Routledge Handbooks. Abingdon, Oxon; New York: Routledge [an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business], 2018. xx, 462 pp. (Tables, graphs, figures, maps, B&W photos.) US$240.00, cloth. ISBN 978-1-138-91750-7.
Border studies is a vast and rapidly evolving field of research. It has a long history of inquiry that has created foundational knowledge about border functions, border living, borderland dynamics, and processes of bordering, de-bordering, and re-bordering. Most recent work has moved beyond pure description toward a higher plane of analysis that draws attention to expressions of otherness, ways of being, and interactivity in border settings. As well, modern studies of political boundaries and borderlands have become increasingly multidisciplinary, which has enriched our understanding of people’s existential experiences on the margins of the state. This innovative tome is a welcome contribution to the growing border studies literature. It is exceptionally well edited, pan-Asian in its coverage, and eruditely written by a team of 38 scholars with disciplinary backgrounds in geography, anthropology, history, regional studies, sociology, humanities, and economics.
Including the introduction, the book is comprised of 36 chapters, which are divided into seven sections that deal with conceptual foundations; livelihoods, commodities and mobilities; land use and agrarian transformations; the state, governance, and statelessness; trade and the borderlands economy; humanitarianism and NGOs; and the militarization of the borderlands. These sections are a reasonable and effective way of organizing the chapters in this large volume. A brief introduction leads each part of the book. In such a large volume, these are helpful contributions that hone the reader’s attention into the topics of the sections more closely before heading into the case studies that follow. Sections two through seven are a collection of informative case studies, some of which are pure descriptions, while others provide deeper conceptual analyses. Likewise, some chapters deal with very specific localities, such as individual villages or border ports of entry, or short segments of a single boundary, while others comprise larger-scale studies that contend with regions or states. Some readers could see these differences as inconsistencies, while others might see them as manifestations of scholarly diversity. The layout of the book is appealing, and the use of supporting diagrams, maps, and photographs in many of the chapters is helpful in illustrating the points the authors are describing.
The chapters in Part 1, the conceptual foundations section, are geared largely toward violence, contention, exclusion, and militarization. A more balanced theoretical overview at the outset of the book, including discussions on migration, economics, and social environments, would have been warranted to help set the tone for the chapters that follow. As well, the book ends abruptly without a concluding chapter that helps bring the discourse to a close, elucidate the overall concepts and theoretical tidbits throughout, and outline the gaps that need to be filled by future research.
While several chapters touch upon economic issues such as agriculture, commerce, and trade, economic development should probably have received a brighter spotlight given its contemporary emphasis in many of Asia’s frontier zones. Likewise, and relatedly, only a couple of chapters mentioned tourism, and only tangentially, which is surprising given that tourism is one of the most influential socio-cultural, economic, ecological, and political forces in Asia that determines human mobilities, economic development, environmental impacts, cross-frontier interdependence, and gendered spaces in frontier areas. A chapter dedicated to tourism would have been valuable, but as tourism is more than just economics, it could have easily also been brought fruitfully into other discussions throughout the book.
Similarly, while several chapters mentioned cross-border cultures, seemingly missing is a deeper discussion about the notion of “borderlands culture” and frontier areas as “third spaces” that reflect unique cultures, geographies, economies, and politics on the margins of the state that stand apart from those located in the national center and further inland. Perhaps this would have addressed the editors’ question in their introductory chapter of whether there is “anything particularly Asian about the borderlands discussed” (6). In answer to their own question, they suggest that “the Asian borderlands analysed in this book are not fundamentally different from other borderlands around the world” (6). I agree with their admission overall, but the contents of the book are very Asian, which in a sense makes it quite unique, and seeing Asian borderlands as third spaces that are culturally and socio-spatially exceptional would have helped de-emphasize the editors’ concerns.
In spite of these minor criticisms, the advantages of this book far outweigh its minor shortcomings. It is a valuable contribution to the growing literature on the uniqueness of border spaces and borderlands, which heretofore has not been examined systematically in Asia. The main strength of the book is its empirical contribution and multidisciplinary perspectives. The authors have laudably provided real-world academic fodder that will no doubt become a well-used reference piece far into the future. All scholars and students interested in political geography, geopolitics, anthropology, history, sociology, humanities, and economics ought to be very keen on reading this volume, as these subjects pertain to the unique settings of state peripheries and borderlands. I applaud Horstmann, Saxer, and Rippa for their efforts to bring together a unique, interesting, and engaging collection of essays that contribute much about the human experience of living and working in the borderlands or crossing through them. I recommend this handbook as a standard text for borderlands scholars. There is little doubt that it will become one of the most tattered books in my collection as I continue to return to it time and again for empirical examples for my teaching and theoretical inspiration for my research.
Dallen J. Timothy
Arizona State University, Phoenix, USA