Borderlands

UniGR-CBS Working Paper Vol. 17

Visuel
Working Paper Vol. 17
Abstract

In the 21st century, cooperative cross-border projects in many peripheral areas of EU member states have steadily gained in importance; but, as the Covid-19 pandemic demonstrated, they can by no means be taken for granted. Borderland cooperation involves many actors, and complex as well as varied background conditions. Funded by Germany’s Federal Ministry of Education and Research (project key 01UC2104), the network project ‘Linking Borderlands: Dynamics of Cross-Border Peripheries’ undertakes a comparative analysis of two borderland regions, one in south-western, one in eastern Germany: the so-called Greater Region on the borders of Belgium, France, Germany, and Luxembourg, and the Brandenburg-Lubuskie Region straddling the German-Polish border. The Working Paper outlines the background to EU borderland cooperation and sketches some central lines of development taken by border studies, before presenting its five constituent perspectives.

Miniature
Summary

There is an extensive growth in the number of international borders. At the same time goods, people and ideas are more mobile than ever before. A Companion to Border Studies brings together viewpoints on these developments by preeminent border scholars from the fields of anthropology, geography, history, development studies, political science and sociology. Case studies from Asia, Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and the Americas, are presented. A comprehensive analysis of key characteristics of frontiers and borders, including topics such as security, cross-border cooperation, and controls, population displacements and migration, transnationalism and hybridity is provided.

Miniature
Summary

The anthology “European Borderlands,” edited by Elisabeth Boesen and Gregor Schnuer, contains an introduction and 11 chapters of content. It deals with everyday practices in European border regions that support social development and cultural identity. Changes in border regions are considered from a historical, sociological, economic, geographical, literary, anthropological or political perspective. The selected case studies are mainly located in border regions between Germany and its neighbouring countries, but also between Belgium and France, Estonia and Finland or Hungary and Slovakia. They show the diversity of border demarcations, which contradict a “borderless Europe” through border narratives.

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