Slow and spectacular violence: debilitation and onward mobility at the EU’s borders

From pushbacks to shipwrecks, spectacular forms of state violence at the EU’s borders are well documented. In this article, we trace a continuum of racialised violence that exists between these spectacular instances of state border controls, as well as more mundane practices that discourage arrival, integration and settlement. Following Rob Nixon, we conceptualise these latter practices as a slow violence that precludes finding a ‘liveable life’, echoing the experiences of the working poor and other racialised communities. Using the Maltese Islands as a case study, we argue that these two forms of violence occur at sea and on land, and are intimately linked, working to reinforce each other. This continuum of violence both encourages onward mobility and creates barriers to that same mobility – a mobility that remains shackled to the state violence that shapes it. Finally, the paper turns to how people resist this spectacular and slow violence, reflecting on the different strategies adopted by people on the move and their allies.