Eur-Asian Border Lab was created through a Horizon Europe Action on Widening Participation and Spreading Excellence (HORIZON-WIDERA-2021-ACCESS-03), in the course of a Twinning project titled “Advancing Trans-Regional Border Studies” (Nov 2022 — Oct 2025).
The Eur-Asian Border Lab was co-created as an online and offline platform to catalyse trans-regional synergies and intellectual conversations among scholars studying borders and bordering across different world regions, with a specific focus on bordering in Europe and Asia. Tallinn University (TLU), the leader of the project, alongside enhanced its research and institutional capacity in studies of borders and bordering. The partners, University of Eastern Finland (UEF) and University of Amsterdam (UvA) contributed their expertise, experience and networks.
Team
Project “Advancing Trans-Regional Border Studies,” 2022—2025
- Karin Dean, project leader and TLU team leader
- John Buchanan, TLU team
- Tina Harris, UvA team leader
- Jussi Laine, UEF team leader
Additionally, the following scholars were a part of the Eur-Asian Border Lab team:
- TLU – Tarmo Pikner, Raili Nugin, Tauri Tuvikene, Kadri Kasemets, Timothy Anderson, Daniele Monticelli
- UvA – Willem van Schendel, Polly Pallister-Wilkins, Barak Kalir
- UEF – Alicja Fajfer
Central Asian Studies Institute (CASI) at the American University of Central Asia (AUCA), Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, was the Lab’s associated partner.
Activities
The Eur-Asian Border Lab facilitated conceptual testing of theoretical ideas in diverse empirical settings and applied insights from academically peripheral regions into mainstream theorization in border studies. The Lab held a major symposium “Bridging the Regions and Disciplines in Border Studies” (TLU/ 18-19.01. 2024), numerous research seminars and smaller workshops, for example, an international workshop “Negotiating inter- and intra-ethnic connectivities in boundless Southeast Asia” (TLU / 16.04.2025), a Research Day (TLU / 9.10.2025), and fieldtrips to the Estonian-Russia border. It created this website as its online platform and archive of ideas and resources on borders and border related events. It held online essay and photo essay contests with the work by the winners and runners-ups published together with the Lab’s blog posts, news and events.
Engagement with the diverse range of practitioners and policymakers working on border-related issues has been an important aspect of the Lab’s work. The Eur-Asian Border Lab Forum series with a motto ‘where research meets pressing border issues’ was created for this purpose, and held six roundtable events over 2024—2025 that brought practitioners to the university.
The project supported early career researchers in multiple ways, including transferrable skills workshops at TLU run by UEF staff, and multiple co-teaching and research exchanges for 11 junior scholars from TLU, UEF and UvA to visit a partner institution. A Summer School “Testing Border Theories and Concepts Across Regions” in collaboration with the American University of Central Asia was organized for junior scholars worldwide who are interested in borders (Bishkek, 2.-6.06.2025).
Research
Although research was not the main activity, all Lab members conducted pilot studies, advancing the conceptualization of volumetric bordering – how bordering is enforced not only over territories but also across air, seas, data and virtual spaces.
WHILE THE PROJECT ENDED IN OCTOBER, 2025, THE EUR-ASIAN BORDER LAB IS THERE TO STAY!