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It is commonly thought that, thanks to globalization, nation-state borders are becoming increasingly porous. Steffen Mau shows that this view is misleading: borders are not getting more permeable today, but rather are being turned into powerful sorting machines. Supported by digitalization, they have been upgraded to smart borders, and border control has expanded spatially on a massive scale. Mau shows how the new sorting machines create mobility and immobility at the same time: for some travellers, borders open readily, but for others they are closed more firmly than ever. While a small circle of privileged people can travel almost anywhere today, the vast majority of the world's population continues to be systematically excluded. Nowhere is the Janus nature of globalization more evident than at the borders of the 21st century.
List of contents
Acknowledgements
1. Borders are back!
2. Statehood, territoriality and border control
3. Opening and Closing: The Dialectic of Globalization
4. Fortification: Border walls as bulwarks of globalization
5. Filtering borders: Granting unequal opportunities for mobility
6. Smart borders: Informational and biometric control
7. Macroterritories: Dismantling internal borders, upgrading external borders
8. Extraterritorializing control: The expansion of the border zone
9. Globalized borders
Notes
About the author
Steffen Mau is Professor of Macrosociology at the Humboldt University of Berlin.
Summary
It is commonly thought that, thanks to globalization, nation-state borders are becoming increasingly porous. Steffen Mau shows that this view is misleading: borders are not getting more permeable today, but rather are being turned into powerful sorting machines. Supported by digitalization, they have been upgraded to smart borders, and border control has expanded spatially on a massive scale. Mau shows how the new sorting machines create mobility and immobility at the same time: for some travellers, borders open readily, but for others they are closed more firmly than ever. While a small circle of privileged people can travel almost anywhere today, the vast majority of the world's population continues to be systematically excluded. Nowhere is the Janus nature of globalization more evident than at the borders of the 21st century.
Report
'Elegantly written and sharply argued, Steffen Mau's book examines the changed function of borders in the era of globalization. Selective citizenship, algorithmic governance and the securitization of mobility are some of the mechanisms through which freedom of movement is shown to be the privilege of only a few wealthy elites. An essential and eye-opening analysis of territorial authority in the 21st century.'
Lea Ypi, London School of Economics and Political Science
'Territorial borders are complex institutions by which states organize hierarchies of (un)desirability of non-citizens. Steffen Mau employs his great analytical sensitivity to investigate border regimes in policy areas such as migration, labour markets and health, EU integration, separatism and war. As the building of fences and walls has again become a global growth industry, this timely and highly readable book offers important insights on the politics of territoriality.'
Claus Offe, Hertie School of Governance
"[C]ompelling and eminently readable"
European Journal of Cultural and Political Sociology
