Conference Themes
Borders in the post-Corona Era
Covid-19 has resulted in new forms of border management. Governments have used the spread of the pandemic to enforce stronger control of borders, excluding the movement of people across borders, based on stringent health controls. At the same time, other forms of cross-border activities, not least virtual communication, conferencing, and dialogue, have become common. Papers dealing with the potential long-term impact of the pandemic on cross-border movements and activities will be welcomed. Related subjects can be the ways in which governments have manipulated the agency of borders, as a means of meeting other political objectives, such as the prevention of migration, smuggling, and violence across borders.
Border Interfaces
Covid-19 has resulted in new forms of border management. Governments have used the spread of the pandemic to enforce stronger control of borders, excluding the movement of people across borders, based on stringent health controls. At the same time, other forms of cross-border activities, not least virtual communication, conferencing, and dialogue, have become common. Papers dealing with the potential long-term impact of the pandemic on cross-border movements and activities will be welcomed. Related subjects can be the ways in which governments have manipulated the agency of borders, as a means of meeting other political objectives, such as the prevention of migration, smuggling, and violence across borders.
Borders and Power Relations
Borders are demarcated, managed, and controlled by power elites at both local and national levels. The ability to exclude or include through the closing or opening of borders is a powerful political agent of control. The demarcation of social and economic borders is as important a means of economic planning, as is the demarcation of geographical borders for the purpose of zoning and regional planning. Papers are invited that focus on the relationship between borders and power relations, and the different ways in which power remains central to the management of society in general, and borders in particular.
Border Representations
Borders are represented through many forms. Such representations often reflect the true impact of borders upon society as evidenced by diverse groups within it. Representations range from maps (cartography), film, poetry, literature, art, caricatures, and theatre. Papers are invited that focus on such border representations. In addition to formal presentations, participants are welcome to include poster presentations or film sessions that focus on the diverse border representations and narratives.
Ethics and Human Rights at the Border
The way in which border are demarcated, imposed upon the physical landscape, and managed, sometimes lead to many infringements of ethics and human rights. These range from the way in which migrants are treated at the borders to the ways in which land is expropriated by the superimposition of borders. Papers are invited to explore the way in which human rights might be contravened at borders, as well as the rise of grassroots organizations that seek to protect and defend those who are powerless in the face of border stringencies.
Legal Status of Boundaries in the 21st
From Global to Local Borders
Borders occur at diverse scales and levels, ranging from the spatial to the social, and from the global to the local. The borders that impact us most in our daily lives are the municipal, urban, and local that compartmentalize society into residential, schooling, and municipal zones. Many of these local borders are invisible inasmuch as there are not fences or walls, though they have a great impact on people who rarely interact with a national border. Papers are invited that focus on the impact of local borders on border communities, in their daily life patterns.
Maritime Boundaries
Environment and the Border
The environmental threat that has been brought about through climate change rarely recognizes borders. Pollution and environmental spill-over require cross-border cooperation to improve quality of life. People living within close proximity to borders are often impacted negatively by the lack of cross-border cooperation. Papers are invited that focus on the negative and the potential positive impacts of borders on the way in which the environmental issues are managed to the benefit of people living across both sides of the border.
Gender at the Border
The impact of the border often differentiates among gender and other marginalized and minority groups. Border checks, profiling, and surveillance often reproduce power relations and increase insecurities for women and other minority groups. Repressive border management and security practices have been shown to discriminate among gender, age, and ethnic groups, often through the categorizing and selection of such groups, not at least due to the fact that most border management is overwhelmingly a male profession. Papers are invited about the way in which border management might impact upon the perpetuation of such binary categories, and the ways in which this can be addressed and changed.
Walls, Fences, and the Re-Securitization of Borders
The removal of the Berlin Wall signified to many analysts the end of the era of walls and fences at borders. However, the past two decades have witnessed a significant growth in the construction of new border walls and fences throughout the world, mostly by applying post-9/11 securitization narratives, and also as a way of preventing migration and cross-border movement of ‘unwanted’ and ‘alien’ populations. Papers are invited that examine the impact of physical walls and fences upon the local environment – both from a physical, visual perspective, and as a political agency of control.
Border Agendas for the 21st Century
The renaissance of border studies during the past three decades has undergone changing narratives. Starting from the borderless world discourses of the globalization theories of the 1980s and 1990s, through the re-securitization narratives of the post-9/11 era, from the focus on national and state borders to the discussion of local borders, and from geographical and territorial borders to invisible and vertical borders, the border narrative and multiple agendas have crossed different disciplines and have become multi-dimensional. Papers are invited that raise major issues and questions that borders scholars are, and should be, addressing in the next generation of border studies.