Theory of the Border

Borders now take many forms, from biometric data that divides the body to drones that patrol the airspace above a country. Thomas Nail argues that they can no longer be understood only as lines between nation-states, because their form and function have become too complex and hybrid for that.

Rather than treating borders as the outcome of states that already exist, Nail reads social history through the continuing movement of bordering that organises and divides society in the first place. He argues that societies and states are products of this process. His framework, which he calls kinopolitics, is applied to several major historical border regimes, including fences, walls, cells and checkpoints.

Out of that analysis he develops what he calls critical limology, presented as a set of tools for examining contemporary border politics. Edition note: published by OUP USA in 2016, 290 pages. ISBN-13 9780190618643.