State, Migrants, and the Negotiation of Second-Generation Citizenship in the Israeli Diaspora

Abstract

Using second-generation Israeli migrants in the United States as a case study, this article explores one unusual site in which the politics of diasporic citizenship unfolds. It examines the North American chapter of the Israeli Scouts (Tzofim Tzabar) as an arena of negotiation between representatives of the sending state apparatus and migrants over the meaning (and practices) of citizenship outside national territory. This quotidian space is important to migrants’ contestation with the state concerning their claims for a form of membership that is neither territorial nor contingent upon the fulfillment of traditional civic duties (e.g., military service). Challenging the state-supported model of republicanism, in which presence in territory and the fulfillment of a predetermined set of civic duties are preconditions for citizenship, Israeli migrants advocate instead an arrangement based on a strong cultural identity and a revised set of diaspora-based material practices of support.