This introduction prefaces a special issue on the topic of feminist participatory methodologies in geography. Drawing upon the experiences of the contributors in developing new tools and methods to facilitate interaction with participants and working with groups that tend to be forgotten, subordinated and/or alienated, we argue for the methodological significance of instating a feminist perspective to participatory research. Although much theoretical debate has taken place among feminist and post-colonial scholars on unequal research relationships between ‘researchers’ and ‘research subjects’, the literature on how to operationalize greater equality remains quite limited. We attempt to fill this research gap by bringing together scholars working in both the Northern and Southern hemispheres in order to illuminate the multifaceted ways in which these methods can be used not only to debunk hierarchical research relationships, but also to produce new scientific insights with greater validity.

Many host-countries have liberalised migration policies to facilitate the transition of international students to the local labour market as they are seen as economic agents who increase global competitiveness and integrate easily. However, how migration and educational policies at the regional and national levels emerge, are negotiated and become implemented, and how they contradict other policies, remains little-known. This special issue aims to address that gap. This introductory paper offers an analytical framework for studying policies of international student mobility that addresses four critical dimensions: discourses, contexts, agents and temporalities before offering some key avenues for future research.

The role of state discourses in the construction of ‘otherness’ and in the production of inequality has become a major issue during a time of increasing changes in migration flows, of an increased presence of nationalist parties, and of increasingly restrictive immigration policies in Europe. In this paper we examine historical shifts in the representation of foreigners within Swiss state discourses and the effects of these shifts on the integration of immigrants into Swiss society. As state discourses regarding foreigners significantly changed after the First World War, the emphasis of immigration policies shifted from a facilitating to a constraining approach. Überfremdung, the notion that excessive numbers of foreigners can threaten Swiss identity, emerged as one of the most influential discourses in Switzerland and provided the foundation for a quantitative and qualitative strategy of defence against the immigration, settlement, and naturalisation of foreigners. In recent years, however, an agreement on freedom of movement between Switzerland and the European Union has been struck, and immigration policies have once again adopted a facilitating stance. As this applies only to citizens of the European Union, a stratified system of immigrant rights has been continued and perpetuated. At the same time, right-wing parties, which have recently risen to power, have successfully used Überfremdung propaganda to persuade Swiss populations to vote against the relaxation of conditions for the naturalisation of foreigners, thus ensuring that immigrants will be excluded from access to citizenship rights over generations. The politics of immigration in Switzerland is above all a politics of national identity.

The spatialities of migrant entrepreneurship have changed dynamically in recent decades. Movements and exchanges transcend national borders more than ever, and transnational migrant entrepreneurship has become a burgeoning field of research. Yet, knowledge is dispersed across disciplines, and an understanding of contemporary spatialities is limited. We review 155 articles published in English, French, German, and Spanish since 2009, thereby providing an overview of existing knowledge on transnational migrant entrepreneurship and suggesting avenues for future research. We identify five current topical areas of research: (1) the business advantages of transnational migrant entrepreneurship, (2) the determinants of becoming a transnational migrant entrepreneur, (3) the transnational networks of migrants, (4) the economic impacts of transnational migrant entrepreneurship on home and host countries, and (5) whether local environments enable or deter entrepreneurial success. Building on our synthesis of the most recent literature, we propose three crucial dimensions which have been under-researched in past and current work, and which address the diversity of geographical locations, spatial connections, and spatial mobilities involved in transnational migrant entrepreneurship. Moreover, we put forward a set of questions for future research which will advance a comprehension of unequal opportunities among transnational migrant entrepreneurs.

The concept of citizenship, originally coined by Marshall, and synonymous with social rights and equality, is pivotal in understanding and overcoming the social injustices that many migrants experience. Marshall's notion of social rights, however, does not elaborate on economic rights. Feminist authors argue that women's equal access to sources of income outside family relations is key to their citizenship. Access to spaces of paid work is a significant aspect of migrant women's citizenship because their residence status and naturalization is often contingent on their employment. The author thus argues that economic rights should be central to debates on migration and citizenship. The proposed term ‘economic citizenship’ is used to examine experiences and strategies of fifty-seven skilled migrant women from Latin America, the Middle East, and South East Europe when trying to access positions in the Swiss labour market corresponding to their professional qualifications. The feminist and postcolonial perspectives of ‘intersectionality’ and participatory research are used to understand how and why inequalities in the labour market occur. It is found that traditional ideas about gender roles, discourses about ethnic difference, and discriminatory migration policies intersect to create boundaries for skilled migrant women in accessing upper segments of the Swiss labour market. Migration, therefore, does not always imply empowerment and emancipation, but also generates new forms of social inequality.