Laura Cleton

Dr. Laura Cleton is a postdoctoral researcher at Erasmus University Rotterdam's Erasmus School of Social and Behavioural Sciences, specializing in deportation governance and migration policies. She leads the FAiR project investigating legitimacy perceptions among street-level bureaucrats implementing return policies. Previously, she held postdoctoral roles at UNU-MERIT and Maastricht University, focusing on diaspora capacity-building. Her PhD (2022), awarded prestigious prizes, explored the legitimation of child deportations via intersectional boundary work.

Her research interests span migration governance, feminist migration studies, and family migration policies. She serves as Associate Editor for the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, chairs IMISCOE's GenSeM committee, and is Secretary of the Dutch Association for Migration Research (DAMR).

Key awards include the 2022 APSA Best Dissertation Prize and the Van Poelje Prize. Her work addresses gendered/racialized family norms in deportation, temporalities of deportability, and bureaucratic legitimation strategies. Recent publications analyze ethical challenges in accessing deportation systems and controversies around migrant family detention.