Post/Humanitarian Border Politics between Mexico and the US ─ People, Places, Things

What is the significance of the things that migrants leave behind in contemporary border struggles? In what ways do places like the desert play a role in such struggles? And what is the status of people in this context? The author addresses these questions by assessing the politics of different humanitarian interventions in the Mexico-US border region. Examining various artistic and academic engagements of things left behind, as well as legal struggles over the distribution of water bottles and practices of recycling of discarded belongings, this book develops a unique 'more-than-human' perspective on the significance of people, places and things to humanitarian border struggles. While drawing attention to the ambiguities of humanitarian interventions, Squire also focuses on the critical potential of a post/humanitarian border politics that transforms place by fighting for people, through things.

Vicki Squire is Associate Professor of International Security at the Department of Politics and International Studies (PAIS), University of Warwick, UK. She is author of The Exclusionary Politics of Asylum (2009), editor of The Contested Politics of Mobility (2011), and Associate Editor of the journal Citizenship Studies.