We Need Your Help: Mobilization by West African Diasporas in Response to Ebola

• In Event: 156 - Section on Global and Transnational Sociology Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 06. Health, Medicine, and Global Networks

Abstract

The 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa was an unprecedented public health disaster. Among those who stepped forward to help respond to the outbreak were members of the global diasporas of the most affected countries, those who reside elsewhere but identify themselves as Guineans, Liberians, or Sierra Leoneans and retain a connection to those countries. In this paper, I use real-time data on conversations among and about the Sierra Leonean diasporas, along with archival data from diaspora organizations and retrospective interviews with activists and key informants, to explore the process by which diaspora Sierra Leoneans mobilized to fight Ebola. I find that diaspora groups contributed to the response to Ebola in varied ways, ranging from public awareness and lobbying to recruiting skilled professionals to work on the ground in Sierra Leone. Members of the diaspora often collaborated with and supported efforts by more traditional humanitarian actors. I highlight three sources of resilience leveraged by the Sierra Leonean diaspora in their effort to mobilize against Ebola: a shared collective imaginary about the civil war of the 1990s, specifically narratives of having overcome the war as evidence of the country’s resilience; positive emotions, especially hope, as a way to combat a pervading sense of helplessness and despair; and a shared and inclusive (trans)national identity. This paper makes important contributions to the sociological literature on disaster, resilience, and social mobilization, and to the literature on transnational diaspora communities. It also yields practical lessons for future humanitarian disasters, diaspora initiatives, and non-diaspora social movements.

Author

• Ryann Manning, Harvard University