Fieldwork Without Borders

I’ve crossed a lot of borders of late: Ghana-Burkina Faso-Ghana-UK-Turkey-Ghana.  In a touristic (and anthropological) sense, it’s easy to perceive borders as nodes of red tape.  What’s more challenging is interpreting why these nodes are structured (or unstructured as the case may be) the way they are and how these nodes are negotiated by social actors. Ghana has a pretty notorious reputation for being a challenging beaurocratic context for obtaining and maintaining a visa.   I’m convinced that it’s a system that is intentionally convoluted so that an informal economy can build around the management of the confusion.  In my most recent visa renewal effort I made the decision to take action like a Ghanaian would take action against red tape; I called a friend who had a friend who works in the immigration office.  And then I did the exact opposite of what the large poster board at the immigration headquarters messaged--I handed over a little extra money for the processing of my visa.  I used informal formalities to becoming illegally legal.  Perhaps most telling about the extent to which this is the norm is that my friend kindly enacted, but slightly smirked at, my request to put the extra money in an envelope so that it didn’t appear visible. That slight smirk relayed how unnecessary this step actually was.

I’ve also had experiences that make me inclined to think that the red tape is not just about the development of an informal economy that helps underpaid government workers.  I think it’s also about making sure the outsider gets a taste of their own medicine.  It’s retributive.  Ghanaians desiring to go to the US must endure an endless (and in most cases hopeless) process to obtain a visa to the States.  The US embassy in Accra always has a line of Ghanaians waiting outside the embassy building to have an opportunity to sit down inside with an embassy official to face questioning on why they want to go to the States and who will vouch for them.  Unless they have a large bank account in combination with a powerful connection in the States, their request for a visa will inevitably be denied. Even for Ghanaians who have never attempted to obtain a visa, the narrative of the experience is one that runs strongly and structures Ghanaians’ understanding of their position on the world stage.  

Posters such as this one are prolific in enticing Ghanaians to part with money for a service that promises to get them a work or student visa to the states. 

This makes me think that the experience I had of being illegally detained and verbally harassed by a Ghanaian immigration officer was a way to remind me of my position on the world stage.  I can only interpret this diatribe as a frustrated Ghanaian wanting to remind me, a US citizen, of my ability to move about the world.  I felt profiled by the immigration officer.  And it was a pretty wretched feeling.  Anthropology prides itself on participant observation—doing the best you can to live and feel the experience of the society you are trying to integrate into.  This was participant observation I did not sign up for and the medicine was pretty bitter. But it is still relevant data for my attempts to understand the social and economic climate of this country. 

Borders don’t simply represent different nations. Borders represent different political, social and economic opportunities.    Our world is one in which historically, and contemporarily, borders are often physically imposing places that protect one population’s resources from another population’s resources.  Sometimes that protection is warranted against acts of aggression, as is the case with the remnants of a wall built in Gwollu in the Upper West Region of Ghana.  This wall was built in the early 19^th Century to protect the inhabitants of Gwollu against slave raiders.   Sometimes these physical boundaries are really more about reactions to a neoliberal age that creates great disparities.  These disparities push populations to seek better opportunities. This is why thousands of Central American children are waiting for “processing” at the US/Mexico border.  

Gwollu wall built to protect against slave raiding

I think as well of the hundreds of Muslim Ghanaians who legally traveled to Brazil for the World Cup but have just applied for asylum to escape what they are calling religious persecution in Ghana.  Though they claim that their persecution is tied to religious differences within the Ghanaian Muslim community, I’m not so sure this tension even exists, let alone does it serve as the most pressing factor pushing these Ghanaians out of their home context. Religious persecution is a much smarter card to play on the international stage than the political economy card.  Ghanaians want to leave Ghana because of structural violence—an instable economy that includes a deflating national currency, no job opportunities, and rising fuel, electricity and water costs that leave the majority of the population struggling to get by.  The region of Brazil that these Ghanaians have applied for asylum is an area known to have plentiful employment opportunities that have attracted many foreign workers. 

These are issues that not only affect the Hondurases and Ghanas of the world, but also the so called developed nations.  In Scotland, where I recently traveled, discourse is building towards a vote for independence from or ongoing dependence on the UK.  The debate, from what I was able to gather, is one largely centered around improving Scotland’s socio-economic indicators that are seen as oppressed by UK leadership.  Instead of feeling pushed out of their homes and across other national borders, Scotland has an opportunity to redefine what its borders with England mean in terms of political and economic authority.  If contemporary Scotland can mimic the social protection services of the days of yore (see photo below), Scotland might have a knack for creating a more equitable and healthy life for all of its citizens without its citizens having to flee to another place.

The tagline for wooing Scots to vote yes for independence