Written by Andrés Reséndiz and translated by Socorro M. Torres Lopez
The Center for Research on North America at the National Autonomous University of Mexico inaugurated a new collective project on communication and diaspora diplomacy, cooperating with the Global Research Forum on Diasporas and Transnationalism, India. The PAPIIT IN 302324 project, “Communication and diaspora diplomacy. Perspectives from the contexts of reception in the Americas, Europe, and Asia”, counts with the support of DGAPA and will have a monthly seminar on diaspora diplomacy, with alternating sessions in English and Spanish.
On Monday, January 29th, 2024, the inaugural conference of the aforementioned project was presented by Prof. Antonio Alejo from the University of Granada. This was the first in a series of conferences that will permit us to reflect upon the importance of the topic, which will bring together specialists on the subject from different latitudes, specifically from Mexico and India.
Prof. Antonio Alejo emphasized the need to think about the concept of alternative diplomacies beyond the international sphere, where the nation-state is the predominant agent. However, there exists a non-state-centric agency with relevance in our contemporary reality that has epistemic, political, and ideological implications. Prof. Alejo urged looking at the concept from global studies, thus, parting from this perspective, “the study of diaspora diplomacy counts with a relevant development for the study of policy analysis and the institutional frameworks of states in the face of the processes and the challenges of migrants”.
In this sense, diasporas are instrumentally situated as strategic recourses to strengthen negotiations and presence between countries of origin, transit, and destination because they are thought of as subjects that form a part of a nation-state, and the challenge is to question whether these frameworks are sufficient to comprehend diasporas/migrants.
Making this reflection, the question arises, how do we rethink diplomacy in the face of contemporary human mobilities? To this question, Dr. Alejo considers that it is important to think about diplomacy not in a traditional sense, whose origin is the Treaty of Westphalia, but rather to approach it from critical perspectives that allow the concept to be approached from alternative perspectives because the traditional perspective implicitly entails a naturalization of hierarchies between states that leads to the exercise of disproportionate power even through peaceful mechanisms.
Among critical studies on diplomacy, authors such as Costas Constantinou, Sam Opondo, Jason Dittmer, and Fiona McConnell stand out, who work on issues of minorities, indigenous rights, and the limits of diplomacy.
One of the fundamental concepts in critical studies is that of Nomadic Thought, where the works of Braidotti and Levin stand out, who think of this category beyond a permanent stage of humanity, but rather as a distinct possibility of human coexistence in a contemporary environment of the nation-state. This category paves the way for thinking about other categories proposed by Ulrich Beck and Saskia Sassen, such as deterritorialization and methodological nationalism to analyze the processes, think about subjects beyond the nation-state and complexify who these lives in ductile movements are.
Dr. Alejo articulates the category of Nomadic Thought, with others such as translocality, multiple belongings, old and new diasporas (spatial), and permanent virtual connections (temporal), to analyze two contemporary phenomena in a more concrete or empirical way: The new American diaspora of the United States, and the Nova Galician diaspora from the United Kingdom. These two examples show the construction of new diasporas through lives in ductile movement that in turn transform their environment. Under this context, Dr. Alejo carried out an analysis of transnational dynamics using as an example the life of Eduardo Verástegui and migrant congressman Raúl Torres who coincide in nativist thought.
To close the conference the Dr. leaves the question of how nativism impacts diplomacy through conservative narratives and how it is reconfigured and in turn, makes sense to think about it in terms of who it serves and what it serves for. With this, diaspora diplomacy makes sense as a way to understand our global environment and the dynamics of plural mobility. Questions that remain open to be discussed in the next sessions of this seminar and this project.
Andrés Reséndiz is a PhD in Social and Political Sciences at UNAM, member of the PAPIIT IN302324 project, “Communication and diaspora diplomacy. Perspectives from the contexts of reception in the Americas, Europe, and Asia”, coordinated by Camelia Tigau.
Translated by Socorro M. Torres Lopez, Fulbright García-Robles grantee in the Mexico-United States Studies Master’s program at UNAM, member of the same PAPIIT project. Contact papiit302324@unam.mx