Border Crossings Research Articles

Title 42 and the Impact on Asylum Seekers: Exploring the Effects of its Termination and its Changes on the US Immigration System

The repeal of Title 42, an emergency immigration restriction, represents a significant policy shift in how the United States treats migrants who arrive at the southern border, particularly those seeking asylum. For over three years, U.S. border officers used Title 42 to deport hundreds of thousands of migrants to Mexico or their home countries, claiming that their presence could contribute to the spread of the coronavirus. While Title 42 is allegedly a public health policy, it has been utilized to regulate and prevent unauthorized border crossings. Democrats and campaigners have denounced title 42 because it prevents refugees from obtaining asylum, a legal right they normally have once they reach US territory. Republicans described it as an effective border control tool, requesting that Title 42 should be codified into law so that it may be utilized outside of the pandemic setting. The period of Title 42 ended, which created more obstacles than solutions for asylum seekers. As the US ends Title 42, the rules for asylum seeking are changing once again, the United States will revert to Title 8 under the new standards. The Title 8 Code outlines a strict asylum policy which makes it harder for immigrants to file claims and to seek asylum. Under this new regulation everyone coming from Latin-America, except for Mexico, has to face the harsh reality that the requirements of Title 8 make most of them ineligible for asylum. How does the repealing of Title 42 affect the US immigration system and how will it influence the 2024 elections as the termination was introduced at a critical time, when Biden is seeking a second term?

Examination of the Cultural Awareness Scale for Border Crossers

Abstract Previous studies suggested that long-term Chinese residents living in Japan, instead of identifying as Japanese or Chinese, may have a “superordinate orientation” not characterized by nationality. This study developed a scale to measure cultural awareness of border crossers and evaluated its reliability and validity. To confirm the scale’s reliability, we conducted two online surveys of adult Chinese who had lived in Japan for at least three years at the time of the survey. A 45-item scale was created based on the interview results. The same items were used in both surveys. An exploratory factor analysis (maximum likelihood method, promax rotation) was performed on the valid responses to the first survey. A confirmatory factor analysis was conducted on the valid responses to the second survey. The results showed that the Cultural Awareness Scale for Border Crossers has acceptable reliability and validity.

Healthcare without borders: Creating a shared medical decision-making model to support global patients at Northwestern Memorial Hospital

Individuals from across the globe increasingly elect to travel to the USA for the primary purpose of receiving healthcare. These border crossings create opportunities for rich cultural exchange, as well as for direct conflict between the basic values and preferences of global patients and their healthcare team(s). A series of ethics cases at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where clinicians were morally distressed by the request of families of global patients to withhold medical information about life-threatening disease from the patient, led to a new partnership between the International Health and Medical Ethics teams. This paper describes the development, implementation and outcome of that creative collaboration: an innovative upstream preventive ethics initiative that honours the primary obligation of Western healthcare providers to uphold informed consent and patient autonomy while honouring a wide scope of preferences in communication and decision making identified among this patient population.

Exploring the Role of the Migration Policy Resolution in Enabling Anticipatory Governance in North Macedonia

Abstract The migration landscape is a dynamic phenomenon shaped by geopolitical shifts, economic transformations, and climate change. North Macedonia, located in the heart of the Balkan Peninsula, serves as a critical transit country for significant migration patterns due to its strategic location and political aspirations towards Europe. Facing internal demographic challenges such as population decline and aging, the country is transitioning towards attracting immigration and becoming a destination for migrants. The Mediterranean Crisis of 2015 highlighted North Macedonia's pivotal role in migration routes, with over 800,000 individuals crossing its borders amid Europe's refugee and migrant influx. Despite containment efforts, the country remains part of mixed-movement routes, with significant border crossings observed in subsequent years. The long-term suspicions of brain drain were confirmed when the demographic census of 2021 revealed a startling 10% population decline over nearly two decades, emphasizing persistent outmigration and aging trends. To address migration challenges, North Macedonia adopted the Resolution on Migration Policy 2021-2025, aiming to establish a robust framework for managing both legal and illegal migrations. Anticipatory governance emerges as a proactive approach to navigating migration complexities, incorporating foresight and policy integration to shape sustainable migration policies in the country. The development of an Anticipatory Migration Governance model that seeks to foster transformative mindset shifts among stakeholders and institutionalize forward-looking planning, ensuring the effectiveness of migration management strategies. Through capacity development, improving of data collection, and decisions based on data, North Macedonia aims to navigate migration dynamics and achieve economic development with future-looking inclusive policies and collaboration.

Detection dogs fighting transnational narcotraffic: performance and challenges under real customs scenario in Brazil.

Narcotic Detection Dogs (NDDs) are essential tools in the fight against drug trafficking, acting with high precision and improving efficiency at border posts. When trained efficiently, these dogs can detect a great variety of compounds, such as cocaine, marijuana and its derivatives, and synthetic drugs, among others. Most of the knowledge on canine detection processes and efficiency has been determined in experimentally controlled conditions, but narcotic seizures detected by dogs in realistic anti-drug operations have not yet been critically determined in a Country with continental dimensions such as Brazil. This study aimed to evaluate the data set concerning the performance, operations, efficiency, and success rate of NDDs used by the Brazilian Customs Authority (Aduana) in the fight against drug trafficking. Narcotic seizure rates increased in luggage and packages detected by NDDs working at border crossings from 2010 to 2020, with an estimated value of over US$ 2 billion in losses to the cocaine drug trafficking business. NDD units also increased most narcotic groups seized in the same period. The number of NDDs and anti-drug operations, and Customs Border Post (CBP) influenced the rates of drugs seized. NDDs provided an increase of 3,157 kg/animal of drugs seized for every new dog introduced into the inspection systems.

Towards an understanding of patterns of movement of people in relation to the translation of devotional literature in early modern Europe. Seventeenth-century German and Dutch translators of English devotional literature

ABSTRACT This article expands on the generally accepted hypothesis in cultural history, that numerous migrants, exiles, or expatriates were among the most prolific translators in early modern Europe. It examines Dutch and German translators of English devotional literature in the seventeenth century in terms of the following framework: the extent to which these individuals were involved in migration, and the nature of the relationship between border crossings and translation. I will compare several highly mobile translators from the Hartlib circle, with the three most prolific Dutch and German translators of devotional literature during this period. My findings suggest that it was not migration but mobility that stimulated the collection and translation of devotional literature. Mobility, however, was not the only determinant.

From across the globe – traumatic injuries are an international concern at the US-Mexico border wall

IntroductionSocio-economic and political events of recent years have caused a significant increase in immigrants attempting to illegally cross the United States (US)-Mexico border. While a 30-foot border wall separates the...

The River that Killed and Saved: Illegal Border Crossings of the Dniester to Romania during Collectivization and the Great Soviet Famine (Late 1920s–Early 1930s)

This article examines the fate of Soviet refugees who fled collectivization and the famine by focusing on the residents of the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (MASSR) who attempted to cross the Soviet–Romanian frontier during the late 1920s–early 1930s. The article discusses their lives in the USSR prior to their flight, their perilous journey across the border, and their experiences in Romania.

Roundtable Discussion: Translation in Creativity

This Forum, appearing in each issue of the Journal of Literary Multilingualism, aims to continue the conversation started in the very first issue, where we collected articles which assessed and debated the field of literary multilingualism studies. The Forum is a space for shorter, more informal reflections on the field and its future: position papers, dialogues between scholars, roundtable discussions, responses to articles within the journal, and responses to recent multilingualism conferences or events. We welcome proposals for contributions, particularly from marginalized perspectives or on neglected aspects of literary multilingualism. Please contact us directly to discuss ideas. For this Forum, we present a roundtable discussion, organized and moderated by Eugenia Kelbert, in which Vesna Goldsworthy, Matthew Reynolds, and Douglas Robinson share some of their ideas around the relationship between translation and multilingual writing, particularly in relation to their intersecting roles as writers, translators, and academics. — Juliette Batty-Taylor and Till Dembeck, Forum Moderators The study of literary multilingualism exists within the context of recent attempts, by several scholars in comparative literature, to make sense of multilingual and/or global literary practices. From the translation zone (Apter) to born-translated (Walkowitz) or untranslatable fiction, these attempts have almost invariably involved translation, as a concept if not as a practice. What is, then, the place of translation when it comes to understanding multilingual and translingual writing? How does this theoretical debate relate to the actual practice of literary translation? And what happens to literary style when theorists of translation and translators experiment with multilingual writing or when translingual writers translate? The present discussion explores the hitherto undefined zone of creative interaction between translation and multilingual writing in the hope of contributing to the more conceptual debates from a hands-on perspective. It is based on the roundtable entitled “Stylistic Border Crossings in Multilingual and Translated (Con)texts” that was part of the Stylistic Border Crossings In and Beyond Translation conference held on March 9–10, 2023.1 The conference and the roundtable were organized by Eugenia Kelbert with the British Centre for Literary Translation and the East Centre, University of East Anglia. Each of the three guests wears a combination of multiple hats that bridge theory and practice and include “translingual writer,” “literary translator,” “translation studies scholar,” “writer,” and “literary scholar.” — Eugenia Kelbert

Pornography and Transnationality

This article addresses border crossings in the 1970s related to sexual commerce, in particular in the small community of Hälle, located near the Sweden–Norway border at Svinesund and European route E6. As the legal situation with regard to pornography differed in Norway and Sweden, Swedish legislation being more liberal, Norwegians travelled to Sweden to both buy and to consume on-site sexually explicit material and entertainment. By choosing this perspective, the article shifts focus away from the sexually explicit material itself, towards the spaces in which it can be found, and reflects upon consumption of such material as a literally transgressive, non-normative sexual behavior.

Estimating the incidence of Venezuelan migration and other socioeconomic factors on urban growth in Colombia.

This study investigates the intricate relationship between Venezuelan migration and urban growth in Colombia from 2018 to 2021. The study employs remote sensing data and social network metrics to uncover migration patterns and their impact on urban expansion. The methodology consists of three stages. Firstly, nighttime satellite imagery is used to analyze year-over-year urban growth in Colombia. Secondly, social network data estimates Venezuelan migration, overcoming challenges of underreporting and informal border crossings. Lastly, an econometric analysis explores the quantitative link between Venezuelan migration and urban growth, integrating socioeconomic variables to address endogeneity. The findings reveal the complex interplay of Venezuelan migration, socioeconomic factors, and urban growth. The study outlines remote sensing analysis, introducing the Anthropogenic Footprint Expansion Index (AFEI) to quantify urban growth. Facebook API data estimates migration trends and explores socioeconomic impacts on urban expansion. The analysis uncovers migration, poverty, aging, and urban population proportion as key factors affecting Colombia's urban landscape. Furthermore, the research underscores how Venezuelan migration affected short-term urban expansion pre- and post-COVID-19. Migration had a notable effect before the pandemic, but this influence waned afterward. The study highlights migration's short-term nature and emphasizes age demographics' role in medium-term dynamics.

Spine Injuries Sustained After Falls While Crossing the U.S.-Mexico Border.

This study is to report the demographics, incidence, and patterns of spinal injuries associated with border crossings resulting from a fall from a significant height. A retrospective cohort study was performed at a Level I trauma center from January 2016 to December 2021 to identify all patients who fell from a significant height while traversing the U.S.-Mexico border and were subsequently admitted. A total of 448 patients were identified. Of the 448 patients, 117 (26.2%) had spine injuries and 39 (33.3%) underwent operative fixation. Females had a significantly higher incidence of spine injuries (60% vs. 40%; p < 0.00330). Patients with a spine fracture fell from a higher median fall height (6.1 vs. 4.6 m; p < 0.001), which resulted in longer median length of stay (LOS; 12 vs. 7 days; p < 0.001), greater median Injury Severity Score (ISS; 20 vs. 9; p < 0.001), and greater relative risk (RR) of ISS >15 (RR = 3.2; p < 0.001). Patients with operative spine injuries had significantly longer median intensive care unit (ICU) LOS than patients with non-operative spine injuries (4 vs. 2 days; p < 0.001). Patients with spinal cord injuries and ISS >15 sustained falls from a higher distance (median 6.1 vs. 5.5 m) and had a longer length of ICU stay (median 3 vs. 0 days). All patients with operative spine injuries had an ISS >15 relative to 50% of patients with non-operative spine injuries (median ISS 20 vs. 15; p < 0.001). Patients with spine trauma requiring surgery had a higher incidence of head (RR = 3.5; p 0.0353) and chest injuries (RR = 6.0; p = 0.0238), but a lower incidence of lower extremity injuries (RR = 0.5; p < 0.001). Thoracolumbar injuries occurred in 68.4% of all patients with spine injuries. Patients with operative spine injuries had a higher incidence of burst fracture (RR = 15.5; p < 0.001) and flexion-distraction injury (RR = 25.7; p = 0.0257). All patients with non-operative spine injuries had American Spinal Injury Association (ASIA) D or E presentations, and patients with operative spine injuries had a higher incidence of spinal cord injury: ASIA D or lower at time of presentation (RR = 6.3; p < 0.001). Falls from walls in border crossings result in significant injuries to the head, spine, long bones, and body, resulting in polytrauma casualties. Falls from higher height were associated with a higher frequency and severity of spinal injuries, greater ISS, and longer ICU length of stay. Operative spine injuries, compared with non-operative spine injuries, had longer ICU length of stay, greater ISS, and different fracture morphology. Spine surgeons and neurocritical care teams should be prepared to care for injuries associated with falls from height in this unique population.

The art of reimagining borders in Patricia Vázquez Gómez’s BorderXer

ABSTRACT Geopolitical bordering practices affect not only migrants and refugees, but also non-human animals, environments, and Indigenous communities. But metaphorical borders also exist inside and are imposed on everyone. These include emotional, psychic, and cultural borders that limit freedoms. This article examines the potential solidarities for and multi-scalar politics of building an abolitionist praxis rooted in this expansive notion of borders and our collective struggles to cross or abolish them altogether. It examines US-based artist Patricia Vázquez Gómez’s art exhibition BorderXer, first exhibited in Portland, Oregon, U.S.A. in 2019, to develop a geographical analysis of ‘borderXers’ (border crossers) that operates at scales from the flesh, to body, to community, to the transnational. The artist uses photographic, installation, textual, and video works to connect audiences’ own experiences of borders imposed on their bodies and psyches to the material geographies of the US/México borderlands. These borders limit both freedom of movement and freedom to be in relation and community with others. These works unsettle dominant and dominating notions of borders and reveal possibilities for the remaking of exclusionary border relationalities. I argue that the aesthetics of the exhibition develop an abolitionist perspective on borders that exceeds the artist’s explicit calls for ‘open borders’.

Insecticide efficacy and emergence timing of the Douglas-fir twig weevil.

The Douglas-fir twig weevil (Cylindrocopturus furnissi Buchanan) (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) has recently emerged as a significant pest of Christmas trees grown in the Pacific Northwest United States. The larvae girdle and disfigure twigs, which adversely affects tree marketability. Trees produced for export are also routinely destroyed for phytosanitary reasons when C. furnissi is discovered at border crossings. Due to historically being a sporadic and benign pest on planted and natural Douglas-fir (Psuedotsuga menziesii), there is a lack of chemical management options. In laboratory experiments, we assessed the knockdown effects (ability to kill or incapacitate) of 4 insecticides commonly used on Christmas trees: one assay tested knockdown after direct contact for 24 h, and the other assay tested knockdown after being allowed to feed on treated twigs with 2 days, 7 days, and 14 days residuals. Concurrently, we monitored temperature and adult C. furnissi emergence at a noble fir bough farm for 2 years to estimate the ideal degree-day window for applying insecticides. Bifenthrin and esfenvalerate knocked down all weevils on contact within just 4 h, whereas chlorpyrifos and acephate failed to achieve 100% knockdown within 24 h. Only acephate failed to knock down more weevils than the control (water) after feeding on treated twigs, regardless of the insecticide residue age. Degree-day modeling revealed a variable emergence window between the 2 years but 50% of adult emergence occurred between approximately 1,000-1,100 degree days (1st January, 50 °F (10 °C), single sine). Future work should assess the resulting management recommendation: apply bifenthrin or esfenvalerate once annually just after 1,000 growing degree days for 2 or more years prior to harvest.

Who is to blame? Stories of European Union migration governance in Italian, Maltese, and Spanish newspapers

AbstractWhile scholars have investigated how media frame human mobility and securitize irregular border crossings, little research has been dedicated to how European Union (EU) actors are portrayed in media coverage of migration across the Mediterranean. By integrating framing into narrative analysis through the Narrative Policy Framework, our article fills this gap. Specifically, we provide a content analysis of Italian, Maltese, and Spanish newspapers and identify the key narratives underlying the portrayal of specific EU actors. We show that, overall, lack of EU solidarity is the prevalent issue in Italian, Maltese, and Spanish newspapers alike, followed by the alleged inefficiency of EU actors. Accordingly, the EU and its key actors are regularly narrated as either villains, responsible for the crisis and deserting member states in need of solidarity, or as weaklings unable to take effective action. These narratives appear remarkably consistent across countries, over time, and newspapers with different ideological orientation.

Oil smuggling, borderland and border management in Nigeria

ABSTRACT On 29 May 2023, the vexed subsidy on PMS was finally removed after the unilateral border closure imposed since 2019 failed to prevent cross-border smuggling of the petroleum products in Nigeria. The ceaseless transborder smuggling despite border closure, raises questions about the effectiveness of border management in Nigeria. This study analyses the inefficacy of border policing against smuggling in Nigeria, arguing that strategies to monitor porous borders can only prevent cross-border smuggling of fuel in the absence of relationships between smuggling gangs and compromised border inspectors at various border crossings. The study identifies how the pervasive corruption and neo-patrimonialism characteristic of the Nigerian state has aided oil theft in the country and rendered border enforcement inefficient in addressing smuggling. By drawing attention to the profound socio-cultural ties as well as close economic relations between communities and villages on both sides of the border in the smuggling activities, the paper brings scholarship on the trans-border criminal cartel into international relations and contributes to the debates on contemporary border management politics in Africa.

Правовые основы китайской миграционной политики в период с 1949 г. по 1970-е гг.

At present, China is one of the few world powers that has focused on its achievements increased attention from the entire international community. Obviously, in the 21st century, the world community will also have to observe the geopolitical dominance of China, so the author considered it necessary to analyze the legislative foundations of its migration policy from 1949 to the 1970s in order to better understand the issues of its formation and development. within the framework of this scientific study, the author examined the features of the emergence and further formation of Chinese policy in the field of migration, as well as its legal foundations from the moment the PRC was formed and inclusive to the 1970s. The author comes to the conclusion that with the emergence of the PRC, the Chinese authorities established the strictest measures for controlling border crossings, and therefore there were practically no external migration processes in the country. At the same time, with the formation of the PRC, the migration policy of this country began to largely depend on a number of political factors. Being in the conditions of an external hostile environment, the state also had to introduce a rigid system for issuing visas to leave the country, so external migration flows until the end of the 1970s. remained insignificant. Until the end of the 1970s. it was characterized by a small number of people leaving the country, due to the strictest measures to regulate emigration with few reasons for leaving and entering. Therefore, the organizational and legal measures taken by the Chinese leadership in 1978 contributed to the further development of migration policy.

Geopolitics of mobile masses: refugee and tourist metaphors in Finnish-Russian bordertown media

This paper examines the discourses on mobile others as objects of massification or likened to natural forces. By creating a dialogue between theories of crowds/masses and popular geopolitics, we examine how a local media frames the actual, imagined and absent border crossings of refugees and tourists when a voluminous mobile group disappears in tandem with an emerging unease about a new mobile group. We focus on the freesheet Imatralainen, published in a South Karelian Finnish-Russian bordertown that has been a tourist destination since the late eighteenth century but where invisible geopolitical tension is part of everyday life. Our discourse analysis shows that from the Crimean crisis to the migrant ‘crisis’ (2014–2016), local media have frequently portrayed Russian tourists and non-European migrants via a natural force rhetoric while viewing both refugees and tourists as potential resources or burdens. The mobility of others can represent itself as an external threat, and it can be taken as a perspectival threatscape that opens space for geopolitical issues amplified or transformed through the idea of masses and crowds into potential local issues. The article contributes to tourism geographies and the geopolitics of mobilities literature by evaluating the potential of classical crowd theories for understanding how threatscapes relating to the refugee-tourist nexus are made and manipulated by linguistic collectivisation, silencing and dehumanisation. We argue that more attention should be given to the role of the local in shaping the popular geopolitics of mobilities that construct, sustain and fabricate discourses of ‘otherness’ and massification.

Casualties of border changes: evidence from nighttime lights and plant exit

Abstract We investigate the economic effects of the Russia–Ukraine conflict – following the 2014 annexation of Crimea – on Russian border regions. While southern regions gained market access to Crimea, northern regions lost market access to Ukraine. Using nighttime lights data and geo-referenced plant-level data, we find that regions with deteriorating market access saw 43% less growth in lights – translating into 6–12% lower growth in GDP depending on the assumed lights-GDP elasticity – and a 35% increase in the exit probability for manufacturing plants after 2014. Exploiting variations in closed local border crossings in the northern regions, we find that these effects may be partly driven by less cross-border labour flows.

Gender Abolition as Border Crossings in Maya Piña's "Devenir transmigrante en la Windy City"

Gender Abolition as Border Crossings in Maya Piña's "Devenir transmigrante en la Windy City"