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Paper short abstract

This paper shows how, despite political polarisation and high tensions between activists and border guards in the field of migration, solidarity groups managed to build contingent forms of cooperation with border guards.

Paper long abstract

This paper examines morally ambivalent forms of cooperation between grassroots groups supporting migrants and refugees and Border Guards in Poland during the heightened migrant influx at the Polish–Belarusian border. Based on ethnographic observations, interviews, and an online survey conducted under the Christian-conservative Law and Justice government (2015–2023), the paper explores how political polarisation shaped practices of solidarity, dissent, and collaboration in a context of border militarisation, pushbacks, and the so-called “hybrid war” with Belarus.

I argue that while dominant polarised narratives framed activists and state actors as irreconcilable opponents, forms of cooperation nonetheless emerged. These interactions were situational, largely concealed, and contingent, taking place predominantly at the level of individual actors rather than through institutional frameworks. Such micro-practices cut across ideological divides, enabling limited humanitarian action while simultaneously generating tensions within activist networks around complicity, responsibility, and the limits of solidarity.

The paper sheds light on the potential for cooperation between border guards and activists even within a state apparatus focused on border militarisation and pushbacks. It contributes to broader discussions on cooperation between humanitarian action, activism, and the state in contested borderlands.