Bodies in transit: migration and necropolitics in the sonoran-arizonan desert. a mixed-methods analysis of the structural production of vulnerability (2018–2024)

Abstract

The Sonora–Arizona corridor is one of the principal migration routes along the Mexico–United States border and one of the regions with the highest incidence of migrant deaths in North America. This article examines the relationship between the intensification of border enforcement policies and the structural production of vulnerability that increases the risk of migrant mortality in the Sonoran Desert during the 2018–2024 period.

The study adopts a convergent mixed-methods design that combines descriptive statistical analysis of migrant death records obtained from the Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner and specialized humanitarian databases with a critical documentary analysis of official reports, publications from international organizations, and academic literature. Integrating these methodological approaches makes it possible to identify temporal and spatial patterns of migrant mortality while examining the political and institutional rationalities that shape the contemporary regime of border governance.

The findings indicate an increase in recorded migrant deaths during the study period, associated with the displacement of migration routes toward remote desert areas characterized by extreme temperatures, water scarcity, and limited access to search and rescue operations. Drawing on the theoretical perspectives of biopolitics, necropolitics, and Rawls’s theory of justice, the article argues that contemporary migration governance produces an unequal distribution of risk, exposing migrants disproportionately to conditions of precarity and preventable death. Furthermore, human smuggling networks and the violence associated with irregular migration intensify the vulnerability of people traveling through the Sonora–Arizona corridor.