Decentering the Study of EU Border Externalization and Why This Matters

Abstract Critical border studies have gone a significant way in emphasizing the social character of international political phenomena by broadening the ontology of security and utilizing sociological methods to reveal the aspects and agents of politics that have been otherwise left in the margins. This article argues that most of these studies, more specifically those that adopt a practice approach, still have weaknesses in comprehending the agency of the Global South in their analyses of EU border security externalization. It falls into three parts, answering three questions: What is the limit in the literature? Why does it matter? What to offer as an alternative? First, the article introduces a novel classification of research on the EU’s border security practices in the Mediterranean based on their depiction of non-EU actors. Second, it reflects on the need and significance of overcoming these limits to incorporate the agency of the Global South. Third, it proposes an approach to scrutinizing externalization to better locate the agency of non-EU parties applying a multi-layered and processual analysis of how Turkey (as a case to illustrate claims on theory and method) has constituted its border regime through encounters with Europe/EU. The paper emphasizes two insights: border externalization is a relational, social, and dynamic process; and it is co-constituted by not only implementation actors but also multiple agents from different levels of politics and policing. Analyzing the process of dynamic encounters, it seeks to locate the agency and responsibility of multiple parties in the making of insecurity while decentering the actors of the EU.