Politics of Exhaustion - by Leonie Ansems de Vries (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

This book exposes the strategies that make migrants' lives unliveable and explores their resistance to this violence. Drawing on years of research across Europe, the author captures the lived reality of asylum seekers, refugees and other marginalised migrants, including their struggles with constant evictions, detention, push-backs, deportations and violence.

Blending feminist, intersectional and decolonial perspectives, the book reframes exhaustion as both a tool of governance and a site of struggle. By amplifying neglected voices and envisioning politics grounded in solidarity, care and friendship, this is a powerful call to rethink how movement, borders and struggle are understood.

Review Quotes

"Required reading for anyone seeking to challenge the dominant crisis-framing of migration and asylum. The Politics of Exhaustion shows us how pernicious governing techniques slowly wear migrants down, but also how migrants creatively reconfigure the cramped conditions of their displacement." Debbie Lisle, Queen's University Belfast

"A truly exciting book that redefines how we think about borders, violence, struggle and solidarity and inspires new ways of imagining and building justice." Bridget Anderson, University of Bristol

"Thoughtful and reflective, this book provides rich conceptual and methodological insights and moves the reader to rethink migration struggles and the lived experiences of exhaustion on which these rest." Vicki Squire, University of Warwick

About the Author

Leonie Ansems de Vries is Reader in International Politics at the Department of War Studies, King's College London, and Co-Chair of the UK Higher Education Humanitarian Group.