Renata Blumberg and Raphi Rechitsky
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781479898992
- eISBN:
- 9781479806799
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479898992.003.0011
- Subject:
- Sociology, Migration Studies (including Refugee Studies)
This chapter focuses on border politics on the redrawn border of the Ukraine and the EU to interrogate how transnational social movements that seek to challenge territorial borders can also actively ...
More
This chapter focuses on border politics on the redrawn border of the Ukraine and the EU to interrogate how transnational social movements that seek to challenge territorial borders can also actively construct internal social borders. It analyzes the case of No Border Camp, a convergence of over three hundred activists from countries around the world, to protest unjust immigration enforcement and the militarization of European borders. Activists involved in these transnational initiatives confronted tensions that emerged around “borders of difference” and power disparities, which limited the impact of the movement's antiauthoritarian practices. While differences of language and region were pronounced and impacted network-building within the camp, collaborative efforts to advocate for more just border enforcement were also hindered by varied understandings of appropriate antiauthoritarian organizing strategies. Although the mobilization was successful in achieving some goals, global economic inequalities as well as activists' divergent relationships to and imaginaries of place inhibited the implementation of anticapitalist, antinationalist politics. In this case, organizing across borders of identity or nationality affirmed differences, rather than blurring or transcending them. Despite activists' rejection of liberal rights discourses that are foundational to nation-states, they confronted tensions emerging from national origin as well as the geopolitical power relations among countries.Less
This chapter focuses on border politics on the redrawn border of the Ukraine and the EU to interrogate how transnational social movements that seek to challenge territorial borders can also actively construct internal social borders. It analyzes the case of No Border Camp, a convergence of over three hundred activists from countries around the world, to protest unjust immigration enforcement and the militarization of European borders. Activists involved in these transnational initiatives confronted tensions that emerged around “borders of difference” and power disparities, which limited the impact of the movement's antiauthoritarian practices. While differences of language and region were pronounced and impacted network-building within the camp, collaborative efforts to advocate for more just border enforcement were also hindered by varied understandings of appropriate antiauthoritarian organizing strategies. Although the mobilization was successful in achieving some goals, global economic inequalities as well as activists' divergent relationships to and imaginaries of place inhibited the implementation of anticapitalist, antinationalist politics. In this case, organizing across borders of identity or nationality affirmed differences, rather than blurring or transcending them. Despite activists' rejection of liberal rights discourses that are foundational to nation-states, they confronted tensions emerging from national origin as well as the geopolitical power relations among countries.
