The Migration-Displacement-Asylum nexus between the border-crossing order of things and its challenge: the control and management migratory and border-crossing policies and transborder citizenship emerging practices in the frontiers of Spain (European Union)-Morocco (Africa) and Colombia-Venezuela (ACN-South America). 1990-2010

The subject of study of this doctoral thesis is addressing to the nexus configuration between asylum and intern displacement migratory processes and the identifiable response in control and management migratory and border-crossing policies which state a “Border-crossing Order of things ”. Additionally, analyzing the potential challenge/response to that identifiable order in “Transborder Citizenship Emerging Practices” by migrants, displaced people and refugees. A comparative study is carried out about/in the frontiers Spain-Morocco (European Union) and Colombia-Venezuela (Andean Community of Nations) in the period 1990-2010. In Chapter One, it is intended to made clear the coordinates about the What and How of the research as well as the results. This is done by three subsections: the literature review and the approach to the problem; research questions, hypothesis and research objectives; research methodology. The methodological design used poses a combination between qualitative and comparative research, which allow us to analyze and compare observations and descriptions (exploratory-descriptive research) and also to analyze and compare the addresses and representations (analytical-interpretive research). Generally, the type of comparison followed was the one proposed by Skocpol and Somers called “ Contrast of Contexts ” which is essential for the interpretive comparative variant in social sciences, different to the type of comparison by “ hypothesis control ”. On the other hand, we followed Charles Ragin’s (1987) suggestions about the “Case-oriented Research ” and about the complex problems of the “ Conjunctural Causality ”, in other words, causal models that vary “ according to the context ”. In Chapter Two, Global Order of Control and Management of Migrations and Borders.. The emergence from the Migration-Displacement-Asylum nexus, the contextualization is made and the characteristics for this order are shown; in order to highlight transformation of the international migration tendencies to forced migrations and alongside with it, the emergence of the Migration-Displacement-Asylum nexus. The global order of control and migrations management as a border regime responds to a policy spin and to the policies that transform the frontiers into a mechanism for the migration control (Faist, 2003); just as shown in the detailed description of the global and regional control agendas, management and migration and border-crossing cooperation; migration and border-crossing policies, and the protection and asylum policies for refugees, asylum seeker and migrants in the frontiers Spain-Morocco and Colombia-Venezuela. In Chapter Three, emerging typologies related to the migration-displacement-asylum nexus that allowed us to make the analysis and the comparison in the specific border-crossing zones Spain-Morocco and Colombia-Venezuela; which have a big potential of being used in other case studies. These typologies correspond to: the closely related causes of forced and voluntary migration in their home countries; the diverse motivations of several migrants, displaced and asylum seekers; motivation changes during migration for many migrants, displaced and asylum seekers; motivation changes during migration for many migrants, displaced people and asylum seekers; the close relation between refugees and economic migrants in some transit countries in the Spain-Morocco frontier and the close relationship between refugees and economic migrants on the way through Colombian regions; the rising similarities in the migration process for both “ forced ” and “ voluntary ” migrants; refugees and migrant workers can have similar experiences in the host countries; the experience of return, repatriation or deportation can be similar. We have built an analytical-comparative proposal that includes theoretical contributions from anthropology and politics about frontiers and migrations, entering into conversation with political theories about frontiers, migrations and citizenship. Our proposal consists in analyzing control and migration/border-crossing management politics and the “ transborder citizenship emerging practices ” through two analytic triads “ ( IBO-1 e IBO-2 ) ”, known in critical literature about frontiers as “ IBO ( IFO in spanish ) triad: Identities, Borders, Orders “ ( Kearney, 1995; Albert, Jacobson and Lapid, 2001; Van Houtuum and Van Naerssen, 2001 ). The analytic and comparative effort allowed to integrate the two triads in three related pairs ( I-1 and I-2 ), ( B-1 and B-2 ), ( O-1 and O-2 ) between the state-built identities and their migration policies ( I-1 ) and the ways of identification-disidentification that the migrants-displaced-asylum seekers and refugees claim and negotiate ( I-2 ). Between the states border-crossing control ( B-1 ) and the unauthorized border crossing of the migrants-displaced-asylum seekers ( B-2 ). Between the states’ power and the politics orders ( O-1) and the ways of political subjectivation from the migrants-displaced-asylum seekers and refugees (O-2 ). The IBO-1 triad corresponds to the border-crossing order of things and the IBO-2 triad to the potential challenge to that order via transborder citizenship emerging practices. In Chapters Four and Five, the previous analytical-comparative framework was applied in the Spain-Morocco and Colombia-Venezuela borders. In each case, the control and management migratory and border-crossing policies were analyzed taking into account three main aspects: identities production and classification, specially the political and civic identities. This is selectivity (Filter function); the frontierization practices, not only control and regulation but also the border-permeability function (Filter function), who can or cannot enter (citizens and non-citizens production ), taking into account the role of the States as well as their regional, global and local registry. In this dimension we talk about the border-crossing order of things. On the other hand, also in each case, the practices from the migrant, displaced, refugees, asylum seeker citizenships in other border games through de-frontierization practices; it is about authorized and unauthorized border-crossing agents and they answer to the Border Crossing Control but previously, they have been qualified and some identities have been attributed such as “irregulars“, “illegals”, “undesirables” and so on, against that, they answer de facto, claiming-verifying that “Any human being is illegal”; this through active processes of disidentification and disclassification, they will be rejecting, also de facto, their imputation as non-citizens; and in this process, they act as if they were citizens, in an equality verification as human beings and as a subject of universal law (Ranciére, 1999). Summarizing, these are “transborder citizenship emerging practices “ from these migrant subjects alongside with their regional, global and local registry. In this analysis dimension, we talk about the (potential) challenge to the border-crossing order of things. Chapter Six gathers the compared analysis about the Spain-Morocco and Colombia-Venezuela borders. In this doctoral thesis, defining two case study was from the beginning the search for a comparative analysis that allowed addressing every case itself to give account of its own dynamics and evolution. From the particularities of the migration-displacement-asylum nexus in each border-crossing zone, there was an advance in a comparison, not as a migratory flows problem itself, but in its political articulations related to migration/border-crossing control and management politics and the citizenship practices. Actors and their political interactions related to their position in the face of borders. Borders are the matters of dispute that reconfigures constantly the concept of politics and the political Chapter Seven about conclusions was oriented to answer the question “How migrants, displaced people and refugees are constituted as political actors and are allowed to appeal to their community members condition? As exposed in the conclusions, in their transborder migrants condition and the democratization assertion from the borders, the transborder citizenship emerging practices take shape. Finally, we present some limitations, possible contributions from the doctoral thesis and some proposals for the future research development. The importance of contributing with studies that overcome the methodological nationalism and the internal focus was posed; also contributing to the methodological, epistemological and conceptual change in the borders, migrations and citizenship studies and strengthening a new epistemic community; and contribution to the ongoing research program about the relation between identity, borders and political orders in border-crossing zones. This analytical-comparative proposal pretends to be one step to the formation of a method or a theory about the comparative anthropology in the borders and periphery and more specifically, as the presentation of the border-crossing order of things and its challenge hypothesis. Therefore, the same questions that we have posed in this doctoral thesis could be asked concerning different borders and demarcation and policies regimes to perform compared works about how some borders are built and the migration processes that pass through it. A short-term future researching development could be addressing the migration-displacement-asylum nexus with a comparative analysis of the borders between Colombia and Venezuela and, Ecuador and Panama in the post-peace agreement transition process