Collaborative borderscaping: Using the border as a resource for cross-border spatial design

In the debate on cooperation between neighboring border regions within the EU much attention has been focused on the hindering and impeding effects of borders. Over the last two decades, however, at least within border studies, the attention has shifted towards viewing borders as resources and ‘borderscapes’, suggesting that, beyond being mere obstacles or defense lines, borders inherently also represent critical and creative resources for cross-border opportunities. This chapter first theorizes how both these dimensions of the border, the border as a threshold and the border as a creative resource can be combined in creating attractive spatial designs in the borderland, what we coin as a collaborative borderscaping approach. Next, we conceptualize how, using this approach, together with actors in the region, a borderland can be collaboratively designed (‘scaped’) using these two dimensions of the border as spatial planning scenarios. By way of example, we report on our findings of using this approach in the borderland of Euregion rhine-meuse-north, along the Dutch-German border.