Description
Following Brexit, the UK government has been focussed on “taking back control” of the country’s borders. In this paper I seek to understand the lived experience of post-Brexit bordering practices from the perspective of the EU nationals most directly targeted and impacted. I consider the EU Settlement Scheme (EUSS) as emblematic of the UK’s post-Brexit border regime and engage a counter-archive of testimonies from EU nationals to better understand the lived experience of applying for and using the EUSS. Specifically, I draw on ontological security studies literature to better understand how navigating this changing status has impacted on the sense of being and belonging of EU nationals post-Brexit.
I find that the manifestation and experience of contemporary everyday bordering practices are grounded in a logic of contingency and through this introduce the concept of the Damoclesian border – the experience of the border is mediated by the individual circumstances of those targeted, but ultimately, the contingencies underpinning the manifestation of the border mean that is not possible to know with certainty when, where, or with what outcome the next border will be encountered. This uncertainty and contingency works to disrupt the ontological security of those targeted.
