Flies That Buzz…

The Mexico-US border is one of the longest land borders in the world. The physical border, the businesses and the communities located on either side represent a snapshot of globalisation in action, with the disparities between the rich north and impoverished south clearly illustrated. I hope to explore through the geological concepts of proximity and distance, the experiences of migrants, border patrol guards, industry and local communities within the border area with particular regard to the movement of peoples into the border area and the United States.

The Mexico-US border is 2,000 miles long and has the busiest land border crossings on the planet. As an example, the San Diego/Tijuana border can process up to 65,000 cars and 30,000 pedestrians every day, amongst which somewhere in the region of 20 – 30 people are caught trying to enter the United States illegally. The border was originally established in 1848 with the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which resulted in America nearly doubling its landmass whilst Mexico ceded fifty-five percent of its land. The border boundaries were finally clarified with the Gadsden Purchase in 1853. Both the treaty and purchase left many people on either side of the border feeling distanced from both the American and Mexican governments. This was particularly true for the indigenous peoples such as the Yaqui and Tohono O’Odham nations whose belief systems were unfamliar with the concept of ownership of land and whose families and communities were sundered by the border. These feelings persist to the present day with delegations from the Tohono O’Odham nation seeking US citizenship for members of their tribe who are denied a passport due to being born on the Mexican side of the border, but, whose ability to cross the border has been increasingly compromised due to tightening of immigration controls.

The ideas of proximity and distance are particularly useful when discussing globalisation, but by extension such subject matter is vast in its scope. As such the border between Mexico and the United States is a good snapshot of globalisation, as the issues within the globalisation debate that cause so much heated dispute are all present here. The border not only establishes national boundaries but can be used to regulate the movement of people and trade, although it has been noted that movement of people has become more restricted whilst trade has been allowed to move with greater ease. In 1994, Mexico and America signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), primarily established to help bolster Mexico’s economy, it has instead led to a magnification of the financial inequalities between the two countries and an upsurge of migration from Mexico into the United States. American and foreign owned companies have taken advantage of the perceived lower cost of living (leading to lower salaries) as well as tax incentives, to set up factories (Maquiladoras) to produce their goods. Worth an estimated 79 billion but characterised by its low salaries, the Maquiladora industries are noted for their pristine factories but sub-standard worker accommodation. This contrast exemplifies the distance felt by many workers on the Mexican side of the border whose proximity to that line of demarcation puts them within sight of the United States and yet whose living conditions, lacking sanitation, electricity and running water, extremely low salaries (on average $4 per day), limited workers rights and long hours, couldn’t be further removed from that found within the U.S. Despite the aforementioned issues, the population along the border has doubled up to 10 million in the years 1995 – 2005. The proximity of cities such as El-Paso to the border and thus the Maquiladoras has reaped certain benefits, with industry suppliers expanding or relocating their operations in order to be close to their customer bases across the border.

The impoverished state of nations in Central and South America has led to a movement of people northwards, seeking to improve conditions for both themselves and their families. The concept of distance is demonstrated in two ways with the example of people like Pedro Jose who took two months to travel the 1,500 miles to the U.S. (physical distance) and yet despite making it across the border feels culturally distant from the American way of life claiming that he does not want to become American: “I will always be Mexican”. Many Mexicans believe that their culture extends across the border, which reinforces the distance that these migrants have in their relationship to American society. This idea is manifest with the annual celebration of the Blessing of the Animals Parade in Los Angeles, which features traditional music, food and costume. Los Angeles has one of the largest Mexican populations in the world within which many of the community maintain a sense of closeness through Spanish media. The remoteness of many Mexicans from U.S. society is also demonstrated by groups such as Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán (MEChA) who have reservations about integrating fully into the United States, arguing that they are not accepted and that integration would require them to forsake their culture. Despite these reservations, parades such as the Blessings of the Animals can be viewed as an ideal way of bringing different people and their respective cultures into closer proximity, as they allow people to view (in this instance) Mexican culture, possibly for the first time.

Annually, approximately 500,000 people are arrested with that number also being turned away at the border whilst 200,000 people enter the United States legally. Many American born citizens are deeply disconcerted at what they describe as the flood of immigrants into the U.S. This has led to the formation of protest groups such as the Civil Homeland Defence, American Border Patrol and Voices of Citizens Together. These groups maintain that migrants that enter the U.S. illegally have no intention of becoming “good” American citizens, that few if any have qualifications or skills that would be beneficial to the United States and that ultimately, the rate of Mexican immigration is unprecedented. The aforementioned protest groups ardently believe in maintaining their economic and cultural distance from Mexico and that their proximity to the border and the increase in migrants into the U.S. threatens their own cultural ideals. Furthermore, in order to tighten immigration controls, the U.S. Federal Government has increased the budget for the border security to $13 billion. This has led to the recruitment of more officers and influx of the latest technology used in defence of the border. The use of night-vision goggles, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and electronic sensors in defence of the border reinforces the distance, financially, between the two nations. It is after all unlikely that should they even want to, that the Mexican government would have the financial reserves to emulate what the U.S. as done.

Not everybody on the American side of the border readily accepts the claims made by groups such as The Civil Homeland Defence. An array of groups have coalesced under the umbrella movement No More Deaths whose purpose is to lobby for immigration reform and maintain an ethical distance from the anti-immigration movement. Members of this group such as the Reverend John Fyfe of the Tucson Presbyterian Church argue that it is the tightening of immigration through border crossing areas, such as at Tijuana/San Diego, that is forcing more people into attempts to cross into the United States via the Arizona desert. It is alleged that over 2,000 people have died in the desert between 1998-2004 due to exposure and/or dehydration.

Possibly the most unique stance taken with regard to proximity and distance is found within the cross-border populations known as the Mexifornians. Due to what they view as their trans-national situation, in that they may live on one side of the border whilst working on the other, they have come to feel distanced from both the left and rights perspectives held by other people. This idea is articulated by Christian Ramirez (at the time of writing ran the San Diego branch of the American Friends Service Committee), who notes that he has friends and family on both sides of the border, and that they are “a border people with a dual nationality.” This view demonstrates a positive view of the concept of proximity between people on alternate sides of the divide.

Using the Mexico/Us border as a case study, proximity and distance can be shown to be pertinent in a variety of ways. The idea that globalisation brings people together can be seen with the establishment of the Maquiladoras, whose location means that they are ideally located to move their products efficiently into America and ultimately the wider world. Proximity is also shown by the closeness that immigrant populations have for each other, particularly in the forming of distinct communities within conurbations such as Los Angeles and their wilful holding on to heritage and tradition. The concept of distance has been shown in a mostly negative light. The Mexican migrants feeling of estrangement from wider American society, the financial distance between Mexico and the United States and the complete sense of alienation that indigenous peoples feel within what they regard as their own land. Similarly, many American born citizens are keen on the idea of maintaining or even increasing the distance, both culturally and economically between themselves and the peoples south of the border. The idea of a Mexifornian culture demonstrates that proximity and distance and interlinked. The geographical proximity between friends and family leading to an intermingling of cultures primarily through those same peoples distance from the rather polarised viewpoints of the US-Mexico border issues raging around them.

Afterword:
When I was researching the above essay, I found myself continually coming across what are in effect crimes against humanity within the Maquiladora system. Whatever the view of people about immigration into the United States (and after all, are not the loudest voices of protest descendants of immigrants themselves?) - surely something should be done about the Maquiladoras. No sanitation, no representation, no humanity. The video below was made by the group At The Drive In as protest at what goes on within the border area of Mexico.