Are we all transnationals now? Network transnationalism and transnational subjectivity: the differing impacts of globalization on the inhabitants of a small Swiss city

Abstract

I ask in this article how the inhabitants - migrants and non-migrants - of a specific geographical space, a small Swiss city in French-speaking Switzerland, live out different forms of transnationalism. Transnationalism is for this purpose defined and operationalized on two dimensions: I make a distinction between <i>network transnationalism</i> and what I call <i>transnational subjectivity</i>. The first dimension includes the transnational social networks; the latter refers to the cognitive classifications of a person's membership and belongings in transnational space. Analysis of the personal social networks of 250 inhabitants of this city, supplemented by data from qualitative interviews, brings to light four different ideal types of how transnationalism is lived. It reveals that these morphologies are closely related to questions of social positioning as well as processes of integration, locally or in transnational space.