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Transnationalism: Its Implications for Active Citizenship and Sense of Belonging in Canada

Presentation at:Diasporas in the Age of Globalization: Power, Identity

and Internal Dynamics

Workshop

16th International Metropolis Conference,Azores

September 14th, 2011

Lloyd L. WongDepartment of Sociology

University of Calgary

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Conceptualizing Transnationalism

Transnationalism Perspective

Many immigrants are not “uprooted”.

Maintain multiple ties, links, and networks with their homelands.

Engage in social relations that link their societies of origin and settlement.

Transnationalism can be conceptualized as: 1) a mode of immigrant adaptation and 2) as social space that stretches beyond national borders.

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Conceptualizing Citizenship

Table 1. Delanty’s Core Components of Citizenship (Delanty, G., 1997)

Type

Form

Formal

Substantive

Civic citizenship

Rights

Participation

Ethnic citizenship

Duties

Identity

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Rights and Transnational Citizenship Rights pertain to “citizenship-as-legal status”.

Economic and political factors influence what those rights are and how they evolve.

Rights can be highly controversial, contested, and problematic.

Briefly look at some recent examples of problematic areas that pertain to the rights.

Concentrate more on the normative aspects of citizenship - “citizenship-as-desirable-activity” and look at civic participation and belonging.

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Examples of Perceived Problematic Transnational Citizenship

Evacuation of Lebanese Canadians from war- torn Lebanon in 2006

- proposed tax for non-resident Canadians- review of dual citizenship policy

Royal Bank of Canada – 2007- closing of U.S. dollar accounts of dual citizens who are non-residents.

Recently some discussion as to whether or not remittances, and other forms of flow of capital out of Canada, should be monitored or even perhaps and controlled.

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Transnationalism & Active Citizenship

Public & Policy-Making Discourses and Assumptions

Transnationalism reinforces non-Canadian cultural beliefs, attitudes & behaviours of the “home” country.

Transnational practices “segregate”, “insulate”, “isolate” people from the Canadian “mainstream”.

Transnationalism is an obstacle or barrier to their active citizenship within Canada, to their sense of belonging to Canada, and their allegiance to Canada.

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Transnationalism & Active CitizenshipPublic & Policy-Making Discourses and

AssumptionsContinued

The greater the transnationalism the greater the ambivalence, divergence, and perhaps contrariety with Canada.

In other words, the greater the transnationalism the less the active citizenship and the less the sense of belonging to Canada.

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Research Question and MethodologyResearch Question

What is the relationship between transnationalism and active citizenship? And sense of belonging?

Methodology

Secondary data analysis of the Ethnic Diversity Survey developed by Statistics Canada and Canadian Heritage and administered in 2002.

Public use data file provided by Statistics Canada.

Approximately 40,000 cases.

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How is transnationalism measured?

Two ways of empirically measuring transnationalism:

1) Transnationalism as a dichotomous variable.-single citizenship and dual citizenship

2) Created a transnationalism scale using 3 variables:

i) citizenship status;ii) family in country of birth; andiii) trips back to country of birth

(Cronbach’s alpha = 0.82)

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How are active citizenship and belonging measured?

Active citizenship is as measured as “civic participation” and “political participation”.

Civic participation - dichotomous variable in terms of membership in organizations and also as a scale.

Political participation as a scale (voting in federal, provincial and municipal elections).

Belonging is a scale measured from a weak to a strong sense of belonging to Canada.

Sense of belonging may even be considered as a crude proxy for “loyalty” and “allegiance”.

Table 1: Frequency Distribution of Citizenship

Citizenship Status: Frequency Percent

Canadian Citizenship 35,531 85.2

Dual Citizenship 3,415 8.2

Missing 2,749 6.6

Total 41,695 100.0

Table 2: Civic Participation and Transnationalism1

Transnationalism

Civic Participation(Membership in:)

Non-Transnational(Single Citizenship)

Transnational(Dual Citizenship)2

Any Civic Groupχ 2 =0.02, p>.10Not significant

Yes = 53.9No = 46.1

Yes = 46.2No = 53.8

Sports Club or Teamχ 2 =27.82, p<.001φ = 0.027

Yes = 21.3No = 78.7

Yes = 17.2No = 82.8

Community Organizationχ 2 =5.69, p<.05φ = 0.012

Yes = 7.3No = 92.7

Yes = 6.1No = 93.9

Religious Groupχ 2 =53.06, p<.001φ = 0.037

Yes = 6.0No = 94.0

Yes = 9.5No = 90.5

Hobby Clubχ 2 =11.83, p<.01φ = 0.017

Yes = 5.0No = 95.0

Yes = 3.6No = 96.4

Cultural Groupχ 2 = 14.62, p<.001φ = 0.019

Yes = 3.6No = 96.4

Yes = 5.0No = 95.0

Table 2 (Continued): Civic Participation and Transnationalism1

Transnationalism

Civic Participation(Membership in:)

Non-Transnational(Single Citizenship)

Transnational(Dual Citizenship)2

Charitable Organizationχ 2 =.064, p<.10Not significant

Yes = 2.5No = 97.5

Yes = 2.6No = 97.4

Service Clubχ 2 =3.67, p<.10Not significant

Yes = 2.2No = 97.8

Yes = 2.8No = 97.2

Job Related Associationχ 2 =1.31, p<.10Not significant

Yes = 2.2No = 97.8

Yes = 2.1No = 97.9

Ethnic/Immigrant Associationχ 2 =362.38 p<.001φ = 0.10

Yes = 1.6No = 98.4

Yes = 6.7No = 93.3

N=39,501 for all 10 of the above 2x2 crosstabulations.

1All ten crosstabulations bootstrapped and the statistical measures include chi-square (χ 2 ) to test statistical significance and the phi coefficient (φ) to measure the strength of the relationship.2Includes Canadian citizenship along with one or more non-Canadian citizenship.

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Table 2: Summary of Findings Transnationals are, on some of the groups, lower

than non-transnationals in their civic participation.

However, on many other groups, they are higher than non-transnationals or there is no difference.

Where the differences are statistically significant (chi-squared) they are often extremely weak and negligible (phi-coefficients).

Overall finding, is that for any civic group, there is no statistically significant difference in civic participation.

Table 3: Logistic Regression of Transnationalism and Civic Participation, Political Participation, Sense of Belonging to Canada, Importance of Ethnic Identity, and Experienced Ethnic/Racial Discrimination1 (Odds Ratios)

Independent Variable

CivicParticipation

PoliticalParticipation

Sense of Belonging to Canada

Importance of EthnicIdentity

ExperiencedEthnic/RacialDiscrimination

Transnationalism .997 .847*** .977 .955 1.661***

Gender .909** 1.152** 1.173*** 1.226*** .732***

Marital Status .999 1.663*** 1.056 1.052 .824**

Age .998 1.049*** 1.027*** 1.022*** .981***

Income 1.018 1.043*** 1.017 1.010 .983

Children .965 1.226*** 1.005 1.080 1.282***

Completed School in Can. 1.500*** 1.383** .750*** 1.142* .485***

High School 1.049 1.463*** .977 1.099 1.104

Some Post Sec 1.290*** 1.635*** .943 1.023 1.718***

College 1.278*** 1.762*** .846** 1.006 1.648***

Bachelor’s 1.866*** 1.840*** .802** .993 1.813***

Post-graduate 2.252*** 1.637*** .714 *** .907 1.831***

N 42476 42476 42476 42476 42476

1Bootstrapped*=p>.05, ** = p>.01, *** = p>.001

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Table 3: Summary of Findings

Transnationalism and:

Civic participation: no difference - n.s. Political participation: 15% less likely – weak

Sense of belonging to Canada: no difference – n.s.

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CONCLUSIONS

Overall, there is virtually no relationship between transnationalism and active citizenship.

When active citizenship is considered as political participation then there is a weak relationship – transnationals are 15% less likely to participate.

There is no relationship between transnationalism and a sense of belonging to Canada.

In discussions of transnationalism one should be cognizant of ethnic group differences.

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CONCLUSIONS - continued

Overall, the concerns about the negative consequences of transnationalism on active citizenship and on a sense of belonging to Canada are largely exaggerated and overblown in public and policy-making discourse.

Transnationalism is not a major obstacle or barrier to people’s active citizenship within Canada nor to their sense of belonging to Canada, and consequently perhaps not to their allegiance or loyalty to Canada.