- Associate Professor Dr Olga OleinikovaFounder & Director"Our mission is to translate the silent movements of millions into a coherent global strategy. We are not just observing; we are architecting the response to a world in permanent flux."
One of Australia's leading migration scholars, Dr Oleinikova is Associate Professor in Migration at the University of Technology Sydney. A migration sociologist specialising in new forms of cross-border mobility (including reproductive mobility), forced displacement, and climate migration across Asia-Pacific, she has held research fellowships at Oxford University, the Max Planck Institute, Prague Charles University, and WZB Berlin. Listed among Forbes Top 40 Global Ukrainians, her work is supported by grants from DFAT (Australian Government Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade), NED (National Endowment for Democracy), Oxford University, and UTS. She has advises DFAT and the UN Migration Agency. Author of 5 book (3 monographs), she pioneered the systematic study of life strategies of migrants from crisis regimes, and founded GIEHM to build the global evidence base the field of emerging mobilities demands. - Dr Polina Smiragina-IngelströmCo-Founder & Deputy Director"The intersection of climate displacement and reproductive health is the most critical human rights challenge of the next century. GIEHM is where we build the evidence for that reality."
A victimologist at the forefront of research on hidden exploitation and human trafficking in Europe, Dr Smiragina-Ingelström is a lecturer and senior research manager at DIS Stockholm and Executive Secretary of the Victimology Working Group within the European Society of Criminology. She serves as external expert for the European Commission DG HOME (EU Anti-Trafficking Hub), previously served the OSCE as chief investigator on the gender dimensions of human trafficking and worked directly with survivors as a migrant counsellor and reintegration assistant with the UN Migration Agency (IOM). She has held research fellowships at the University of Sydney Law School, Lund University and Stockholm University. Sitting on the advisory board of the Journal of Modern Slavery, her expertise in structural inequality, child protection and reproductive exploitation places her at the centre of GIEHM's policy and research agenda.
GEIHM's Advisory Board.
GIEHM's Advisory Board shapes the institute's intellectual direction and ensuring rigour across both research areas.
- Reproductive Health
Professor Angela Dawson
University of Technology Sydney (UTS) · Sydney, Australia
Nationally and internationally recognised expert in maternal and reproductive health and Associate Dean of Research at UTS. She leads the reproductive health theme at INSIGHT, the UTS Research Institute she established in 2023, focusing on under-served populations including refugees and women in humanitarian emergencies - Reproductive Technologies
Professor Marcia C.Inhorn
Yale University · Connecticut, United States
One of the world's foremost medical anthropologists, holding the William K. Lanman Jr. Chair at Yale University. Author of seven books and editor of fifteen, her decades of ethnographic research on IVF and cross-border reproductive travel have made her one of the founding scholars of the field of reproductive migration. - Computational Demography
Dr Emilio Zagheni
Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (MPIDR) · Rostock, GermanyDirector of the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research and global pioneer in computational demography. He leads the Laboratory of Digital and Computational Demography and is best known for his foundational role in using web and social media data to study migration processes. - Climate Migration
Associate Professor Yvonne Su
York University · Toronto, Canada
Associate Professor at York University and Visiting Scientist at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, specialising in forced migration, climate displacement, and queer migration. With over $12 million in secured research funding, her work has been cited in the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report. - Migration & Displacement
Professor AKM Ahsan Ullah
Universiti Brunei Darussalam · Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei
One of Asia's foremost scholars of migration, displacement, and refugee studies, with positions at the American University in Cairo, the Asian Institute of Technology, and multiple Canadian universities. Author of over 20 books with Routledge and Palgrave, and consultant to the World Bank and UK International Development Department. - Migration & Law
Dr Natalia Ollus
European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control (HEUNI), UN affiliated · Helsinki, Finland
Director of the European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control (HEUNI), affiliated with the United Nations, she is one of Europe's leading experts on migrant worker exploitation, forced labour trafficking, and anti-trafficking policy. She has held positions at UNODC, the UN Permanent Mission of Finland, and the OSCE Vienna. - Reproductive Migration, BioLaw
Professor Sonja van Wichelen
University of Sydney · Sydney, Australia
Professor of Anthropology and Sociology and Deputy Head of School (Research) at the University of Sydney. A leading scholar at the intersection of law, life science, and globalisation, her research spans legal anthropology, reproductive technologies, surrogacy, and global migration. She directs the Biopolitics of Science Research Network.
A worldwide network of expertise.
GIEHM Associates are leading researchers, legal scholars, demographers, and policy experts from across the world.
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Professor Charlotte Faircloth
University College London, Social Research Institute, UK
Human Reproduction
UK
Charlotte Faircloth is Professor of Family and Society at the UCL Social Research Institute and Co-Director of the Thomas Coram Research Unit. She is one of the directors of the UCL Centre for Human Reproduction where she leads Repro@UCL, a network for social science and humanities scholars working on reproduction, broadly defined. From sociological and anthropological perspectives, Charlotte’s work has focused on parenting, gender and reproduction using qualitative and cross-cultural methodologies. This research has explored infant feeding, couple relationships, intergenerational relations and, recently, the impact of coronavirus on family life. She is currently leading the 50 Years of Becoming a Mother project. -
Professor Stine Willum Adrian
Arctic University of Norway (UiT)
Reproductive Technologies
Norway
Stine Willum Adrian is Professor of Sociology in the Department of Social Sciences at the Arctic University of Norway (UiT). She holds a PhD in feminist science and technology studies (STS) and cultural analysis. Her research focuses on reproductive technologies and on technologies of death and dying. Adrian has conducted extensive ethnographic studies of fertility clinics and sperm banks in Denmark and Sweden, examining IVF, insemination, cryotechnologies, and sperm banking. She has a particular interest in the mobility of gametes and cross‑border fertility travel. Her monograph, Sperm Stories: Ethics on Borders and Boundaries, will be published by Emerald in 2026. -
Associate Professor Medea Badishvili
Ilia State University, Georgia
Displacement & Reproductive Migration
Caucasus / Georgia
Associate Professor in Human Geography and Head of the Master Programme in Gender Studies at Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University, Georgia. Holding a PhD in Human Geography, her research spans labour migration, refugee flows, gender equality, and women's empowerment across Eastern Europe and post-Soviet contexts. Her current research — supported by a DAAD fellowship at the University of Göttingen — examines the lived experiences of Ukrainian refugee women in Germany and Georgia, exploring how displacement reshapes power dynamics and cultural identity. Her expertise in gender, migration, and post-Soviet states makes her a vital contributor to GIEHM's research agenda.
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Associate Professor Michal Nahman
University of the West of England (UWE Bristol), UK
Reproductive Migration
UK
A pioneer in the study of cross-border human reproduction and repro migration, Associate Professor Dr Michal Nahman has spent over 25 years examining the movement of gametes, reproductive tourism, and migrant women's experiences as egg donors. Her major publications include Extractions: An Ethnography of Reproductive Tourism (Palgrave, 2013) and Global Fertility Chains (2022) — foundational texts in the field GIEHM is building upon. She currently researches human milk markets and food sovereignty, and is former Chair of the Board of Project MAMA, supporting maternity action for migrants and asylum seekers. Her work sits at the very heart of GIEHM's research agenda.
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Post-Doctoral Researcher Polina Vlasenko
University of Oxford, UK
Reproductive migration
Europe / Ukraine
A postdoctoral researcher in social and cultural anthropology at the University of Oxford, Dr Vlasenko holds a PhD from Indiana University, Bloomington, where her dissertation examined the political economy of Ukraine's export-oriented egg donor and IVF industry — exploring donor eggs as racialised commodities and egg donors' experiences of reproductive labour under post-socialism. Her research centres on women's reproductive intimacies and labours, the political economy of assisted reproduction, biocapitalism, and post-socialist transformations of gender and biotechnology. She brings rare and direct empirical expertise in reproductive migration and the global circuits of fertility to GIEHM's founding research agenda.
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Post-Doctoral Researcher Yvonne Frankfurth
University of Cambridge, UK
Reproduction
Europe / Germany / US
Dr Yvonne Frankfurth is a sociologist of reproduction, technology, and the state, and an STS Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School. Drawing on her Cambridge PhD on Germany's egg-donation ban and cross-border fertility travel, her research examines reproductive governance, law, and emerging technologies across Germany, Europe, and the US — contributing to debates on reproductive migration, donor conception, bioethics, and reproductive justice. Her comparative, interdisciplinary approach bridges sociology, law, and science and technology studies, offering critical insight into how states regulate reproductive mobility and access — making her work central to GIEHM's mission.
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Professor Linda Steele
University of Technology Sydney, Australia
Law
Australia / Asia-Pacific
Professor of Law at the University of Technology Sydney, Dr Steele works at the intersection of disability, law, and social justice. Her research examines how law enables and redresses institutional violence against marginalised populations, with particular expertise in forced sterilisation, bodily autonomy, and the legal governance of reproduction. Her concept of "disability-specific lawful violence" offers a powerful framework for understanding the legal grey zones that drive reproductive migration across borders. Recipient of the Australian Legal Education Award for Excellence in Teaching, she brings to GIEHM critical legal expertise at the intersection of reproductive rights, human rights, and migration.
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Associate Professor
Hong Quan Nguyen
Vietnam National University Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Climate Migration
Vietnam / Southeast Asia
Associate Professor at Vietnam National University Ho Chi Minh City, Dr Nguyen Hong Quan is an environmental hydrologist with over 20 years of experience in climate change adaptation, water systems, and sustainability science across Vietnam and the broader region. Author of more than 100 ISI/Scopus-indexed articles — 70% in Q1 and Q2 journals including Nature and Science of the Total Environment — he applies interdisciplinary approaches bridging academia, industry, and government. He serves on editorial boards of Circular Economy and Sustainability (Springer) and PLOS Sustainability and Transformation, and on the Policy Advisory Board of the Global Circularity Protocol for Business.
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Anne Brandt Christensen
Faculty of Law, DIS Study Abroad in Scandinavia
Law
Denmark / Europe
A licensed Danish Advokat and member of the Danish Bar Association, Anne Brandt Christensen brings over two decades of frontline legal expertise in human trafficking and victim protection. Member of the Council of Europe Network of Specialised Lawyers & NGOs, she has been repeatedly nominated by the Danish Government as Expert for GRETA — the Council of Europe's expert group on action against trafficking. A recipient of the European Crime Prevention Award (EU) for anti-trafficking work in 2014, she has chaired NGO HopeNow and serves on the board of NGO AmiAmi. Her practical legal expertise at the intersection of trafficking, migration, and victim rights makes her an invaluable voice in GIEHM's policy and research network.
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Associate Professor Elizabeth (Libby) J. Pfeiffer
Rhode Island College, US
Reproductive Justice
US / Africa
Associate Professor of Sociocultural Anthropology at Rhode Island College, Dr Pfeiffer is a medical anthropologist with expertise in global public health, reproductive justice, and African Studies. Her research examines infectious and chronic disease, sexual and adolescent health, health disparities, and the social determinants of health across Kenya and the United States. Her long-term ethnographic work on HIV stigma — exploring how social, economic, and political forces shape access to care and health outcomes — is the basis of her book Viral Frictions: Global Health and the Persistence of HIV Stigma in Kenya (Rutgers University Press, 2022). -
Assistant Professor Sneha Banerjee
University of Hyderabad, India
Reproductive Governance
India
Assistant Professor in Political Science at the University of Hyderabad, Dr Sneha Banerjee completed her PhD at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, and held a postdoctoral fellowship at the Centre de Sciences Humaines (CSH), New Delhi, where she remains an associate researcher. A recipient of the Swiss Government Excellence Scholarship at the University of Zürich, her research focuses on commercial surrogacy regulation in India, with broader interests in gender and law, the politics of reproduction, and feminist International Relations. Her deep expertise in surrogacy policy and reproductive governance in the Global South makes her an important voice in GIEHM's research network. -
Ilona Cenolli
Center for Bioethics & Health Policy, UK
Bioethics & Health Policy
UK
Ilona Cenolli is a bioethics and health policy researcher focused on reproductive ethics, reproductive migration, health system resilience, and health justice. They hold a Master of Bioethics from Harvard Medical School and are a Fellow of the Royal Society for Public Health in the UK. Ilona’s work examines how emerging technologies, cross-border healthcare, environmental change, and unequal health systems shape people’s reproductive choices and access to care. They have worked across research, regulation, and policy in the UK, the US, and Albania. They are especially committed to building bioethics capacity in LMICs and advancing inclusive, evidence-based health policy. -
Associate Professor Anthea Vogl
University of Technology Sydney, Australia
Migration Law
Australia
Dr Anthea Vogl is an Associate Professor of Law at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS). A socio-legal expert in refugee and migration law and the politics of narrative, she is co-director of UTS's clinical refugee law program. Anthea is an Associate of Border Criminologies at Oxford University and author of the award-winning book Judging Refugees: Narrative and Oral Testimony in Refugee Status Determination (Cambridge University Press, 2024). Her expertise in forced migration, legal storytelling, and refugee status determination brings a critical legal and human rights dimension to GIEHM's interdisciplinary network. -
Anniina Jokinen
European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control (HEUNI), UN affiliated, Finland
Trafficking & Criminal Policy
Nordic / Baltic Sea Region
Anniina brings thirteen years of experience in international criminal policy, including eight years as a researcher at HEUNI and a role as Adviser to the Task Force on Trafficking in Human Beings at the Council of the Baltic Sea States in Stockholm. Trained in sociology, social anthropology and social history at the University of Helsinki, her expertise spans human trafficking, labour exploitation, forced marriage, and gender-based violence, alongside extensive experience in EU and Nordic-funded project development. Her work translating research into policy and training materials for governments, businesses and NGOs brings practical, structure-questioning rigour to GIEHM's research agenda.
Associate.
