The governmentality of migration: Intercultural communication and the politics of (dis)placement in Southern Europe

•The EU and the Italian state have implemented a state infrastructure governing the migration flows towards Europe.•Expertise on intercultural communication is celebrated as a key resource of this infrastructure.•I investigate the status of expertise on intercultural communication within an infrastructure managing migration in Italy.•I discuss how expertise on intercultural communication regulates migrants' access to the life projects migration stands for.

The European Union and the Italian state have currently implemented a state infrastructure enabling to govern the migration flows towards Europe. This infrastructure has involved the formation of an ensemble of institutions, procedures, analyses and reflections that raise the efficiency of migrants' reception, integration or expulsion. Expertise on intercultural communication has been celebrated as a key resource of this infrastructure. In this article, I discuss the status of expertise on intercultural communication within an infrastructure managing migration in Italy. I focus on the circumstances by which expertise on intercultural communication has emerged as a crucial technology of this infrastructure and on ways this knowledge contributes to the regulation of migrants' access to the life projects migration stands for.