Free Movement and the Specter of Perpetual Return

• In Event: Diaspora Politics: Transnationalism from Above and from Below

Abstract

A specter is haunting Europe – the specter of perpetual return. As European citizenship has enabled free movement of people within the European Union’s borders, millions of Central and Eastern Europeans have crossed borders for economic and political reasons without having to become politically uprooted from their countries of origin. This has produced a context in which average citizens work abroad partially or fully disconnecting from the national economy, while remaining politically connected with their homelands. Nationals abroad demand political incorporation and sometimes leverage their transnational lifestyle to amplify their voice (diaspora voting, coordinated protests in several countries, homecoming and convergence on protest venues etc.). Government institutions and political parties have to adapt to citizens’ being no longer physically present on national territory, yet eager to maintain voice at home. This paper examines the interactions of transnationalism from below and transnationalism from above, which I refer to as the politics of mobility. This paper reveals how states and political parties seek to incorporate, shape, or silence intra-EU movers’ political voice at home, by legitimizing their input as a political actor or excluding them from the diaspora. Outcomes reflect the interplay between the histories of migration and past top-down transnational political engagement (structure, institutions) with contemporary political agendas (strategies). I identify three main strategies: direct (Romania), disrupt (Poland), and deny (Hungary), and examine the ways in which they have influenced intra-EU migrants’ ability to play a political role as citizens and diaspora members in the last decade.

Author

• Ruxandra Paul, Amherst College