Border controls are like national parties

LinkedIn blog post, 01/07/2025, by Sven Franck (en français , in Deutsch)

TL;DR - This weekend my green consciousness had me taking the bus from Ljubljana to Munich (faster than by train, go wonder) to catch a direct train to Utrecht. However, reducing exposure to Deutsche Bahn's punctuality does not save travellers from the new German government's paneuropean-domino of illegal border controls.

My simple A->B trajectory thus saw me loosing 30min between Slovenia and Austria and another 30min between Austria and Germany as the bus had to unload for passport control. My connection left for Utrecht as we arrived in Munich. I had to buy another ticket leaving midnight and spent the night between trains until arriving in Utrecht, in theory in time to checkout of the hotel I reserved. Great.

Symbolism on the back of citizens

I was travelling to Borderball between Volt Nederland and Volt Deutschland, an annual festival to discuss how to work across borders instead of closing them. The actual border passed behind our camp and you would be surprised: we crossed countless times without being bothered.

If anyone wanted to enter illegally, they could do so next to our camp or likely anywhere along the border except for the main rail and highway crossings. Nobody with bad intentions uses these. Anyone travelling does and probably ends up loosing time and money. Will these border controls make the country safer and reduce illegal migration? No. Will they reduce support for the extreme-right? See previous question.

It's not only pointless, we also annoy our neighbours (sorry, Poland) and motivate citizens to take matters into their own hands 😱. To stress this point, we finished the weekend at another border crossing, stopping traffic (no worries, authorised protest) and distributing cheese to car drivers since... internal border controls are cheesy.

National politics has its limits

Let's be clear: Europe must handle external borders. With a single point of entry procedure and options for member states to contribute hosting or financial means. With free movement, but support paid in the hosting member state. Less bureaucracy, less cost, less extreme-right. What's not to like?

Instead, national parties cling to their borders, handling bureaucratic requests 27-fold and wasting millions on showcase projects like Meloni's ghostcamp in Albania. All the while, citizens and business loose time and money at borders while governments groom the extreme-right because symbolism remains what it is: symbolism.

We will be stuck until we support European parties and agendas. Check out #jumpstartEU.