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<p>Mexico and<br>the United States exist in a symbiotic relationship: Mexico frequently provides<br>the United States with cheap labor, illegal goods, and, for criminal offenders,<br>a refuge from the law. In turn, the U.S. offers Mexican laborers the American<br>dream: the possibility of a better livelihood through hard work. To supply each<br>other’s demands, Americans and Mexicans have to cross their shared border from<br>both sides. Despite this relationship, U.S. immigration reform debates tend to<br>be security-focused and center on the idea of menacing<br>Mexicans heading north to steal abundant American resources. Further, Congress<br>tends to approach reform unilaterally, without engaging with Mexico or other<br>feeder countries, and, disturbingly, without acknowledging problematic southern<br>crossings that Americans routinely make into Mexico.<br><br>In Run for the Border, Steven W. Bender<br>offers a framework for a more comprehensive border policy through a historical<br>analysis of border crossings, both Mexico to U.S. and U.S. to Mexico. In contrast<br>to recent reform proposals, this book urges reform as the product of<br>negotiation and implementation by cross-border accord; reform that honors the<br>shared economic and cultural legacy of the U.S. and Mexico. Covering everything<br>from the history of Anglo crossings into Mexico to escape law authorities, to<br>vice tourism and retirement in Mexico, to today’s focus on Mexican<br>border-crossing immigrants and drug traffickers, Bender takes lessons from the<br>past 150 years to argue for more explicit and compassionate cross-border<br>cooperation. <br><br>Steeped in<br>several disciplines, Run for the Border<br>is a blend of historical, cultural, and legal perspectives, as well as those<br>from literature and cinema, that reflect Bender’s cultural background and legal<br>expertise.</p>