Globalisation can no longer be thought of as a term that merely describes the practical, political and procedural networking of capital, commodities and consumers. Working reflexively it networks people, who use the physical, electronic and psychological networks set up to serve the interests of global commerce to travel from one locale to another. Like the cheap frocks, fridges or foodstuffs globalisation has weaned society to expect, these people are a ubiquitous source of labour, prepared to work in our factories and in our fields, servicing our hotel rooms, cleaning our homes and teaching our children. Yet despite this little is known about the lives of international migrants in the UK from their own perspectives, and there is relatively little social research (educational) with which to contextualise the migration statistics or evaluate the claims of the British press. This thesis starts by discussing the impacts of rising international migration on a place, Nottingham. It moves forward to discuss the relationship between UK society, globalisation and international migration to explore the idea that globalisation is reflexive, and that people are able to use what Appadurai (1996) terms the scapes of globalisation to network themselves from poorer regions of the world toward regions where they will experience higher levels of safety, structure and reward for their labours. Investigating the range of statistical, policy, evaluative and scholarly research relating to international migrants in the UK, this thesis focuses in on the need to ‘get beneath’ the statistics, the reports and the evaluations, to understand international migrants, their lives in Britain and their relationships with UK society and its social structures from their own perspectives. The study, which drew on material from a series of interviews held with 20 international migrants over the course of a year, succeeded in giving ‘voice’ to a set of deeply personal narratives about circumstances, motives, dreams and aspirations that belonged to a group of people who are often spoken of, but rarely heard; those living the ‘silenced lives’ (LeCompte, 1993) of the ‘hard to reach’. The study found that reflexive globalisation is not a fair and equal process; migrants enter and travel through ‘zones of migration’, which they navigate and negotiate via the differing amounts of agency apportioned to them by the UK State on the basis of their legitimacy within and in relation to a tiered policy of immigration and asylum. Framed by this relationship with the UK State, migrants become agents of this legitimacy, which serves to empower or restrict their abilities to act. Further agency is found in securing paid employment and by ‘diasporic clustering’ rather than integration. The thesis argues that the concept of reflexive globalisation adds to the literature around ‘glocalisation’ and the ‘geography of power’ and that the study itself (in its development of substantive and lasting relationships with a ‘hard to reach sample’) offers practical insights from which other researchers may benefit.

This thesis seeks to conceptualise and mobilise migration resistances as forces of animation through which contemporary forms of EUropean border governance can be productively explored. By following different migration struggles ethnographically, it inquires into their emergence and asks what practices of government and control they reveal. Situated within the academic fields of ‘critical border and migration studies’ and Michel Foucault’s conceptualisations of power, resistance and the art of government, resistance is understood as method. As a set of analytics and catalysts that sets sociopolitical processes and phenomena into frictional motion, resistance is developed as a mode of critical investigation. It is argued that, while always specific and situated, migration struggles form transversal resistances that bring to light particular aspects of the ‘EUropean border dispositif’ which seeks to monitor, regulate and deter certain human mobilities. In a multi-sited ethnography, conducted in diverse borderscapes, heterogeneous struggles are explored. The first study follows the Non-Citizen movement that emerged in Germany and interprets their confrontational and provocative struggle as dissent. The second ethnographic study explores the Boats4People campaign that took place in Italy and Tunisia to protest migrant deaths in the Mediterranean Sea and focuses on their embodied practices of solidarity. The third study follows different individuals and groups in transit into three Greek borderscapes and conceives their attempts of border-subversion and escape as excessive practices. Dissent, solidarity and excess are mobilised and interpreted as three specific but interrelated facets of resistance that collide with and contest manifold diffused border practices and materialisations throughout and beyond EUropean space. Furthermore, it is argued that migration struggles question the community in whose name unbelonging and exclusions are performed. The thesis suggests that these resistances not only expose certain dominant discursive frames through which EUrope becomes continuously reproduced and recognised as united, peaceful and humanitarian, but also draw attention to questions of colonialism and race as well as to the various registers of violence that must always underpin EUrope’s division-creating practices. Through migration struggles, EUrope’s dominant frames and self-conceptions are decentered so that other imaginaries of politics, solidarity and community come to the fore.

From the 1830s to 1917, despair in India drove a small minority into indentureship overseas. These were probably men and women of considerable initiative and extraordinary courage. Their achievements in British Guiana suggest this. Men, women, and children toiled relentlessly on the sugar plantations, while exploiting every conceivable niche to supplement meagre wages. They built a stable family life. They adapted rice and cattle to the plantation environment, thus adumbrating the character of future Indian villages; but they also resisted the injustices of the system. Indians founded villages throughout coastal Guiana, from the late nineteenth-century. In spite of endemic malaria, a hazardous environment requiring elaborate drainage and irrigation, poor sanitation, an undercurrent of Black envy, and the remorseless hostility of the plantocracy and the State to Indian enterpise in rice and cattle, they progressed. Indians adapted their rich material and religious culture, recreating aspects of their ancestral villages. At the hub of their tradition was the family: although most migrated alone, a modified joint-family structure evolved. Their thrift, industry, judicious delegation of family labour, and an exemplary commitment to their families, sustained them in activities which others considered unremunerative. The practice of Hinduism and Islam was costly; it encouraged saving. Cultural security strengthened their self-confidence and sustained effort; it bred a sense of purpose. By the 1920s, rice, cattle, commerce, etc., had spawned an Indian middle class. These set standards for the community: they established an entrepreneurial tradition; their professional achievements undermined Indian indifference to education; some promoted intellectual curiosity; and facilitated Indian participation in organised cricket, the most eloquent manifestation of arrival. The middle class expanded conceptions of attainable goals. But Indian adaptation was shaped profoundly by a resurgence of pride in the achievements of ancient India and the rise of Gandhi. A separate Indian community, differing significantly in their basic assumptions from those of the Blacks, developed in British Guiana. The implications for race relations were already ominous in the 1920s.

This thesis examines the forms of identity which are adopted by individuals who were born in Birmingham with at least one parent who had been born in Northern Ireland or the Republic of Ireland and the processes of identity formation which give life to these identities. This thesis places the identity and experiences of the research population within the context of the Anglo-Irish historical relationship, political situation in Northern Ireland and the events surrounding the 'Birmingham Pub Bombings'. It also positions the group in relation to recent academic debates regarding race, ethnicity and 'dominant group identity'. It is intended that this thesis will represent a contribution to these debates and to the understanding of Irish experience in Britain. The fieldwork phase of the project was conducted in Birmingham and consisted of two distinct, yet overlapping stages. Firstly, a survey of the research population using questionnaires which were distributed to potential respondents by a series of 'gatekeepers'. This provided data and served as a filter to stage two. Secondly, fifteen semi-structured, in-depth qualitative interviews with members of the cohort.

There has been excellent academic research, not only on diaspora, but also on postconflict Bosnia and Herzegovina in regards to transitional justice and peacebuilding. However, the factors that play a role vis-à-vis diaspora mobilization and transitional justice have been explored less. Theorizing has been ad hoc. Thus, the guiding question of this thesis is: How do diaspora utilize the political environments in their hostlands when they mobilize towards issues of transitional justice, in what ways and why? I develop a typological theory of diaspora mobilization, focusing on transitional justice claims, to systematize understanding and to develop midrange level explanations. Four types of diaspora mobilization (engaged, involved, reactive, and inactive) are theorized based on three independent variables: citizenship regimes, collective claims, and the presence or absence of ‘translocalism’ within diaspora communities. In particular, the more open citizenship regimes are, the higher the potential for diaspora mobilization will be. The thesis builds on the idea of translocal communities being an important factor in helping to determine the level of diaspora mobilization, along with the presence of collective claims in relation to transitional justice processes in the post-conflict homeland environment. The study is based on a qualitative research design using a unique two-level comparative lens, focusing on three countries in Europe (Sweden, France, and Germany) as well as four different cities within Bosnia and Herzegovina (Sarajevo, Banja Luka, Prijedor, and Srebrenica). The research methods include semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and process tracing with multi-sited fieldwork. Thus, transnational, translocal, host country, and homeland influences are incorporated into analysis. The study provides comparative rigor to research on diaspora mobilization that is particular and rare. It establishes diaspora as an important actor to consider in transitional justice based efforts and provides a new perspective on the idea of translocalism.

This study addresses how the UK and the Swedish Iraqi diaspora mobilised towards state-building in Iraq following the 2003 US led intervention. It explores why some diaspora mobilised towards state-building processes through institution-building and governance while others through civil society. While the literature has explored diasporic development and peace-building, it has not systematically addressed diaspora mobilisation for state-building. Neither has it paid sufficient attention to the factors that shape diasporic political choices in intervention and conflict settings. My thesis contributes to this body of literature and argues that an overlooked dimension of state-building, is that of civil society. State-building involves top-down approaches of institution-building but also bottom-up approaches of participatory politics that encourage democratic practices. I thus develop a new two-category operationalization of state-building to capture the interventions and transnational fields of different diaspora groups and individuals. My findings show that during different time periods, three factors have shaped the mobilisation of the UK and Swedish Iraqi diaspora towards state-building; diaspora profiles, hostland foreign policies towards the homeland and links to homeland political parties in Iraq. Theoretically these findings demonstrate that diaspora's socio-economic profiles and networks are key to understanding the type of politics that diaspora can engage in. Meanwhile, hostland foreign policies can shape diasporic interventions by creating different relationships with homelands and thus different opportunities for engagement. Furthermore, in divided societies, diaspora connected to homeland political parties, or represented by them, are more likely to be involved in the apparatus of the state, where as those excluded are more likely to engage outside the structures of power through civil society. Finally, my study demonstrates that temporal vii dimensions are crucial for understanding, which factors mattered, when and why. Empirically, this thesis also contributes original knowledge about the UK and Swedish Iraqi diaspora. It sheds new light into the myriad ways that diaspora in these two countries have been attempting to rebuild the country after the 2003 intervention by illustrating their efforts and experiences, and how it has informed their current relationship to Iraq.

This study analyses transnationalism across the borders of Brazil and Paraguay. In particular, my interest regards the everyday practices and representation of Brasiguaios, a term commonly used to refer to those living in the Brazilian and Paraguayan border region. Whilst the well-established field of transnationalism usually focuses on processes forged by immigrants settled in a country geographically distant from their country of origin, this research demonstrates how migrants living in geographical proximity to their country of origin, as well as non-migrants living within a border region of their country engage in intense forms of transnationalism. The research for this thesis adopted multi-sited ethnography by living with and observing individuals in two distinct locations. The first location was the landless camp Antônio Irmão, known as the Brasiguaios landless camp, in the town of Itaquiraí, also in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul. Most of its residents are Brazilian migrant returnees from Paraguay. The second location was the joint Brazilian towns of Ponta Porã, in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, in Brazil, and the Paraguayan town of Pedro Juan Caballero. Although most individuals living in these towns are not migrants, they are engaged in transnationalism. The two main distinct features of this study are the development of proximal transnationalism, a concept that explains the short forms of transnationalism within border regions; and the understanding that there are multiple representations of Brasiguaios. Thus, it is not possible to speak of a single, unique Brasiguaio identity. This thesis makes an academic contribution by its use of multi-sited ethnography to bring together the disciplines of transnationalism and border studies to show how everyday life and identities, framed within two nation-states that have increasingly affected the lives of individuals, are manifested in a border region of two countries, at the same time, seemingly disregarding the existence of the state.

The topic for this thesis is the package of policies referred to as “Co-development”. Co-development or Cooperation for Development comprises the actions of formal institutions at the national and regional levels as well as those of non-governmental organisations which are designed to stem immigration by fostering development in the source-country. The thesis examines co-development by comparing the migratory regimes in the European-Mediterranean Partnership and the North American Free Trade Agreement areas, focusing on Spain and the United States as host countries, Mexico, and Morocco as primarily sending - but increasingly transit and host - countries. The starting point for the thesis are the two trade oriented development programmes under way in each region - the MEDA Programme in Morocco and the Plan Puebla Panamá in Mexico-Central America. The thesis critically examines the “development-migration” nexus, particularly conventional ways of analysing the relationship between migration and development, and the way in which these models inform official policies for trade and development. The comparison draws upon a Multi-level Governance analytical framework which examines the interaction of state and non-state actors at the three main levels (Macro, Meso, and Micro) where Co-development takes places. The analysis of the multi-level interaction allows understanding the vertical or horisontal interrelation among actors in the process of co-development. Moreover, it allows a fuller understanding of the contribution of “bottom up” as much as “top down” co-development. Within this framework, the migrant emerges as a central actor - a transnational agent who is able to foster co-development by comparison with many national and international programmes.

The acculturation process is an important part of the experience that immigrant children and their families go through when adapting to live in a new country. Most studies on acculturation have included immigrant groups – mainly adults – living in North America and Europe. This thesis seeks to redress that imbalance by focussing on the acculturation attitudes and well-being of children and adolescents both in Chile and the United Kingdom (UK). A further important aspect is to examine how the discrepancies in acculturation within the family relate to children's well-being and family relationships. In this thesis, a bi-dimensional approach (both desire for culture maintenance and culture adoption/desire for contact with other groups) is used to test various hypotheses about the relationship between acculturation orientations - children's, parents' and discrepancies between the children and parents - and well-being of children. Several features characterise the research: two different receiving contexts (UK and Chile); different national origins of participants (with immigrant background and non-immigrant background); use of cross-sectional, longitudinal and qualitative methods; use of both perceived parent and actual parent scores; and the presence of social mediators and moderators (e.g., perceived discrimination, perceived peer acceptance, perceived school climate and perceived family relationship). The main findings were that, both in UK and Chile, immigrant children showed preference for maintenance of their heritage culture (CM) and establishing contact with receiving groups (DC) (or adopting the receiving culture (CA)), and that this preference was related to better well-being than other options, both concurrently and longitudinally. The acculturation discrepancies between children and parents had different consequences on well-being if they were on CM, CA or DC, depending on the measure used to calculate the discrepancies and also for immigrant and non-immigrant children. The findings are discussed in relation to the existing literature, and implications are drawn for improving psychological adjustment of immigrants and for future research that is needed.

Third Culture Kids are the children of people working outside their passport countries, and who are employed by international organisations as development experts, diplomats, missionaries, journalists, international NGO and humanitarian aid workers, or UN representatives. The “third culture” they possess is the temporary, nomadic multicultural space they inhabited as children, within an expatriate community and, in some cases, international school. This culture is distinct from their parents’ homeland culture (the first culture) and from that of the country in which they spend their formative years but of which they are not native members (the second culture). The “third culture” inhabited by Third Culture Kids does not unite the first and second cultures, but rather comprises a space for their unstable integration (Knörr, 2005). This thesis explores the following question: In what ways does being a Third Culture Kid affect notions of belonging, identity and place? Through analysis of both fieldwork in an international school, and exploratory life story interviews with adult TCKs from myriad backgrounds, this work contributes to a better understanding of the experience of growing up abroad, and tracks the long term effects of this experience on the ways in which TCKs orient themselves towards belonging, identity and place. Throughout the course of this research, findings coalesce to orient TCKs as cosmopolitans, rooted in the expatriate communities of their childhoods, continuing in mobility and self-conscious “otherness” into adulthood, and moving through place as “elite vagrants”.