Same Border, Different Subject Constructions: The daily shopping visitors and the refugees across the Turkish-Bulgarian border in Kırklareli, Turkey

Abstract

The Turkish-Bulgarian border at the town of Kırklareli embodies different realities and representations with respect to different subjects, namely, for those who reside there, visit regularly from neighbouring countries via open and easy access, and for those whose paths traverse the town to -illegally- cross over to Bulgaria, the European Union territory. This article aims at contributing to border-studies by means of a study on how border residents in Kırklareli position two different subject identities for the ‘others’ that they confront along the border, and how they construct a subject identity for themselves in the process. Based on the findings of the fieldwork conducted through a series of semi-structured interviews, we argue, the border crossings of the daily Bulgarian shopping visitors and refugees or illegal immigrants moving in the opposite direction create a different hierarchy of ‘self’ and ‘other’, complicated by the fact that this is also a border between the European Union and Turkey. As members of the EU, Bulgarians crossing the border for daily shopping represent an advantageous and welcomed European ‘other’ for the local population, particularly for the local shopkeepers. However, in the process, they realize they themselves are Europe’s ‘other’. Illegal migrants trying to cross the border, on the other hand, represent an uninvited ‘other’ condemned to a ‘Bare Life’, a definition bestowed by Agamben, the social theorist.