Julien Brachet is a researcher at the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD), University of Paris and a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Senior Research Fellow at the University of Oxford. Julien’s research focuses on patterns of mobility to and through the central Sahara, particularly in Niger and Chad, where he has conducted extensive fieldwork. He studies migration networks, transport systems, and trade between Sub-Saharan and northern Africa, with a focus on the shifting strategies that allow local people to adapt to the growing severity of national and international migration policies. This work is part of a long-term research project on the progressive implementation of a global system of surveillance, spatial control and management of mobility in Africa.