Transnational Lives in the Welfare State (TRANSWEL)
My research is about people who lead transnational lives and the relation between them and the Norwegian state institutions. I focus on the encounter between the bureaucrats in the institutions of the welfare state and people who live partly in Norway and partly in another country. In cooperation with Grete Brochmann, I examine this encounter from the perspective of the institutions. My guiding research question is: How do institutions of the welfare state accommodate and experience the encounter with people who lead transnational lives? Other members of the TRANSWEL project team examine this encounter from the perspective of the people who lead transnational lives. Together, we seek to explore transnational living in the welfare state.
In contemporary Europe, an increasingly high number of people live partly in one country and partly in another. Since this way of living can entail both benefits and challenges for states, it is important to assess how institutions relate to people with transnational lives or lifestyles. In order to do this, I investigate what happens within the bureaucracy, within the welfare institutions, when faced with increased transnationalism. What rules and regulations are applied and how? What parameters affect the outcomes of the encounters, and how are these encounters experiences from the perspective of the people in the institutions? As more knowledge can help develop better policies and help reduce unnecessary bureaucratic frustrations, one of my research objectives is to explore how the welfare state can adapt to and approach the benefits and challenges of transnational living.