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In a context of accelerated intensification of migration outflows worldwide, states have become increasingly concerned with the political incorporation of non-resident nationals in the demos (Collyer 2014; Arrighi & Bauböck, 2017). This, in turn, has triggered scholars’ interest in closely examining emigrant enfranchisement processes, the determinants and effects of external voting rights, and the diversification of emigrants’ non-electoral modes of participation (Rhodes & Harutyunyan, 2010; Lafleur, 2013; Gamlen, 2015; Vintila & Martiniello, 2020). Yet, there is a lack of comprehensive dialogue between migration studies and political participation accounts on this topic. Such scholarly dialogue is much needed to inform further research on the causal mechanisms of diaspora mobilization in the homeland arena; and to better assess, in comparative perspective, how, when and why non-resident populations connect with homeland politics beyond elections. To the best of our knowledge, there is no systematic analysis on the interaction between demand-side (i.e. overseas voters’ attitudes and preferences toward home-country elections) and supply-side factors (i.e. the relation of homeland authorities, diaspora-based party organizations, civic associations with overseas voters). By combining migration studies and political participation, this interaction becomes essential to draw inferences on the different levels of impact on decision-making processes at home, and the capacity to make homeland governments accountable and politicians responsive. Existing literature has taken three diverse pathways that rarely connect with each other. First, several contributions have investigated the enactment, regulation and implementation (e.g. Pallister, 2019; Palop-García & Pedroza, 2019; Turcu & Urbatsch, 2020), alongside policy reversals (e.g., Brand, 2006; Wellman, 2015), of emigrant enfranchisement. Second, the political, institutional, and socio-economic determinants and consequences of political engagement from abroad have emerged as a burgeoning research agenda in both migration studies and empirical political science research. Drawing on the seminal research of voter turnout (e.g., Powell, 1986; Jackman, 1987; Verba et al., 1995), scholars have paid close attention to explaining emigrant voters’ turnout, either at an aggregate (e.g., Belchior et al., 2018; Burgess & Tyburski, 2020; Ciornei & Østergaard-Nielsen, 2020) or individual level (e.g., Chaudhary, 2018; Peltoniemi, 2018; McCann et al., 2019; Finn, 2020). Third, the increasing multiplicity of (in)formal channels of socio-political activism across borders—often incentivised by processes of emulation and diffusion in global politics—has stimulated research on transnational social movements (Tarrow, 2005), political parties abroad (Paarlberg, 2017; Kernalegenn & Van Haute, 2020) and migrant civic associations (Lafleur, 2013).
Considering the growing richness of this field of study as well as its societal-political relevance, this Workshop aims to foster a fruitful scholarly exchange between migration and electoral studies researchers working on transnational political engagement. We are particularly interested in bringing together case-studies, comparative analyses and conceptual papers that explicitly discuss one of the many aspects connected to the diaspora mobilization towards the homeland arena. Situated at the junction of migration studies and core comparative political studies, we consider that a Joint Sessions Workshop on this subject is a timely academic endeavour. The Workshop builds on and expands collaborative work previously initiated in panels organized in the Sections on migration endorsed by the ECPR SG Migration and Ethnicity for the 2020 ECPR General Conference and the 2019 General Conference; as well as different panels on transnational political mobilization organized for the IMISCOE Network (International Migration, Integration and Social Cohesion in Europe). During these events, we have already created a solid and diverse network of senior scholars and early career researchers sharing a genuine interest on diaspora mobilization and homeland politics, who already expressed their interest in participating in an ECPR Workshop on this subject. As the salience of this topic has increased over the last decades, one expected outcome of this Workshop is the publication of a Special Issue on Diaspora Mobilization and Homeland Politics with a high-quality academic publisher. About the co-organizers: Johanna Peltoniemi is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Department of Political and Economic Studies of the University of Helsinki (Finland) and a board member of the Finnish Political Science Association. Peltoniemi is a member of the Finnish National Election Studies research consortium and a migration fellow from the Finnish Institute of Migration. She is an editor of a prize-winning webjournal Politiikasta. She is a country coordinator in V-Dem and country expert in GLOBALCIT. Her research interests focus on transnationalism, emigrant voting behavior and cross-border political representation. Her previous works have been published e.g. in Representation, Journal of Contemporary European Studies, Politiikka, Yhteiskuntapolitiikka and Research on Finnish Society. Sebastián Umpierrez de Reguero is an Associate Researcher at the Universidad Diego Portales (Chile) and Universidad Casa Grande (Ecuador). He is a dual-PhD Candidate in Political Science at Universidad Diego Portales and in Humanities at Leiden Universiteit (Netherlands). His research areas include electoral studies, legislative politics, and transnational migration. Sebastián is a co-author is the book of “Political Parties Abroad: A New Arena of Party Politics” (edited by T. Kernalegenn & É. Van Haute, Routledge, 2020) and has recently published in the Oxford Encyclopaedia of Latin American Politics, Latin American Policy and Latin American Politics and Society. He has organized different panels on Diaspora Politics for the 2020 ECPR General Conference, as well as is an active member of the ECPR SG of Migration and Ethnicity, and the IMISCOE SC on Migration, Citizenship and Political Participation (MIGCITPOL).
Papers will be avaliable once proposal and review has been completed.