[en] The Republic of Moldova is one of the States both located beyond the new Eastern border of European Union and concerned by the European Neighbourhood Policy. The European policy about them is ambivalent, particularly regarding the borders they share with the EU. This raises the question if Moldova is a periphery of the European Union, and how this asymmetric relationship has been built in the course of time. Since EU is a more and more important actor on the former communist geopolitical area, one could easily believe that the European community is the leading force there. This article seeks to identify other actors, involved in the territorial building of Europe and its neighbourhoods, and this by analysing trade mobility that have been existing for about fifteen years between Romania and the Republic of Moldova. Our aim is therefore to understand how the peripheral position can be built "from bellow", as well as how the centre/periphery relationship is organised. We argue that the EU "neighbours" peripheral situation – here considered from the Moldovan case – is both a consequence of social dynamics "from bellow", from local daily practices and ways of life, as of policies initiated from Brussels. The transborder trade mobility analysed here is mainly oriented from Moldova toward Romania. It acts as a spatial structuring agent : it generates social, economical and political (as well as identity processes) relations between the two sides of the border; by doing this, it strengthens a transborder territory. This evolution is bounded to the recent revaluation of State border that could be observed in the political debates about the enlargement to Central and Eastern European countries. All of this causes tensions, shaped in the level of integration or marginalization of the direct peripheries of EU. Therefore an immediate consequence of the enlargement is the growing gap between the core of the EU and some of it neighbours.

[fr] La République de Moldavie fait partie des Etats situés de l'autre côté de la nouvelle frontière orientale de l'UE et intégrés à la Politique européenne de Voisinage. Ils sont soumis à une politique ambivalente, notamment à propos des frontières qu'ils partagent avec l'Europe élargie. La Moldavie est-elle donc une périphérie de l'UE, et quelles sont les modalités de construction de cette relation par nature asymétrique ? Il serait tentant de croire que l'Europe communautaire mène la danse. Cet article cherche toutefois à identifier d'autres acteurs de la construction territoriale de l'Europe et de ses voisins. L'objectif est de comprendre la construction " par le bas " de la position de périphérie ainsi que sa structuration interne. Ainsi, la " mise en périphérie " des voisins de l'UE - ici la Moldavie - procède tout autant de pratiques et modes de vie des habitants que des politiques initiées depuis Bruxelles. La circulation à vocation marchande analysée va de la Moldavie à la Roumanie. Elle engendre des relations sociales, économiques, politiques voire identitaires entre les deux versants de la frontière et participe ainsi à la consolidation d'un territoire transfrontalier. Des tensions résultent de ces deux logiques croisées, européenne et locale, perceptibles dans le niveau d'intégration ou de marginalisation des périphéries de l'UE.