European Somalis' Post-Migration Movements

Front matter

Joëlle Moret

European Somalis’

Post-Migration Movements

Contents

NGO TIO ois ieee endemic ei aes 1.1 Theorising Mobility Practices in Unequal Transnational Social Fieldsi a E EA NE fs 1.1.1 Categories, Hierarchies and the (Re)production GE Social Inequalities eiaa 1.1.2 A Transnational Perspettive. isis scscccssessatce conte ssvaieuedacascatuncs ee 1.1.3 Bringing “Mobilities” into Migration Studies RNO 1.2.1 Methodological Transnationalism. E E T 1.2.2 Reflexivity: On the Researcher’s Positionality Mt TED Piekla AE eee 5 1.2.3 Delineating the Field: Conceptual Issues Related tothe Population Wider Study .nsic.:scisecsscncacatcmsonsnenaxcveancine 125 Data-Anialysis: Methods: ccccsccsessssgseremevesstrsnstvanevatensvivieena Lol Recent TANO eip rece trorenereeaeraet neers 1.3.2 Mobility and Migration from Somalia... ides 1.3.3 Political, Legal and Discursive Contexts: Bitan and Swe tek Let csias Appendix: Interview Methodi errie PROT SPONGES ipur P E PE AE A

2.1 AnÜveriew of the Literie saien 241.1 Transnational Studies cccsscciccsiaccacsccasaces a E 2.1.2 The Literature on Circulation

2.2 Post-Migration Mobility Practices: A Typology... 2.2.1 Star-Shaped et EEA AET VITNE A T Pane Pendular MODINIY scicecssisiiaeisoesoss Se E vii viii

Chapter 1 A) Introduction Geek for

This book is about the cross-border movements of a specific group of people at a particular moment in their lives and trajectories. It is about migrants who left their country of origin, Somalia, settled in Europe and have since elaborated complex mobility patterns in order to improve their living conditions. Their lives have been shaped by a first, important move across national borders: the one that brought them to Europe, in most cases through asylum channels and following the collapse of their state of origin. This move has led them to being labelled “migrants” or “refugees” and treated accordingly. They are part of large waves of migration that European states have mostly tried to avoid. However, because of the international conventions these states have signed, among other reasons, they have accepted these newcomers.

Many studies about migrants from poorer countries focus on this particular cross-border movement (the “migration”) and its consequences for settlement and incorporation in the new country. The present research takes a step further: it explores other types of movements, those that Somali migrants may undertake once they have settled in their new country of residence. These “post-migration mobility practices”, as I refer to them, have not raised much attention among migration scholars or policymakers, largely because they do not fit into the common sedentarist narratives about migrants from less economically developed parts of the world to Europe or other powerful regions.

These cross-border movements might appear to be rather banal practices at first sight. It is indeed very common to cross borders, especially for people who live in in Europe, where countries are small and close to their neighbours. From the beginning of this study, however, I was persuaded that something more than just “travelling” or “moving around” was going on. Near the beginning of my fieldwork, I met with Awa, a Somali-Dutch woman based in London whose astute comments opened my eyes more than once and challenged me to think harder. We were discussing my research questions when she contested my initial assumption that she might be a “mobile woman”. When I asked her why, she suggested that Somalis’ tendency to cross borders frequently was sometimes treated too casually:

© The Author(s) 2018 1 J. Moret, European Somalis’ Post-Migration Movements, IMISCOE Research Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95660-2_1

People move for reasons, right? And sometimes you hear, “Oh Somalis are nomadic, they just like to move around”. Like we have nothing else to do than move around; our ultimate aim is to move around [laughs]. Just to move. And you think: hello, I’m not moving around for the sake of moving around, you know! [...] Nomads, they don’t move around because they just move around, but because the grass is not green anymore. They have reasons to move; it’s not exercise [laughs again]!

While I remain cautious regarding interpretations of mobility as a reproduction of nomadic habits, I believe that this quotation indicates the purpose of my research quite clearly. This study explores how, why and with what effects some settled migrants “move around’, or, in my terms, develop sophisticated “cross-border mobility practices”. If mobility is not the “ultimate aim”, then it is a means, a resource people use to gain access to certain advantages. This study assesses the varied cross-border mobility patterns that some settled Somali migrants develop, the conditions under which they are (or are not) able to develop them and the concrete processes that allow them to turn their mobility into an asset and obtain higher social positions within particular hierarchies.

Based on the qualitative data collected in this study, I have elaborated a novel typology of the various cross-border mobility practices migrants may develop. Star-shaped mobility, pendular mobility, secondary migration, temporary visits to the place of origin, definitive return and immobility are the six ideal types of the ways the people in this study may cross borders. The typology refers to — sometimes onetime but more often regular — movements that are significant enough to induce some changes in the lives of the people who undertake them. The typology is explained in detail in Chap. 2, which describes and analyses the ways in which the individuals I met cross borders, the frequency and regularly of their moves, the activities they undertake while on the move and the different places they link together through these activities and movements.

Taking migrants’ cross-border movements as a starting point further challenges transnational scholars’ tendency to assume that transnational ties connect migrants only to their country of origin and/or to people with a similar national or ethnic background. The findings set the ground for an empirically grounded argument that expands our understanding of transnational processes as potentially including places other than the country of origin and the country of settlement, as well networks other than those based on family and ethnic ties. However, I want to avoid the epistemological trap that those who adopt a transnational lens or focus on mobility sometimes find themselves in — that of over-emphasising fluidity and “‘deterritorialised” experiences and practices (see for instance Mitchell 1997; Adey 2006; Franquesa 2011). Strong attention is paid to migrants’ local contexts, the “localities” (Guarnizo and Smith 1998) that constitute specific hierarchies, create differentiated access to resources and shape the constraints and opportunities people face. This focus makes it possible to include relations and social inequalities at both the local and the transnational levels in the analysis of migrants’ lives and cross-border mobility practices.

This research builds not only on debates in migration and transnational studies, but also on academic discussions in the more recent field of mobilities studies

(Sheller and Urry 2006; Kaufmann 2009). While studies on international migration have recently started to address, mostly cautiously and even critically, the idea of mobility, mobilities scholars have showed little interest in migration (Hui 2016). One of the most promising aspects of mobilities studies lies in the theorisation of mobility as an element of social differentiation involved in the production of power relations and inequalities. Some prominent scholars have defined this perspective as the “politics of mobility” (Cresswell 2010b; Massey 1994). This study builds on this perspective, arguing that mobility is an unequally distributed resource that can, under certain conditions, be mobilised and transformed into social and economic advantages. This central argument is developed primarily in Chap. 3. Illuminating the politics of mobility helps uncover how Somali migrants, as social actors with particular social positions, are able to develop a kind of “mobility capital” and convert it into further advantages.

The idea that cross-border mobility may constitute an important resource for some people is also central to a strand of the literature interested in “circulation” (see for instance Tarrius 1993, 2000; Tarrius et al. 2013; Morokvasic 2003; Morokvasic-Miiller 1999; Dahinden 2010a; Schmoll 2005; Schmoll and Semi 2013). People engage in specific economic activities, such as (underground) trade, sex work or diverse types of odd jobs while being constantly on the move. They specifically opt for these practices as an alternative to more traditional forms of settlement migration, yet I demonstrate that settled migrants may develop similar strategies when they possess the ability to cross borders regularly.

This study challenges a (sometimes overly static) sociology of social inequalities because it examines the ways in which social actors’ social positions may differ depending on the places and hierarchies involved. It builds from recent research that analyses how wealth differences between different countries may inform migrants’ practices (see among others Nieswand 2011; Nowicka 2013; Kelly and Lusis 2006). The status inconsistencies these differences produce may pose constraints, but they may also create opportunities for those who are able to navigate in a transnational social field. In fact, while most of the respondents in this study encounter obstacles to their ability to valorise their assets in dominant social fields in their country of residence, they also find opportunities to mobilise their resources in other places and hierarchies. This study argues, empirically and theoretically, that capital is transnationalised through cross-border mobility practices, thus demonstrating that social inequalities need to be examined at the transnational level as well as at the level of the nation-state. Chapter 4 investigates these complex processes on the basis of the detailed life stories of three respondents who have developed different types of post-migration mobility practices over the years.

This focus on a neglected aspect of some migrants’ practices, i.e. their cross-border movements, opens new avenues for thinking about their lives and experiences. It makes it possible to explore the agency of people often considered helpless due to their situation as “refugees,” the protracted civil unrest in their country of origin or supposed problematic activities and practices there (female genital mutilation, religious fundamentalism or links with terrorism). While paying close attention to the local contexts (in plural) to which these migrants are connected, and to the specific constraints and opportunities that characterise them, I focus my analysis on the projects and activities these migrants develop thanks to their ability to cross borders.

The findings further challenge those dichotomies that usually consider mobility as the prerogative of a global, cosmopolitan, highly-skilled elite for whom borders have lost their meaning, while migrants are supposedly stuck in a sedentary stasis. Save their initial move (the migration), labour migrants and refugees are often considered, by both policymakers in immigration countries and many researchers, through the perspective of sedentarity and local incorporation and with the expectation of loyalty towards their new country of residence. While the transnational perspective has opened new ways of thinking about migrants’ multiple anchorages, this study provides empirical evidence of the concrete ways in which migrants may develop initiatives to build on connections with other places and improve their living conditions thanks to the specific activities they perform across borders. These alternative forms of “integration”, outside of the frames set by nation-states — or rather mostly in parallel to them — remain underestimated. Yet they can prove beneficial for migrants, and possibly for their countries of residence, as is discussed in Chap. 5 in particular.

While the mobility practices of highly qualified, circulating migrants are generally regarded positively in the academic literature, those of less privileged migrants have been of less interest. The study demonstrates that, under certain conditions, migrants who are not global elites may also benefit from the sophisticated and diverse mobility practices they have mastered.

1.1 Theorising Mobility Practices in Unequal Transnational Social Fields

1.1.1 Categories, Hierarchies and the (Re)production of Social Inequalities

The politics of research involves the theoretical premises that guide the design and the conduct of the research process. In order to make those premises explicit, questions related to the nature of reality (ontology) and the relationship between this reality and the researcher (epistemology) need to be answered (Denzin and Lincoln 2005; Guba and Lincoln 1994). Those premises can also be considered “belief systems” or “worldviews” that guide the research process (Guba and Lincoln 1994). In contrast to positivist thinking, this qualitative study begins from the view that reality is not something “out there” to be discovered by an objective or neutral researcher, but instead socially constructed, and that the main goal of the research process is to understand how, by whom and in what contexts. The focus is on the perspective that people have on their activities and environments, the discourses they construct about them and the subjective meaning they give to them. I have

1.1 Theorising Mobility Practices in Unequal Transnational Social Fields 5 adopted an interpretive, constructivist perspective to understand how some migrants travel, cross borders and develop transnational activities and social fields. The object of the study — what I call post-migration mobility practices — has thus emerged from understanding the meanings that respondents give to their own movements and/or sedentarity, and to those of others, at a particular moment in their biography, in particular countries of residence and from specific social locations.

According to this perspective, the “world of lived reality and situation-specific meanings that constitute the general object of investigation is thought to be constructed by social actors. That is, particular actors, in particular places, at particular times, fashion meaning out of events and phenomena through prolonged, complex processes of social interaction involving history, language, and action” (Schwandt 1998). The goal of research, therefore, is not to find causalities between events or to “explain” how the world functions, but rather to “understand” social phenomena from the point of view of those who live it. The term “understanding” is translated from Weber’s concept of Verstehen (Weber 1965): for Weber, social phenomena can only be understood by grasping the meanings that social actors attach to what they do (see also Aron 1967).

One of the aims of this research is thus to understand the meanings that the Somali migrants I met give to their situation. How do they see the country in which they currently reside? Are there other places that are meaningful to them, and in what ways? How do they manage to link those different places, and what do those links bring them? How do they relate to significant others located in different geographical places, but also in different social positions, in terms of gender, lifecycle, social class, ethnicity, level of education or legal status? And above all, how do cross-border movements play out in these women’s and men’s lives?

The organisation of society along various axes of differentiation — in particular gender, social class and ethnicity/race — partially shapes the distribution of resources among the population (see Scott 1986; Jenkins 1994; Bourdieu 1987). More specifically, the differentiated allocation of resources is related to the social and symbolic evaluation of those who possess those resources, depending on their social positioning along various axes of differences. In other words, individuals’ social location in ethnic, gendered and classed boundaries and hierarchies influences their access to resources, but also the value of the resources they possess.

Categories of social difference are representations and normative ideas that structure and organise social life. These organising principles and references are not neutral: they are allocated specific contents (for instance, women do certain things better than men, or ethnic groups have specific, bounded “cultures’”’) that are valorised unevenly. Women’s reproductive tasks related to the domestic sphere obtain less recognition (in symbolic as much as in monetary terms) than men’s activities in the labour market. Similarly, some migrants’ cultures are considered “backward” and implicitly inferior to the “modern”, European societies in which they live. The social construction of differences thus occurs through the hierarchisation of social categories (their relational valuation) and the related unequal allocation of economic and cultural resources (Anthias 1998b). Through these mechanisms, women come to be seen as different from men, migrants as different from nationals and refugees as a different category of migrants than expatriates: specific social meaning is given to each of these constructed categories. In turn, access to education, the labour market or specific social networks differs depending on who you are and how you come to be categorised in dominant discourses. What you are comes to legitimise how the resources you possess are evaluated, and therefore the ways in which you can convert them (Bourdieu 1986) into other resources and accumulate privileges and advantages.

Furthermore, social differences are rendered “natural”, which itself is a sign of the unequal distribution of resources (Anthias 1998b). Processes of naturalisation concern the content of the categories as much as the categories themselves, as well as the boundaries that are assumed to separate them from one another. Social order comes to be perceived as “an accommodation to the natural order” (West and Fenstermaker 1995). More importantly, naturalisation processes simultaneously justify the social hierarchies that constitute this taken-for-granted social organisation of differences. The (re)production of representations about the world takes place through “the subtle imposition of systems of meaning that legitimise and thus solidify structures of inequality” (Wacquant 2008). Hidden processes that tend to reify boundaries and hierarchies thus take attention away from the inequalities that they imply, even for those who are directly concerned. These processes participate in the (re)production of collectively shared representations that influence what people do and the meaning they give to their experiences and those of others.

To sum up, concurrent perspectives on social differences are not just a matter of different worldviews. They involve issues of power and have strong political implications in that they are involved in creating, maintaining and reproducing social inequalities. In this book, gender, social class and ethnicity/race, but also religion, age, stage in the lifecycle and legal status are considered to be not only outcomes of relational and dynamic social constructions, but also hidden dimensions of power relations. Social categories and their hierarchisation may differ depending on the socio-historical context in question. When it comes to mobile people, more than one context may be relevant simultaneously. Many of the people I have met navigate in different social and geographical environments: I have employed a transnational perspective that makes it possible to take into account the sometimes conflicting yet related contexts that influence these individuals’ lives.

1.1.2 A Transnational Perspective

Migration studies underwent a serious renewal during the 1990s with the development and subsequent refinement of scholarship on transnationalism. While the processes that were being studied, related to international migration, were not new, the perspective was, with scholars focusing on the sustained linkages that some migrants maintained with their country of origin after having migrated (see in particular Glick Schiller et al. 1992, 1995; Vertovec 1999; Faist 2000; Portes et al. 1999 for earlier definitions of transnationalism). This new approach modified researchers’

1.1 Theorising Mobility Practices in Unequal Transnational Social Fields 7 understanding of processes of migration and migrants’ lives in different ways, in particular because it challenged a number of assumptions that had guided studies on migration — as well as government policies — until then.

First, the new transnational lens challenged early assimilationist theories, which viewed migration as a process that would eventually and definitely lead migrants to abandon any kind of relationship with their country of origin, conform to the rules of their new country of residence and “melt” into it (R. E. Park 1928). Even though assimilation was understood in less normative terms by the 1990s, there remained a widespread view of migration as a rupture with previous identifications, loyalties and social networks. While it had earlier been considered natural for migrants to have to choose “between here and there”, it now became clear that some migrants had developed desires and abilities to live “here and there” at the same time (Tarrius 2002). Migrants’ economic, political, social and religious participation did not stop at the borders of their countries of immigration, but extended to other places, in particular their place of origin (Levitt and Jaworsky 2007; Vertovec 2009; Khagram and Levitt 2008).

A second and related assumption that these scholars worked to deconstruct was the idea (often found in social science research) that the borders of the nation-state constitute the natural delimiting container of society, what Wimmer and Glick Schiller (2002) have called “methodological nationalism’. Nation-states were created, in a specific historical context in the nineteenth century, as the units that delimit and separate territories from one another, based on the view that the people who live in those territories are nationals of the states in question (Wimmer and Glick Schiller 2002). This idealised vision of the world was soon challenged by migrants, i.e. people who settled in nation-states of which they were not citizens. Some scholars, in particular those interested in international migration, started to challenge this naturalised view of borders, which causes migrants to be seen as an anomaly that disturbs this taken-for-granted “national order of things” (Malkki 1995). Transnational scholarship has made it possible to go beyond the idea that migrants have to change their loyalties and identifications to fit this view of a unity between the state and the population located in its territory. It has opened the possibility of alternative perspectives on space and boundaries, in particular those of migrants themselves.

The literature on transnationalism flourished at a time of growing concerns about and academic interest in globalisation. Broader theoretical discussions acknow]- edged and analysed the increasing disconnections between space and time: while Beck was arguing for a “cosmopolitan turn” in the social sciences (see for instance Beck and Sznaider 2006), others analysed how flows, and in particular human mobility, had become fundamental dimensions of the globalised, postmodern world (Appadurai 2001; Bauman 2000).

A transnational lens also challenges the belief that the migration process is linear, a point that is central in this book. Empirical studies have made it clear that migration often does not involve only a single move from a point of departure to a point of arrival. The linkages that migrants strive to keep alive and further build on often coincide with different kinds of movements across borders. Migrants regularly move back and forth between their country of origin and their country of residence, go back to visit their families and friends who have not migrated, circulate between different locations and envisage and undergo temporary or definitive returns to their place of origin (Jeffery and Murison 2011). While it is true that transnational identities and practices do not require cross-border mobility, the transnational perspective has allowed researchers to analyse how the initial move and settlement in a new country is, for some migrants, intimately related to further types of movements.

I understand the transnational perspective as a lens rather than a new theory. Transnationalism does not explain things, actions or events. It is a way of looking at social reality without remaining trapped within taken-for-granted assumptions. Adopting such a lens makes it possible for a variety of practices to emerge from the data and, even more importantly, for the meanings that are given to those practices by respondents to be taken seriously. It is a vision that departs from the possibility of a transnational reality without assuming either its non-existence (as in assimilationist perspectives) or its necessary relevance for all migrants, as in some celebratory accounts of transnationalism.

However, when considering the transnational processes at stake, I have been careful not to privilege similarities based on a common origin at the expense of other types of differences that cross “ethnic groups”, such as those pertaining to gender and social class (Anthias 1998a). I have strived to avoid “groupist” (Brubaker 2004) perspectives on migrants’ transnational practices and identifications, and to get away from the “ethnic lens” (Glick Schiller et al. 2006; Anthias 1998a; Brubaker 2005; Dahinden 2012, 2009). Migrants’ enduring connections with their country of origin do not necessarily translate into identities and solidarities revolving around their ethno-national background. For all these reasons, I do not refer to Somali migrants as a diaspora. The history of the word “diaspora” and its social analyses is long and complex, and nuanced understandings of the concept are now widely accepted (Cohen and Fischer 2018; Dufoix 2003). For evident epistemological reasons, this book is not interested in determining whether Somali migrants should be defined as a diaspora or not. Emic rather than etic definitions of the term, however, would fit better with my constructivist perspective: such an approach seeks to illuminate how and under what conditions some social actors may define themselves as part of a diaspora. Diaspora becomes, in this view, a “claim” and a “category of practice” rather than an imposed definition of a predefined group (Brubaker 2005). Kleist (2008a, b), for instance, convincingly argues that identification with a diaspora among some Somali migrants — especially men — represents an important resource in their struggle for recognition. Horst (2013) similarly argues that European relief and development institutions work with such self-defined diaspora groups but have the effect of depoliticising their claims rather than empowering them (see also Sinatti and Horst 2015). The concept of diaspora is closely connected to ideas related to transnationalism (see for instance Faist 2010 for a discussion). I have opted to use the latter term because of its broader scope and because it makes possible the inclusion of cross-border activities and networks that have nothing to do with either the ethnic group of origin or the country of origin.

1.1 Theorising Mobility Practices in Unequal Transnational Social Fields 9

Scholars have used different concepts to refer to sustained cross-border linkages: “transnational social space” (Faist 2000; Pries 2001), “social formations” (Dahinden 2010b; Luis Eduardo Guarnizo and Smith 1998; Vertovec 2003) and “communities” (Goldring 1998; Kivisto 2001). Like others (for instance Goldring 1998; Nieswand 2011; Pessar and Mahler 2003; Portes et al. 1999; Vertovec 1999), I feel most comfortable with the concept “transnational social fields”, which was first developed and later elaborated by Nina Glick Schiller and other scholars (see in particular Basch et al. 1994; Glick Schiller 2010; Glick Schiller and Fouron 1999; Levitt and Glick Schiller 2004). This concept emphasises first the interconnections between people and institutions located in different places that might influence, even indirectly, migrants’ lives and practices. Transnational social fields are “networks of networks that link individuals directly or indirectly to institutions located in more than one nation-state” (Glick Schiller 2010). Second, although this concept should not be conflated with Bourdieu’s concept of “discrete fields of power” (Glick Schiller 2010), it allows for an empirical and theoretical acknowledgment of the multiple and interlocking contexts that shape the constraints and opportunities that migrants face. Social fields have no geographic materiality or coercive power, yet they are durable influential entities that affect the lives of both migrants and non-migrants (Nieswand 2011).

The concept of transnational social fields underlines the fact that “the transnational” stems from people’s practices and does not exist per se, in contrast to nation-states, their institutions and legal apparatuses. At the same time, however, it is constituted by interlocking networks and institutions that do exist materially and exert an influence on people. Moreover, social actors are socially located within those institutions and networks: they are gendered, ethnicised/racialised and classed, sometimes in conflicting ways. The transnational social fields and the local or national social fields and other hierarchies in which the migrants in this study are embedded interact to shape the frameworks of constraints and opportunities in which they move.

However, the “nation” remains meaningful and pertinent in transnational studies (Dahinden 2017; Glick Schiller 2015). Migrants’ practices, networks and identifications are not free from constraints, and most empirical studies show how much not only states, but also power relations between them, influence migrants’ lives. For a start, being able to cross borders depends on states’ issuing the necessary documents and their authorisation to cross their borders and enter their territories. Moreover, power relations between states exert a strong influence on who is and is not considered a migrant (Glick Schiller 2010).

Migrants who are transnationally connected are also locally anchored, and bringing those anchorages back into perspective is a way to investigate issues of social positions, inequalities and power relations. Guarnizo and Smith (1998) argue that transnational practices connect people across borders, but “are embodied in specific social relations established between specific people, situated in unequivocal localities, at historically determined times” (11). Migrants embedded in transnational social fields are always also geographically and socially located social actors. The concept of “locality” refers to the multiple specific contexts in which migrants are socially, economically and politically rooted and which constitute the constraints and opportunities they must square with (Dahinden 2010b; Guarnizo and Smith 1998).

The concept of locality — or rather its plural form, “localities” — makes it possible to include different geographic orders in the same analytical framework. While nation-states should not be left out of the analysis, they are not the only unit that matters in understanding transnational processes. Social actors are located in specific countries, regions, cities or villages and neighbourhoods at the same time, and they all participate in shaping the contexts in which they live. Legislation and policies in the place of residence, socio-economic and political contexts, local networks and opportunities to meet with other people and exclusion and inclusion processes all interact to create specific opportunities and constraints for migrants to become simultaneously locally anchored and transnationally involved.

The concept further makes it possible to understand that transnational practices and identifications do not stand in opposition to mooring, anchorage and incorporation into possibly multiple localities: rather, both types of processes interact with each other. Since the beginning of the 2000s, there have been discussions about the link between them, with a (sometimes normative) concern regarding the impact of transnational practices and identifications on migrants’ incorporation into their country of residence (see Bivand Erdal and Oeppen 2013 for a detailed discussion). In this book, “incorporation” refers to migrants’ “processes of adaptation” (Bivand Erdal and Oeppen 2013) to their new place of residence. These processes include migrants’ inclusion in the labour market or the educational field as much as their connections to local institutions and people (associations, neighbours, other parents, friends and so on). In contrast to the idea of “integration”, it does not make normative assumptions about local or national policies aimed at regulating migrants’ adaptation.

Most of the literature agrees that transnationality and incorporation combine in different constellations rather than compete with each other (Morawska 2003; Levitt 2003; Bivand Erdal and Oeppen 2013), and that high levels of transnational involvement do not directly translate into low levels of local incorporation (see for instance Itzigsohn and Giorguli-Saucedo 2005; Snel et al. 2006). A closer look at the different empirical studies at hand, however, reveals a nuanced picture in which social position at the local and transnational levels is an important differentiating element. Various studies concur that migrants with a high level of qualification and a good socioeconomic position in their country of residence are the most likely to develop transnational networks and activities (Portes et al. 2002; Levitt 2003, 2009). Others demonstrate that migrants who are the most marginalised and suffer the most from exclusion and discrimination also maintain more transnational links than others (Dahinden 2009; Itzigsohn and Giorguli-Saucedo 2005). Itzigsohn and Giorguli- Saucedo (2005) refer to the first form of transnationalism, which involves a high degree of incorporation made possible by the investment of sufficient capital at both the local and transnational levels, as “resource-dependant transnationalism’, and to the second, which develops in response to exclusion, as “reactive transnationalism’”’. In both cases, the conditions encountered in both the country of residence and other