2) 162-184.

Selected presentations:

Lampert, B. (2010) Diaspora and development? Nigerian organisations in London and their transnational linkages with ‘home’, paper on final PhD findings presented at the 53rd Annual Meeting of the African Studies Association, San Francisco, USA, 18 November.

Lampert, B. (2007) Diaspora and development? Nigerian organisations in London and their transnational linkages with ‘home’, invited seminar presentation on initial PhD findings given in Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS) series ‘Perspectives on African migration’, Oxford, 10 May.

Lampert, B. (2006) Transnational social security networks? The case of Nigerian diaspora organisations in London, invited paper presented at Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS) workshop on migrant social security networks, Oxford, 6 February.

Lampert, B. (2003) The pathetic panopticon: colonial power and its limits, paper presented at the annual meeting of the Canadian Association of Geographers, Victoria, Canada, 29 May.