Includes bibliographical references (p. 183-187) and index.

Defining the region, objectives, and approaches -- Distinguishing characteristics and early history: frontier, borderlands, border region ; The Colonial Period: life on a New World frontier ; From frontier to borderlands ; Conflict between the United States and Mexico ; Early border phenomena -- Booms and busts on the border: economic development, 1880s to 1920s ; The first border boom, 1880-1910 ; The border economy during the Mexican Revolution ; Prohibition on the border ; Early free trade -- Life on the border: social change, 1880s to 1930s ; 1880s to 1910 ; Causes of the Mexican Revolution ; The social character of the Revolution in the Mexican North ; The Revolutionary period on the U.S. side of the border ; Transboundary population movements during the Revolution, Prohibition, and Depression -- Booms and busts on the border, 1930s and 1940s ; The Great Depression ; World War II -- Economic trends since 1950: legacies of the wartime economy ; The border economy comes of age ; Mexican government policy and the border: PRONAF and BIP--the Maquiladoras -- The consequences of rapid growth in the border region: social change and cultural change since the 1940s ; Population and migration ; Urbanization ; Mexican Americans. The impact of migration on sending communities. Cultural evolutions. -- U.S.-Mexican relations at the border: 1890s to 1990s ; The elusive boundary: water, environmental issues, and drug trafficking ; Migration ; NAFTA in the border region.