Diaspora Strategies as Technologies of Citizenship

Abstract

In recent years, a growing number of origin countries have begun to more consciously engage with their diasporas abroad. In order to connect and nourish the relationship with their absent citizens, states now use a range of measures that are referred to here as “diaspora strategies”. These include the promotion of dual nationality, the permission of absentee voting, the encouragement of diaspora investments and, the official proclamation of emigrants as “national heroes”. This article analyses diaspora strategies from the perspective of citizenship. Firstly, it classifies existing diaspora strategies as legal, political, economic and cultural and relates them to the citizen roles as constituents, political participants, taxpayers and co-nationals. Secondly, it analyses diaspora strategies as technologies of citizenship that actively partake in shaping the diaspora. Thirdly, it analyses what particular citizenship ideal is promoted by diaspora strategies. It finds that emigrant citizens are shaped as mobile and entrepreneurial but also as loyal to their national community. The theoretical framework derives from Michel Foucault's notion of governmentality and elaborations by other scholars. The article argues that diaspora strategies seek to instil and strengthen emotions of national obligations and thereby work to secure international migration.