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This article examines 'diasporic geopolitics' as a significant factor in the future of global politics. Whereas discussions of global order in IR have been highly spatialised, we instead highlight the extent to which different regions of the world are entangled via ongoing migration processes, and their legacies in the form of global diasporas. We examine the significance of these interconnections by focusing on rising powers and their relations with the existing international order. Major migration-sending states such as China, India, and Turkey are now aspiring great powers that seek to exert global influence in international affairs. In this context, their diaspora governance policies are also undergoing a transformation, with diasporas increasingly understood as important assets for promoting sending states' geopolitical agendas and great power ambitions. We examine three mechanisms by which such states exert power transnationally via their diaspora engagement policies. States can treat 'their' diasporas as economic assets that facilitate trade and foreign investment; as soft power assets that contribute to the promotion of 'civilisational' politics; and as diplomatic assets that can be strategically mobilised or repressed. We conclude by discussing the implications for thinking about the nature of global order and power politics in the coming 50 years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article introduces and lays out a conflict assemblage framework for understanding the political geography of globalized civil wars. It suggests the utility of conceptualizing Turkey's Kurdish conflict as an assemblage in which networked actors use multi-scalar strategies as part of their overall conflict strategy. Insurgent organizations such as the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) operate at various scales beyond the national—including local, regional, transnational, and global—and in so doing utilize political opportunities and mobilize resources that are embedded in different locales. In the Kurdish case, disparate sites such as Diyarbakir, Marseille, Istanbul, London, New York, and Kobane become tied together within a single conflict assemblage that transcends geographical boundaries. An assemblage approach to violent conflict is a form of ontological theorizing that highlights this spatial and political complexity. By treating violent conflicts as assemblages with their own symbolic boundaries, political dynamics, internal governance structures, and strategic logics, we gain a better understanding of the contours and dynamics of globalized civil wars. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article develops the concept of 'entangled migration states' as a means of highlighting the centrality of migration governance to state-building processes, the constitution of state sovereignty, and interstate relations. Drawing on the example of France and Algeria, it demonstrates the key role that migration played in three phases of state-building: the colonial period of Algérie française; the Algerian nationalist independence movement; and postcolonial state-building. In the case of France and Algeria, at least three actors constructed and instrumentalised migration and mobility regimes as sources of power and control – the French imperial state; the non-state Algerian independence movement; and the newly sovereign postcolonial Algerian state. A focus on the entangled nature of migration management allows for a deeper historicisation of contemporary migration regimes and draws attention to the central role played by migration diplomacy and transnational governmentality in contemporary migration management regimes, thus calling into question some of the spatial assumptions undergirding the 'migration state' concept. The article traces the evolution of mobility patterns and control in the Franco-Algerian case; their relationship to state-building processes; and the implications for rethinking the 'migration state'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay (re-) introduces the concept of the migration state and its significance for migration studies in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, discussing its intellectual history and relationship to Hollifield's wider body of work. The authors lay out the main features of the ideal-typical liberal democratic migration state before discussing the extent to which it can be used to describe and theorise a wider variety of migration states, paying attention to the particularities of state development across different cases and regions, but also looking forward to how imperial and colonial legacies may shape future state responses to managing migration and mobility. Drawing on the individual contributions to this special issue, we suggest three theoretical and conceptual moves that can enrich our understanding of contemporary migration states: historicisation, decolonisation, and disaggregation. We discuss how the articles in this special issue engage with the migration state concept in ways that incorporate developments in migration studies over the past twenty years, using the concept to push the field in new temporal and comparative directions that open up the possibility of a more global approach to understanding migration. The essay concludes by looking at the future of the migration state and suggests areas for further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Policy actors engaged in migration governance operate in complex environments characterised by spatial entanglements that bring together different levels and jurisdictions. While "levels‐of‐analysis" and multi‐level governance (MLG) frameworks capture some of this complexity, they undertheorise the extent to which migration and mobility are both causes and consequences of other forms of spatial entanglement. This article sets forth an "entangled" approach to migration governance and applies it to the Turkish case. It discusses how historical legacies and regional ties produce enduring cross‐border connections, examining diaspora engagement policies; migration diplomacy; and conflict and security in Turkey through the lens of entangled migration governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Diaspora politics has been celebrated as a form of transnationalism that can potentially challenge authoritarian regimes. Arguably, opposition groups and political activists can mobilize beyond the territorial limits of the state, thus bypassing some of the constraints to political organization found in authoritarian states. The literature on transnational and extraterritorial repression complicates this model, for it shows that states can use strategies of 'long‐distance authoritarianism' to monitor, intimidate and harass diasporic populations abroad. Yet, non‐state actors in the diaspora also sometimes use such repressive strategies to mobilize internally, gain hegemony within the diaspora, and marginalize or eliminate internal rivals. This raises the question of whether such activities can be understood as non‐state forms of authoritarianism. Cases of diasporic politics pertaining to Turkey and Sri Lanka are briefly explored with a view to examining how state and non‐state forms of transnational repression can, under some conditions, result in the dynamics of competitive authoritarianism within a diaspora. In such cases, 'ordinary' members of the diaspora may become caught between multiple forms of transnational repression in addition to potentially experiencing marginalization and securitization in their new home. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Academic and policy debates on migration and refugee "crises" across the world have yet to engage fully with the importance of cross border population mobility for states' diplomatic strategies. This article sets forth the concept of "migration diplomacy" as an object of analysis for academics and practitioners alike, distinguishing it from other forms of migration-related policies and practices. It draws on realist approaches in international relations to identify how the interests and power of state actors are affected by their position in migration systems, namely the extent to which they are migration-sending, migration-receiving, or transit states. The article then discusses how migration issues connect with other areas of state interest and diplomacy, including security interests, economic interests and issues of identity, soft power, and public diplomacy. Finally, the article suggests the utility of applying a rationalist framework based on states' interests in absolute versus relative gains as a means of examining the bargaining strategies used by states in instances of migration diplomacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The multiple politics and identities of many contemporary diasporic configurations raise a number of important conceptual issues for the study of diaspora politics, including what counts as a "diaspora," how do particular "diasporas" emerge, and what shapes their politics? This article discusses conceptual and substantive splits in the burgeoning social science literature on diasporas and suggests the value of analyzing the politics and policies of sending states as crucial factors in both "diaspora-shaping" and "diaspora-generating" processes. It presents an extended case study of the emergence of diaspora groups connected with contemporary Turkey, situating Turkey's "New Diaspora Policy" in its historical context. The article concludes by suggesting that the proposed framework allows for a deeper theorization of the relationship between identity categories and political action, thus shedding light on the conceptual puzzle of what constitutes a diaspora. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The structural components of a state are regularly conflated with a state's national identity. In reality, however, the assumption that the boundaries of a state and its national identity are coterminous is problematic. While this has always been the case, changes in the ability of actors in the international system to use communication and transportation technologies to sustain transnational collective identities points to the need for new empirical research in this area. Contemporary diasporas are defined by a national or cultural identity, yet differ from nation-states in terms of their organizational and spatial logics. By comparing diaspora mobilization in two cases, we find that both non-state political entrepreneurs and state elites are using diasporic practices of identity formation as a means of generating economic and political support in an increasingly integrated global economy. This points to discontinuities between a territorially defined states system and deterritorialized practices of collective identity formation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]