Harga and the visa nexus: The securitization of youth mobility in Tunisia.

This article critically examines the Schengen visa regime from the perspective of young Tunisian applicants, highlighting how the European Union's border externalization and securitization practices shape experiences of (im)mobility and "stuckedness" in post-2011 Tunisia. It situates the visa regime within broader neocolonial power relations and EU–Maghreb political economy, revealing how visa procedures function as invisible borders that reproduce social inequalities and extend suspicion of "irregular" migration to ostensibly "regular" mobility applicants. Through ethnographic research, including interviews with Tunisian youth and auto-ethnographic reflection, the study uncovers bureaucratic, financial, and symbolic barriers embedded in the visa process, which contribute to anxiety, exclusion, and politicization among applicants. The article argues for shifting the analytical focus from the highly visible "border spectacle" of irregular migration to the less visible but equally restrictive mechanisms governing regularized mobility, thereby exposing the interconnectedness of mobility regimes and their role in sustaining unequal Euro-Maghreb relations.