Following the selection of the best abstracts submitted in response to the Call for Papers, the World Customs Organization (WCO) and the World Bank will host a Research Conference on the theme of informality related to international trade and border administration in Brussels, Belgium.

   Four major areas will be discussed at the Conference:  

1. Local importers of developing and emerging countries, their individual trajectories, practices and their relationships with the administrations controlling the borders, their organization as transnational commodities value chains and the relationships between these chains;
2. Economic, political, and social effects of the international movements of goods subject to informal practices;
3. The representations, official and unofficial practices of the border administrations in relation with what/who they name "informal";
4. The role of administrations and international/transnational organizations producing norms to regulate international trade flows, within an ideological framework influenced by corporations promoting self-government while the usual forms of national sovereignty remain in place.

   Prof. Keith Hart will deliver a keynote address at the opening of the Conference.

   Selection Committee:

• Keith Hart (University of London, University of Pretoria and University of Kwazulu-Natal, Durban);
• Thomas Cantens (World Customs Organization and Centre Norbert Elias Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales);
• Robert Ireland (World Customs Organization);
• Cristiana Panella (Royal Museum for Central Africa);
• Gael Raballand (World Bank).

• WCO Member Administrations;
• Universities and research institutions;
• International organizations.