Becoming Diaspora. How the host and origin countries influence migrants' activism in aid and development: a comparative perspective

This article supports the idea that there are factors that stimulate the transition from the status of migrants to the one of diaspora. These factors are responsible for triggering a process that, time after time, leads migrants to become diaspora and engage in the origin countries to bring change through aid and development projects. What are these factors? This article suggests to consider the convergence of two distinct dimensions that positively affect the transition from migrants to diaspora. These are: the attitudes of host countries vis-à-vis the migration phenomenon, including the recognition of migrants as potential development actors, institutional structures and opportunities to support diaspora activism (contextual factors); secondly, the sudden eruption of a crises that, in the origin country, solicit diaspora engagement in helping fellow nationals (situational factors). Using a comparative analysis, this article argues that the convergence of contextual factors in the host societies and situational factors in the migrants’ origin countries at a certain time in history deeply influence the attitude to activism in aid and development by migrants as individuals and as groups. The article brings narratives from three cases: the Malian diaspora in France, where both factors occur, generating a high level of constant diaspora engagement in Mali; the Libyan diaspora in the UK, where the support of institutional structures to Libyans exists, though at a slower pace, and the fall of the Geddafi’s regime in 2011 prompted the reaction of Libyan diaspora, apparently limited to the initial phase of the humanitarian crises; the Afghan diaspora in Europe whose engagement in aid and development is hindered by the absence of a specific institutional support in the host countries and by the lack of a specific triggering situational factor in Afghanistan.