This book offers an examination of how border control functions activated far from border lines fundamentally reshape the world we live in. Moving beyond the headlines of migration crises, it reveals that border control is no longer just about migration containment. Through compelling case studies from across the globe—from the Mediterranean and North Africa to South America and into the intimate space of the family—the contributors demonstrate how "externalisation" actively transforms places.
The chapters in this volume uncover how efforts to manage mobility create new economic realities, alter local politics, and even restructure family life and civil society. Far from being a simple imposition of power, these bordering practices are shaped in turn by the unique communities and histories they encounter. The book argues that borders do not just divide space but actively generate new social realities and power dynamics on the ground, with profound consequences for societies near and far.
This volume is essential reading for students, scholars and researchers in migration studies, border studies, political geography, international relations, and sociology. It will also appeal to policymakers, human rights practitioners, and civil society organizations working on migration governance, refugee protection, and transnational mobility issues.
The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of Geopolitics.
Table of Contents:
Introduction: Embedding Externalisation: How Bordering Practices Transform Places 1. Over Land and Sea: NGOs/CSOs and EU Border Externalisation Along the Central Mediterranean Route 2. Re-producing the Humanitarian Border 3. Between ‘Trochas’, Orphans and Mourning: Migrant Mobilities and the Effects of US ‘Soft’ Remote Control in Ecuador 4. The Effects of Externalised Border Control Management by Germany on Marriage Migrants from Third Countries 5. Externalising Migration Controls through Development Programs in Egypt 6. Countering Containment: Chronoscopy and Resistance in an Era of Externalisation
About the Author :
Sebastian Cobarrubias is an ARAID Researcher at the Department of Geography, Universidad de Zaragoza. He is a Section Editor for Oxford Intersections and on the Editorial Board of Political Geography
Paolo Novak is Senior Lecturer in Development Studies and Co-Director of the Centre for Migration and Diaspora Studies, at SOAS London. He is the author of Buildings of Refuge (2025)
