The construction of a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border—whether to build it or not—has become a hot-button issue in contemporary America. A recent impasse over funding a wall caused the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, sharpening partisan divisions across the nation. In the Arizona borderlands, groups of predominantly white American citizens have been mobilizing for decades—some help undocumented immigrants bypass governmental detection, while others help law enforcement agents to apprehend immigrants. Activists on both the left and the right mobilize without an immediate personal connection to the issue at hand, many doubting that their actions can bring about the long-term change they desire. Why, then, do they engage in immigration and border politics so passionately?

Divided by the Wall offers a one-of-a-kind comparative study of progressive pro-immigrant activists and their conservative immigration-restrictionist opponents. Using twenty months of ethnographic research with five grassroots organizations, Emine Fidan Elcioglu shows how immigration politics has become a substitute for struggles around class inequality among white Americans. She demonstrates how activists mobilized not only to change the rules of immigration but also to experience a change in themselves. Elcioglu finds that the variation in social class and intersectional identity across the two sides mapped onto disparate concerns about state power. As activists strategized ways to transform the scope of the state’s power, they also tried to carve out self-transformative roles for themselves. Provocative and even-handed, Divided by the Wall challenges our understanding of immigration politics in times of growing inequality and insecurity.

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"This is an accessible book for anyone interested in immigration politics and social movements, stratification and identity politics. Elcioglu offers an important contribution to social movements and contentious politics studies by delving into the life stories and understanding both sides of the immigration debate through their own lens."

"Divided by the Wall is a must-read for scholars of political movements because of its vivid, thoughtful depiction of this phenomenon at the US-Mexico border." - Social Forces

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"The analytical perspective and remarkable findings of Divided by the Wall open a dialogue among political sociologists who study social movements and political mobilization."

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"Divided by the Wall has clearly succeeded in provoking important questions and opening new lines of investigation. Elcioglu sets a high standard for comparative ethnography of dueling social movements. The text is accessibly written and would be suitable for undergraduate and graduate courses on social movements, immigration, and ethnography. Students would likely find their engagement with the text to be a highlight of the term."

"An evocative portrait. . . . Divided by the Wall’s sharp insights into the overlapping rationales of white immigration activists make it an urgent and fresh analysis of a much-examined place." - New Mexico Historical Review