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The Making and Unmaking of Borders

A Psycho-social reading of crossing borders

Simon Western

Introduction

We live in a world of borders. Territorial, political, juridical and economic borders of

all kinds quite literally define every aspect of life in the 21st century (Nail 2016)

This short essay explores how borders are increasingly important in today’s world. Individual

and social anxieties are rising in response to borders being ‘made and unmade’ at a phenomenal

pace in the past few years. The phrase ‘Crossing borders’ unleashes a chain of associations

and meanings in society today. When we think of crossing borders, national boundaries,

immigrants and passport controls may immediately come to mind. Walls, fences, security

barriers and checkpoints are all associated with borders, yet many other borders exist that we

have to cross multiple times each day.

As borders become unstable and fluid, individuals can become anxious and threatened. The

unmaking of borders, and the dismantling and loosening of border regimes, removes obstacles

and creates radical new possibilities and opportunities for some, whilst threatening others. The

making of new borders, and the tightening of border regimes, creates hardship and

marginalisation for some, and a feeling of security for others.

Borders and movement

A border controls flows of movement (Nail 2016). It can act as a barrier, returning a

flow of movement back on itself, or as a filter that allows some things to pass and others not.

A border may also be a boundary or an edge, it can be man-made or naturally occur in the

environment, such as the Himalayan mountains bordering between India and China. Borders

are not only material manifestations, they are also found all over the virtual world, and borders

also inhabit the space between physical and virtual spaces, controlling the flow of accessibility

to the virtual world via passwords for example. Borders also occur within us and between us.

Emotions, affects and thoughts flow, crossing internal borders within each of us, and also flow

between us as relational phenomenon.

Border regimes within us

In my work as a coach, therapist and consultant, I am constantly crossing the border lands

between the conscious and unconscious worlds. When exploring a client’s unconscious,

psychoanalysis teaches us that something important is at stake when the clients defence

mechanisms kick in, and they offer resistance. These psychoanalytic concepts ‘defences and

resistance’ echo military language, for example when a force encounters an enemies border,

they too meet defences and resistance. This mirroring of language reveals how closely our

internal borders relate to external borders. Our internal worlds impact and shape the external

world.

“I saw that beautiful barbed wire going up,” President Trump 3rd November 2018

U.S. President Donald Trump and his followers export their internal fearful mindsets, that see

‘the other’ as a dangerous invader, through their rally cries and Trump’s promise to ‘build the

wall’. Interestingly the other chant at Trumps election rallies of, ‘lock her up’ (referencing to

Hilary Clinton) is also about walls and borders - in this case the security walls of a prison.

The demand to build walls and lock people up, signifies the internal desire for punitive security

borders to be inflicted on the ‘bad other’, so the self can feel safe and secure, at both physical

and at emotional-identity levels. Psychoanalysis teaches us that when we create a ‘bad other’

in our minds, it usually represents a split-off part of ourselves, an unwanted aspect of ourselves

that we cannot consciously tolerate, so we evacuate the bad or disliked part of ourselves and

project it onto others. We create internal ‘security’ borders, behind which our repressed

anxieties and dormant fears lie. As in most borders however they are never 100% secure, and

leaks occur in the flows of movement the border tries to stop. In this case our unconscious

life seeps into our consciousness, often in displaced ways. Making new borders and re-

enforcing existing border regimes, are simplified solutions politicians use to mobilise popular

support, claiming it will protect the ‘good us’ from the ‘bad them’. The Brexit cry of ‘take

back control’ is another example. Taking back control means to many the remaking of a lost

border to prevent the free flow of people. The conscious and unconscious borders within us,

and the relational borders between us, constantly regulate our libidinal flows. Our emotions

and affects, our drive and psychic energy are regulated by border regimes within us, between

us and external to us.

Internal mindsets produce external realities. Internal anxieties and fears produce

nationalist politicians, external walls, scapegoats and repressive laws. This also happens in

reverse. Our internal worlds are shaped by external realities. When physical borders impose

themselves on us each day, for example the Berlin wall during communism, or the Israeli

security wall or apartheid wall (depending on which side you live on), or the gated

communities of Johannesburg where high walls, razor wire and security guards dominate the

landscape, an unconscious internalisation process takes place. We internalise the walls and

border regimes and they create normative mindsets that limit and shape how we live.

Internalising restrictive border walls, creates defensive and fearful mindsets.

Luxurious Prisons

Interestingly when the powerful build border walls to defend themselves against an undesirable

other, the wall impacts on both sides. The gated community in a city acts as a defence against

the poor, but it also encloses the rich in a (luxurious) prison, and both sides internalise the

impact of this. A border controls both the flow in and out. Whilst walking in Johannesburg’s

wealthy districts I experienced the dystopian future that is becoming normal in other cities.

High walls, razor wire, security gates, security guards and nobody walking or cycling, just

people locked in their houses and cars. What mindsets and cultures are internalised when we

live with border regimes that are so pervasive, defensive and also aesthetically destructive.

Digital Border Regimes

This internalisation of border regimes also occurs in our encounters within the virtual and

financial world. In recent years we find ourselves constantly crossing virtual borders, signing

in and using security passwords. Each time we shop, buy something on-line, visit a website we

cross a border, each with its own way to control and restrict the flow of movement. We

internalise the experience of being constantly monitored by these digital border regimes,

checking we are human and not robots, and expelling us from places beyond our reach. These

new online border regimes are a dominant feature of our daily existence, and we can internalise

a sense of the world being a place of borders. The constant boundary crossing, the warnings

of dangerous viruses and cyber-attacks and the fears of being shut out, discriminated against,

and the frustration at not able to cross the border, creates new anxieties, frustrations and even

rage in the digital age. Yet the paradox is that IT, the internet, social media and mobile

communications can also erase borders, making connections possible that were once

impossible. Techno-utopians still dream of new radical democracies, and open societies

modelled on open-source technology and new possibilities of the commons. Knowledge and

information is now freely accessible at the click of a mouse, that was once only available to

elites, and required difficult border crossings. We live in times where huge new potential exists

and vast open spaces appear as so many borders have been dismantled and loosened in this

digital era, whilst at the same time more borders exist than we could have possibly imagined

in the past.

Shifting Borders

This is an age when as Nail (2016) says; borders are being made unprecedented rates.

Despite the celebration of globalisation and the increasing necessity of global mobility,

there are more types of borders today than ever before in history. In the last twenty

years, but particularly since 9/11, hundreds of new borders have emerged around the

world: miles of new razor-wire fences, tons of new concrete security walls, numerous

offshore detention centres, biometric passport databases, and security check points of

all kinds in schools, airports and long various roadways across the world (Nail 2016:1)

Yet borders are both being made, and being unmade, at an un-precedented rate. This

relationship between the making and unmaking of borders is symbiotic, each force impacting

on the other. As borders are unmade, new anxieties are unleashed that create a drive to make

more borders. As borders are being made, activists strive to open up new spaces and loosen

border regimes.

Three examples revealing how borders are being made and unmade.

1. Trade borders

Globalisation, neo-liberal free trade, mass air travel and the EU’s four freedoms of

movement (finance, people, goods and services) are examples of a radical unmaking of

borders in recent times. Neo-liberal capitalism offered a vision, at least on the surface,

of open-trade and free-markets, (although many would claim that elites created hidden

borders under this rhetoric of freedom excluding many from accessing a share of the

wealth that was created). There is currently a counter-revolution against these

globalising forces to create new borders that protect national trade, and the movement

of labour (e.g. Brexit and economic nationalism elsewhere).

2. The Digital age unmakes borders in ways we couldn’t imagine in the last decade,

unleashing new possibilities, huge opportunities and also unforeseen consequences. As

discussed earlier there is also a rapid proliferation of borders in the virtual world.

Microsoft is a good example of a company that managed to exploit the virtual world of

border-making to create their vast profits. Through the licensing of their software

(word, excel etc) and creating restrictive borders that prevented open use, they created

their vast business empire.

3. Identity Borders Another unmaking of borders comes about through a radical changing

of legal and emotional identity borders. Same-sex marriage and transgender rights are

examples of the unmaking of border regimes both legal and cultural, which defined

identity norms for past decades. The unmaking of these borders is hugely liberating

for many and threatens the identity of others. The speed of this change is phenomenal.

For example in Ireland, a conservative catholic country until recent years recently

voted in a gay Taoiseach (Prime minster) and held a referendum that allowed same-sex

marriage. These changing border-regimes are part of what some call ‘culture wars’

taking place in the USA and the West. Some fighting for more borders, some for less

borders. Interestingly those who fight for less borders for marginalised people to gain

rights (such as transgender rights) are seen by others to be imposing new border regimes

that restrict free speech and thinking (Western 2015). Borders are not straightforward,

they are complex and enmeshed in power relations.

Our individual and collective identities are at stake when border regimes change, for

better or for worse.

Conclusion and Reflections

Crossing borders in the recent past was probably less confusing and demanding.

Institutions, social norms and rituals, made borders more rigid and prior to the digital revolution

and hyper-globalisation borders were more stable. They were never fixed but were less fluid

than in today’s disruptive world. We live in confusing times where more borders are appearing

all of the time, and where many borders are disappearing or becoming more porous.

In today’s world we have to accommodate fast changing border regimes, which requires

sensitivity and maturity. It also requires us to reflect on how these border regimes impact on

our intimate as well as political and social lives.

References

Nail T. (2016) Theory of the border. Oxford University Press

Western S. (2015) Political Correctness and Political In-correctness A psychoanalytic study of new authoritarians https://www.academia.edu/17284587/Political_Correctness_and_Political_Incorrectness_A_psychoanalytictic_study_of_new_authoritarians