For an Inclusive Borderland Discourse

Understanding borderlands through the lens of traditional securities espouses the conflict management approaches of suppression, sometimes assimilation, but rarely integration. While the strategic goals of a state in administering borderlands are to ensure connectivity, develop effective regionalism and sub regionalism, and warranty internal stability, we argue that they cannot be successful without addressing the non-traditional security aspects. To verify this theoretical argument normatively and empirically, we assess the trade, infrastructural, and mobility aspects of India-Myanmar border and Myanmar-Thailand border in this project. The impact of non-traditional security on traditional security is exemplified by referring to the instances of political violence and demonstrations at the borderlands between 2016 and 2024. Some findings of this project were presented at the 2024 Annual Conference of the Canadian Political Science Association, held at McGill University, in June 2024.