Transnationalism Despite the Border Regime: (De)Bordering Processes and Multiscalar Solidarities Among Moroccan Irregularized Travelers

The trajectories of irregularized Moroccan travelers to and across Europe trace complex, convoluted and ever-changing geographies, following actors’ shifting social positions in various hierarchies that deeply affect the power to choose when to move and when to stay put. Notwithstanding their marginalized legal, social and economic position, Moroccan migrants deploy a wide range of mobility practices in order to follow employment opportunities and a possibility to regularize their legal status, within a map of mobility marked by their social networks in constant change. What enables migrants to realize their transnational movements despite the strengthening of the European border regime? At what price do they perpetuate their mobility patterns? In this paper, I present findings from a trajectory ethnography of Moroccan men on their way to Europe, illustrating how “multiscalar” solidarities can empower them to resist and navigate the bordering processes that hinder their access to geographical mobility and stability.