Bloody Borders: Colonial Legacies and the Systemic Violence on the Balkan Route

This thesis directly confronts the brutal structural violence, dehumanization, and systemic exclusion staked in European border regimes, spefically along the Balkan Route. Through a compelling synthesis of ethnographic fieldwork, historical analysis, and leading edge migration studies, this research grapples with the unbroken thread of colonial legacies extending through the very fiber of contemporary border enforcement. It investigates the commodification of movement within smuggling economies, impunity in border violence, and the psychological and existential disruptions experienced by those who migrate. The work challenges dominant narratives around migrants as victims or a threat, instead highlighting migrants resilience, agency and strategies of survival. Through the critique of the European Union's border policies, the thesis repositions migration as a deliberate collision against the racial, wealth and power hierarchies in place to protect the privileges of the few. Furthermore, this study urges towards a breaking apart of exclusionary frameworks, and towards the increase of an ethical, reflexive and solidarity based approach to migration research, through centering the voices of those most affected by these policies.