Profile of DCMÉT member Eloy Rivas-Sanchez

It's never too late, and is always a good idea, to celebrate colleagues and friends.

Having some fun in Viña del Mar, Chile, just before the International DCMÉT Symposium in 2021 (with Eloy in the centre and Olmo Fregoso Bailon, a longstanding colleague and friend of DCMÉT)

And at the conference.

Eloy Rivas-Sánchez is an Associate Professor of Sociology, and Chair of the Centre for Social Sciences in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at Athabasca University, Canada. He also serves as Research Director of the Migration and Democracy axis at the UNESCO Chair on democracy, Global Citizenship and Transformative Education (DCMET).  Eloy has been the Chair since its very beginning in late 2016/early 2017. 

His work engages with critical sociology, migration studies, social movement research, global citizenship education, and democratic theory. Traversing and throughout his research, teaching, community engagement, and international collaboration, he is extremely committed to advancing scholarship and public dialogue on social justice, migrant rights, social solidarity, democratic participation, and transformative social change.

Rivas-Sánchez’s research focuses on migrant justice movements in Canada and the United States. It examines how migrants with precarious legal status (refugee seekers, undocumented workers, temporary farm workers), receiving/host communities, and social movements build collective forms of resistance and solidarity in response to exclusionary border regimes and restrictive citizenship frameworks. His scholarship explores themes such as radical democracy, social movements, transnational solidarity networks, political belonging, and alternative visions of citizenship.

Supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), his current projects investigate:

1) types of work that facilitate dignified labour conditions and enhance belonging and citizenship participation among migrant workers in Alberta, and

2) the ways migrant justice movements across Canada create life-enhancing forms of solidarity and collective action beyond conventional institutional politics.

Eloy is presenting ground-breaking research on undocumented migrants in a number of countries, especially in the Americas. 

Drawing on political sociology, critical migration studies, and democratic theory, his work seeks to contribute to debates on solidarity, social transformation, and the role of civil society in addressing contemporary global challenges experienced by migrants and other highly vulnerable communities.

Rivas-Sánchez also serves on research committees and scholarly associations at both national and international levels, such as the Committee on Social Movements, Social Change and Collective Action of the International Sociological Association (ISA), the Canadian Sociological Association (CSA), the Parkland Institute and the Latin American Studies Association. He collaborates with community organizations, social movements, educators, and policy advocates concerned with migrant justice, democratic participation, and social justice.

Originally from Mexico, Eloy undertakes transformative research, scholarship and engagement throughout the Americas, and the UNESCO Chair DCMÉT is extremely appreciative of his commitment to social justice, and also his engagement with our diverse activities over the past decade (his involvement in our three international symposia in 2021, 2022 and 2023 as well as his collaboration as an editor in our Epicentre and Pygmalion Democracy books was exceptional!).

Muchas gracias, querido Eloy, y un abrazo muy fuerte!!!

Athabasca University: https://www.athabascau.ca/humanities-and-social-sciences/our-people/eloy-rivas-sanchez.html

List of publicaitons: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=Ej3TfZ8AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao