Bordering and Ordering the Twenty-first Century: Understanding Borders

There is a joke that old people from Transcarpathia like to tell: it is about having lived in three different states without ever having left one’s native village. The joke illustrates the “nomadic” character of European borders in the 20 century and their power to shape individual identities and human fates. The personal story with which Gabriel Popescu starts his book is more complex. It is about a young academic with a Romanian passport exploring the world while his country is moving from the Communist block to the EU, NATO and the Schengen area; about a contemporary nomad crossing the nomadic borders of the 21 century, with their permanently changing geopolitical status, social and economic contexts and border regimes. The strength of this book lies in the way it combines personal experience with professional competence, in its sensitivity for details, its rich use of empirical material and its critical stance.