Normalizing racism: Vigilantism, border security and neo-racist assemblages

Abstract

In this essay, we trace the relations among the early years of the US-Mexico borderlands after the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (1848), the role of racialist discourse in shaping the border and US immigration policy, and contemporary bordering and security environments. Our ultimate aim is to show how contemporary security knowledge and practices form an assemblage with racialist discourses and practices in the post-9/11 era. Current security thinking is in itself racialized and follows the contours of what Étienne Balibar has described as 'neo-racism' (1991), which has offered vigilante groups more credibility in matters of security and immigration than they previously enjoyed. In short, we will show how the racial-territorial nexus of 'classical' racism has come together with the security-economy nexus of securitization theory and practice to form a neo-racist assemblage that we identify at the heart of US-Mexico border security and migration debates.

The Crimmigratory Agenda: Historical, Economic, and Political Dimensions of the Criminalization of Immigration in the United States

“…Within this exclusionary momentum, white supremacist and nativist dialogues moved back into the mainstream, grandfathered in by the "loud panicking" (Van Berlo, 2015). Reframing xenophobia and racism toward migrants as concern for national security and economic well-being enabled these views to find a place in the national discussion, as their purveyors found sanction and support in political circles (Kurz & Berry, 2015).…”

“…Personnel, funding, and massive federal resources have been poured into the border wall and accompanying border patrol (Johnson, 2015). In addition to the administration's continued description of immigrants as degenerates and "filth" (Sessions, 2017), racist vigilante violence at the border underscores the role of anti-immigrant, member-focused ideologies as a factor in the populist approach to protecting a "racial geography" (Kurz & Berry, 2015) that, when launched to political power, takes the form of harsh legislation against immigrants. The dehumanization needed as a foundation for severe crimmigration policies was seeded and seated within far-right popular politics.…”

Counterterrorism and race

“…Each of these texts notably fall outside of IR in their purview due to their separate trajectories of argument emanating from postcolonial and sociological modes of societal inquiry as well as broader political historical, and literary mediums. Nonetheless, they remain integral for IR inquiry into counterterrorism and race in so far as they discuss real-world politics wherein racialized discourses shape counterterrorism through government and societal apparatuses (Kurz and Berry 2015).…”