Undoing Border Imperialism by Harsha Walia

Undoing Border Imperialism Reviews

• 
  Thomas

  One of the most revolutionary and powerful nonfiction books about social justice I have ever read. I would without doubt recommend Undoing Border Imperialism to those who want to elevate their views pertaining to immigration justice beyond the liberal notion of immigration reform. Harsha Walia grasps this issue at the root and delves deep into the importance of dismantling both borders and imperialism from existing at all. Here is a quote that I feel like summarizes main concepts within Undoing Border Imperialism:
  
  “Border imperialism encapsulates four overlapping and concurrent structurings: first, the mass displacement of impoverished and colonized communities resulting from asymmetrical relations of global power, and the simultaneous securitization of the border against those migrants whom capitalism and empire have displaced; second, the criminalization of migration with severe punishment and discipline of those deemed ‘alien’ or ‘illegal’; third, the entrenchment of a racialized hierarchy of citizenship by arbitrating who legitimately constitutes the nation-state; and fourth, the state-mediated exploitation of migrant labor, akin to conditions of slavery and servitude, by capitalist interests. While borders are understood as lines demarcating territory, an analysis of border imperialism interrogates the modes and networks of governance that determine how bodies will be included within the nation-state, and how territory will be controlled within and in conjunction with the dictates of global empire and transnational capitalism.”
  
  Walia includes so many compelling ideas grounded within an intersectional framework, including: the racialization of immigrants and immigrants of color, the weaponization of femininity against male immigrants of color, the recruitment of poor Black, Indigenous, People of Color into the military to further perpetuate imperialism, and more. The format of this book exemplifies its commitment to decolonization, too. Walia incorporates the narratives and the wisdom of various activists and on-the-ground movement organizers, highlighting the necessity of collective action and community care. Again, recommended for those who want to start off their 2021 with some high-quality nonfiction.
• 
  Kab

  4.5 Walia synthesises swirling frameworks of social justice, shares practical aspects of activism, and calls on us to overgrow the logics of capitalism and colonialism.
  
  

  Border imperialism is structured by, first, the free flow of Western capital and plunder which creates mass displacements, while simultaneously securing Western borders against the very people who capitalism and empire have dispossessed and impoverished; second, criminalizing migrants through their construction as deviants and illegals, which also ensures profits for companies that receive contracts for border militarization and migrant detention; third, the entrenchment of a racialized hierarchy of citizenship by arbitrating who legitimately constitutes the nation-state; and fourth, the legal denial of permanent residency to a growing number of migrants to ensure a precarious, exploitable, and expendable pool of labor.
• 
  Amy

  Excellent and very accessible short book that uses first person testimonies, essays, poetry and movement based practices & history to give much needed critical analysis on border regime, settler colonialism, capitalism and imperialism. Harsha is absolutely brilliant and this is a much needed book for our movements to reflect on and move towards collectively doing better. Highly recommend.
• 
  Jacob

  This book interrogates the ways that state borders function as an imperialistic and colonial tool of not only governments, but neoliberal capitalist interest from the perspective of No One Is Illegal (a Canadian pro-immigrant group). The book is written in fairly easy to understand language, which does not divulge into academic jargon. Any person at an adult reading level should be able to pick up this book and read it. This is important, as it opens up the text to a wide audience who can benefit, learn, and become motivated from the message of the book. The text is split into five chapters which look at aspects of border imperialism from different angles. The first looks at the issue from an academic perspective, the second explores the genesis and examination of the policies and procedures of No One Is Illegal, the third examines a variety of tactics that have been used to undermine oppressive immigration practices, the fourth examines these issues from a variety of perspectives via a roundtable format, and the fifth introduces principles of decolonization. I give more in depth explanations of each of these chapters below.
  
  One of the most touching aspects of the book is that, throughout the text, there are sprinkled 13 personal narratives relating to experiences with the immigration system and NOII. These narratives offer anecdotal accounts of the emotional and physical stress, pain, and strength behind NOII and other decolonization groups. These stories were my favourite part of the text.
  
  The first chapter takes an academic look at the ways that borders function within a neoliberal mindset. The border functions to promote migrants as illegal, which ultimately others and dismisses migrant humanity. We tend to ignore the imperial factors that tend to lead to migration – climate change is a large factor (estimates suggest that there will be over 50 million climate refugees worldwide by 2020), but so too does subsidized commercial farming, which undercuts the prices of farmers in many countries, forcing them to abandon their practice (and move into cities, seeking work). Thus, Western states are often responsible for migrants, but are unwilling to 1. take responsibility for their actions; and 2. allow refugees to enter into their states. Instead, they demonize these refugees and asylum seekers as "illegals", incarcerating them in dangerous facilities. Furthermore, capital appropriates these workers (both in form of illegal workers, and in oppressive work environments abroad) in order to produce cheap goods. The illegalities imposed on migrant populations makes them docile for the interests of capital. It is interesting that neoliberal capitalism is able to freely flow between borders, while people are not. The entire creation of borders is oppressive, and constructed by Western hegemonic economic interest.
  
  The second chapter explores the group No One Is Illegal. It goes through the ways that NOII acts within various heterogenous spheres of activism (from fight illegalities in systems of immigration, to fighting for indigenous struggles, to womyn's rights, etc). It marks out an anecdotal (and to some degree structural) account of the strengths of NOII, and the influence it has had in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal. They show a commitment to direct support on the basis of solidarity – not charity – within a horizontal field. They describe their organizing as "the politics of linking movements to the everyday experiences of oppressed peoples and inviting these communities to take leadership" (digital edition). In doing so, they created meshworks of oppressed peoples who were then able to fight oppression together, rather than on their own. This has led to movements stressing decolonization and the displacement of hierarchical structures of power. It includes a chronological list of resistance movements and successes of NOII.
  
  The third chapter serves as an extension of the second, but explores the various tactics that can be used in the fights against systematic oppression in hierarchical systems. They go through various theoretical strategies and tactics and show how these have been used by groups such as NOII to fight back against oppressive systematic and governmental forces. This includes how to build alliances with groups that are ideologically opposed, which knowing when to push for practical goals over long term purity and understanding how to stratal that line (of revolution v. reform) effectively. Other tactics include transforming narrative around "illegalities" into narratives about undocumented workers. This can lead to a diversity of tactics rather than a uniform position. There is also a section on oppression, and a nuanced discussion of how oppression goes beyond intersectionality. The end goal is effective movement building that is grounded in the lived experience of undocumented peoples in order to empower marginalized communities towards permanent positive change. In this they provide an alternative to the authoritarian leninist and meshwork anarchist models (where non-hierarchical is not synonymous with structureless).
  
  The fourth chapter continues the discussions touched on in earlier chapters, but through a multiplicity of voices in a round table discussion. This serves to bring more diverse perspectives on the subjects of border colonialism and oppression using a non-hierarchical method. 15 participants from multiple organizations within Canada offer insight into 6 questions posed to them by the author. The questions relate to the material earlier in the book, and provides some overlap from different perspectives.
  
  The fifth chapter looks specifically at decolonization as a strategy against Border imperialism. The text defines decolonization as, in part, "a dual form of resistance that is responsive to dismantle current systems of colonial empire and systemic hierarchies, while also prefiguring societies based on equity, mutual aid, and self-determination." It is both a process of deterritorialization, as well as a goal to be reached. The chapter goes on to explain what decolonization is, and explores how we might begin to proceed in its efforts. It requires an indigenous starting point, and pushes towards the reimagining and reconfiguration of "our communities based on shared ideals and visions." Freedom will never exist within the bounds of colonial imperialism. It can only occur through a decolonization strategy that breaks free of the confines of colonial capitalism. This also requires the decolonization of hierarchical social relations to develop a more egalitarian relational model.
  
  I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in taking a deeper look at the policies and politics surrounding immigration. This text puts forward ways that NOII has pushed back against oppressive immigration policies in Canada, and accounts for a variety of different tactics of that process. It also provides insight on the reasons that these movements are necessary, for anyone who is wary of groups such as NOII. Overall, I appreciate this text, and was thankful that I was able to read it. It helped to open my mind to the struggle of undocumented migrants in Canada who face severe hardship from the Canadian government and immigration offices within the country.
  
• 
  priya ☁️

  "Migrants, particularly undocumented migrants or asylum seekers arriving irregularly, are punished, locked up, and deported for the very act of migration. In order to justify their incarceration, the state has to allege some kind of criminal or illegal act. Within common discourses, the victim of this criminal act is the state, and the alleged assault is on its borders. The state becomes a tangible entity, with its own personhood and boundaries that must not be violated. Butler describes the policing of the state and its national subject as a "relentlessly aggressive" and "masculinist" project. Within this concept of sexualized nationhood, borders are engendered as
  needing protection, or as cultural theorist Katrina Schlunke puts it, "vulnerable shores that must be kept intact and secured against the threat of un-negotiated penetration by strangers."
  
  By invoking the state itself as a victim, migrants themselves are cast as illegals and criminals who are committing an act of assault on the state. Migrants become prisoners of passage; their unauthorized migration is considered a trespass, and their very existence is criminalized."
  
  "The power of state control and the insidious nature of racism force us to metabolize our own oppression, and many of us become "the good Indian" or "good immigrant" who is silent, complicit, and grateful to the colonial master."
  
  "Migrants, many once Indigenous to their own lands, but often displaced due to Orientalist crusading and corporate plundering, are thrown into capitalism’s pool of labor and, in a cruel twist, violently inserted into the political economy of genocide: stolen labor on stolen land."
  
  "Even an intersectional approach that acknowledges the overlapping and layered nature of power and privilege can lead to a flattening of all oppressions—a simple "additive effect" rather than "entirely different conceptions of people’s lived realities."
• 
  Ryan Mishap

  "We also must never underestimate the power of narrative storytelling, which is at the heart of our movements. We are not moved by dry statistics but rather by the stories that touch us and compel us to act."
  
  A brilliant, inclusive, expansive, necessary book that will introduce you to or reawaken alternative thought patterns. It is easy for some of us to glide along in our culture with day to day living and forget that our hierarchical, consumerist society is predicated on violence against people and the earth; on dispossessing people home and abroad, driving migration; on cheap, expendable labor and goods; on a foundation of exploitation and colonialism.
  
  Undoing Border Imperialism not only challenges but provides alternative ways to organize, interact, and live based on non-hierarchical, realistic ways of being. This isn't just one person's academic book either, but a conglomeration of her analysis and experience, the many authors and activists she cites, the contributions from dozens of others, and a history of the No One is Illegal movement in Canada. She even begins the book with fictional vignettes from various people (after the introduction).
  
  I especially liked the places where she brings up contentious issues that often drive movements apart and presents ways to side-step the no-win confrontation and instead move forward without covering up oppression or ignoring realities.
  
  Highly recommended. As in, go read it now.
• 
  Kurt

  "What will free us is the collective and public recognition of all bodies, all abilities, all genders, all experiences, and all expressions as inherently valuable, and by virtue of their very existence, as distinctly human. Since border imperialism and its constituent processes of capitalism and colonialism have psychologically dispossessed as well as structurally divided us, decolonization is an assertion of our intrinsic self-determining beauty and humanity" (265).
  
  UNDOING BORDER IMPERIALISM is mind-blowingly good. I teared up, I gasped, I kept asking—urgently—how the fuck I will engage in decolonization in my own life, in my own work. This book is the ultimate work of praxis: Walia weaves together theory, personal narratives, on-the-ground movement stories, and the wisdom of a-zillion revolutionaries. As hard and complicated as all this makes genuine decolonization seem to be, I love that Syed Khalid Hussan ends the epilogue with these sentences: "We must act every day. We must act" (283). This is not a book to rot on a library shelf; this is a book to take to the streets.
• 
  Victoria Law

  One December day in 2007, two thousand people showed up at Vancouver’s International Airport. Unlike other days, these particular people had not come to catch a flight; they were there to stop a person from boarding one. Laibar Singh, a paralyzed refugee from India, was facing deportation. On the day he was to leave, those two thousand people, mostly Punjabi elders and aunties, shut down the international terminal, causing the cancellation of dozens of flights. They formed a protective circle around Singh for hours, finally forcing immigration enforcement to back down.
  
  “This historic blockade in December 2007 is the only documented time in recent North American history that the violence of deportation has been prevented through the power of a mass mobilization and direct action,” wrote Harsha Walia, one of the organizers responsible for this mass mobilization and the author and editor of Undoing Border Imperialism. Walia is a longtime organizer with No One Is Illegal (NOII), a decentralized network of groups across Canada that works with refugees, undocumented migrants, and migrant workers. At the same time, NOII also offers a systemic critique of border imperialism. This combination “stands in contrast to more mainstream immigrant rights movements that ignore the centrality of empire and capitalism to the violence of displacement, migration and border controls” (110). Walia combines her own analyses, experiences, and writings with poems and short essays by other migrant justice organizers as well as a roundtable discussion with various organizers with NOII.
  
  The stopping of Singh’s deportation is just one example of migrant rights organizing documented in Undoing Border Imperialism, the latest in the Anarchist Intervention series, a collaboration between AK Press and the Institute for Anarchist Studies. But beyond being a list of visible victories, the book also examines the behind-the-scenes organizing that enabled this and other successes while placing immigration and deportation in a broader political context. Moving away from the popular rhetoric that blames and punishes migrants or forces them to assimilate, the concept of “border imperialism” examines and analyzes the processes of displacement and migration.
  
  My entire review can be read at
  http://monthlyreview.org/2014/03/01/c......
• 
  Steven Fake

  Lots of words. This is one of those works full of lefty rhetoric that permit the reader to read page after page while conveying virtually no actual information. Buzzwords and trendy academics populate the text fleshing out ideas that are already intimately familiar to those acquainted with the left.
  
  Nonetheless, the general politics and activism of the contributors to this book are praiseworthy. No doubt many will get more out of it than I did, as is perhaps evidenced by the many luminaries providing blurbs for the book.
  
  Chapter three, "Overgrowing Hegemony: Grassroots Theory," is the best piece in the book, as it focuses on the concrete needs of organizing effectively. It critiques the "insular networks" of the left, which seems a bit ironic given that it is hard to imagine anyone but left-inclined graduate students reading this book.
  
  Walia was already familiar to me, principally for being on the wrong end of a 2010 debate on the black-bloc tactic:
  http://vancouver.mediacoop.ca/video/2916.
  
  Happily, the book did introduce me to a useful quote I quite like:
  “Democracy is not, to begin with, a form of State. It is, in the first place, the reality of the power of the people that can never coincide with the form of a State. There will always be tension between democracy as the exercise of a shared power of thinking and acting, and the State, whose very principle is to appropriate this power.” —Jacques Rancière, “Democracy Is Not, to Begin with, a Form of State”
• 
  Liz

  A cogent, readable articulation of an pro-migrant politics that engages with race, gender, colonialism, queerness, etc. the first chapter, "what is border imperialism?" was particularly great and I'd recommend it to anyone.
  
  Later chapters were sometimes a bit too vague and celebratory, a list of values really. I, too, want an anti-authoritarian movement that also develops the leadership of the most oppressed, that is attentive to gender justice and violence against women without being essentialist or demanding impossible purity, that has a holistic analysis of imperialism as something that affects both migrants and indigenous people but in different ways, that affirms indigenous sovereignty - but what would that actually look like? And what are some of the barriers to its success, what are its failures? There's always something and it's usually pretty illuminating! Ultimately this is kind of a manifesto, but I wanted a history, a guide, something more concrete and critical. It's not necessarily a fault of the book that it's something a bit different.
• 
  Onii

  Analyzing colonialism and capitalism’s aspirations and how they intersect is key to deepening our understanding of international migration because we would find that the methods and culminations of these powerful frames of the world often overlap, making diaspora and human struggle within migrant movements between point A and point B, and their existence in the world residing in either point A or point B, a prearranged system of domination, control, and exploitation. In such little ink, Walia is able to convey at an introductory level that neoliberal and neoclassical theories of migration are reductive as it conveniently ignores more obvious factors -- Migration is a much bigger, more complicated, and more violent cycle of western empire as opposed to individual or random cases of movement.
• 
  Annabelle

  Changed my life. Although two dimensional in its words the messages are alive and well in Walia's delivery. Might be intimidating at first but honestly necessary to engage with!!!
• 
  Dawn

  Anyone who has been involved in activism in any of Canada’s largest cities has probably worked with Harsha Walia at some point along the way. An organizing powerhouse who is active across issues and with a lengthy list of groups, Walia is also a writer and regular public speaker. Somehow, amidst a flurry of events and other work, she found the time to grace us with her first book, Undoing Border Imperialism, which came out with Oakland’s AK Press in the fall. In more ways than one, the book is a true manifestation of theory meeting practice, taking strength from Walia’s varied and extensive readings, from her personal life experiences, and from over a decade of movement organizing in Canada.
  
  “Undoing border imperialism would mean a freer society for everyone since borders are the nexus of most systems of oppression,” writes Walia. “Rather than conceiving of immigration as a domestic policy issue to be managed by the state, the lens of border imperialism focuses the conversation on the systemic structuring of global displacement and migration through and in collusion with capitalism, colonial empire, state building, and hierarchies of oppression.”
  
  Walia carefully outlines her theory of border imperialism, but she doesn’t stop there the way an academic or journalist might. Instead, she dedicates the bulk of the text to reflection and to proposals around what makes for meaningful activism in this context. Undoing Border Imperialism lays out a compelling definition of the concept of border imperialism, and then takes readers through concrete experiences of how it can be challenged and dismantled.
  
  “Border imperialism is a useful analytic framework for organizing migrant justice movements in North America. It takes us away from an analysis that blames and punishes migrants, or one that forces migrants to assimilate and establish their individual worth,” she writes. Vancouver-based Walia plays an ambitious role as both author and curator of Undoing Border Imperialism. She contributes the tight and sometimes dense analysis that builds the concept of border imperialism and grassroots organizing theory. These sections are interspersed by poetry and short stories from primarily women of color writers and activists based in Canada and the United States. Undoing Border Imperialism concludes with a written round table discussion that Walia calls the heart of the book.
  
  Walia describes border imperialism as emerging from a confluence of four central practices spearheaded by nation states and accompanied by ongoing processes of capitalist accumulation. The first is capitalism and empire, which underpin the entire system, followed by the criminalization of migrants, the production of racialized, sexist and imperialist national identities, and the denial of legal permanent residency and citizenship to migrants.
  
  Undoing Border Imperialism is focused on the experiences of those who are displaced because they are impoverished by the expansion of neoliberal capitalism, by wars and invasions, and because of the climate crisis. This displacement can result in people and groups crossing state borders, but it does not need to in order for it to fit within the category of border imperialism. “The world over, Indigenous communities are at the forefront of resisting dispossession while facing the brunt of displacement, particularly from rural areas into urban centers,” writes Walia.
  
  She points out that the conditions that lead to the displacement of Indigenous peoples from their traditional lands to the city are essentially the same conditions that push people (who are also sometimes Indigenous) to migrate across state borders.
  
  One of the strengths of Walia’s analysis is the way that she steps back and captures the big picture, providing readers with an accessible systemic analysis. “Border controls are used to deter those for who migration is the only option to the plundering of their communities and economies due to the free license granted to capital and militaries,” she writes. She makes it clear that the same states that control and criminalize migration are in part responsible for the movement of millions of people who migrate for security or economic reasons.
  
  Undoing Border Imperialism effectively challenges conventional wisdom and clichés, like the idea that the state is shrinking under neoliberal capitalism. “Contrary to the suggestion by some analysts that the Western state’s jurisdiction is withering under the power of multinational corporations, I would contend that the state is not eroding under transnational capitalist globalization. The state, along with its forms of governance including through border imperialism, is evolving to continue to meet the needs of capitalist expansion through more flexible means of governance and accumulation,” writes Walia. Though in some areas like the provision of social services there is little doubt that the role of states has generally receded, borders embody current sites for the expansion of state power, with thousands of kilometers of walls, growing armies of border police, and an increasingly intrusive surveillance apparatus.
  
  Part of the control of migration documented in the book is a growing prison-industrial complex where migrants are detained. According to Walia, these detentions serve to reinforce white supremacy and the dominant order as well as generate revenues for private prison owners and contractors. “Within mainstream narratives, criminals are never imagined as politicians, bankers, corporate criminals or war criminals, but as a racialized class of people living in poverty,” she writes.
  
  The prison system is but one form of state violence against racialized migrants and Indigenous people. “The material structures of the Western state have killed, tortured, occupied, raped, incarcerated, sterilized, interned, occupied, raped, incarcerated, robbed land from, pillaged, introduced drugs and alcohol into, stolen children from, sanctioned vigilante violence on, denied public services to, and facilitated capital’s hyper-expolitation of racialized communities,” writes Walia.
  
  Ongoing attacks by nation-states on these communities take place domestically throughout much of the world, as well as internationally by nation states who are able to project their power outwards. “These lived experiences of otherness are shaped by imaginings about who is entitled to protection from the nation-state because they represent the national identity, and who faces violence by the nation-state because their bodies are deemed not to belong.” These same logics, Walia argues, are projected outwards by imperialist nations. “The logic of racism and inferiority that drives Western imperial wars is inextricably connected to the logic of racism and exclusion within the West.”
  
  “Within border imperialism, the state-capital nexus relies on the apartheid nature of citizenship status to expand a pool of disposable migrant and undocumented labor that lowers the wage floor for capitalist interests without disturbing the normative whiteness of the nation-state.” Walia notes that the migrant laborer population of Gulf Cooperation Council countries (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirate) hovers around 40 per cent, these workers are rarely granted citizenship.
  
  “An analysis of border imperialism encapsulates a dual critique of Western state building within global empire: the role of Western imperialism in dispossessing communities in order to secure land and resources for state and capitalist interests, as well as the deliberately limited inclusion of migrant bodies into Western states through processes of criminalization and racialization that justify the commodification of their labor,” writes Walia.
  
  She refers to the West throughout the book “not only to denote the geographic site of the global North (that is, Europe, Australia and North America) but also to reference the dominance of Western political, economic and social formations and ideologies that have led to the foundation of other settler-colonial states such as Israel, and that are increasingly adopted by neoliberal states in Latin America, Africa and Asia.”
  
  Delineating between the so-called West and the rest of the world is no small task, and the emphasis on the culpability of Western states may absolve some responsibility for displacement of Indigenous peoples, peasants and the urban poor from local (non-Western) governments. There are few (if any) nation-states in the world that do not, in some way, repress or limit the movements of migrants or facilitate displacement to clear the way for industrial or energy projects. Nor are Western states the only ones guilty of limiting inclusion based on race and/or citizenship. Rather, these elements are embedded within state-building worldwide.
  
  Following her analysis of border imperialism, Walia walks readers through the creation and organization of No One is Illegal groups in Canada over the past 12 years, highlighting successes in preventing deportations and in carrying out support work with migrants, Indigenous land defenders, and other directly impacted communities. In linking anti-colonial struggles to migrant justice organizing, Walia suggests that decolonization is a key process in collectively undoing the damage done by border imperialism. “Since border imperialism and its constituent processes of capitalism and colonialism have psychologically dispossessed as well as structurally divided us, decolonization is an assertion of our intrinsic self-determining beauty and humanity,” she writes.
  
  Perhaps the book’s most important contribution is one that is identified by longtime activist and writer Andrea Smith in the introduction. “…Harsha asks us to look at how anti-immigrant xenophobia, white supremacy, and settler colonialism are mutually reinforcing in ways that actually prevent us from seeing how these logics are fully connected,” writes Smith.
  
  Undoing Border Imperialism is an important title that deserves to be on everyone's reading list, filled as it is with compact and readable theory and movement organizing gems from the front lines of migrant justice and Indigenous solidarity organizing in Canada.
  
  
  http://upsidedownworld.org/main/inter...
• 
  Lynn

  Lots of Academic Jargon and Anger.
  
  I didn't see the term Anarchist Interventions when I borrowed this from the library. I agree with many of the ideas in loosening borders. I don't believe that there can't he borders. There hasn't really been times when there hasn't been borders of some kind. This book uses a lot of jargon geared towards mostly academic audiences and like minded readers. It expresses a lot of terrible and horrible abuses that need to end but it doesn't seem to have any idea to run a government or society and its claims see to invite more cruel in place of others. Sounds a lot like communism and not a pleasant version. The jargon! The jargon!
• 
  Blessing

  must read for everyone who dreams of creating utopia!! tears in my eyes, fire in my soul & immense love and gratitude in my heart. so many thank yous to harsha & all the contributors. this work is soul-nourishing, gut wrenching & hope-filled.
• 
  R.J. Pate

  As an emotional and physical runner, I have more than the outmost respect for Mlle. Harsha Walia & what she did HERE putting together amazing analysis from many comrades across Turtle Island!
  May they continue to stay safe & vigilant. These lives, stories & tribunals are a must read!
• 
  violetslikecastanets_

  I just re-read this book and was really happy I did. I first picked this book up in 2014 when I had just moved Tucson, AZ and immersing myself for the first time in antiborder work, but never finished it. Re-reading it this time, I was struck by how much of this theory and analysis is imbued in the work that I have been doing along the US Mexico border. It felt both refreshing and comforting to read Harsha Walia's book. I recognized the dynamics and conundrums of the organizing work that I do, for example how to be doing direct support work while also engaging in larger movement-based abolition strategy, echoed in the accounts of organizers with NOII in Canada. This book has aged well, and still feels like a really apt read for anyone curious about learning lessons from those on the ground or for those who have learned this theory thru praxis.
• 
  Faaiz

  In this important and highly pertinent book, the author introduces the concept of border imperialism and situates it within the interlocking and interconnected systems of oppressions - imperialism, colonialism, racism, capitalism, heteropatriarchy, ableism, etc.

  The first defining process within border imperialism is displacements as a result of the coercive extractions of capitalism and colonialism, and the simultaneous fortification of the border—often by those very same Western powers that are complicit in these displacements—which renders the migration of displaced people as perilous.
  
  Border controls are used to deter those for who migration is the only option to the plundering of their communities and economies due to the free license granted to capital and militaries. Capitalism destroys land-based subsistence cultures and concentrates wealth and property into the hands of a select few. Production within capitalism is disconnected from human need, collective creativity, and the natural world—all of which become commodities to be bought and sold on the market.
  
  a fundamental feature of border imperialism within neoliberalism is to facilitate capital flows across borders while also ensuring labor flexibility by legalizing an exploitable migrant labor workforce.

  
  
  Primarily through her work with the decentralized chapters of the No One is Illegal (NOII) Canada, the author also highlights the various events and activities that she and her organization have been involved in to fight against deportations and work towards overarching strategic goals such as the eventual abolition of borders, prisons, dismantling of capitalism, and end to the nefarious and continuous incursions on the Indigenous lands and communities in Canada. The other half of the book delves into more specifics about what it means to organize, how organizations should be or could be structured to build movements, forge alliances, and chart our path to our collective liberation. It is this part that resonated with me deeply on a personal level.
  
  I have to admit that organizations, associations, and groups have never really appealed to me, in fact, I have actively avoided them and shunned them. And I'm all the poorer for it, mentally, emotionally, intellectually and so on. The way my life shaped up along with all my inadequacies and limitations just instilled in me a deep cynicism regarding others, almost a misanthropy. It is something that I'm actively trying to ameliorate so that I can give more meaning to my life and have something more to offer.
  

  One of the contradictions of border imperialism and capitalism is that while we are increasingly dependent on intricate production processes for our basic clothing and food, we are increasingly isolated from one another. Each of us plays such an atomized role in the global economy—like cogs in a wheel—that our social relations come to mimic that atomization. This psychological and social isolation, first, encourages our addiction to consumer culture, which in turn feeds endless capitalist production, and second, perpetuates our fears of one another, which justifies ever-expanding state surveillance and criminalization within border imperialism.

  
  I know I am not alone in feeling this level of alienation with this level of intensity. We live in a terribly alienating and atomized world. This is why this book resonated so deeply with me. Because the work of the author and her peers through their organizations imagine and actively work towards creating a world that is radical, transformative, and better, and where we care for one another and are taken care of to heal and work towards our collective liberation. The framework that the author proposes and practices is that of decolonization. In her words:

  Decolonization is more than a struggle against power and control; it is also the imagining and generating of alternative institutions and relations. Decolonization is a dual form of resistance that is responsive to dismantling current systems of colonial empire and systemic hierarchies, while also prefiguring societies based on equity, mutual aid, and self-determination.
  
  By challenging the dehumanization intrinsic to the dominating and coercive systems of border imperialism, decolonization affirms the sacredness of all life and restores our relationship to the Earth.
  
  Since border imperialism and its constituent processes of capitalism and colonialism have psychologically dispossessed as well as structurally divided us, decolonization is an assertion of our intrinsic self-beauty and humanity
  
  Striving toward decolonization requires us to challenge a dehumanizing social organization that robs us from one another and normalizes a lack of responsibility and care for one another and the Earth. This does not suggest a simple call for unity across our differences—particularly those rooted in systemic colonial privilege—but rather evokes a necessary struggle from our specific histories and locations, while refounding alliance, community, and kinship with one other. Decolonization calls on us to learn about and challenge each other in our complicities and contradictions within asymmetric relations of power and oppression, as we unlearn colonial strategies that foster competition and division among each other. Perhaps more than anything else, decolonization invites us to actively become good ancestors to future generations.
• 
  Kinjo Kiema

  Wrote an article inspired this book:
  https://wagingnonviolence.org/wr/2021...
  
  
  Really great, loves how she weaves together political analysis and stories and lessons from grassroots organizers!
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  J.

  Needed to read each chapter twice to fully digest it, this book is full of rich and incisive ideas. Highly recommended!
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  Hilary

  Harsha Walia, a South Asian activist based in Canada, uses the framework of border imperialism to understand (1) how Western states criminalize and exploit migrants and (2) how systems of imperialism, colonization, and capitalism displace and dispossess communities all across the globe. She challenges the myth of Western benevolence in migrant issues, as well as state-sponsored rhetoric of "border protection" and "national security." Rooted in the basis of decolonization and Indigenous sovereignty, this concept of "undoing borders" helps us connect the migrant justice movement with other social justice issues, such as dismantling the prison and military industrial complex, climate justice, Palestinian sovereignty, and police abolition. From war refugees from Vietnam and Laos, to the islanders of the Pacific Island nation Tuvalu that have been displaced by climate change, to Filipinx migrants recruited to precarious and low-wage jobs, migrant justice should be an important part of our conversations during API Heritage Month.
  
  This book is a mix of academic, movement, and experiential theories, largely based in lived experiences of organizers and migrants. Works from other contributors are included, like Lily Yuriko Shinde's excerpt on how her parents were interned in British Columbia with other Japanese Canadians. Additionally, Walia draws from her own work in No One Is Illegal (NOII) and includes some fantastic organizing history on Canadian activism. I also appreciated the chapter, based in roundtable format, where other NOII activists answer questions on sustainable grassroots organizing, reform vs. revolution, and the radical nature of decolonized dreaming.
  
  Full review here:
  https://www.instagram.com/p/COiHTVPL6Ve/
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  Karen Kohoutek

  This is a book that is on the line between theory and practice, and as such, it's in a mode I think of as professional activism, with plenty of talk about praxis and hegemony. Kind of an AK Press house style. Not a bad thing, but I know there are people who are put off by that, especially when they're not used to it. But Walia makes this tendency fairly accessible; more than some do! The work in question is based in Canada, focusing on immigration issues, in conjunction with Indigenous sovereignty issues, but the ideas about border imperialism transfer to all the North American borders. The book includes perspectives from multiple people involved in the group No One is Illegal. It deals with the complications of building alliances with organizations whose politics don't completely align, and other more practical problems of coalition and activism, which was kind of what I was looking for. I'm still looking for material on what to do when you don't have a strong, healthy local group to work with, or the organizing background to start one, but I guess there's no magic wand for that. This did give me some stuff to think about, and I underlined a lot!
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  Ignatz

  A good introduction to migrant organising, and to its integral role in struggles against capitalism and imperialism. The emphasis on indigenous sovereignty, coming out of the context of so-called "canada", was new and useful to me (I've heard the slogan "no one is illegal" more times than I can count, but never the other half, "canada is illegal" - I would love to see this applied to the u.k.). But a lot of this seemed kinda introductory to me, though that may equally attest to its impact as a work. That said, I think at times it was confused on whether organisers should ultimately aim to directly take on the state or not, suggesting a few times that we can just form alternative communities outside the state and that will somehow solve things. Similarly, the sense of how to take on imperialism outside a settler context or via resisting borders was left fairly vague, which seems a related problem. Perhaps I'm just too Leninist - but then again, most Leninists could learn a lot from the analysis here. Worth reading and reflecting on, and I will be recommending it, so.
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  Maya Bon

  Walia shares her experience organizing with the No One is Illegal (NOII) network struggling alongside non-resident immigrants who are at risk of deportation. She describes detailed encounters of their work, outlining how NOII strives to provide open space for debate and accountable alliances while maintaining collective values and principles. This book provides approachable guidelines, overviews, and lessons that stuck with me. Particularly poignant sections were her discussions of settler privilege, solidarity versus support through the lens of feminist writer bell hooks, and the importance of decolonizing social relations.
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  alexander

  [3.5/5] As clear-eyed, bold, and blunt as a political book can be, it acts not only as a nuanced and comprehensive take on the havoc and destruction wrecked by the illegalization of human migration via the conception of "border imperalism," it also contains and connects real-world political actions and implications to theory to show how praxis has (not) worked and what this means for any left, anti-borders movement going forward.
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  Sari Hellara Hernández

  This is a great book that introduces the movement for the abolition of borders. It highlights the power that arises from the collaboration and joining of forces of migrant rights, Indigenous "land back" and anti-racist activists. The layout of the book is brilliantly thought out and very well executed. It includes a combination of moving first-hand experiences and stories as well as informative narrations of how campaigns are built and sustained.
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  Meg

  Still just as relevant as when it first came out. If you get stuck in the middle (I ended up skimming much of the No One is Illegal timeline, for instance), keep with it. The chapter "Overgrowing Hegemony" is a great practical dive into building coalitions and alliances in organizing, and the epilogue (by Syed Khalid Hussan) is moving and beautiful.