Law Enforcement mobilities Across Borders | LEmobAB

Police cooperation across border-regions has a long history in Europe: whilst informal cooperation across border-regions has been the rule rather than the exception, cooperation has been increasingly institutionalised, initially through bi- or multilateral agreements and later also through supranational EU law. Both the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union and the Convention implementing the Schengen Agreement encourage bilateral cooperation between member states. Increasingly, however, the EU Commission has problematised the differential configuration of bilateral agreements and the multiple options given in EU law as a “complex web”, said to hamper an effective law enforcement cooperation. As envisaged in EU Security Union Strategy (2020) and in the Schengen Strategy (2021) the Commission presented proposals for an EU Police Cooperation Code. Addressing in particular cross-border police cooperation instruments -  such as hot-pursuit, cross-border surveillance, Police and Custom Cooperation Centres and joint patrols -, in 2022 the European Council adopted upon proposal of the Commission a Recommendation on operational law enforcement cooperation.

LEmobAB ― Law Enforcement mobilities Across Borders ― investigates the interdependency between localised policing-practices across border-regions and European legal-political practices in the field of police cooperation and interrogates the ways that policing contributes in shaping the European space. Three questions lead this research (1). Empirically, what are the relations and variables between situated bilateral cross-border police cooperation (CBPC) and the role of legal-geopolitical practice in fostering security cooperation? Conceptually, what role do LE mobilities and border-regions play in the creation of a European space? And applied, how can qualitative police- and security-research’s understanding of complex social, legal and political dynamics increase its impact? By connecting bottom-up empirical insights and situated experiences from selected border-regions with the study of ongoing legislative developments on EU level, this study contributes to filling an important knowledge gap. On a theoretical level the project develops the interface between legal anthropology, international relations/international political sociology and global criminology. In its applied dimension, the project promotes practices of knowledge visualisation in analysis and communication.

Project website

Researcher

Monika Weissensteiner (School of International Studies, University of Trento)

Supervisor

Alessandra Russo (School of International Studies, University of Trento)

Activities carried out within the Project LEmobAB

Conference organizer/host 

  • Police Cooperation and European Integration. Developments in law, policy, practice. Conference organized on the 10/06/2025, at the School of International Studies, University of Trento. Speakers: Prof. Dr. Christian Kaunert, Prof. Dr. Saskia Hufnagel, Dr. Vanessa Ugolini, Prof. Dr. Toine Spanens, Drs Nils Filius, Dr. Monika Weissensteiner. Full program: https://eventi.unitn.it/en/police-cooperation-european-integration 

Conference and Workshop Presentations 

  • Weaving collective creative ethnographic practices into the anthropological study of institutions: challenges and experiences with multimodal ethnographic research (Monika Weissensteiner & Alice Sophie Sarcinelli, conference presentation), Panel 09 Visual Anthropology Transgressing Disciplinary Boundaries: Outsider s Challenges and Experiences with Multimodal and Visual Methods, Royal Anthropological Institute Film Festival and Conference, 03/07/2025 [online]. 
  • The EU Police Cooperation Code Initiative: an analysis of the “complex web” through interlegality, space and temporality [conference presentation], Panel 01 Developments in police cooperation through the lens of multiple analytical perspectives, Police Cooperation and European Integration. Developments in law, policy, practice, 10/06/2025, at the School of International Studies, University of Trento. 
  • Legal pluralism as a lens to analytically engage with the “patchwork quilt” of cross-border police cooperation in Europe: the case of Police and Custom Cooperation Centers in information exchange [conference presentation], Panel 15 Science and Technology Studies and Legal Pluralism convened by Turner B., International Conference on Legal Pluralism, 13-15/01/2025, Universitas Indonesia, Indonesia.
  • Visualizing legal pluralism, space and border reconfigurations in Europe. Possibilities and criticalities when engaging in map-making, based on a case study on cross-border police cooperation [seminar paper-presentation], 2024 seminar-series of the SIS Cluster in International Security, School of International Studies, discussant Ragazzi F. (Leiden University), University of Trento, IT.
  • Police Cooperation Within the spatial-legal configuration of an Area of Freedom, Security and Justice [conference presentation], Panel Open Track Law 01: Authority and efficacy in EU Law chaired by Öberg J., 54th Annual Conference of the University Association for Contemporary European Studies (UACES), 2-5/09/2024, University of Trento, IT.
  • Policy and law, temporality and space: “studying through” Schengen [conference presentation], Panel On/doing power: policy, law and the difference it makes convened by Hummel A. and Oancă A, Annual Conference of the European Association of Social Anthropology (EASA), 2024, Barcelona, ES [18/07/2024; online panel].
  • Crisis mobilisations: narratives, experiences and trajectories in security and law enforcement [co-convenor and panel chair], joint interdisciplinary conference Peace, conflict, and security in times of existential crises: Critical, interdisciplinary, and public engagements, organized by The Collaborative Research Centre “Dynamics of Security” (SFB/TRR 138) and the Anthropology of Peace, Conflict, and Security (APeCS) network of the European Association of Social Anthropologists EASA, 21–22/03/2024, Marburg, DE.
  • Rethinking cross-border police cooperation [conference presentation and panel chair], POL Panel 23. Police partnerships and collaboration, 23rd Annual Conference of the European Society of Criminology (ESC), 09/09/2023, University of Florence, IT.
  • Splash page exhibition: visualization and visual engagement [exhibition], panel Comics-based ethnographies and ethno-graphic novels, 9th International Ethnography and Qualitative Research Conference, 7-10/06/2023, University of Trento, IT.

Invited Talks and Workhops

Topics: visual methods; migration, Schengen, security; police-cooperation

  • Visual methods in qualitative research: drawing, PhD and post-doc Workshop, 31/01/2025, School of International Studies, University of Trento, IT.
  • Relavanz und Potential des Zeichnens als ethnographische Methode. Beobachten & visuelle Methoden” [On the relevance and the potential of drawing as an ethnographic method. Observation and visual methods], invited guest lecture in BA seminar on qualitative methods for environmental studies lead by Dr. Bettina Paul, 05/11/2024, University of Hamburg, DE.
  • On the production of narratives, visuals, imaginaries: possibilities and challenges of visual ethnographic narratives on policing and security labor”, invited presentation and material exhibition, panel III Visualizing security labor, Workshop “Re-imagining Security Labor”, 10/06/2024, Netherlands Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS), Amsterdam, NL.
  • Migration in the Schengen Area, invited lecture in the module “Police Engagement in International Context”, 27/08/2024, Deutsche Hochschule der Polizei [German Police Academy], Münster, DE.
  • Operational police cooperation: understanding developments in new EU legislation and policy through the case of the EU Police Cooperation Code / Council Recommendation 2022/915, invited lecture in the MA seminar "Organised Crime and transnational police cooperation”, 28/11/2024, Politieacademie [Police Academy of Apeldoorn], NL.
  • Cross Border Police cooperation in Joint Operations (joint presentation with Filus N.), invited lecture in the MA seminar "Organised Crime and transnational police cooperation”, 29/11/2024, Politieacademie [Police Academy of Apeldoorn], NL.
  • Im/mobilita’ e confini interni, invited lecture on internal Schengen border regulation and im/mobilities, 9th edition of the SUXR/FUTURA program, accredited seminar open to students from all faculties, 18/10/2024, Faculty of Law, University of Trento, IT.
  • Im/mobilita’ e confini interni, invited lecture on internal Schengen border regulation and im/mobilities, 8th edition of the SUXR/FUTURA program, accredited seminar open to students from all faculties, 13/10/2023, Faculty of Law, University of Trento, IT.
  • Police checks in border-areas (art. 23 SBC), invited input to workshop “Re-writing borders”, 21/07/2024, ASGI, Vallecrosia, IT.
  • Visualizing ethnography - drawing as method, invited lecture in MA methodology seminar lead by Ana Ivasiuc, 17/10/2023, Department of Anthropology, National University of Ireland, Maynooth, IE [online].
  • Grenzüberschreitende Polizeiarbeit [Cross-border police cooperation], invited lecture at MA course in EU law by Dr. Jens Wölk, 25/05/2023, Faculty of Law, University of Innsbruck, AT [online].

Training attended (selection)

  • International Course on Legal Pluralism, Commission on Legal Pluralism & Universitas Indonesia,08-11/01/2025, Universitas Indonesia, Indonesia.
  • BA modules in KV (2023&2024): Use of vector-graphic programs; Infographics; Interaction/narration skills; Züricher Hochschule der Künste, Faculty of Design, Subject Area Knowledge Visualization, CH (Zurich University of the Arts, MSCA secondment partner).
  • Interactive webinar “'Empowering early-career researchers in policing', organized by the Working Group of Policing Studies of the European Society of Criminology, 18/12/2023 [online].

Publications

Dissemination (text and visualization): 

Academic articles

  • Sarcinelli A., Weissensteiner M. (2024) Visual law [section]: What’s in a name? Children’s rights and legal voice within administrative and juridical procedures of recognition of same-sex filiation, Amicus Curiae, Series 2 (2), pp. 203-223 [text and illustration].

Infographics 

  • The Schengen Area (1/2025): IT, EN
  • Re-introduction of border control (1/2025): IT

Exhibitions (see presentations)
LEmobAB Project Website: www.lemobab.eu

Disclaimer:  This project has received funding under the European Union’s HORIZON 2021 programme. Marie Sklodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship,  grant agreement N° 101063837. Views and opinions expressed are those of the author only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or of the European Commission’s Research Executive Agency. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.

Funding

European Commission, HORIZON 2021 programme, Marie Sklodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship,  Grant Agreement No 101063837. 
Cordis: https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101063837.

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