Immigration panics, borders and eating disorders

This paper maps some dynamics of eating disorders against those of recent panics about immigration and current calls for greater border and immigration controls. Building on psychoanalytic thinking about extremism and racism, the paper concentrates on particular ways in which the rhetoric and underlying anxieties around immigration have strong links with anorexic ideation. It posits that interchange across boundaries is important for health in both the economy and the individual and that, while rational argument about immigration levels is possible, extreme views in the contemporary US, UK and Europe are fuelled largely by irrational elements which can best be understood using psychoanalytic ideas.