Bordering Britain: Law, Race and Empire - Paperback

by Nadine El-Enany (Author)

(B)ordering Britain argues that Britain is the spoils of empire, its immigration law is colonial violence and irregular immigration is anti-colonial resistance.

Front Jacket

Immigration law teaches white British people that Britain and everything within it is rightfully theirs. 'Others' are here as their guests. Yet Britain would not be the wealthy, plentiful place that it is without its colonial history. We should not wait for the law to rule on our entitlement to colonial spoils... (B)ordering Britain charts the evolution of British immigration, asylum and nationality law from the 1900s to the present, arguing that it must be understood in the context of Britain's imperial history. Against the all-too-familiar mythological narratives of Britain's colonial past, it shows how a retreating imperial power resorted to immigration laws to cut itself off physically and symbolically from its colonies and the Commonwealth, taking with it what it had plundered. British immigration laws are acts of colonial seizure and violence, obstructing the vast majority of racialised people from accessing the spoils of empire. (B)ordering Britain makes clear, regardless of what the law, media and politicians dictate, people with personal, ancestral or geographical links to colonialism, or those existing under the weight of its legacy of race and racism, have every right to come to Britain and take back what is theirs.

Back Jacket

"Immigration law teaches white British people that Britain and everything within it is rightfully theirs. 'Others' are here as their guests. Yet Britain would not be the wealthy, plentiful place that it is without its colonial history. We should not wait for the law to rule on our entitlement to colonial spoils..."

(B)ordering Britain charts the evolution of British immigration, asylum and nationality law from the 1900s to the present, arguing that it must be understood in the context of Britain's imperial history. Against the all-too-familiar mythological narratives of Britain's colonial past, it shows how a retreating imperial power resorted to immigration laws to cut itself off physically and symbolically from its colonies and the Commonwealth, taking with it what it had plundered.

British immigration laws are acts of colonial seizure and violence, obstructing the vast majority of racialised people from accessing the spoils of empire. (B)ordering Britain makes clear, regardless of what the law, media and politicians dictate, people with personal, ancestral or geographical links to colonialism, or those existing under the weight of its legacy of race and racism, have every right to come to Britain and take back what is theirs.

Author Biography

Nadine El-Enany has written for numerous publications including the Guardian, Media Diversified, Left Foot Forward and Critical Legal Thinking. She recently co-edited After Grenfell: Violence, Resistance and Response. Nadine is Senior Lecturer in Law at Birkbeck School of Law and Co-Director of the Centre for Research on Race and Law.