Chapter One One of the most well known examples of how borders are formed and how they can affect the lives of people occurred during and after World War II.  From 1940 to 1944 Germany and Italy invaded the European mainland, to which a large portion of the free world (allied forces) united to drive the invaders out.  When World War II ended, the U.S., the U.K. and the Soviet Union divided the occupied lands up, creating defined formal borders.  These borders were agreed upon by and were to be maintained by the three countries, however over time the politics of borders and who could and could not cross them became an issue an Germany eventually became a divided country; the East (Russia) and the West (the Free World).   This resulted in the Berlin Wall which was a border fence built to keep people in (the East) and those in the West out.  What were originally boundaries between occupation forces became barriers to human and commercial traffic and ultimately morphed into a formal border between two, politically and economically divergent countries.  The fence between East and West Germany became a physical border, protected with mine fields, wire fence that could only be cut with a torch, guard towers, lights, and armed forces with orders to shoot-to-kill people trying to “leave” rather than potential invading forces.  Eventually, in 1989 the Berlin Wall was taken down uniting Germany into one country;  the Federal Republic of Germany. The separation between East and West Germany was a political and economic barrier that has left remnants of “otherness” in some people’s minds.  A physical, political, and economic wall had separated people of the same ethnicity, language, and culture for nearly fifty years.  Twenty years after that barrier came down there are still political, social, and cultural repercussions. Our text outlines the difference between barriers, boundaries, and borders. Each has separate and unique functions while all are common components of the modern political and economic lines that separate countries, states, and counties.  Natural barriers and boundaries make some of the best borders because of the inherent difficulties in crossing them.  Geography is the best example of a natural barrier and therefore natural borders. · Barrier is a material object that is intended to the block passage of people and/or property.  Barriers can include solid walls, electric fences and mine fields. · Boundary is line (imaginary or physical) that fixes a limit.  Boundaries can be political, economic, legal, physical or mental. · Border is an outer edge, perimeter, periphery, or rim and are commonly used to delineate national and political boundaries. Geography, such as a mountain range has long been a barrier to movement and in much of the world it still is.  Many mountain ranges have acted as natural barriers, boundaries, and borders.  An example of this type of border would be the Andes mountains which is a continual mountain range that run ...

1. Chapter One
One of the most well known examples of how borders are
formed and how they can affect the lives of people occurred
during and after World War II. From 1940 to 1944 Germany
and Italy invaded the European mainland, to which a large
portion of the free world (allied forces) united to drive the
invaders out. When World War II ended, the U.S., the U.K. and
the Soviet Union divided the occupied lands up, creating
defined formal borders. These borders were agreed upon by and
were to be maintained by the three countries, however over time
the politics of borders and who could and could not cross them
became an issue an Germany eventually became a divided
country; the East (Russia) and the West (the Free World). This
resulted in the Berlin Wall which was a border fence built to
keep people in (the East) and those in the West out. What were
originally boundaries between occupation forces became
barriers to human and commercial traffic and ultimately
morphed into a formal border between two, politically and
economically divergent countries. The fence between East and
West Germany became a physical border, protected with mine
fields, wire fence that could only be cut with a torch, guard
towers, lights, and armed forces with orders to shoot-to-kill
people trying to “leave” rather than potential invading forces.
Eventually, in 1989 the Berlin Wall was taken down uniting
Germany into one country; the Federal Republic of Germany.
The separation between East and West Germany was a political
and economic barrier that has left remnants of “otherness” in
some people’s minds. A physical, political, and economic wall
had separated people of the same ethnicity, language, and
culture for nearly fifty years. Twenty years after that barrier
came down there are still political, social, and cultural
repercussions.
Our text outlines the difference between barriers, boundaries,
and borders. Each has separate and unique functions while all

2. are common components of the modern political and economic
lines that separate countries, states, and counties. Natural
barriers and boundaries make some of the best borders because
of the inherent difficulties in crossing them. Geography is the
best example of a natural barrier and therefore natural borders.
· Barrier is a material object that is intended to the block
passage of people and/or property. Barriers can include solid
walls, electric fences and mine fields.
· Boundary is line (imaginary or physical) that fixes a limit.
Boundaries can be political, economic, legal, physical or
mental.
· Border is an outer edge, perimeter, periphery, or rim and are
commonly used to delineate national and political boundaries.
Geography, such as a mountain range has long been a barrier to
movement and in much of the world it still is. Many mountain
ranges have acted as natural barriers, boundaries, and borders.
An example of this type of border would be the Andes
mountains which is a continual mountain range that runs along
the west coast of South America. These nearly impenetrable
mountains form a natural physical barrier and therefore a
natural border between the Pacific and Atlantic countries of
South America. Chile, Peru, Ecuador and Colombia all lay
along the western slopes while Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil and
Venezuela lie along the eastern slopes.
Besides mountains there are many other natural geographical
barriers which can include oceans, rivers and straits. Both
North and South America consider the Atlantic and Oceans to
be natural barriers, shielding those continents from attack, due
to the vastness and difficulty of moving attacking forces across
these waters.
Another good example of a natural barrier for the U.S. would be
the Rio Grande River which has served as a natural barrier in
North America, establishing more of half the international
border between the United States and Mexico. Other natural
bodies of water that provide barriers in North America would
include the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River which comprise

3. a large portion of the international border between the U.S. and
Canada.
Another natural geographical barriers that make for excellent
boundaries are deserts. Deserts are good boundaries because
they are and as a result little can survive long without access to
water. Not only that, the extreme temperatures are detrimental
to human life (extreme heat by day and extreme cold by night).
In the U.S. the desert regions are essentially found across the
entire southwest of the United States and northwest expanse of
Mexico. Across this region are found several major deserts
stretching from Laredo, Texas to San Diego, California
including the Sonoran and Chihuahuan.
National borders are established in a variety of ways. Countries
begin with some sense by the people of commonality amongst
themselves and uniqueness from others. Often, that
commonality stems from a combination of language, ethnicity
and religion. This becomes the core component of the political
entity that establishes relationships with neighboring groups.
Over time, fixed, identifiable limits are placed on which group
controls a given area politically. Formal arrangements are
usually concluded by treaty (an agreement) which is usually
formalized through some sort of signed document.
The evolution of the modern nation state from the late 18th
century to the early 20th century corresponds with the absolute
claims to legal and political supremacy and the ascendance of
effective international law which has essentially been derived
from the will of nations. This all changed with the
establishment of the United Nations at the end of World War II.
With this came the modern era of international relations from
which we derive the current system of the law of nations.
Nations longer operated from the perspective of mutual respect
and abstention in the internal affairs of other nations, but
instead moved to the U.N. model of organized joint cooperation.
With this understanding of the origin and evolution of the law
of nations it is necessary to establish the identity of states. A
state is a “legal personality” or an “international legal person”

4. in proper terms. The Convention on Rights and Duties of
States (1933) defines in Article 1, “The state as a person of
international law should possess the following qualifications:
(a) a permanent population; (b) a defined territory; (c)
government; and (d) capacity to enter into relations with the
other states.” In Article 2, “The federal state shall constitute a
sole person in the eyes of international law.”
When does a “state” become a “state” is the subject of two
different theories:
1. One says it is recognition of the “state” by an established
state(s).
2. The other theory looks to the establishment of facts that meet
the criteria of statehood as laid down in recognized
international law (UIO, 1933).
As a result, a state may exist without being recognized by other
states. The primary function of international recognition is to
declare one country acknowledges the other state’s political
existence and as such is willing to treat that entity as an
international person, with the rights and obligations of States.
Collectively, the governmental powers of a state are referred to
as its sovereign powers. The fullest measure of sovereign
powers is exercised by a state over its land, air and coastal
territories which leads to the institution of borders between
nations.
Our text covers the ways which states can acquire more
territory;
1. Accretion. This is the expansion of a state’s territory by the
operation of nature. An example would include the shifting of
the course of a river, volcanism resulting in creation of new
landmass, and rivers laying down silt in their drainage basins.
2. Cession. This involves the transfer of sovereignty by means
of an agreement between the ceding and the acquiring states.
3. Conquest. This comes when one country acquires the territory
of another through military force and a declaration of the
conquering state’s intention to annex it.
Borders between countries frequently span land, rivers, and

5. lakes. In the Restatement, Second, Foreign Relations Law of the
United States (1965), these boundaries were defined in
subsection 12 as;
1. The boundary separating the land areas of two states is
determined by acts of the states expressing their consent to its
location.
2. Unless consent to a different rule has been expressed,
a. when the boundary between two states is a navigable river, its
location is the middle of the channel of navigation;
b. when the boundary between two states is a non-navigable
river or a lake, its location is the middle of the river or lake
(Wilkes, 1965).
Boundaries on oceans fall under a separate rule of law, the Law
of the Sea. The United Nations Conference on the Law of the
Sea in 1958 adopted four conventions which include;
1. on the Territorial Sea and the Contiguous Zone,
2. on the High Seas,
3. on the Continental Shelf, and
4. on Fishing and Conservation of the Living Resources of the
High Seas (United Nations Diplomatic Conferences, 1958).
Because there where disagreements between countries a Third
Conference on the Law of the Sea was convened and in 1982
produced a new treaty with a variety of additional provisions.
The U.S. has never agreed to the United Nations Convention on
the Law of the Sea and has only agreed with the part which
establishes the territorial waters of a country as extending 12
miles from the low-tide water line of the country’s landmass.
The contiguous zone is limited to 24 nautical miles from the
low-tide water line and a state may;
1. exercise the control necessary to:
a. prevent infringement of its customs, fiscal, immigration or
sanitary laws and regulations within its territory or territorial
sea;
b. punish infringement of the above laws and regulations
committed within its territory or territorial sea (United Nations
Diplomatic Conferences, 1982)

6. Waters that are not parts of exclusive economic zones, within
the territorial sea, or the internal waters of a state, or in the
archipelagic waters of an archipelagic state are considered the
high seas. For hundreds of years international law saw the high
seas as belonging to everyone and under the U.N. Convention,
art. 87, the high seas “shall be reserved for peaceful purposes.”
The sovereignty of a state implies the right to regulate
commerce through taxation, tariffs, and prohibitions. This is
one of the fundamental core considerations of being an
independent nation. One of the key components of the U.S.
Constitution is the “Commerce Clause” in Article I, section 8
which says “The Congress shall have the power…. To regulate
commerce with foreign nations, and among the several States,
and with the Indian tribes.” Congress exercises this power
through passage of laws and imposition of taxes, duties,
imposts, and excises. In order to better address the growing
international trade experienced in the early 20th century, the
Congress established the U.S. International Trade Commission
(USITC) in 1974.
The USITC is a federal agency with investigative powers on
matters of trade. The activities of the USITC activities include:
1. Determining whether U.S. industries are materially injured by
reason of imports that benefit from pricing at less than fair
value or from subsidization;
2. Directing actions against unfair practices in import trade,
such as patent, trademark, or copyright infringement;
3. Making recommendations regarding relief for industries
seriously injured by increasing imports;
4. Advising whether agricultural imports interfere with price-
support programs of the U.S. Department of Agriculture;
5. Conducting studies on trade and tariff issues and monitoring
import levels;
6. Participating in the development of uniform statistical data
on imports, exports, and domestic production and in the
establishment of an international harmonized commodity code
(Legal Information Institute, 1974).

7. As with most things, there are always bad (unintended results)
to everything. Removing trade barriers between countries is no
exception. Agreements such as NAFTA, while good in general
has also produced some significant problems. One problem
NAFTA has taught us is the low standards of living in one
country results in lower wages for workers, such as is the case
in Mexico, which has placed companies here in the U.S. in a
position where the relocation of a factory from here to be more
profitable in the lower wage country. This “increasing the
bottom line” improves the financial reports of companies, at the
cost of lost employment in the original country.
This can also happen in the reverse. The agriculture industry
here in U.S. is extremely efficient in producing food which
results in relatively low food prices. These products, as a result
of treaties such as NAFTA are exported to countries like
Mexico where traditional food production methods are costly
and labor intensive, making the food prices there high. The
result of the agricultural U.S. exports into Mexico has resulted
in a loss of agricultural jobs in an inherently poor country.
Another thing the world is learning is the globalization of trade
is rapidly breaking down economic barriers between countries
worldwide. The result is that borders have begun to change in
function and purpose.
As history has taught us, there have been, and probably always
will be disputes regarding the boundaries between two
countries, or even territories that aspire to be recognized a
country (i.e. Palestinian). There are several ways these disputes
can/have been resolved.
A close to home example would be when the United States went
to war with Mexico in 1846 over a over a depute of where the
border was between Mexico and the State of Texas. At the
conclusion of the war, Mexico agreed to the Treaty of
Guadalupe Hidalgo in which Mexico ceded California, Nevada,
Utah, Arizona, most of New Mexico and Colorado and formerly
claimed lands north of the Rio Grande River.
Other disputes may go to national or international courts for

8. resolution. For example;
1. the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea resolves
disputes over access to mineral resources on the seabed in
regions not reserved to any state or territory.
2. the International Court of Justice resolves disputes over the
delimitation of boundaries along continental shelf between
States with opposite or adjacent coasts.
Many countries have gone to war over border and boundary
disputes. It is only the recent past that has seen a move to
negotiation and arbitration to resolve such disputes. An
example of a dispute over who possessed a particular territory
that ended in a military conflict is the Falklands War of 1982.
The conflict was the result of a protracted historical
confrontation regarding the sovereignty of the islands. The
long-standing dispute resulted in the Argentinean invasion and
occupation of the Islands on 2 April 1982. In response, the
British government dispatched a naval task force to engage the
Argentinean Navy and Air Force and retake the islands by
amphibious assault.
History has shown us disputes over borders are resolved through
a variety of methods. Anything from legal action, to tribunals,
to the use of military force has been utilized throughout time.
Another method of resolving continued border violations is for
a state to erect barriers.
According to our text, barriers are material objects that are
intended to block passage. Although natural formations such as
mountains or streams historically make the best barriers most
country borders are artificial delimits drawn on maps. This has
resulted in the need, in some instances, to erect physical
barriers to prevent, or limit, unwanted incursions across
borders.
When one thinks of manmade physical barrier, the "Great Wall
of China" is very most likely to come to mind. The wall built to
protect the Chinese Empire from intrusions by the various
nomadic peoples in Mongolia and Siberia. The Great Wall has
also effectively allowed China to control unwanted immigration.

9. The most contentious wall in recent history has been the wall
being built by Israel to isolate Jewish settlements from
encroachment by the native Palestinians living in the West
Bank. Israel has been building communities throughout the land
seized in a previous conflict under a variety of initiatives, with
frequent starts and stops as part of the ongoing and often stalled
peace process with the peoples of the occupied territories. The
Israelis refer to the wall as the “separation” or “security fence.”
Opponents to the structure refer to it as the “Apartheid Wall.”
Regardless of the name or the opinions of the world the
function on the barrier is clearly intended to suicide bombers
and snipers, primarily for Palestine, from launching attacks
against the Jewish population.
Modern manufactured barriers work on a small scale, but tend
to be cost prohibitive on a large scale. The border between the
U.S. and Canada is almost entirely devoid of barriers to
movement. The border between the U.S. and Mexico has
several natural barriers to movement including the Rio Grande
River and the extensive deserts. These have been insufficient in
stopping the movement of contraband and people into the U.S.
from Mexico. As a result, significant efforts are being
expended developing and constructing barriers of various types
to control illegal crossings.
The bottom line is any barrier constructed to restrict movement,
also hinders the free flow of commerce. This is the conundrum
facing engineers and politicians alike; how to build barriers to
keep out those not wanted, while allowing the movement of
people and commodities. This is the fundamental quandary
facing all nations throughout history. Securing a state’s
borders, whether by establishing economic or political
boundaries, or the construction of physical barriers, is the
subject of the remainder of this course.
Case Study

10. Students will read chapter 2 of the Edward Alden text, The
Closing of the American Border.
Upon completion of the weekly Alden chapter reading
assignment, students will then submit a one-page summation,
outlining the chapter. The summations should concentrate on
thepolitical, cultural, ethnic and religious implications of this
effort. The summation should also cover the student's personal
observations of successes and/or failures of America's efforts to
secure its border pre & post 9/11.
The weekly summation will not require formatting or
references, but points will be taken off for lack of content,
grammatical errors and/or for a late submission. The weekly
chapter summation will be worth 25 points each week, for a
total of 175 points (the final chapter of the Alden book will be
included in the final exam). Note that on week 8 of the course,
students will use information from their submissions from The
Closing of the American Border case studies as building
points for their final exam.
Chapter Two
The idea of surrounding a city with walls has occurred in
history many times. Examples of walled cities are found in
China, Korea, Japan and the Middle East. Early Rome was
walled and as the city grew, so did the walls. History has
shown us a walled city has two chief advantages: it allowed a
small force to resist a larger opposing force, as least long
enough to enable a more effective and substantial resistance,
and, secondly, it allowed for poorly-trained forces to hold out
against a better trained enemy. The basic principle of
fortification is to put a barrier between "defender" and
"attacker". The walls not only protected the inhabitants of the
city, but also marked the city's boundaries.
In the reverse, when an attacker was confronted with a wall, the

11. attacker had five options; retreat, establish a siege and hope that
disease and starvation wears down the defenders, go over the
wall, go under the wall, or go through the wall. Siege has been
the most common military practice in history. Providing the
attacker could find sufficient provisions for their forces in the
surrounding countryside, the walls provide an excellent prison
from which the defenders have no escape and only the supplies
stored within to wait out the attackers. To go over a wall,
through it, or under it all require the construction and placement
of siege weapons such a portable towers, battering rams, or the
employment of sappers to undermine the walls. This took time,
sufficient local materials, and skilled artisans, not all of which
were readily available in all conditions.
One famous walled city was the City of Jericho which is located
on the west bank of the Jordan River. Jericho is one of the
oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world and the most
striking aspect of this ancient city was a massive stone wall
nearly 12 feet tall and over 6 feet wide at its base. Included
within the wall was a tower over 12 feet tall with an internal
staircase of 22 stone steps.
Another good example would be the City of Troy, which
controlled the entrance to the Black Sea from the Mediterranean
and was an important trading center. Troy's wall were massive
and sloped outward on its face, thus giving not only great
stability but also superior resistance to attack. The wall was
provided with square towers and had several unique gate
designs including an overlapping of walls so that any invader
would have to made several 90 degree turns while under
constant attack from above in order to try to breach the city.
One of the most well known walls would be the so called Great
Wall of China that was constructed as both a border and a
barrier. Our text tells us there are four major walls which
encompass the Great Wall of China (all built during different
period of time) which include:208 BCE (the Qin Dynasty)1st
century BCE (the Han Dynasty)1138–1198 CE (the Five
Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period)1368–1620 CE (from

12. Emperor Hongwu until Emperor Wanli of the Ming Dynasty)
The Great Wall of China is a series of stone and earthen
fortifications built between the 5th century BCE and the 16th
century CE to protect the northern borders of the Chinese
Empire. The most famous is the wall built between 220 BCE
and 200 BCE by the first Emperor, Qin Shi Huang as it was the
wall that defined what was to eventually become China.
Between the 5th century BCE to 221 BCE, the states of Qi, Yan
and Zhao constructed fortifications to defend their own
borders. These walls were built to withstand attack by forces
equipped with swords and spears, and thus, these walls were
made mostly by stamping earth and gravel between board
frames.
Qin Shi Huang unified China in 221 BC and established the Qin
Dynasty. The Qin Wall was built during the reign of the First
Emperor. This wall was constructed by the joining of several
regional walls built by the Warring States. Intending to impose
centralized rule and prevent the resurgence of feudal lords, the
emperor ordered the destruction of the wall sections that
divided his empire along the former state borders. To protect
the empire against intrusions by the Xiongnu people from the
north, the emperor ordered the building of a new wall to
connect the remaining fortifications along the empire’s new
northern frontier.
The Great Wall concept was revived again during the Ming
Dynasty. The primary purpose of the wall was not to keep out
people, but to insure people on the outside of the wall could not
cross with their horses or return easily with stolen property. In
other words, the Great Wall of China we know today was built
as a means of border control.
Time has demonstrated even the most iconic borders are much
more fluid than the physical structures indicate. A good
example of this fluidity in borders would be Europe; from the
end of the Western Roman Empire through the present day.
When the Roman Empire fell, it was divided into four provinces
and subdivided into thirteen dioceses for administration under

13. the Roman Catholic Church. The borders between the various
provinces and dioceses were sometimes established along rivers,
other times paralleled mountain ranges and other times simply
lines drawn between political entities with no geographical
basis to the decisions.
Borders have been identified and then re-identified for many
reasons over the years to include religious wars, fights over
resources, fighting invaders and wars over the succession to a
throne have all been the cause of borders being changed in
history.
The United States is no exception. Over the years, many
countries established colonies in North and South America
which resulted in a never-ending conflict over access to the rich
mineral resources of the continents. The ebb and flow of
change in the Americas was tied to the fortunes of the colonial
powers home countries and their associated conflicts over
territory and power on the European continent.
After the Revolutionary War, the Treaty of Paris (1783) was
signed between the U.S. and Great Britain and the original
thirteen colonies gained control of all lands from the Eastern
seaboard to the Mississippi River. In 1800, Napoleon offered to
sell the territory in what is now known as Louisiana to the U.S.
for about $15 million and the Louisiana Purchase treaty was
signed in 1803. More border controversy followed when Spain
questioned the legality of the Louisiana Purchase, but this was
eventually settled with the Adams-Onís Treaty of 1819. Before
the United States could secure the land it has today, it had fight
a second war with Great Britain, a war with Mexico, and a war
with Spain.
Even in more modern history, walls have continued to be used
for the same old purposes they were in early civilization;
protection and border identification. After the first World War
the French feared the Germans would return for revenge and
built a wall (Maginot Line) intended to keep the Germans out of
their country. The French were right about the Germans return
(WW II) and quickly found out their "wall" would not even slow

14. down the German advance.
Not to be outdone, the Germans felt the need to build a wall
(Siegfried Line) to identify and protect their borders too. In
1938 construction on the West Wall which stretched from
Aachen in the north to the Rhine River and then along the Rhine
to the border with Switzerland began. As the French learned,
walls of this nature do little to stop the march of a modern army
as the Americans and British would penetrate the Siegfried Line
as rapidly as the Germans drove around the Maginot Line at the
beginning of the war. In an era of modern warfare, the
protection of the border from land incursions is insufficient and
a considerable portion of the border protection involved the
establishment of air defense capabilities. The advent of air
defense along the Siegfried Line as a component of border
security and the German development four years later of
ballistic missiles, would determine the long-term policies of
countries faced with border security issues for most of the
remainder of the 20th century.
Not all border walls were to keep invaders out. For over forty
years a wall spanned the length of Europe in an attempt to keep
people from leaving. Fearful that continued interaction of
people within the Soviet Union and those of Western ideologies;
Joseph Stalin decreed the East would be sealed off from the
West through the erection of an ideological, military, political,
and physical barriers (called the " Iron Curtain").
The "Iron Curtain" was a physical fence that stretched for
thousands of kilometers to separate Eastern and Western
countries and it was especially strong in Germany, where the
division of Berlin by a concrete and barbed wire wall became an
unmistakable symbol of the forced separation of politically free
and communist totalitarian societies.
The "Iron Curtain" was erected not with the purpose of
preventing a NATO invasion, but to keep people from leaving
the Soviet dominated countries in a continuing drain of
intellectual power and skilled labor for the better opportunities
offered by democratic societies. East German soldiers were

15. under orders to shoot anyone attempting to defect.
Communications in the modern world would ultimately result in
the fall of the "Iron Curtain". Television and radio simply made
the physical barriers separating the Eastern Bloc countries from
their Western counterparts moot. There was no way to prevent
the continuous bombardment of audio and visual images of the
“good life” experienced under democracy and capitalism from
permeating the regions behind the "Iron Curtain". As a result,
protest demonstrations broke out all over East Germany in
1989until the "Iron Curtain" that had divided the European
continent for nearly half a century succumbed to the will of the
people to be free.
Another well known boundary that was formed through conflict
is the so called demilitarized zone (DMZ) that includes a 2.5-
mile wide, 160-mile long zone has been erected in 1953 at the
end of the Korean War between South Korea and North Korea.
The DMZ was created as each side agreed to move their
stalemated forces back 2,200 yards from the front lines, creating
a buffer zone between the troops. Today, the Military
Demarcation Line (MDL) goes down the center of the DMZ and
indicates exactly where the front was when the agreement was
signed.
The Korean DMZ is symbolic in nature, having little to do with
actually stopping any aggressions between the two countries.
The DMZ only serves as one last reminder of the ancient efforts
by empires to protect themselves from outsiders.
From the earliest days of human society a border has been
necessary to identify the boundaries of territory and provide
security for members of the society. As civilizations grew,
expanded and came into conflict, the delineation of a border
was insufficient, resulting in a need to establish barriers to
invasion. This resulted in the building of walled cities, border
fences and electronic surveillance systems to monitor cross-
border traffic.
Frequently, border security has been as much about regulation
of trade and control of moving populations as it has been about

16. physical security of cities and nations. Today, it is a
combination of all aspects associated with the control of
territory for the good of a recognized population.
History has taught us one thing; borders are fluid. Borders
change as populations move and societies transform.
Economics, politics, religion and conflict are all factors
affecting modern borders and driving them to change. In a
world where industry, religion, and transportation are
globalized, borders may soon become an anachronism, forcing a
new reality on the human community.
References
Legal Information Institute (LLI) (1974). Commerce Clause,
Article I, section 8 International Trade Commission (USITC)
in 1974. Cornell University of Law. Retrieved
from: https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articlei
United Nations Diplomatic Conferences (1982). United Nations
Conference on the Law of the Sea, 1982. Retrieved from:
http://legal.un.org/diplomaticconferences/lawofthesea-
1982/docs/vol_XVII/a_conf-62_121.pdf
x
United Nations Diplomatic Conferences (1958). United Nations
Conference on the Law of the Sea, 1958. Retrieved from:
http://legal.un.org/diplomaticconferences/lawofthesea-
1958/lawofthesea-1958.html
x
University of Oslo (UIO) (1933). Montevideo Convention on
the Rights and Duties of States. Retrieved from:
http://www.jus.uio.no/english/services/library/treaties/01/1-
02/rights-duties-states.xml
x
Wilkes, Daniel (1965). Restatement (Second), Foreign Relations
Law of the United States. Case Western Reserve University.
Retrieved from:
http://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?artic
le=4461&context=caselrev

17. Case Study
Students will read chapter 1 of the Edward Alden text, The
Closing of the American Border.
Upon completion of the weekly Alden chapter reading
assignment, students will then submit a one-page summation,
outlining the chapter. The summations should concentrate on
thepolitical, cultural, ethnic and religious implications of this
effort. The summation should also cover the student's personal
observations of successes and/or failures of America's efforts to
secure its border pre & post 9/11.
The weekly summation will not require formatting or
references, but points will be taken off for lack of content,
grammatical errors and/or for a late submission. The weekly
chapter summation will be worth 25 points each week, for a
total of 175 points (the final chapter of the Alden book will be
included in the final exam). Note that on week 8 of the course,
students will use information from their submissions from The
Closing of the American Border case studies as building
points for their final exam.