At the border, politics risks exposing itself to the impolitical, to a sense of movement beyond its conventional socio-political definitions, and to an expression of the political without a sovereign tone. One might say that it is this risk-which is also to say, this chance for a life otherwise-that a migratory politics seeks out. And yet, just as the prospect for movement seems to become ever more limited, such limits are reinforced by nostalgic repetition no less than through the proliferation of borders.

Full text. Co-authored with Brett Neilson, Vacarme 34, 2006. Republished in Michel Feher, (ed.), Nongovernmental Politics, New York: Zone Books, 2007, pp.469-481. In French as “De Woomera à Baxter: temps exceptionnels et espaces non gouvernementaux.”