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Transnationalism is a research field and social phenomenon grown out of the heightened interconnectivity between people and the receding economic and social significance of boundaries among nation states. [1] [2] [3] [4]
The term "trans-national" was popularized in the early 20th century by writer Randolph Bourne to describe a new way of thinking about relationships between cultures. [5] However, the term itself was coined by a colleague in college. [6] Merriam-Webster Dictionary states 1921 was the year the term "transnational" was first used in print, which was after Bourne's death. [7]
Transnationalism as an economic process involves the global reorganization of the production process, in which various stages of the production of any product can occur in various countries, typically with the aim of minimizing costs. Economic transnationalism, commonly known as globalization, was spurred in the latter half of the 20th century by the development of the internet and wireless communication, as well as the reduction in global transportation costs caused by containerization. Multinational corporations could be seen as a form of transnationalism, in that they seek to minimize costs, and hence maximize profits, by organizing their operations in the most efficient means possible irrespective of political boundaries.
Proponents of transnational capitalism seek to facilitate the flow of people, ideas, and goods among regions. They believe that it has increasing relevance with the rapid growth of capitalist globalization. They contend that it does not make sense to link specific nation-state boundaries with for instance migratory workforces, globalized corporations, global money flow, global information flow, and global scientific cooperation. However, critical theories of transnationalism have argued that transnational capitalism has occurred through the increasing monopolization and centralization of capital by leading dominant groups in the global economy and various power blocs. Scholars critical of global capitalism (and its global ecological and inequality crises) have argued instead for a transnationalism from below between workers and co-operatives as well as popular social and political movements. [8]
Transnationalism as concept, theory and experience has nourished an important literature in social sciences. In practice transnationalism refers to increasing functional integration of processes that cross-borders or according to others trans bordered relations of individuals, groups, firms and to mobilizations beyond state boundaries. Individuals, groups, institutions and states interact with each other in a new global space where cultural and political characteristic of national societies are combined with emerging multilevel and multinational activities. Transnationalism is a part of the process of capitalist globalization. The concept of transnationalism refers to multiple links and interactions linking people and institutions across the borders of nation-states. Although much of the more recent literature has focused on popular protest as a form of transnational activism, some research has also drawn attention to clandestine and criminal networks, as well as foreign fighters, as examples of a wider form of transnationalism. [9]
Some have argued that diasporas, such as the overseas Chinese, are a historical precursor to modern transnationalism. However, unlike some people with transnationalist lives, most diasporas have not been voluntary. The field of diaspora politics does consider modern diasporas as having the potential to be transnational political actors and be influenced by transnational political forces. [10] While the term "transnationalism" emphasizes the ways in which nations are no longer able to contain or control the disputes and negotiations through which social groups annex a global dimension to their meaningful practices, the notion of diaspora brings to the fore the racial dynamics underlying the international division of labor and the economic turmoil of global capital. In an article published in 2006, Asale Angel-Ajani claimed that "there is the possibility within diaspora studies to move away from the politically sanitized discourse that surrounds transnational studies". Since African diaspora studies have focused on racial formation, racism, and white supremacy, diaspora theory has the potential to bring to transnationalism "a varied political, if not radical political, perspective to the study of transnational processes and—globalization". [11]
Different approaches have attempted to explain transnationalism. Some argue that it is driven mainly by the development of technologies that have made transportation and communication more accessible and affordable, which thus dramatically change the relationship between people and places. It is now possible for immigrants to maintain closer and more frequent contact with their home societies than ever before.
However, the integration of international migrations to the demographic future of many developed countries is another important driver for transnationalism. Beyond simply filling a demand for low-wage workers, migration also fills the demographic gaps created by declining natural populations in most industrialized countries. Today, migration accounts for three fifths of population growth on western countries as a whole, a trend that shows no signs of slowing down.
Moreover, global political transformations and new international legal regimes have weakened the state as the only legitimate source of rights. Decolonization, the fall of communism, and the ascendance of human rights have forced states to take account of persons as persons, rather than as citizens. As a result, individuals have rights regardless of their citizenship status within a country.
Others, from a neo-Marxist approach, argue that transnational class relations have come about concomitantly with novel organizational and technological advancements and the spread of transnational chains of production and finance. [12]
When immigrants engage in transnational activities, they create "social fields" that link their original country with their new country or countries of residence. "We have defined transnationalism as the process by which immigrants build social fields that link together their country of origin and their country of settlement". [13] These social fields are the product of a series of interconnected and overlapping economic, political, and socio-cultural activities:
Economic transnational activities such as business investments in home countries and monetary remittances are both pervasive and well documented. The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) estimates that in 2006 immigrants living in developed countries sent home the equivalent of $300 billion in remittances, an amount more than double the level of international aid. This intense influx of resources may mean that for some nations development prospects become inextricably linked—if not dependent upon—the economic activities of their respective diasporas.
Political transnational activities can range from retained membership in political parties in one's country of origin and voting in its elections to even running for political office. Less formal but still significant roles include the transfer or dissemination of political ideas and norms, such as publishing an op-ed in a home country newspaper, writing a blog, or lobbying a local elected official. There is also the more extreme example of individuals such as Jesus Galvis, a travel agent in New Jersey who in 1997 ran for a Senate seat in his native Colombia. He was elected and intended to hold office simultaneously in Bogota and Hackensack, New Jersey where he served as a city councilor.
The rise of global capitalism has occurred through a novel and increasingly functional integration of capitalist chains of production and finance across borders which is tied to the formation of a transnational capitalist class. [8] [14] This approach has led to a broader study of corporate networks, the global working class [15] and the transnationalization of state apparatuses and elites. [16] [17]
Transnational psychology developed in response to the new psychological contexts created by escalating globalization, global power dynamics, increasing migration, an ever more interconnected world, and other phenomena that transcend nation-state boundaries. It is a branch of psychology that applies postcolonial, postmodern context-sensitive cultural psychology, and transnational feminist lenses to the field of psychology to study, understand, and address the impact of colonization, imperialism, and globalization, and to counter the Western bias in the field of psychology. Transnational psychologists partner with members of local communities to examine the unique psychological characteristics of groups without regard to nation-state boundaries. [18] [19] [20]
Transnationalism is an analytic lens used to understand immigrant and minority populations as a meeting of multiple simultaneous histories. [21] Socio-cultural transnational activities cover a wide array of social and cultural transactions through which ideas and meanings are exchanged. Recent research has established the concept and importance of social remittances which provide a distinct form of social capital between migrants living abroad and those who remain at home. [2] These transfers of socio-cultural meanings and practices occur either during the increased number of visits that immigrants take back to their home countries or visits made by non-migrants to friends and families living in the receiving countries or through the dramatically increased forms of correspondence such as emails, online chat sessions, telephone calls, CDs/ VDOs, and traditional letters.
In the late 1980s, ethnic studies scholars would largely move towards models of diaspora to understand immigrant communities in relation to area studies, although lone patterns of international flow would become accompanied by the multiple flows of transnationalism. [22] However, to say that immigrants build social fields that link those abroad with those back home is not to say that their lives are not firmly rooted in a particular place and time. Indeed, they are as much residents of their new community as anyone else.
Transnationalism is criticized for being too far removed from ethnic studies' efforts to empower solidarity in minority communities. [23] [24] Asian American Studies provides a counterargument in that its inception was based in comparative analysis of the racial discrimination against Asian Americans and Vietnamese during the Vietnam War. [25] A collection of scholarly articles, edited by Terese Guinsatao Monberg and Morris Young, seeks to understand how transnationalism reveals ways Asian/Americans "negotiate, resist, and work against emerging, shifting, and often intensified 'highly asymmetrical relations of power.'" [26] Furthermore, inter-movement spillover plays an important role in transnational climate change politics. Based on these findings, one can conclude that when movements come together in the form of actors and social change tactics, movements become stronger and more prominent. This is the purpose and overall effect of inter-movement spillover.
Transnationalism has significant implications for the way we conceptualize immigration. Traditionally, immigration has been seen as an autonomous process, driven by conditions such as poverty and overpopulation in the country of origin and unrelated to conditions (such as foreign policy and economic needs) in the receiving country. Even though overpopulation, economic stagnation, and poverty all continue to create pressures for migration, they alone are not enough to produce large international migration flows. There are many countries, for example, which lack significant emigration history despite longstanding poverty. Also, most international immigration flows from the global South to the global North are not made up by the poorest of the poor, but, generally by professionals. In addition, there are countries with high levels of job creation that continue to witness emigration on a large scale.
The reasons and promoters for migration are not only embodied within the country of origin. Instead, they are rooted within the broader geopolitical and global dynamics. Significant evidence of geographic migration patterns suggests that receiving countries become home to immigrants from the receiving country's zone of influence. Then, immigration is but a fundamental component of the process of capitalist expansion, market penetration, and globalization. There are systematic and structural relations between globalization and immigration.
The emergence of a global economy has contributed both to the creation of potential emigrants abroad and to the formation of economic, cultural, and ideological links between industrialized and developing countries that later serve as bridges for the international migration. For example, the same set of circumstances and processes that have promoted the location of factories and offices abroad have also contributed to the creation of large supply of low-wage jobs for which immigrant workers constitute a desirable labor supply. Moreover, the decline of manufacturing jobs and the growth of the service sector, key drivers of the globalization of production, have transformed western economies’ occupational and income structure.
Unlike the manufacturing sector, which traditionally supplied middle-income jobs and competitive benefits, the majority of service jobs are either extremely well-paid or extremely poorly paid, with relatively few jobs in the middle-income range. Many of the jobs lack key benefits such as health insurance. Sales representatives, restaurant wait staff, administrative assistants, and custodial workers are among the growth occupations.
Finally, the fact that the major growth sectors rather than declining sectors are generating the most low-wage jobs shows that the supply of such jobs will continue to increase for the predictable future. The entry of migrant workers will similarly continue to meet the demand. In turn, this inflow provides the raw material out of which transnational communities emerge. [27]
Transnational organizations include: [28]
A diaspora is a population that is scattered across regions which are separate from its geographic place of origin. The word is used in reference to people who identify with a specific geographic location, but currently reside elsewhere.
Human migration is the movement of people from one place to another with intentions of settling, permanently or temporarily, at a new location.
In politics, dual loyalty is loyalty to two separate interests that potentially conflict with each other, leading to a conflict of interest.
World-systems theory is a multidisciplinary approach to world history and social change which emphasizes the world-system as the primary unit of social analysis.
Transnational feminism refers to both a contemporary feminist paradigm and the corresponding activist movement. Both the theories and activist practices are concerned with how globalization and capitalism affect people across nations, races, genders, classes, and sexualities. This movement asks to critique the ideologies of traditional white, classist, western models of feminist practices from an intersectional approach and how these connect with labor, theoretical applications, and analytical practice on a geopolitical scale.
Mixtec transnational migration is the phenomenon in which Mixtec people have migrated between Mexico and the United States for over three generations.
Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not usual residents or where they do not possess nationality in order to settle as permanent residents. Commuters, tourists, and other short-term stays in a destination country do not fall under the definition of immigration or migration; seasonal labour immigration is sometimes included, however.
The sociology of immigration involves the sociological analysis of immigration, particularly with respect to race and ethnicity, social structure, and political policy. Important concepts include assimilation, enculturation, marginalization, multiculturalism, postcolonialism, transnationalism and social cohesion.
Transnational citizenship is a political concept which would redefine traditional notions of citizenship and replaces an individual's singular national loyalties with the ability to belong to multiple nation states, as made visible in the political, cultural, social and economic realms. Unlike national citizenship, where individuals interact in such capacities with one sovereign state, transnational citizenship transcends pre-established territorial boundaries in order to create a modern meaning of "belonging" in an increasingly globalized society. Additionally, while preconceived notions of citizenship are often divided between national, social and individual forms of identity, all three categories serve to contribute to the meaning of transnational citizenship. State citizenship can be defined as an individual establishing their sense of belonging by espousing to the liberal-democratic values of the state in the public sphere. When applied to transnational citizenship, an individual would have the opportunity to be civically engaged in multiple societies.
Ethiopian Americans are Americans of Ethiopian descent, as well as individuals of American and Ethiopian ancestry. The largest Ethiopian American community is in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, with some estimates claiming a population of over 200,000 in the area; other large Ethiopian communities are found in Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Las Vegas, Seattle–Tacoma–Bellevue, Denver, the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, Columbus, and South Dakota.
Arif Dirlik was a Turkish-American historian who published on historiography and political ideology in modern China, as well as issues in modernity, globalization, and postcolonial criticism. Dirlik received a BSc in Electrical Engineering at Robert College, Istanbul in 1964 and a PhD in History at the University of Rochester in 1973.
Reverse brain drain is a form of brain drain where human capital moves in reverse from a more developed country to a less developed country that is developing rapidly. These migrants may accumulate savings, also known as remittances, and develop skills overseas that can be used in their home country.
Brain circulation is the circular movement of skilled labour across nations.
The transnational capitalist class (TCC), also known as the transnational capitalist network (TCN), in neo-Gramscian and Marxian-influenced analyses of international political economy and globalization, is the global social stratum that controls supranational instruments of the global economy such as transnational corporations and heavily influences political organs such as the World Trade Organization.
Return migration refers to the individual or family decision of a migrant to leave a host country and to return permanently to the country of origin. Research topics include the return migration process, motivations for returning, the experiences returnees encounter, and the impacts of return migration on both the host and the home countries.
The study of global communication is an interdisciplinary field focusing on global communication, or the ways that people connect, share, relate and mobilize across geographic, political, economic, social and cultural divides. Global communication implies a transfer of knowledge and ideas from centers of power to peripheries and the imposition of a new intercultural hegemony by means of the "soft power" of global news and entertainment.
A neo/new diaspora is the displacement, migration, and dispersion of individuals away from their homelands by forces such as globalization, neoliberalism, and imperialism. Such forces create economic, social, political, and cultural difficulties for individuals in their homeland that forces them to displace and migrate.
Transmigrant is a term, greatly developed by the work of Nina Glick Schiller, which is used to describe mobile subjects that create and sustain multiple social relations that link together their societies of origin and residence. These mobile subjects are now viewed as transnational migrants or transmigrants to distinguish them from migrants and immigrants.
Aihwa Ong is a professor of anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley, a member of the Science Council of the International Panel on Social Progress, and a former recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship for the study of sovereignty and citizenship. She is well known for her interdisciplinary approach in investigations of globalization, modernity, and citizenship from Southeast Asia and China to the Pacific Northwest of the United States. Her notions of 'flexible citizenship', 'graduated sovereignty,' and 'global assemblages' have widely impacted conceptions of the global in modernity across the social sciences and humanities. She is specifically interested in the connection and links between an array of social sciences such as; sociocultural anthropology, urban studies, and science and technology studies, as well as medicine and the arts.
Global apartheid is a term used to describe how Global North countries are engaged in a project of "racialization, segregation, political intervention, mobility controls, capitalist plunder, and labor exploitation" affecting people from the Global South. Proponents of the concept argue that a close examination of the global system reveals it to be a kind of apartheid writ large with striking resemblance to the system of racial segregation in South Africa from 1948 to 1994, but based on borders and national sovereignty.
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