Urbanities,
Vol. 3
·
No 2
·
November 2013
© 2013
Urbanities
53
into Norwegian society and why a fairly clear divide remains between the dominant majority and
ethnically- and racially-defined minorities (immigrants). On the other hand, alongside integration
processes within society, present-day migration is viewed in theoretical literature as a
quantitatively and qualitatively new phenomenon. Multi-stranded ties created by contemporary
migrants exceed the boundaries of a single state. Transnationalism holds that the aim of
contemporary (im)migrants is not to integrate themselves into a new society, but to do the
opposite by preserving and maintaining ties with their country of origin.
Immigrants, Migrants, Transmigrants and Deterritorialised Belonging
.
Contemporary transnationalism
7
studies are based on research which stresses that present-day
migrants traverse the boundaries of one national state and simultaneously participate in several
national realities (Coutin 2006: 326). The notion of immigrants previously embraced in social
science circles was criticised by the transnationalism camp because it primarily referred to people
who arrive in another country after abandoning ties with their country of origin, create a home in
the new country and adapt to the society (Basch et al. 1994: 3-4). On the other hand, the migrant
notion primarily refers to people who temporarily stay in a new country to earn money and then
return home after a certain period of time (Basch et al. 1994: 4). In reality, however, both these
notions proved ineffective for addressing contemporary migration processes. Present-day
(im)migrants maintain ties, patterns of life and ideologies that traverse the boundaries of one or
several states. The concept of the transmigrant entered the scene to describe (im)migrants who
become part of a new society without abandoning ties with the previous one. This concept seeks
to show that existing theories on migration, usually based on an evolutionary model that sees
migrants as integrating into the new society and eventually becoming fully assimilated (see
Brettell 2000, Eriksen 2007: 179), fail to explain how present-day (im)migrants are able to retain
multi-stranded ties with several societies simultaneously against a backdrop of globalisation.
This transmigrant concept stands in sharp contrast with the diaspora notion, which has hitherto
been popular in the social science arena for describing ‘a permanent state of emergency, an
unfulfilled need for rootedness, insularity […] in an alien context and severed links’ (Eriksen
2007: 177-178). The concept of transnationalism refers, in contrast, to dynamic and changing
identities, and, let me reiterate, to creative and selective integration in a host country while
7
This article does not endeavour to present an exhaustive analysis of the transnationalism paradigm and
its evolution. In its broadest sense, here transnationalism is understood along the lines of the definition
given by Basch
et al
: ‘We define “transnationalism” as the processes by which immigrants forge and
sustain multi-stranded social relations that link together their societies of origin and settlement. We
call these processes transnationalism to emphasise that many immigrants today build social fields that
cross geographic, cultural, and political borders [...]. An essential element of transnationalism is the
multiplicity of involvements that transmigrants’ sustain in both home and host societies’ (Basch et al.
1994: 7).
