Imagining the Border-City Relationship

Many alternative visions of the border-city relationship between San Diego and Tijuana circulate among local actors. Some visualize an egalitarian, integrated future. Others have various stakes in reinforcing a bordered imaginary that exaggerates asymmetries and obscures complex economic realities on the ground. Bordering can create local opportunities for profit and contribute to the availability of marginalized labor on both sides of the line. Bordering discourse also provides an identity foil for San Diegans who have come to define themselves as superior, in contrast to a Tijuana stigmatized as impoverished, disorderly, corrupt, dirty, and dangerous. The place images of these cities are intertwined, such that more positive representations of Tijuana will require a reimaging of San Diego. Ultimately, this chapter examines the promise of and constraints on developing a more equal shared regional future, a reduction in Tijuana’s place stigma, and a less bordered imaginary.