21.02.2023 | Open Letter: Blocked by the Border

BERLINER GAZETTE - KULTUR, POLITIK UND DIGITALES SEIT 1999:

80 researchers, cultural workers, journalists, and activists from 25 countries call on event organizers throughout “Europe” and beyond: Stand together against the EU border regime and publicize the occasions when borders sabotage our efforts to build spaces of transnational conversation and cooperation!

Dear organizers of conferences, exhibitions, festivals, hackathons and cultural, educational and activist spaces and institutions,

We want your help to draw attention to the fact that, again and again, our colleagues are being blocked by the EU border regime (and other related border regimes) and thus prevented from attending conferences, exhibitions, panels, workshops, seminars, and other events.

This scandal is rarely publicized or denounced by universities, conferences, art spaces, galleries, and other hosts. Rather, it is often treated like a ‘normal’ inconvenience in event logistics, similar to overbooked rooms, lost luggage, tech malfunctions, and the vegan cookies running out on the last day.

But we must not allow this normalization. We must speak out, loudly, and demand change.

Our open letter is intended to fulfill three functions:

1) it is a collective statement that makes ostensibly individual problems visible as a matter of public concern;
2) it is a call for a decentralized and potentially viral initiative/campaign;
3) it is a kit of ideas and text for event organizers to remix and appropriate for their specific contexts and struggles.

The dis/order of the EU border regime

In criticizing the fact that our colleagues are blocked by the EU border regime, we do not want this to conjure up the specter of “Fortress Europe.” This concept is associated with the mythical image of a monolith: an organized whole that acts as a single unified, unchanging force. Such a mythical image – the complementary counterpart of “Europe, the epitome of the free world”? – glosses over intra-EU and intra-European rivalries, differences, inconsistencies, and contradictions. In so doing, it tends to distract from the operations of a border regime, which is anything but monolithic and uniform.

In this framework, “European values” remain ambiguous and underdefined, strategically upheld or strategically neglected; national and supra-national border policies are being flexibly adapted accordingly, depending on traditional or situational geo-economic and geo-political interests and alliances; and those who are not to be part of Europe are continuously molded in ever new ways.

Who is blocked?

Statistics on the number of people blocked from entering Europe are difficult to secure, and it is almost impossible to find data on the number of artists, intellectuals and other cultural workers. For this reason, and also for reasons of the privacy and safety of individuals, it is difficult to name exemplary or representative cases. The following should suffice to give an idea of the extent and nature of the problem: The spectrum of those affected by borders in this way ranges from non-EU nationals who are accused of “sneaking in,” to colleagues who are stigmatized as “political enemies,” which is to say on the basis of specific legal decrees related to “extremism” or in the context of sanctions and outright economic warfare.

Denial of visas as a key bordering method

More: https://berlinergazette.de/open-letter-blocked-by-the-border/