Cross-Border Politics: Diasporic Mobilization and State Response

Abstract

The global dimensions of diasporic politics and state response have generated a large, interdisciplinary literature. Yet, scholars struggle to find the most productive conceptual tools, as one literature, at point of origin, studies emigration and the other, at point of destination, studies immigration. The transnational turn in the social sciences four decades ago propelled scholars to study cross-border political mobilization by viewing immigration and emigration as two sides of the same coin. This article provides a guide to this scholarship. We show how the political nature of cross-border movements creates and circumscribes conditions for diasporic political mobilization. We then identify the different types of cross-border political activities and the modalities of corresponding home state policies. We conclude by reflecting how the world today has changed since the geopolitical moment in which the transnational turn was born and what these changes mean for studying immigrant and emigrant cross-border politics.