ABSTRACT
Chapter 2 draws on the existing literature on home state–emigrant relations. Although previous studies on transnationalism and diasporas have received noteworthy scholarly interest over the last three decades, the study on home state involvement in emigrant affairs is relatively new and flourishing. There is a recurrent debate as to whether the states’ increased involvement is purely strategic, with an attempt to benefit from their emigrants in terms of social, economic or political affairs, or represent expansion in the citizenship configurations of sovereign states. The chapter first provides a review of the existing literature on transnationalism and diaspora studies, then moves to the scholarship on emigrant engagement policies and attempts to make bridges across the literature on state policies and migrant politics. It suggests that while the emigrant engagement policies aim to create increased linkages between home state and emigrants, they do not exist within a politically neutral environment, and are determined by how core principles of democratic participation and representation were constructed and applied.
