Boundary elements that are making reinforced concrete shear walls widely used have many benefits. They are making the structure earthquake resistant. Economical side as well, they are capable of providing required stiffness, strength, and ductility capacity to protect building systems against strong earthquake shaking.
Where earthquake shaking will result in inelastic response including compression yielding of the boundary elements of the wall, special boundary elements are required. 
Boundary Elements in Shear Walls Details
Such elements generally have closely spaced transverse reinforcement to confine the core concrete and provide lateral support for longitudinal reinforcement, thereby providing a capability for stable compression yielding. Building codes around the world prescribe reinforcing steel detailing requirements whose purpose is to enable the boundary element to achieve the anticipated performance. As wall element geometries have evolved over past decades, however, questions have arisen about the effectiveness of some of these building codes to achieve the desired performance.
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