Doing Frontiers: On the Performativity of the European Border and Migration Regime

Abstract

Determining European territory is a delicate endeavor. A definite borderline is hard to identify. Instead, European security discourse spans a space with conditional qualities: open for some, impervious for many. Referring to Judith Butler's theory, this constribution’s aim is to disclose performative forces that create corresponding subject-categories. Particularly, expert-driven legislation on migration and the militarization of the security discourse is relevant. It is possible to reconstruct a multidimensional matrix of intelligibility. For this, relevant policy documents are analyzed by conducting a qualitative content analysis. This contribution allows to critically question foundational dimensions of European identity constituted by regulatory and exclusive practices at the borders.