Diasporic Engagement Research Articles

Irish diaspora policy and soft power projection

ABSTRACT Diasporic engagement has not been a common aspect of Irish national projection but Ireland’s recent policy platforms have sought to activate diasporic sentiment in the service of soft power. A broader and more diverse construction of diaspora is put forward and a more nuanced Government of Ireland reach-out is directed at a wider range of global markets’ than has heretofore been the case. This reformulation of global Irish identity and diversified spatial projection of Irish interest points to an assertive spatialization of Irish themes in the global sphere as Ireland seeks to harness its diaspora in pursuit of soft power.

Diaspora Diplomacy across Multiple Chinas: Using Hybridities to Analyse Diaspora Diplomacy in Chinese Jamaican Communities

Summary Diaspora diplomacy is a fundamental framework for understanding diasporic engagement, the ways in which diasporic communities from the Global South contribute to the political and economic landscapes of their home nations, as well as the role their diasporic advocacy plays in the relationships between home and host nations. However, complex histories of migration and colonialism can complicate the perceived site of the diaspora’s diplomacy. Recent publications reflect on the concept of ‘multiple worlds’ within postcolonial diasporic communities. In this article, I partner diaspora diplomacy with the postcolonial framework of hybridities to trace the shifting roles of Chinese Jamaican institutions as diasporic diplomats over time. I explore how these organisations both navigate and reinvent themselves within the diverse formations of Chinese identity that endure within the Chinese diasporic ‘periphery’, changing local and Chinese geopolitics and their own positionality within a primarily Black, postcolonial nation.

Diasporic engagement and the climate crisis in Kerala: inclusive disaster relief and reconstruction?

ABSTRACT India has been identified as one of the most vulnerable countries within the global climate crisis. Kerala has been highlighted as a hotspot of climate vulnerability within India, and this was illustrated by the floods of 2018. Nearly, 500 people lost their lives during the floods and 1.4 million were displaced, with the reconstruction programme still taking place today. Anecdotal andmedia accounts have suggested that the Keralan diaspora played a significant part in the disaster relief and reconstruction effort both during and after the floods. However, there has been very little detailed empirical investigation into this particular diasporic engagement during a time of crisis. Drawing upon original empirical research, this paper will examine the nature and impact of Keralan diasporic engagement during, and after, the 2018 floods, particularly focussing upon whether this was an inclusive relief and development effort across the categories of caste, region and religion within the state.

Migrant transnationalism and time: divergent trajectories of diasporic political engagement in early 20th century São Paulo

ABSTRACT Why and how do some migrant groups demonstrate greater engagement with homeland politics than others at particular historical moments? Research has examined both individual-level factors such as migrants’ resources and institutional factors such as contexts of incorporation. Less theorised, however, are the ways in which factors are mediated by temporal contexts such as timing and sequence. Drawing on the notion of path dependence, this study analyses how the temporal orders of four institutional factors – 1) the socioeconomic context of reception, 2) incorporative policies of the receiving state, 3) diaspora policies of the sending state, and 4) migrant networks – resulted in divergent levels of diasporic engagement between Italian and Japanese migrants in early twentieth century Brazil. My findings show that the socioeconomic context of reception provides the initial condition on which migrants develop their networks. Second, the timing of when diasporic policies – relative to incorporative policies – reach out to migrant networks affects the breadths of social class involvement in diasporic engagement. This study contends that timing plays a critical role in producing divergent levels of diasporic engagement at the group-level.

Performing nationalism: The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) and Sri Lankan Tamil diasporic politics in Switzerland

AbstractThe history of post‐war Sri Lanka has seen an escalation of nationalisms that constantly collide. Post‐2009, with the end of the war, the reproduction of narratives around nationalisms has become intense, with home‐grown protests for accountability of minority injustices continuing to sustain its fervour over time. Within the context of Switzerland these events in Sri Lanka are invariably aligned with diasporic engagement. Dominant spaces such as the United Nations (UN) in Geneva, Switzerland become transnational sites for the performance of long‐distance nationalism by Tamil diaspora groups, raising questions around legitimacy and claims‐making. This paper presents empirical insights as to how long‐distance Tamil nationalism is manifested as political engagement, by groups, and/ or individuals, in formal and informal transnational sites within the socio‐political landscape of Switzerland. It argues that modes of political engagement are manifested through rituals of performance and performativity such as scripting and iteration of claims‐making processes that enable legitimacy in transnational sites of lobby and protest within the UN arena in Geneva during the Human Rights Council (HRC) sessions. The paper situates its analysis within a shift in post‐war Tamil diaspora claims‐making narratives from a separatist stance to that of victimhood and human rights producing narratives that present the Tamil diaspora as a singular actor albeit with complex heterogeneity.

Ideas, Discourse, and the Microfoundations of South Korea’s Diasporic Engagement: Explaining the Institutional Embrace of Ethnic Koreans Since the 1990s

This article endeavors to explain South Korea’s institutional turn to “diaspora engagement,” which began in earnest in the late 1990s. This shift can easily be attributed to instrumentalist calculations on the part of the South Korean state, i.e., as an effort to “tap into” or exploit the human and capital resources of ethnic Koreans living outside of the country. But instrumental calculations and interests, while significant and clearly proximate, were not the only nor necessarily the most important (causal) factors at play. Using a discursive institutional and microfoundational approach, we argue that underlying the institutional shift to diaspora engagement, was both an intentional and unintentional reframing of the Korean diaspora as “brethren” and “national assets,” a powerful discursive combination. This reframing did not come about automatically but was instead pushed forward by sentient or discursive agents, including Chŏng Chu-yŏng (the founder of Hyundai) and Yi Kwang-gyu, who was a Seoul National University professor and later the third president of the Overseas Koreans Foundation. Journalists, religious leaders and other activists within South Korea’s NGO community, as well as ethnic Koreans themselves, also played key roles as discursive agents in this reframing process. Central to our discursive institutional and microfoundational approach is the assertion that ideas and discourse were key causal factors in the institutional shift to South Korea’s engagement with the Korean diaspora.

Higher education reform and diasporic engagement in post-earthquake Haiti

ABSTRACT In post-disaster societies, critical events intensify diasporic engagements. This article examines the diaspora as a category of practice that mobilizes energies in furtherance of revitalizing Haiti’s oft-neglected higher education sector. With rebuilding efforts dependent upon international assistance, the diaspora emerges as an important actor that engages national and international entities in shaping that agenda. Hence, the research question posed here: How has diaspora engagement in higher education influenced institutional capacity for recovery and reconstruction in post-disaster Haiti? Conceptualizing the 2010 earthquake as a threshold event that has reconfigured Haitian society and drawing on a post-structuralist notion of power, this article analyzes contexts of engagement where the diaspora negotiated their cultural understanding of higher education with local practices, within larger competing national and transnational power dynamics. These new opportunities for engagement created conditions for the diaspora to move higher education from the margins of national development to the post-disaster rebuilding agenda.

Gift of a temple: socio-economic and cultural changes around diasporic engagement in Jaffna Peninsula, Sri Lanka

ABSTRACT Jaffna District, Sri Lanka, has faced enormous socio-economic difficulties since the civil war ended in May 2009. But in contrast to the visible and apparent infrastructural destruction that characterises much of the District, there is a striking number of newly built Hindu temples. The majority of these new temple constructions are linked to diasporic engagement, philanthropy and giving. Through a Maussian lens, this article provides insights into how the gift of a temple enables people in the diaspora to give something back to local socio-cultural structures, in order to reposition them in relation to their places of origin. However, the Maussian ‘gift’ not only serves the giver; it also impacts on the receiver. The article therefore asks: How does the receiver use these temples? What impact do the temples have on the socio-economic and cultural environment? How are they commodified? Three in-depth case studies will help to provide answers to these questions and to better understand the long-term impact of the gift of temples in post-war Jaffna.

Growing up with a long-awaited nation-state: Personal struggles with the homeland among young diasporic Armenians

This paper explores identification with the nation-state as homeland among young diasporic Armenians in France, Russia and the United Kingdom (UK). For dispersed Armenian communities worldwide, the emergence of a fragile nation-state since 1991 has represented a form of collective goal fulfilment accompanied at times by disillusionment in the national myth of the homeland as a place of sanctuary. We argue that the resulting shift in understandings of homeland markedly differentiates the diasporic experiences of Armenians of diverse backgrounds growing up in the post-independence era from those of previous generations. Key to this shift are ambivalent dynamics between memory and myth integral to personal struggles with the homeland. Analysing original interviews with Armenians aged 18 to 35 in three host states, we unpack how memories of contact with the Armenian state accumulated in youth interact with national myths about the homeland in the context of different family migration histories. The active engagement of young people with homeland myths is shown to play an important role in their recollections of first formative visits to Armenia. Through more regular contact with the state, disappointment in elements of politics and culture that clash with personal imaginings of the homeland can lead to ambivalence in identifying with Armenia. Ultimately, the state plays a key orienting role for many young diasporic Armenians, but clashes between recalled encounters and myths concerning the state can render it a place of partial belonging, unable to fulfil the ideals of the diasporic imagination. The findings highlight the value of attending to interaction between memory and myth in diasporic engagement with ‘homeland’ states more broadly.

Youth and social movements on the move: political engagement among young Spanish migrants in London

ABSTRACTSince the beginning of the economic crisis in Spain young people have migrated abroad looking for job opportunities. In the meantime, after the 15-M movement in 2011, Spanish society created various social movements hoping to make change happen, as well as the pro-independence movement in Catalonia that gathered strength as a response to the Spanish economic and political crisis. This paper analyses how Spanish young people in London, as transmigrants rooted in two different countries, engage with the politics of their home country through two transnational social movements in London: ANC England and the Maroon Wave London. The article describes both local movements (comparing their goals, structure and activities), showing the reasons that young Spanish migrants get involved and their experiences within them. It also rethinks the nature and modalities of young diasporic identities and political engagement in the global age through the experiences of the young people interviewed.

Imputing Diaspora: An Examination of Turkish Political Rhetoric in Germany

In this article, I examine two different frames of diasporic identity found within the rhetoric of Turkish politicians when they address audiences in Germany. I analyze speeches given in 2011 by the then Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and leader of the opposition, Kemal Kılıçdaroğ lu, during the fiftieth anniversary celebrations of Turkish labor migration to Germany. I argue that both wove narratives of identity that emphasized the continuing relevance of Turkey to the lives of expatriate Turks as well as their continued inclusion in Turkish society. I suggest that these were deliberate attempts to construct or maintain imagined communities of diasporic Turks as part of broader political projects. Such transnational reinterpretations of “domestic” issues constitute an understudied dimension of diasporic engagement and diasporic identity formation.

The Korean Wave Phenomenon in Asian Diasporas in Canada

ABSTRACTThis study explores diasporic Asian young people's engagement with the recent wave of Korean pop culture, also known as the Korean Wave, in Canada. Drawing on in-depth interviews conducted in Toronto and Vancouver, the study examines how transnational cultural flow is articulated with social media and ethnic sociality. In the study, while the transnational flow of Korean media content was largely reliant on social media, it was renegotiated by the users’ subject positions as ethnic minorities and by their ethnic networks in the Canadian cities.

‘Saving the Congo’: transnational social fields and politics of home in the Congolese diaspora

This paper explores the diasporic ‘politics of home’ of Congolese migrants in Europe, in particular in the UK, and to a lesser extent in Belgium. We focus on the fragmentation and heterogeneity of the diasporic political sphere by examining the role of first generation activists, religious groups, as well as youth and women's organisations. Within the transnational political field, first generation leaders are in a dominant position and the involvement of other groups, such as women and young people is marginalised by their control of the diasporic ‘rules of the game’ in the Bourdieusan sense. However, the increasing involvement of Congolese women in the field of women's rights advocacy has opened up new paths of political action which can, in certain occasions, lead to transnational forms of engagement. Similarly, second generation Congolese activists are constructing a space of autonomous engagement, relying heavily on the Internet and especially on social media, some attempting to link up with wider social movements. The paper provides an understanding of the social and political construction of these different fields of diasporic engagement as well as their intersectional and dialogical relations.

The ‘Diaspora option’, migration and the changing political economy of development

ABSTRACT Influenced by the recognition of the social and economic value of migrant exchanges, the shift to a Post-Washington Consensus, and the rise of India and China as emerging economies – the ‘Diaspora option’ is becoming a significant component of the development strategies of countries with large migrant populations across Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Asia and Eastern Europe. In this paper we examine the political economy within which the Diaspora option has emerged and the broader implications of the discursive and material ways that migrants are being incorporated as professionalized partners in development. Drawing on a case study of the World Bank's Africa Diaspora Program we examine the underlying assumptions, ideologies and silences upon which this policy option rests. We conclude that the emerging Diaspora option should be approached more critically because the current celebration of these strategies obscures the selective and narrow neoliberal orientation; the assumptions that they make about the nature of diasporic engagement, and their increasing reliance on migrant populations to shoulder the investment risks associated with social transformation.

African diasporas, development and the politics of context

This article seeks to add to the debate on the role of diasporas in development outcomes in sub-Saharan Africa by considering why diasporas are not apparently as effective as development agents in an African setting as they have proven thus far in other regions. It argues that changing diasporic engagement and activities on the continent should be examined against the backdrop of the emergence of a ‘liberalisation from below’ which emphasises local ownership of development outcomes, the historical variety of African state forms and the continuities in the exercise of power and the nature of these states. In so doing, it brings into focus the ongoing transformation in state–society relations whereby the dependence—of elites and ordinary citizens alike—on external resources continues to deepen, and the importance of this context in drawing any conclusions about the role of diasporas as agents of transformation.

The Canadian Tamil Diaspora and the Politics of Multiculturalism

This article explores Tamil diasporic engagement in Toronto, at the turn of the Sri Lankan struggle in 2009, to foreground the contested and transnational character of Canadian multiculturalism. It asks whether Canadian multicultural discourse provides a space for social and political identity-making within the Tamil-Canadian Diaspora. The article then sketches the way multiculturalism informed Tamil-Canadian identity-making amongst young and older Tamil-Canadians prior to these events. It explores how diasporic identity was then crystallized in 2009 through media and political responses within the mainstream and the Diaspora itself. The article argues that security discourses dramatically prefigured the terms of engagement for Tamil-Canadians during the final months of the civil war in Sri Lanka. It concludes by drawing attention to the transformative possibilities of multiculturalism and the way the diasporic lens that this case study uses may contribute to this discussion.

“Beyond Remittancing”: An investigation of the role of ICTs in facilitating and extending the diaspora's contribution to the Caribbean

The diaspora has been recognised as having contributed to the Caribbean and Latin America in the areas of tourism, transportation, telecommunications, trade and the transmission of monetary remittances. However, among the least considered areas is telecommunications and more generally ICTs, even while it has been accepted that important gains can be secured from increasing diasporic involvement in this area. This article aims to begin the discussion in this area focusing on the experiences of the Caribbean diaspora through the notion of telecommunications-mediated diasporic engagement (TMDE), as a means of assessing the ways in which telecoms can help to facilitate and advance the diaspora's relationship with the region. It is shown that the main form of engagement has been social communication, though there is more recent evidence of diversification in TMDE. This is demonstrated in the use of telecoms in disaster response, in facilitating participation in national governance and in the growing investments, services and knowledge networks that are emerging with telecommunications featuring as a means and an end. Nevertheless, opportunities for TMDE remain largely untapped given a number of challenges. Alors que la circulation migratoire qui définit les réalités transnationales des Dominicains aux États-Unis est bien décrite, l'intérêt pour une cartographie des opportunités stratégiques associées à des pratiques transnationales spécifiques, comme le tourisme diasporique, est moindre. Cette étude examine les opportunités et les contraintes liées au tourisme diasporique en République Dominicaine. Elle situe son analyse par rapport à l'arrière-plan contextuel, au sens le plus large, que représentent l’établissement d'une enclave diasporique à New-York et les liens multiples que les Dominicains ont avec leur mère patrie, avant de procéder à l'analyse du secteur touristique en République Dominicaine. De même que celui des Dominicains résidant à l’étranger, le nombre des voyageurs dominicains augmente, parmi lesquels ceux qui reviennent dans leur pays d'origine pour y faire du tourisme. Bien que la littérature existante et mes propres travaux de recherche semblent indiquer que de nombreux Dominicains de la première génération ont cherché à investir leurs revenus obtenus aux USA dans une gamme de micro-entreprises sises dans la mère patrie, ou dans le soutien financier à des membres de leur famille élargie; leurs descendants de la deuxième et de la troisième générations ne ressentent pas cette obligation vis-à-vis de leur pays d'origine. Cependant, d'un point de vue ethnique et culturel, ces derniers s'identifient à la République Dominicaine et y retournent plus que leurs aînés pour y faire du tourisme. Plus leur nombre et leur capital social augmentent, plus la réserve de touristes potentiels qu'ils représentent augmente elle aussi, d'où la nécessité de lancer des initiatives politiques pouvant faciliter la croissance de cet important secteur de niche.

Somali and Ethiopian Diasporic Engagement for Peace in the Horn of Africa

This article examines the complexities and multiple layers of diasporic engagement in homeland peacebuilding in Somalia and Ethiopia. The study challenges the negative perception of diasporas as conflict drivers and unscrupulous long-distance nationalists. It identifies three major contributions of diasporic engagement to peacebuilding in the conflictridden Horn of Africa. First, remittances from the diaspora enhance family economic survival, community stabilization, and economic activities in the absence of effective state institutions. Second, diasporic engagement enhances the space for greater contestation of ideas and broadens the range of political options for the homelanders. Finally, direct and indirect diasporic peace initiatives in the homelands, especially at the local level, have the potential to induce moderate social and economic development and hope for a brighter postwar future. This gives people a stake in their polity and contributes to peace.

Networking Development: Study of the Emerging Areas of Diasporic Engagement in India

Networking Development: Study of the Emerging Areas of Diasporic Engagement in India

Networking Development: Study of the Emerging Areas of Diasporic Engagement in India

Networking Development: Study of the Emerging Areas of Diasporic Engagement in India