Cross-border cooperation in the border region of Germany, France, and Luxembourg in times of Covid-19

Step by step, the growth toward European Union since the Second World War has brought about an internally ‘borderless European space’ which for millions has become everyday normality (Jańczak 2018: 393–5; Medeiros et al.2021a: 963). A milestone on this way was the Schengen Agreement of 1985, which established the two principles of the free movement of persons and a European space of open internal borders (Böhm 2021: 1). Today some 40 percent of EU citizens live in border regions, and almost two million people cross a national border to work on a regular basis (European Committee of the Regions 2021: 3). Accordingly, cross-border cooperation has been considerably boosted in recent decades (see e.g. Beck 2019), with links and networks becoming established and institutionalized across national boundaries (Böhm 2021: 3–4; Cappelli and Montobbio 2016: 723–4). Against this background, the rapid spread of the Corona virus in the spring of 2020 constituted a complex, multi-level challenge. Suddenly, borders were ‘clearly back in a way that may have seemed unlikely prior to the outbreak’ (Radil et al.2021: 132). In border regions, each national state took matters into its own hands, and the resurgence of active border policing, with routine checks and even closures of established crossing points, made the internal borders of the EU ‘Schengen states’ suddenly visible again. The old borders became – 35 years after the signing of the Schengen Agreement (Weber 2021: n. p.) – the new ‘gatekeepers of security’ erected in line with the laws and procedures of individual EU states to protect the health of ‘their own population’ (Alemanno 2020: 307; see also Wassenberg 2020b: 35). The ‘rebordering’ – or as Medeiros et al. (2021a) have dubbed it ‘covidfencing’ – of Europe varied in intensity and scope from one region to another (see in general Brunet-Jailly and Carpenter 2020; Kajta and Opiłowska 2021; Opiłowska 2021; Ulrich et al.2020; Weber et al. 2021a; Wille and Kanesu 2020), but the overall effect was on the one hand to seriously impair the ideal of a ‘Europe without internal borders’ (Opiłowska 2021: 590; Wassenberg 2020a: 114–15), and on the other to underline the inability of the member states to come to any joint response other than strengthening the EU's external boundaries (Alemanno 2020: 313). In a public consultation initiated by the European Commission, 65 percent of respondents considered that ‘border closures increased their perception of the border as an obstacle’ (European Commission 2021: 1), and 79 percent deemed ‘European action in favour of border regions’ important (European Commission 2021: 5).

In a recent article in the journal European Societies, Opiłowska (2021) described the impact of pandemic measures in the first six months of 2020 on the German-Polish borderland: a region ‘which for a long time symbolised the East–West divide but since 2004 has represented an example of a successful reconciliation process’ (Opiłowska 2021: 590–1; on the overall development of this region see also Opiłowska and Roose 2015). The author shows again how the crisis heightened local people's awareness of the extent to which a common space had already come into being. Accordingly, national measures to secure the borders met with demonstrations of solidarity and other joint cross-border activities. Reflecting Opiłowska's analysis, the present article takes as its focus the border region between Germany, France and Luxembourg: a region of deeply rooted connections and developed institutionalization (Durand and Decoville 2020; Weber et al.2021b; Wille 2015) with multiple cross-border exchanges and both labor and residential mobility, as well as cross-border education and training schemes of steadily growing importance (Christmann 2017; Pigeron-Piroth et al.2021). At issue here is how politicians from national to local level evaluate their experience of cross-border management in the first phase of the Covid-19 crisis, what challenges, deficiencies, and opportunities they identify, and what perspectives can be derived from this data for the resilience of the border region to future crises. The theoretical and conceptual framework of the analysis reflects the constructivist approach common to border studies and cross-border cooperation and integration. The empirical basis consists of a qualitative analysis of 54 interviews, essays and press releases whose background will be presented in appropriate detail. Specifically, the article will be concerned with the impact of the response to the Covid-19 pandemic on the core SaarLorLux region – comprising the Saarland (Germany), the neighboring département Moselle in the région Grand Est (France), and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg – with a primary focus on the Saarland-Moselle border region due to the availability of more comprehensive data for this area.

Starting from key perspectives of border studies, in particular cross-border cooperation and integration, the next section will present the conceptual framework, methodological approach, and analytical steps of the inquiry. Section 3 will then provide general contextual background in the form of a brief overview of development processes in the SaarLorLux region both before and during the Covid-19 pandemic. This will be followed in Section 4 by a presentation of the research results: first of all general evaluations of the border crisis, followed by a conspectus of negative and positive facets of cross-border cooperation, and finally a glance at areas singled out for action. The article will conclude with a summary and outlook for future research. In this way I hope to meet a wish recently formulated by Novotný (2021: 3) in connection with the analysis of the effects of ‘covidfencing’ from the perspective of border studies: ‘We need more data, […] we also need an analysis of actors as well as legal and other documents’.

The Covid-19 crisis, with its impacts on European border regions can only be understood in connection with the process of European integration and cross-border cooperation engendered by it – perspectives whose formal conceptualization will provide the framework for the systematic presentation of the empirical data in this article. That EU border regions can, for example, be referred to today by the European Commission (2021) as ‘living labs of European integration’ (see e.g. Jańczak 2018: 398–9; Kuhn 2012 [online 2011]: 95), is intimately connected with political developments since the end of the Second World War. EU integration, with its ‘transfer or evolution of responsibilities, competencies and decision-making from state to European level and the development of a new supranational framework’ (Murray 2009: 229), has enabled the establishment of common rules and procedures – in particular the acquis communautaire – and a concomitant growth of understanding and acceptance of exchange schemes across national borders (see in general e.g. Rumford 2009; Wiener et al.2019). In the wake of regionalization processes, recent decades have seen a parallel downward transfer of responsibilities to regional and local levels (Pallagst 2018: 357; de Sousa 2013: 669). Ongoing processes of European integration and EG/EU reforms have brought about a paradigmatic change in political control from centralized regulation to decentralized cooperation and the corresponding development of adapted political structures in the border regions (Reitel et al.2018).

Another aspect of these developments, observed e.g. by O’Dowd (2002: 32), has been the reconfiguration of borders as both barriers and bridges, a designation that highlights their key role in the emerging constitution of Europe (see Scott 2012: 84; also Cappelli and Montobbio 2016). Despite expectations of an imminently ‘borderless world’ (Ohmae 1999 [1990]), borders, far from becoming meaningless, have become sites of dynamic negotiation (Gerst et al.2021; Kolossov and Scott 2013, paragraph 40; Paasi 2003), a fact increasingly noted in recent contructivistically oriented studies, where the physical boundary, ‘the border’, has largely given way to concepts of ‘bordering’, ‘debordering’, and ‘rebordering’ – a processual and at the same time a complexity shift (Brambilla et al.2015; Wille 2021b). In this perspective, border mapping is viewed as dynamic and variable and as entailing not only (or even primarily) territorial, but also political, social, cultural, functional, linguistic, and/or psychological etc. interweaving and at the same time differentiation. Concepts of ‘borderland’ or ‘borderscape’ (Brambilla et al.2015; Pavlakovich-Kochi et al.2016) sharpen the focus on the regions in question, both reflecting and actively enabling real processes of European integration in which national boundaries become resources for economic, cultural, and social exchange, and political coalitions are explicitly welded to promote cross-border regional development (Popescu 2008; Sohn 2014). Yet – an equally decisive point – this does not necessarily entail the abolition of those borders: as Balibar (1998: 220) noted, ‘borders are being both multiplied and reduced in their localization and their function, they are being thinned out and doubled’ (see also Novotný 2021: 4).

Concretely, cross-border cooperation has been described by de Sousa (2013: 673) as

• The functional dimension ‘relates to the concrete exchanges that link border regions together’ (Durand et al.2017: 6): economic processes (work, shopping, place of residence etc.) immediately impaired or affected by the pandemic.

• The structural dimension covers the ‘dynamics of convergence of the border territories with respect to socio-economic characteristics’ (Durand et al.2017: 6). Covid-19 brought contrary, divergent tendencies.

• The institutional dimension refers to the networking of different players in border regions tending toward institutionalized decision-making (Durand et al.2017: 7); the pandemic spotlighted their effective functioning and ongoing development.

• The ideational dimension of ‘individual and collective representations’ – i.e. the ‘impressions and opinions that the people living on one side of a border have of their neighbours and which result from historical legacies as well as from the actual and evolving social practices within the border regions’ (Durand et al.2017: 7) – took on a high profile in the Covid-19 crisis.

This conceptual framework facilitates systematic analysis of border region development and its contributory factors. It will be applied here especially to the impact of the Covid pandemic on the SaarLorLux region.

The SaarLorLux region has a long history of cross-border exchange (see Section 3 below). To map the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on this region, a survey of informed opinion was undertaken in the shape of interviews and other responses from political decision-makers at national, regional, and local levels reflecting existing multi-level governance structures in the countries concerned. The resultant data was then evaluated systematically (for further detail see Table 1). The survey had three components: (1) four interviews and nine essays drawn from the collection Grenzerfahrungen | Expériences transfrontalières (Weber et al.2021a) providing responses from national and regional levels; (2) complementing these, a further twenty-six interviews were conducted in 2020–2021 with politicians from the Saarland, the département Moselle, and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg in a research project on cross-border governance which also thematized the impact of Covid-19¹ – these provided responses especially from the local level; (3) finally, in order to cover the national level in Luxembourg, fifteen press releases and interviews from the Prime Minister, Xavier Bettel, and the Foreign Minister, Jean Asselborn, were compiled from the Luxembourg government website.

Systematization according to country and level of data source resulted in the following divisions and coding: D_nat/D_reg/D_muni, F_nat/F_reg/F_muni, L_nat/L_muni, where D = Germany, F = France, L = Luxembourg; the respective levels are denoted here by nat ( =  national), reg ( =  regional), muni ( =  municipal). This ensures data privacy above all with respect to the interviews. Evaluation followed Mayring's principles of qualitative content analysis (2022). Using open mode MaxQDA data analysis software, a category set was developed covering border and European matters, negative and positive aspects of the crisis, governance, recommendations, and an open code for other relevant content. The various aspects were refined in deductive and inductive loops, enabling not only striking parallels but also evaluative disparities among the three countries to be identified and collated. In the next step, the coded and systematised passages were linked to the dimensions of integration processes according to Durand et al. (2017). The presentation here reflects this structure. But, for a better understanding of the regional context, some further information will first be given about the development of the SaarLorLux region.

Widening the focus to the so-called ‘Greater Region’ (including the German State of Rhineland-Palatinate and neighboring parts of Belgium, in addition to the core SaarLorLux region; Figure 1), an ever-growing process of institutionalization can be observed, including the establishment of an interregional Parliamentary Deputies’ Council in 1986 and the hosting of regular Greater Region ‘summits’ since 1995 (Weber 2020; Wille 2011). Cross-border exchanges were intensified and supported through agreements and targeted funding projects on the European level like Interreg (Halmes 2008; Jóskowiak 2017). Today the Greater Region covers a total area of 65,400 sq km with a population of 11.6 million and a GDP of €390 billion (2017) – some 2.5% of that of the whole EU (EGTC Summit Secretariat of the Greater Region 2021: n.p.). The region has become the ‘largest European cross-border area of cooperation’ with ‘the most significant concentration of cross-border commuters’ (Evrard 2016: 523-4) – a clear expression of the functional dimension of cross-border integration. In particular, Luxembourg has developed into a job magnet, drawing some 190,000 people from the Greater Region as a whole (IBA-OIE 2022: n.p.) to create a truly cross-border labor market with specific political agreements. The Saarland also attracts some 14,000 commuters, largely from Lorraine (for details see Table 2).

Greater Region initiatives have been accompanied by activities on a smaller scale, for example the Eurodistrict SaarMoselle – a link-up between five municipal clusters of the département Moselle and the Saarland Regional Network (‘Regionalverband’) –, the Quattropole City Network (joining Saarbrücken, Metz, Luxembourg and Trier), the Tonicités City Network (Arlon, Esch-sur-Alzette, Longwy, Luxembourg, Metz and Thionville), or the ‘France strategy’ (Frankreichstrategie) of the Saarland (see Funk and Niedermeyer 2016; Ulrich 2020 [online 2019]; Weber 2020). These diverse forms of cooperation vary in scope and outreach (see Figure 1), but all express the institutional dimension of cross-border integration.

Against this background it is easy to understand the impact on the region of the national responses to the Covid-19 pandemic. German and French health authorities registered their first Corona cases at the end of January 2020 (Weber et al.2021b: 4–5), but the outbreak was initially deemed containable (Weber and Wille 2020: 193). Only a few weeks later (March 11), however, the WHO declared a global pandemic. On the same day, following a decision of the Federal German crisis team, the Robert Koch Institute (Germany's national public health agency) declared the French région Grand Est, bordering on the Saarland and Luxembourg, as a risk area. This led almost immediately to German action to ‘secure its own territory’, with temporary border checks (introduced March 16), an action perceived in both France and Luxembourg as ‘unilateral’. In its ‘Guidelines on Border Management Measures’ (also dated March 16), while approving temporary closures on internal national borders, the EU Commission insisted on the need for detailed agreement and the avoidance of discriminatory measures (European Commission 2020: point 18).

On March 19, regional border crossing was confined to a few named border posts, and ‘good reasons’ (‘triftige Gründe’) were required for it to take place at all (Weber and Wille 2020: 195). Significantly, the WHO did not recommend trade or travel restrictions as an anti-Covid measure. The regional ‘covidfencing’ seriously disturbed the cross-border labor market, destabilized supply chains, and temporarily separated families and friends. Germany's intensified border restrictions only ended between mid-May and mid-June 2020 (Weber and Wille 2020: 197). New measures were enacted between March and May 2021, when the département Moselle was declared a ‘virus variant area’ and cross-border commuters had to present a negative ‘Corona test’ every 48 h – a considerable logistic challenge. Demonstrations against these measures made popular indignation audible and visible (Weber 2021: n.p.; Wille 2020: 12–15; Wille 2021a: n.p.); but the authorities also showed themselves willing to learn (Weber et al.2021b: 13–16). – Focusing on the SaarLorLux region, the following section will describe and analyze the political perception and evaluation of these events and the lessons to be drawn for future emergencies.

Starting from the perspective of the SaarLorLux region as a closely intermeshed borderland, the empirical analysis relates and contrasts utterances of national, regional and local politicians and officials on the impact of the rebordering measures taken against the pandemic in early spring 2020. The SaarLorLux region can look back on several decades of intensifying cooperation, with close economic and everyday ties developed in a largely top-down political process (Lorig 2016; Wille 2015), as a result of which the border region can today be seen as a burgeoning integration area. This perception, shared with striking unanimity by politicians at all levels in all three countries, has arisen ex post out of the Corona crisis – otherwise one might expect there to have been a clearer awareness in advance of the impact of the border checks and closures of spring 2020.

At the national level, politicians are increasingly aware that ‘the borders to Germany's neighboring states have lost their divisive character’, that ‘border regions with complex patterns of movement and many and varied social, economic, cultural, and private bonds’ have developed into ‘integration areas’ (D_nat_2,² see also D_nat_1); and that SaarLorLux ‘is a powerfully integrated and networked region’ where – in the words of the Luxembourg government – ‘Europe is living reality’, and ‘decades of […] familial, economic, and occupational links have been forged and deepened across borders’ (L_nat_2). Here, cross-border integration is described in connection with debordering as already far advanced at functional, institutional and ideational levels (see Durand et al. 2017: 6–7). A similar evaluation is heard at regional and local levels: in the perception of those who live there, the border still exists, but ‘the border regions are more often seen as an entity in their own right’ (D_reg_4) whose inhabitants live ‘in a trans-boundary area that has actually functioned without a border for years, even decades’ (F_reg_2A), as is testified by the ‘cross-border movement of goods and commuters’ (D_reg_2). National borders are viewed here either as an aspect of common history (F_muni_8) which, as such, retains its value, or – given the normality of crossing the border – they are not noticed any more at all (e.g. D_muni_1, D_muni_4, D_muni_8, L_muni_1). In particular, mayors from the département Moselle emphasize the opportunities opening in what they see as a common ‘bassin de vie’: using terms like ‘chance’ (F_muni_2) or ‘multiplication of possibilities’ (F_muni_5), they speak of the ‘positive, absolutely positive aspects of Schengen’ (F_muni_6). Within the region, structural differences across borders remain, for example, with regard to workplaces or shopping facilities, but these can be seen rather as a challenge at the functional level of integration.

Given the normality of this situation and its perceived potentialities, it is not surprising that Germany's Covid-19 border management and de facto rebordering was considered a grave incursion in both France and Luxembourg. Up to then it had been inconceivable that ‘drastic control measures’ (F_nat_1) even including the closure of border crossings, could ever be reintroduced – and the experience was described as ‘frightening’ and ‘a shock’ (F_reg_2A, F_reg_2B, F_muni_4). It seemed ‘a step back into the past’, and all the more irrational in treating the virus as if it had a nationality and could be stopped at the border (F_muni_6). From a French perspective these measures appeared discriminatory. Nor could Luxembourg politicians understand why EU internal borders should be closed (L_nat_2). The national German action was therefore felt as a serious challenge:

Post factum the security measures on the borders were justified and to some extent legitimated by the divergent local histories of infection. The intention, Federal German politicians pointed out in mitigation, was ‘not to barricade oneself in’ or ‘to erect a stronghold [against the virus]’, but to protect ‘human lives’ (D_nat_1, D_nat_2). A few Saarland mayors approved the measures, citing the confused nature of the situation, but at the same time they criticized poor communication with those affected and expressed their relief that the borders were gradually reopening (D_muni_5A, D_muni_5B, D_muni_7). One high-ranking Saarland politician described the border checks as ‘an act of helplessness’ (D_reg_1). In comparison, the statement that ‘Corona could not be stopped at the borders – not with a machine gun nor with police stationed on the bridge at Schengen’ reflects the Luxembourgian position and echoes the strongly held view (L_nat_2) that the hasty rebordering had no place in a Europe of common principles and actions. For their part, the Grand Duchy's politicians expressed unequivocally their unhappiness at the response to the crisis and their demand for a rapid end to restrictions – a reaction soon echoed on regional and local levels. Where the impact of measures imposed from above was immediately felt, the action of the authorities was considered a clumsy, undiplomatic failure (e.g. D_reg_5, D_muni_4, F_reg_1A). As the following section will show, a more appropriate response to the crisis, it was felt, would have been to intensify cooperative governance.

While ‘covidfencing’ (Medeiros et al.2021a; Novotný 2021) appears in the sources cited so far in this article as a profound caesura for the SaarLorLux region, it did in fact have both positive and negative aspects. Overall, an enhanced political awareness of the meaning of cross-border integration arose, as the following paragraphs will illustrate more systematically.

In the early months of 2020, politicians criticized the absence of a coordinated European response to Covid, exacerbated by an apparent insensitivity toward neighboring countries. The only real agreement was to secure the EU's external borders; healthcare measures remained a national responsibility and entailed national rebordering. A French official observed (F_nat_1) that President Macron had already in mid-February suggested a way of taking concerted action, but the response he received had been halfhearted. Again, Luxembourg (L_nat_2) regularly underlined the need for European agreement on any modification of the ‘legal right to freedom of movement and residence’, but restrictions were imposed – and imposed differently – by each nation acting unilaterally. Above all, the measures introduced by the Federal German government to secure its own external borders were considered overly hasty and were not communicated early enough to neighboring countries (F_nat_1, F_reg_1B, L_nat_2) – a criticism that came not only from France and Luxembourg, but also from regional and local authorities in Germany, many of which considered Federal Government actions insensitive to local conditions, especially in border areas. Thus in place of ‘coordination’, the most the Saarland state government could get from Berlin (D_reg_4) was ‘detailed advance information’ (D_reg_3) – a problem of inadequate ‘tuning’ in multi-level governance (see also Crossey 2020). ‘Communication was called for’, but ‘hectic activism’ was the order of the day (D_muni_4, D_muni_5B, F_muni_9B). Police checkpoints and the ‘barricading’ of border crossings were – above all in their historical connotations (D_reg_4, D_muni_9, L_nat_2 etc.) – potent negative symbols. As a mayor from the département Moselle put it: ‘From one day to the next there is a border again, with police on the road checking your papers. People are shocked even to see such a thing’ (F_muni_2). Ideational cross-border integration was clean contrary to such developments (see Durand et al.2017: 7; Novotný 2021: 4).

Another aspect that runs like a thread through the various interviews and essays is the drastic impact on the regional population, in particular cross-border workers, and on the entire, functionally ever more closely intermeshed, economy. Federal German authorities admitted the ‘inconvenience caused by long queues at border checkpoints’ and the ‘at times […] greater restrictions to their normal pattern of life’ imposed specifically on cross-border commuters in comparison with the resident population (D_nat_2). At the state level, Saarland politicians emphasized the economic importance of such workers and especially their crucial role in the healthcare system (D_reg_1, D_reg_2, D_reg_3, D_muni_5B). In the words of one local mayor: ‘If you shut the border you shut our hospital, many of whose workers live in France’ (D_muni_9). In fact – as already indicated above in Section 3 on SaarLorLux – almost 14,000 people commute from Lorraine to work in the Saarland (IBA-OIE 2022: n.p.), a number rather less widely known than the parallel figure for the ‘Luxembourg employment magnet’.

As far as the economy is concerned, cross-border goods traffic – and with it the regional supply system – was seriously affected, and at the individual level many French residents, for example, had to travel a good deal further to the nearest French supermarket than they would normally have done to their local Saarland store: yet another illustration of the everyday meaning of cross-border integration (D_reg_2, D_muni_5A). Both French and Luxembourgian sources voiced these grievances repeatedly, often linking them graphically to individual cases: higher living costs for people unable to reach German discount outlets, ambulances prevented from crossing the border, care patients cut off from their relatives in the neighboring country etc. (F_nat_1, F_nat_2, F_muni_9, L_nat_2). Decisions taken by central governments had – without adequate foresight and anticipation of the complexity of the circumstances involved – immediate impacts at local levels, and it was at local levels far removed from the seat of national government that solutions had to be found. That was the gist of the complaint voiced by local as well as regional politicians.

Uglier undertones were added to the immediate difficulties of the situation when nationalistic sentiments began to infiltrate the separation imposed on adjacent communities (see Dylla 2021; Freitag-Carteron 2021). The news services spoke of ‘French’ rather than ‘cross-border’ commuters, as if the threat was perceived and communicated in the German Saarland as coming from their neighbors’ nationality (F_nat_1, F_nat_6), not from the virus. Long-buried stereotypes and hostilities resurfaced, a phenomenon seen by German authorities as indicative of the stress caused by Covid-19 and rejected as ‘disturbing’ (D_nat_1) and ‘appalling’ (D_reg_2). The prejudices rekindled in both countries did not automatically disappear when the tighter border controls were finally lifted (F_muni_9B).

In this light, the negative side of the crisis lay initially in the absence of a common European response and, as it developed, in deficiencies in the functional and ideational dimensions of cross-border integration. On a more positive political note, the pandemic also showed that Franco-German and European solidarity can be fostered on the regional level, an example being the mutual visit by French and German mayors and members of the legislature in border communities like Grossrosseln as a demonstration of the close bonds linking the border communities (D_muni_5A, D_muni_5B). In the same sense, members of the Eurodistrict SaarMoselle (EGTC – European Grouping of Territorial Cooperation, see Figure 1) viewed regional Franco-German relations as exemplary for other EU countries and emphasized the counterproductive nature of border closures for joint projects (D_reg_5, F_muni_2). Several Saarland mayors took the further step of producing a joint YouTube video (Clivot 2020) as an expression of solidarity with their French partner communities (D_muni_7). That this was well received in France is evident from the comment by a French mayor: ‘Our German colleagues have always done all they could. There was even a YouTube post – you may have seen it – from the Saarland mayors expressing their friendship’ (F_muni_2). Such statements of solidarity on the one hand, and protests like those around Europe Day (May 9) on the other, point in the direction of what Wille (2021a: n.p.) has called ‘deborderization’. Powerful media images demonstrating the interwoven everyday life of the borderlands – including that of the ‘border angler’ Hartmut Fey fishing his breakfast baguette over the border barrier from the local bakery – brought the political point home to people living far beyond the region (D_reg_2, F_reg_2B).

The admission of French Covid-19 patients to German hospitals, several of them in the Saarland, was particularly symbolic, offering ‘concrete proof’ (D_nat_2) of the life-supporting value of Franco-German cooperation and showing an ‘emotionally meaningful’ side of the EU (L_nat_2) and active ‘European solidarity’ (F_reg_1B; and see Böhm 2021: 13; Medeiros et al.2021a: 969). A decisive role here was played by the unbureaucratic spirit of regional decision-makers who fostered a decentralized and cooperative spirit of governance in the borderland: ‘Any number of obstacles were suddenly swept aside by an innovative and creative mindset in the administrations […] that simply saved lives’ (F_reg_2A). Another example was the transfer of medical masks, when an SOS from the département Moselle met with informal support from both Saarland municipalities and the state government (D_muni_5A, D_muni_7, D_muni_8, F_reg_2B). A Saarland politician spoke in this context of ‘cooperation in a core region of the European integration process’ as ‘a yardstick for the whole European project’ (D_reg_3), a view echoed in other political quarters (e.g. F_muni_5, F_muni_10, L_muni_2), where the SaarLorLux region is projected as a grassroots laboratory of European integration, with cross-border governance and integration standing in close mutual relationship.

Turning now specifically to cross-border governance, the following paragraphs will look more closely at the conclusions drawn by politicians and officials for coping with future developments and possible crises. The pandemic has underlined the importance of already established levels of institutionalization as a basis for joint regional activity: routinely cooperating bodies have contributed vitally to Covid management and have proven able across the entire region to intensify their engagement to meet needs as they arose (e.g. D_nat_1, D_reg_1, F_reg_2A). Here, an important role was played in the SaarLorLux border region by existing and extended formal structures and especially by informal contacts and pragmatic approaches. Telephone conferences, SMS exchanges, and messenger services, complemented by video conferences, enabled political decision-makers and administrations to coordinate their activities. Commentators refer unanimously to the discussions this introduced between national and regional – sometimes also local – levels because of the different systems involved (see e.g. D_nat_1, D_reg_3, F_nat_2, F_muni_10), e.g.: ‘Given the different organizational structures of their respective states, a typical feature of Franco-German cooperation is undoubtedly that it must take place in parallel on both national and regional levels’ (D_nat_1). The much criticized one-sided Federal German activity at the beginning of the crisis yielded later to an express aim to set up close and regular exchanges in which the ‘virtual round table’ was elevated to the role of an ‘information hub’ (D_nat_2). This did much to boost mutual understanding (F_reg_1B, F_reg_2A).

At the same time the Franco-German Committee for Cross-Border Cooperation gained in importance beyond the role originally assigned it in the Aachen Agreement (see e.g. D_nat_2, F_reg_2A). Bringing together national, regional and local deputies, as well as cross-border entities like Eurodistricts, this explicitly designated organ of multi-level cross-border governance (Ulrich and Wassenberg 2021: 2) constituted a forum in which local and regional concerns could be immediately brought to the notice of national decision-makers. One participant observed: ‘I think the very first meeting of the cross-border committee made it abundantly clear that it is one thing to talk about closing the border when I’m sitting in Paris or Berlin and quite another here on the border’ (D_muni_9). The divergent competencies and responsibilities involved centrally and decentrally were regularly seen by politicians, above all on regional and local levels, as problematic and as acting as a brake on the process of cross-border governance and integration (D_reg_3, D_muni_1, F_reg_1A, F_muni_2, L_muni_1). Effective coordination and cooperation in the border region are all the more complex given the very different administrative structures that meet there: on the one hand an autonomous nation (Luxembourg), on the other a Federal German State with its own government (Saarland), and in the third place a French région with several départements enjoying little autonomy or scope for independent decision (Lorraine/Moselle)

In order to raise awareness of the problems described above, the Franco-German Parliamentary Assembly has also recently focused on the border regions (F_nat_2), while at the other end of the spectrum the German and French mayors of the Eurodistrict SaarMoselle wrote directly to Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron calling, as a matter of urgency, for borders to be reopened (D_reg_5). Over and above its symbolic function, the Eurodistrict served as a liaison (D_muni_9) in the transfer of French Covid patients to Saarland hospitals and negotiated the establishment of a Franco-German test center at Saarbrücken's Goldene Bremm border crossing (D_reg_5). On the basis of already existing institutional structures, the intercommunal body made a recognizable contribution to Covid-19 management in the SaarLorLux region (F_muni_2, F_muni_5), proving itself in Cyrus and Ulrich's terms (2021: 31) ‘responsive to integration parameters’.

The concert of political voices has, then, underlined the need for action in various directions. The one-sidedly centralized procedures of pandemic management have shown that even at the heart of Western Europe, where the model of integration might be expected to have its strongest roots, longstanding and firmly-established patterns and practices are not inviolable. In this context Federal German politicians speak of European union as ‘an unfinished process’ (D_nat_2) that ‘must constantly prove itself in the face of new challenges’. In this sense the crisis offers an opportunity for further progress (D_nat_1), specifically in the improvement of communications and coordination of activities on both sides of the border, and in the use of local expertise – as in some of the examples already cited (F_nat_2, F_reg_2B, L_nat_2). A strengthening of the Franco-German Committee for Cross-Border Cooperation would enable it to function in this respect as a ‘platform’ and ‘motor’ for future tasks (D_reg_3, D_nat_1, F_reg_2A). Here too the interplay of top-down and bottom-up forces and procedures is essential (see Marchetti 2020). In this respect the strengthening and continuation of processes of institutionalization to facilitate joint decision-making is decisive; ideally this will also serve as an antidote to the EU-skepticism that is showing its head in some quarters (see Durand et al.2017: 7; Novotný 2021: 4, 15).

A key lesson learnt from Covid-19 is the need for early and effective communication in crises. What this means in practice is to have well established, functioning contacts, and effective public relations that can ‘generate confidence’ (D_reg_1, F_muni_9B, L_nat_2) by explaining decisions and actions (D_nat_2). Complementary to this would be the establishment of a plan defining competencies and contacts for future crises (F_nat_1, F_reg_2A). Other self-explanatory aspects of communication are the provision of multilingual information (D_nat_2) and the assurance of a reliable digital infrastructure for regular face-to-face contact (F_reg_2B).

On the administrative level, measures must be taken to remove still existing legal obstacles to regional cooperation and establish rules and procedures specifically for the SaarLorLux integration area – also a step toward structural integration (D_reg_1, D_reg_3 – on the problem of different planning traditions see e.g. Chilla et al.2012; Pallagst and Hartz 2018). The Aachen Agreement does, in fact, make explicit provision for ‘the adaptation of legal and administrative rulings including exceptions’ (Bundesrepublik Deutschland and Französische Republik 2019: Art. 13 (2)). Eurodistricts like that of SaarMoselle could profit from such clauses to develop into ‘real metropolitan areas with special competencies for economic development, tourism, mobility and overall attractiveness’ and as concrete realizations of ‘genuinely coherent cross-border politics’ (F_muni_5, F_muni_9B). The Greater Region's ‘cross-border labor task force’ has already proposed solutions for some detailed everyday problems like taxation, but these still wait to be implemented on a systematic basis (D_reg_3, F_nat_1).

Politicians must furthermore ‘have the courage to […] involve citizens’ in intensified [cross-border] exchange (D_muni_4); this presumes a functioning ability in their neighbors’ language (D_muni_8, F_muni_10), which requires appropriate measures, including (in France) political action ‘from above’ (F_reg_1A) – yet another situation in which the multilevel requirements of the integration project become apparent. With its longstanding multilingual competence, Luxembourg may perhaps serve here as a model.

The Covid-19 pandemic led in spring 2020 to a resurgence of ‘unilateralism’ (Böhm 2021: 2) on the part of Europe's national states that once again revealed the Utopian quality of the idea of a ‘borderless world’ (Ohmae 1999 [1990]). The national state, as Klatt (2020: 46) observed at the time, ‘returned as single actor, replacing practices of cross-border multi-level governance’ with the concept of the state as a ‘bordered container’. Official reactions ‘disregarded the cross-border nature of European borderlands’ (Böhm 2021: 15). Conversely, in the wake of ‘new and emerging complexities’, national borders took on new relevance ‘as the primary policy instrument to contain the health risk and to ensure national security’ (Radil et al.2021: 133). But activity of this kind at the national level had far-reaching consequences, for, as these authors continue, ‘the uncoordinated closure of European borders by individual member states undermine[d] one of the main achievements of European integration: the Schengen agreement, which has facilitated the free movement of European citizens around the Schengen space’ (Radil et al.2021: 134).

Early analyses from the perspective of border studies addressed border regions both in Europe and beyond (see e.g. Brunet-Jailly and Carpenter 2020; Ulrich et al.2020; Weber et al. 2021; Wille and Kanesu 2020; Medeiros et al.2021a). Further empirical research and in-depth analysis along the lines undertaken by Opiłowska (2021), Kajta and Opiłowska (2021), or Novotný (2021) for central European border regions is, however, called for. From the same perspective and with particular emphasis on cross-border cooperation and integration, the present article has provided a comprehensive analysis of political evaluations of the Covid-19 crisis in the SaarLorLux region focused on two questions: How did politicians and officials at various levels view the impact of the pandemic and the response to it? And what consequences did they draw for future developments?

Especially in the first pandemic phase, developments in the SaarLorLux region were often seen as markedly top-down, but this soon yielded to established as well as new forms of cross-border cooperation in the interests of a crisis management tailored to the needs and circumstances of the borderland. Over recent decades SaarLorLux has developed in many respects into a close-knit ideational entity in which crossing the border is an everyday matter and border checkpoints and closures come as a shock, a break in normality. Imposed by the Federal government, German border management was strongly criticized by the Luxembourg government and local mayors (see interviews referred to above) as unilateral and diplomatically clumsy. Wassenberg (2020a: 119) speaks in this context of ‘a return of mental borders’. Local and regional political sources in Germany also made their dissatisfaction with Berlin unmistakably clear, when badly communicated and uncoordinated decisions and actions were taken without awareness or consideration of those whose lives they disrupted.

The other side of the coin was a story of European solidarity starting with protests and demonstrations but soon moving on to the transfer of masks and the admission of Covid-19 patients to hospitals across the border, in striking parallel to the developments noted for instance by Opiłowska (2021). Political sources in all three countries point out that informal as well as formal contacts were brought into play, deepening political understanding and enabling increasingly pragmatic action. The Committee for Cross-Border Cooperation, the Eurodistrict SaarMoselle, and various task forces were strengthened and/or entrusted with crucial tasks, and many political decision-makers cited in the present analysis see these structures as warranting a higher profile. At the procedural level, adaptation and harmonization of regulations for the whole integration area are required across the board. The establishment of regional laws and structures would, in fact, facilitate the further institutionalization of an integrated cross-border space as complementing rather than contradicting existing state structures. Above all the need is felt, over and above existing improvements in cross-border project coordination, to energetically pursue measures that will widen and reinforce common foundations against future crises.

The case study of the impact of the Covid-19 crisis on the SaarLorLux region has shown in exemplary fashion that the ‘European project’ is in fact ‘deeply rooted in border regions where the everyday notion of a Europe without borders is forged’ (Medeiros et al. 2021a: 979). But the unhindered progress of European integration cannot be taken for granted – above all when typically top-down national decisions run temporarily against it. ‘We too’, Radil et al. (2021: 138) observe, ‘should be prepared to reflect on how bordering may become ever-more central to understanding our post-Covid-19 world’. ‘Covidfencing’ has taught us to look critically at developments in cross-border regions: these may go either way, deepening or (at least temporarily) holding back and even cooling relations. The options noted in the 2019 Treaty of Aachen (Cap. 4, art. 13, §1–2) between France and Germany for implementing cross-border projects (including ‘accelerated procedures’ and ‘adapted legal and administrative provisions’) have not yet been concluded, nor has there to date been progress at the European level on the mooted European Cross-Border Mechanism. Debate nevertheless continues about adapting measures for border regions to support European integration (see Medeiros et al.2021b). One thing the crisis has definitely done, however, is to put a spotlight on areas that live and flourish from open borders. Abstracting from the various dimensions of cross-border cooperation and coordination, Wille asks in this context whether ‘the shared moment of crisis and (cross-border) solidarity’ bring EU countries and border regions simply ‘back together’ or perhaps even ‘closer together’ (Wille 2020: 15).

The author is grateful for the constructive comments and suggestions offered by the anonymous referees and the editor.

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Florian Weber studied geography, business administration, sociology and journalism at the University of Mainz (Germany) and gained his doctorate at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg with a thesis comparing German and French area-based policies in light of discourse theory. Since October 2016 he has been Associate Lecturer (Akademischer Rat) at the University of Tübingen's Department of Geography, where he completed his post-doctoral degree (Habilitation) in 2018. In April 2019 he was appointed Junior Professor of European Studies at Saarland University, with special reference to Western Europe and border regions. His research focuses on cross-border multi-level governance, renewable energies, and comparative international urban district policies and development.