Social Harm at the Border: The Case of Lampedusa

by Francesca Soliman

Overview

This book offers a zemiological approach for understanding border control practices, state power, and their social impact. Drawing on an ethnographic study on the borderisation of the Mediterranean island of Lampedusa, it explores border harms from the perspective of the non-migrant community.

Social Harm at the Border examines a range of social harms associated with border control, and draws on themes of security, racialised humanitarianism, economic harms, environment, and culture. It explores the ways in which borderisation exercises control over both migrants and non-migrants, ensuring that border communities remain subordinated to the power of institutional actors, and it offers a novel framework with which to illuminate and explain border harms and their generative mechanisms.

An accessible and compelling read, this book will appeal to students and scholars of criminology, zemiology, sociology, criminal justice, politics, geography, and those interested in the harms caused by border control practices.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781032390468
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	04/14/2025
Series:	Routledge Studies in Criminal Justice, Borders and Citizenship
Pages:	262
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.19(h) x (d)

About the Author

Francesca Soliman is Lecturer in Criminology at Edinburgh Napier University UK.

Table of Contents

1.Introduction 2.Criminology and Migration: A Misguided Relationship 3.Theory, Methodology, and Methods: Doing Zemiology 4.Law and Border: Crime, Security, and Law Enforcement in Lampedusa 5.Hospitality, Racism, and Hierarchies of Victimhood: Humanitarianism as Border Harm 6.The Economic Harms of Lampedusa’s Borderisation 7.At Sea, On Land, In the Air: Environmental Border Harms in Lampedusa 8.Lampedusa’s Border Spectacle: Trauma, Exploitation, and the Harms of Crisis-driven Research 9.Social Harms in Lampedusa: Critically Assessing the Role of Borderisation

Editorial Reviews

The nexus between borders, harm and criminology has harvested complex debates. In this richly conceptual and empirical text, Francesca Soliman addresses substantive gaps so we can better understand and progress discussion and action from a solid zemiological perspective. Essential for anyone interested in the prolific harms of borders, and their human and environmental costs.'

Victoria Canning, Associate Professor in Criminology, University of Bristol

'Francesca Soliman’s book presents an engaging and vivid account of various social harms that can occur within border spaces. It challenges standard criminological thinking on what constitutes harmful behaviour, who is responsible for it, who is affected by such acts and in what ways, and how we should think and respond to them. The books is eloquent and effortless, and presents an original and indispensable contribution to the field of zemiology.'

Milena Tripkovic, Lecturer in Criminology, University of Edinburgh

From the Publisher