For the past two decades, a resurgence of borders has been observed. On the one hand, this is shown by the remarkable increase in border controls, border walls and fortified border installations. On the other hand, however, it shows above all the progressive proliferation or multiplication of borders: they penetrate far into the spectrum of society, they manifest themselves very differently and figure spatially fragmented. This transformation of the border is no longer tangible with the familiar concept of the line, but is reflected in interconnected materialities, localizations, temporalities, corporealities, discourses, and multiple efficacies. These new forms of the border are not only challenging for political actors; also border scholars who engage with the changing border realities are confronted with new conceptual challenges.
Externalized within, bordering processes in Ceuta & Melilla
The notion of ‘externalized within’ traces the social transformations that follow from Ceuta and Melilla becoming frontlines of Fortress Europe. I mobilise the concept of everyday bordering in order to shed light on the links between externalisation and the micro-level social consequences of this process for the undocumented residents of Moroccan origin in the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla. The presented paper explores how politics of exclusion become exacerbated in places where migration control is entangled in multiple layers of externalisation.
Nina Sahraoui is Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow at CRESPPA, Paris, CNRS.
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