Loïc Wacquant is the 30th Aubert Lecturer, honored in the memory of Vilhelm Aubert for outstanding sociology and social analysis. He is Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and Researcher at the Centre Européen de Sociologie et de Science Politique, Paris.
Known for his extensive interdisciplinary work on urban marginality, ethnoracial domination as well as the making of the penal state, Wacquant has redefined understandings of prison systems, urban societies, inequality and ethnicity.
On 4 June, Wacquant will give the 2026 Aubert Lecture at the University of Oslo, while the Aubert Debate will take place the next day, 5 June, at the Institute for Social Research, in Munthes gate 31, Oslo.
The events are open to the public. In-person attendance at the debate requires registration. Both events will be streamed and recorded. A streaming link will be published here in advance. Virtual attendance via event page stream does not require registration.
The events will be held in English.
Aubert Lecture, 4 June 2026, 14:15–16:00, at the University of Oslo
Marginality, Ethnicity, Territory: Punishment in the City
In his Aubert Lecture, Wacquant will put forth a case for interpreting the penal state as an urban institution. Through three steps, he argues that the penal state was invented and is deployed to manage problem categories and territories in the city. Starting with the invention of the workhouse prison in the late 16th century and zooming in on the intensive policing and disproportionate incarceration of subordinate ethnoracial populations in postindustrial societies, Wacquant traces what he calls the double selectivity of punishment by class and ethnicity into the neo-liberal era and within the metropolitan and the Nordic contexts. The lecture will build on his upcoming book, Rethinking the Penal State (Polity Press, 2026).
Aubert Debate, 5 June 2026, 10:00–12:00, at the Institute for Social Research
A Plea for the Genetic Sociology of Ethnoracial Domination
The Aubert Debate will begin with an introduction by Wacquant, taking as his point of departure key contributions from his recent book, Racial Domination (Polity Press, 2024). There, he proposes disposing of “race” as an analytical category, though not as an empirical denotation of how people and institutions categorize people and stratify positions based on a naturalized hierarchy. He also suggests getting rid of the category of “racism” and to replace it with the concept of ethnoracial domination, which combines five different elementary forms: categorization, discrimination, segregation, seclusion, and violence. Wacquant’s introduction will be followed by prepared comments from Julia Orupabo, Research Professor at ISF, and Mette Andersson, Professor of Sociology at UiO. Finally, there will be a debate between Wacquant and the commentators, as well as questions from the audience. The Aubert Debate will be moderated by Professor of Sociology at UiO, Arnfinn H. Midtbøen.
Read more about previous Aubert Lecturers.
Registration
Attendance at the Debate requires registration. Please register here: https://nettskjema.no/a/629327