Cindy Horst is Research Professor in Migration and Refugee Studies and co-director of the PRIO Centre on Culture, Conflict and Co-existence.

Her current research focuses on how individuals, including artists and academics, can challenge the status quo and effect societal change in (post-)conflict settings. In her research on (transnational) civic engagement, she asks questions that problematise normative ideas of 'active citizenship', exploring how people living in culturally and religiously diverse societies engage with their surroundings. She also researches civic support for social justice, humanitarianism and development, including diaspora engagement with regions of origin and the transnational activities of refugees.

Cindy is especially interested in innovative research methodologies that foster a critical and ethically conscious engagement with the theme of study, through shared anthropology, arts-based methods and multi-sited ethnography.

Cindy is the author of 'Creative Resistance. The social justice practices of Monirah, Halleh and Diala' (Lived Places Publishing, 2023) and Transnational Nomads: How Somalis cope with refugee life in the Dadaab camps of Kenya (Berghahn, 2006). Her recent publications include co-edited special issues on relational humanitarianism (2025), refugee education (2023), and arts, violent conflict and displacement (2022). Key articles include 'Miracles in dark times: Hannah Arendt and refugees as 'vanguard'', Journal of Refugee Studies (2021), co-authored with professor Odin Lysaker, and 'Towards a conceptualisation of relational humanitarianism', Journal of Humanitarian Affairs (2023), co-authored with professor Cathrine Brun.

Languages spoken:

Dutch (mother tongue), English (fluent), Norwegian (good), German, (intermediate), French (basic), Somali (basic),

Work Experience:

Moderator of the Refugee Livelihoods Network, UNHCR. Researcher and Lecturer on forced migration, University of Amsterdam

Education:

2003: PhD in Social Sciences on migration and transnationalism among Somalis, University of Amsterdam1997: Foundation Course on Forced Migration, Centre for Refugee Studies, Oxford University1996: MA in Cultural & Social Anthropology, Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen