This article analyzes how, in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis,
regional integration across an international border took place
through political contestation. Although the crisis has been
interpreted as leading to a revival of state borders, we show its
differentiated impact on cross-border relationships at the heart of
Western Europe, namely the Swiss–Italian borderland. A database
encompassing over 1,800 articles published in 11 different print
and online newspapers over two years (2010–2012) allowed an
analysis of the role played by political parties and the media as
drivers of contestation. Our quantitative and qualitative analyses
trace processes of both re-bordering (“Switzerland vs. Italy/the
EU”) and de-bordering (that is, integration across the border)
through discourses prioritizing “the region.” The wider implication
from this study is that borderlands are subject to the same pushand
pull-factors as states but that, additionally, a third dimension
is present. Ignoring this intra-state center-periphery dimension
means not fully capturing borderland dynamics, all the more so if
political entrepreneurs skillfully seize spatial contention to
advance their own conception of regional identity distinct from
that of their nation-state.