Borders define territories within which identities and order are described and delineated. The triptych of indentities, borders and orders is central to understanding the nature of sovereignty and the relations between countries. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the European Union. The changing definition and placement of the border is one of the most striking features of the recent transformations of the Union. The definition of what a border is and where it is for persons has moved out of the territory of national sovereignty and has become the preserve in law of the European Community. The enlargement of the European Union towards the countries of Central and Eastern Europe has created new challenges for the concept of borders in the EU. This volume examines the extent of the Community power and the legal meaning of the EU's borders, as well as the ways to control (or not) the movement of persons across borders. It considers the legal texts - EC law on visas, the Regulations on visas, the meaning of borders for persons in Community Law, the Schengen acquis and its incorporation into the EC Treaty (and where appropriate the TEU); national practice and its transformation with the insertion of the private sector's responsibility for the control of borders and judicial control. The point of departure is the perspective of the individual who is seeking to cross these borders.

This publication provides a historical and ethnographic analysis about the geopolitics and biopolitics of a European securitization process with regard to Senegalese migration history. It examines the way a European border regime was externalized to Senegal in light of the West African maritime route that came to a head in 2006. Beyond a policy-dimension, this publication analyses narratives about migration and about Europe from the viewpoint of a politically engaged urban youth perspective, the Senegalese hip-hop milieu. This provides an external perception of the European Union.

In recent years, a number of European countries abolished national border controls in favor of Europe’s external frontiers. In doing so, they challenged long-established conceptions of sovereignty, territoriality, and security in world affairs. Setting forth a new analytic framework informed by constructivism and pragmatism, Ruben Zaiotti traces the transformation of underlying assumptions and cultural practices guiding European policymakers and postnational Europe, shedding light on current trends characterizing its politics and relations with others. The book also includes a fascinating comparison to developments in North America, where the United States has pursued more restrictive border control strategies since 9/11. As a broad survey of the origins, evolution, and implications of this remarkable development in European integration, Cultures of Border Control will be of interest to students and scholars of international relations and political geography.

The extent to which ordinary people can construct, shift, and dismantle borders is seriously neglected in the existing literature. The book explores the ability of citizens to participate in the making of borders, and the empowerment that can result from this bordering and debordering activity. ‘Borderwork’ is the name given to the ways in which ordinary people can make and unmake borders. Borderwork is no longer only the business of nation-states, it is also the business of citizens (and indeed non-citizens). This study of ‘borderwork’ extends the recent interest in forms of bordering which do not necessarily occur at the state’s external borders. However, the changing nature of borders cannot be reduced to a shift from the edges to the interior of a polity. To date little research has been conducted on the role of ordinary people in envisioning, constructing, maintaining, shifting, and erasing borders; creating borders which facilitate mobility for some while creating barriers to mobility for others; appropriating the political resources which bordering offers; contesting the legitimacy of or undermining the borders imposed by others. This book makes an original contribution to the literature and stands to set the agenda for a new dimension of border studies. This book was published as a special issue of Space and Polity.

Irregular Migration in Europe contributes to our knowledge of the scale and nature of the much discussed but under-researched phenomenon of irregular migration in Europe, whilst improving our understanding of the dynamics of irregular migration and its relation to European societies and economies. Presenting a comparative analysis of the experiences and policies of different EU member states, this book draws on an extensive range of sources, many of which have so far been absent from English-language analyses, to offer an overall picture of irregular migration in twelve EU member states. This volume will be of interest to policy makers and researchers within the fields of migration, sociology and social anthropology, political science, European integration and European studies, political science and public administration.

This work analyses the emergent European border surveillance regime as part of the European border regime/migratory regime and the power structures this technologogical regime is embedded into, is reproducing and creating. The history, politics, policies and technological characteristics of the border surveillance regime of the EU are analysed through a theoretical framework based in political science, political sociology and surveillance studies.

The right to free movement is the one privilege that EU citizens value the most in the Union, but one that has also created much political controversy in recent years, as the debates preceding the 2016 Brexit referendum aptly illustrate. This book examines how European politicians have justified and criticized free movement from the commencement of the first Commission of the EU-25 in November 2004 to the Brexit referendum in June 2016. The analysis takes into account the discourses of Heads of State, Governments and Ministers of the Interior (or Home Secretaries) of six major European states: the UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Romania. In addition to these national leaders, the speeches of European Commissioners responsible for free movement matters are also considered. The book introduces a new conceptual framework for analysing practical reasoning in political discourses and applies it in the analysis of national free movement debates contextualised in respective migration histories. In addition to results related to political discourses, the study unearths wider problems related to free movement, including the diversified and variegated approaches towards different groups of movers as well as the exclusive attitudes apparent in both discourses and policies. The History and Politics of Free Movement within the European Union is of interest to anyone studying national and European politics and ideologies, contemporary history, migration policies and political argumentation.

Offers an integral picture of the EU's internal and external borders to reveal the processes of re-bordering and social change currently taking place, exploring issues such as security, immigration, economic development and changing social and political attitudes.