When pathogens determine the territory: Toward a concept of non-human borders

Abstract

This article conceptualizes how infectious microbes create real borders that are not dependent on human meaning making or identity. By territorializing interfaces between contagion and ecology, infectious agents engage in bordering practices by determining where citizens can move around safely, and thereby challenge the bordering practices and biosecurity efforts of nation-states. Based on empirical examples of microbial borders, evidence from the natural sciences, interviews with public health practitioners, and theoretical support from ethnographic encounters with Amazonian ontologies, the conceptualization links the geopolitics of microbial bordering to biodiversity loss and deforestation, and suggests that microbial bordering should prompt acknowledgment of the role humans play in ecological patterns that far exceed human control and meaning making. The concept of microbial borders is relevant to global health and security efforts in general, expands the theoretical agenda for critical border studies, and contributes to the fields of global health security and New Materialism in International Relations by highlighting that international relations include our relations with non-humans, and that how we choose to cohabitate with them has large implications for human security.