Revisiting ‘Bordering, Ordering and Othering’: An Invitation to ‘Migrate’ Towards A Politics of Hope

‘Bordering, Ordering and Othering’ is a landmark in the scholarship of the ‘processual turn’ in border studies. This commentary provides some reflections on van Houtum and van Naerssen’s paper that seek to foster not only an appreciation of the research avenues it has opened but also a critical interrogation of its shortcomings. Rethinking borders as processes has significantly contributed to the conceptual evolution of borders. And yet, I am concerned with how the b/ordering-othering perspective can be questioned and broadened. In so doing, I conclude by taking up van Houtum and van Naerssen’s invitation to problematise the border, questioning certainty and securities provided by the exclusive modern state-centric way of thinking borders based on fixed and everlasting binary framing, which blind us to the constant state of becoming of political and social order. It’s an invitation to ‘migrate’ towards an alternative politics of hope.