Deconstructing border practices in the Estonian‐Russian borderland

Abstract

The Estonian‐Russian borderland is a relatively fragile, fairly contested and highly politicised arena in which a number of vital issues for both countries meet and are negotiated. This fact makes the borderland a part of the (geo)political process, including bargaining over social space and resource access, where one can find actors located on different spatial levels and situated among various interests groups. The present article attempts to study how borders with a multitude of meanings and roles can be understood and crossed in time, scale and from different geographical settings. It illuminates the conflicting visions and asymmetric interests among the local borderland population, regional authorities, central governments and international actors. Lastly, it will be argued that border negotiations are unlikely to succeed or intensify where conflicting visions and asymmetric interests dominate, different actors talk ‘different languages’, or boundary‐producing practices simply prevail over border‐crossing practices.