Transnational Repression, Diaspora Mobilization, and the Arab Spring

• In Event: 426 - Section on International Migration Paper Session. Immigrant Organizations and the Assimilation/Transnationalism Divide

Abstract

This study draws on theories of transnational advocacy and repression’s effects on mobilization to investigate how Libyan and Syrian anti-regime movements based in the U.S. and Great Britain emerged at the onset of the 2011 Arab revolutions. Scholars assume that diasporas are free to mobilize transnationally from liberal Western states but neglect to analyze the conditions under which movements emerge to challenge illiberal homeland regimes. Based on 144 interviews and ethnographic observations, I find that “transnational repression” impacted Libyan and Syrian co-national relations and suppressed anti-regime mobilization in the diaspora before 2011. At the onset of the Libyan revolution, the regime’s annihilative retribution shocked diasporans into “coming out” immediately to protest and form advocacy organizations. The Syrian’s slow-motion revolution produced variegated moral shocks that converted sympathizers to a pro-revolution stance over time, but because repressive threats increased for diasporans at the revolution’s onset, this forced activists to engage in “guarded advocacy.” Homeland repression did not produce public anti-authoritarian mobilization until the scale of violence at home made closeted advocacy morally reprehensible. The implications for understanding transnational mobilization and the practice of citizenship are discussed.

Author

• Dana M. Moss, University of California-Irvine