Nation Within and Beyond: Changing Boundaries of Membership and Belonging in Finnish Diaspora Engagement Policy

This paper examines how membership and belonging in the Finnish diaspora have been constructed in the past two decades. Diaspora engagement policies have gained increasing attention in migration governance and development, with many states now actively reaching out to their diasporic populations for purposes ranging from the social and economic development of the homeland to the promotion of cultural exchange and the reinforcement of national identity. Diaspora is commonly defined as a population dispersed outside its original homeland and understood through shared cultural, ethnic or national identity. Beyond describing state actions and aspirations, diaspora policies are therefore particularly significant in shaping, expressing, and reinforcing narratives of the nation that operate both within and beyond state borders. This spatial dynamic becomes particularly salient in contexts where populations of nation-states, and consequently emigration flows, are increasingly diverse, thus challenging normative conceptions of both the diaspora and the nation. Building on this observation, this paper analyzes how the Finnish diaspora has been discursively constructed and how representations of diaspora membership have evolved alongside shifting articulations of Finnish nationhood and national identity. Finland offers an illustrative case study due to its long history of emigration and its more recent transition into a country of immigration. Introduced in the 2000s, Finland's diaspora policy has framed the global Finnish community (including both Finnish citizens and individuals with Finnish background) as a valuable resource for the country’s social and economic development. Simultaneously, Finland has witnessed a notable shift away from longstanding assumptions of cultural and ethnic homogeneity towards a greater recognition of diversity, prompting renewed debated over the boundaries of Finnish national identity. Drawing on a qualitative analysis of the Finnish diaspora policy documents from 2006 to 2026, the paper demonstrates how Finland's increasing societal and ethnic diversity and evolving understandings on nationhood are reflected within the diaspora engagement policy. While policy discourses increasingly acknowledge change, the diaspora continues to be predominantly framed through the prism of kinship and collective memory, producing simultaneous and at times paradoxical constructions of both the diaspora and the nation. The paper argues that despite Finland’s historical diversity and the growing presence of immigrants and their descendants – including their participation in outward migration from Finland – policymakers face a challenge in integrating a nation in flux into diaspora engagement practices.