Elastic Borders: Fluctuating Policies of Securitization, Deterrence, and Expulsion in the United States

Grounded in critical border theory, this paper introduces the concept of elastic borders to analyse abrupt and fluctuating migrant regulation and deterrence policies in the United States of America between 2017 and 2025. Elastic borders are pliant over space and time, contracting inward through securitisation and digital tactics within the nation’s territory while simultaneously expanding outwards to externalise migration control to select (often neighbouring) countries through legal agreements while also restricting ingress through technological means. Elastic bordering practices are created through policy decisions regarding migrant status and management, causing frequent shifts in bordering practices. Elasticity is an essential aspect of the complex and ambiguous system to hinder the mobility of asylum seekers and undocumented migrants across US and other borders. As both internal and external bordering strategies multiply through elasticity, migrant precarity is often heightened and mobility is controlled. While our case study is of the United States, we contend that states, along with actors at local and supranational administrative levels, are increasingly relying upon elastic borders to limit and manage migration, drastically reducing regularised pathways.