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This essay explores return migration through alternative circuits, an emerging modality among Venezuelan and other South American migrants who, faced with structural barriers such as mass deportations, visa requirements, and the militarization of routes to the United States, opt to return to their countries of origin via informal maritime routes through the Panamanian Caribbean. The objective is to understand how these marginal trajectories shape new forms of collective agency, territorial appropriation, and symbolic resistance to hegemonic migration control regimes. An exploratory methodology was used, based on documentary analysis, complemented by social media observations and telephone contact with logistical operators, to reconstruct the operation of an informal route connecting Puerto Miramar with Puerto Obaldía and Necoclí. The findings show that this mobility, far from being spontaneous, follows a logic of informal transnational organization, sustained by digital networks, community actors, and local economies. This form of return reveals a social production of migrant space, at times tolerated by states, which highlights the tension between sovereignty, informality, and human mobility. These practices should be recognized as legitimate expressions of migrant agency and territoriality in a deeply unequal global context.
Este obra está bajo una licencia de Creative Commons Reconocimiento-NoComercial-CompartirIgual 4.0 Internacional.
