The International Implications of Border Security

• In Event: The Microdynamics of Border Control

Abstract

States are increasingly investing in walls and filtering infrastructure along their borders in an attempt to guard against unwanted cultural, economic, and security threats from non-state actors. What impact do these processes have on state-to-state relations between neighbors? We argue that significant efforts toward heightened border control have the potential to directly and indirectly worsen interstate hostility and make transnational cooperation more difficult. We test this claim empirically using multiple identification strategies and new, global data on the built environment along international borders, allowing us to unpack whether different types of infrastructure such as walls or border crossing structures exert a differential impact on interstate conflict and cooperation. Provisional results are consistent with our expectations, demonstrating important, unintended consequences of controlling border security regimes. Because effective border governance requires cooperation among neighbors, these findings also highlight how intensified border control strategies can be self-undermining.

Authors

• Michael Kenwick, Rutgers University

• Beth A. Simmons, University of Pennsylvania