Abstract
Diasporas are often viewed as mirrors for their homeland’s politics. The Lebanese diaspora’s involvement in the 2019 Thawra, however, established the diaspora as a locus for autonomous and disruptive political action. Through an analysis of the spatialities of protest, this paper analyses the diaspora’s involvement in the Thawra, its implications for the protest movement, and for the diaspora itself. It argues that diaspora protests gave rise to new tactics and protest repertoires. These mirrored protest activity on the ground, supported protestors in Lebanon, and constituted the diaspora as a locus for contestation and claims-making. Moreover, the diaspora’s mobilization in the Thawra contributed to the consolidation of diasporic identity and the construction of alternative societal imaginaries and conceptions of citizenship that challenge Lebanon’s state-centric and sectarian citizenship regime. This paper thus makes the case for reassessing the autonomous political role of diasporas to gain a fuller understanding of transnational protest dynamics, solidarities, and citizenship beyond the boundaries of the nation-state.
Introduction
A popular saying amongst politicians and commentators is that Lebanon is a bird “with two wings, the resident and the expatriate” (bi-jinahayn, al-muqim wa-l-mughtarib).1 This image reflects the importance of Lebanon’s diaspora to the country’s self-conception as a long-time land of emigration with a diaspora population that far outnumbers Lebanese residents. Lebanese emigrants play an important economic role through remittances, investments, and tourism. In Lebanon’s current economic and financial crisis, the diaspora has acted as a lifeline for those still in the country. Moreover, the contemporary concomitant crises have triggered a fresh wave of emigration.2 Beyond its economic role, scholars have analyzed how the Lebanese diaspora has replicated sectarian divisions abroad,3 has sustained the political status quo,4 and has been exploited by political parties for domestic gains.5 Less attention, however, has been paid to the diaspora as a political actor in its own right. In this article, I make the case for analyzing the diaspora beyond a mirror of homeland politics and as a locus for autonomous political action. I contend that the 2019 Thawra provided an opportunity for the diaspora to engage in disruptive political acts that extended the spatiality of the Thawra beyond the geographical borders of Lebanon. This created transnational protest repertoires that mirrored protest activity on the ground, supported protestors in Lebanon and constituted the diaspora as a locus for contestation and claims-making. Furthermore, I argue that the diaspora’s mobilization in the Thawra contributed to the consolidation of diasporic identity through the creation of diaspora-focused organizations and diaspora narratives. Finally, I contend that the diaspora took part in the construction of alternative societal imaginations and conceptions of citizenship that challenge the state-centric, territorialized notion of citizens as rights-bearing, and, in the Lebanese case, sectarian subjects. As such, the diaspora lens highlights the mutual influence that the diaspora had on the Thawra and vice-versa, and enables a fuller understanding of solidarities, community, and belonging beyond the boundaries of the nation-state.
My research builds on recent work by scholars such as Casanovas and Kerras,6 Armouch, Talhouk and Vlachokyriakos,7 and Tan8 who have analyzed the Lebanese diaspora’s role in the Thawra. Moreover, it draws on the literature of diaspora studies, Social Movement Theory, and Critical citizenship studies. Empirically, it focuses primarily on the Lebanese diaspora in the United Kingdom. It is important, however, to note that the diaspora is not a homogenous and monolithic actor. This article does not aim to provide a comprehensive survey of diaspora activity during the Thawra; further empirical research is needed to adequately portray the full range of activity and impact that the diaspora’s mobilization has had. Instead, it is intended as a starting point for the conceptualization of the Lebanese diaspora as a locus for autonomous political action.
Theoretical Background and Historical Context
Diasporas and Homeland Politics
The definition of diasporas is contested. Diasporas include a wide range of people, including short-term residents working or studying abroad as well as long-term expatriates and their foreign-born descendants. While essentialist accounts view diasporas as pre-political results of migration processes, constructivist understandings of identity recognize the socially constructed nature of diasporas. Adamson thus defines diasporas as “transnational ethnic groups defined by a common identity and attachment to a real or imagined homeland.”9 This attachment, Underhill argues, is the “expression of political consciousness rooted in a sense of transnational belonging”10 rather than a simple result of ancestral connection. Taking a Social Movement Theory approach to the construction of diasporas, Sökefeld argues that the formation of diasporas can be understood as a process of strategic mobilization by political entrepreneurs.11 Diasporas can thus be understood as socially and politically constructed transnational communities that assert a sense of belonging and attachment to a nation, whether linked to an existing territory or not. Diasporas are thus transnational but bounded by national, ethnic, religious, or cultural identity markers.12
Regarding diasporas’ political role vis-à-vis their home countries, Burgess argues that diasporas have socioeconomic and political incentives for engaging in homeland politics, including cross-border personal and economic linkages, and their degree of politicization and access to political processes back home.13 Furthermore, Koinova argues that diasporas’ sociospatial context – their ties to hostlands, homelands, and other diaspora communities – create opportunities and challenges for diasporas to effect political change.14 Finally, Krawatzek and Müller-Funk conceptualize political linkages in terms of political remittances. These, they argue, are constituted through “multi-directional flows”15 of political principles, vocabulary and practices that are transferred between different loci. These political remittances can trigger political acts such as protesting, electoral participation, or social activism. Krawatzek and Müller-Funk further argue that such political remittances have transformative potential that is neither inherently positive or negative, but can shape hybrid identities, thus influencing narratives of belonging and identity construction in the diaspora and at home.16
Lebanese Diaspora
The Lebanese diaspora predates the modern state of Lebanon. Indeed, Tabar argues that Lebanese emigrants played an important role in lobbying national and international authorities for the creation of the Lebanese state.17 Lebanese emigration has historically been induced both by the search for economic opportunities and to escape conflict. There are sizable Lebanese expatriate communities across the world, including in Europe, North and South America, Australia, West Africa, and the Gulf.18 The Lebanese state has adopted a laissez-faire approach to emigration and has adopted few diaspora policies.19 For example, while non-resident Lebanese could vote in Lebanon from 2009 onwards, it was only in 2018 that Lebanon introduced out-of-country voting.20
Economic remittances are an important contribution to Lebanon’s economy, as are diaspora investments, entrepreneurship, and tourism.21 Politically, the Lebanese diaspora has been conceptualized as both weak and strong in influencing homeland politics. Scholars such as Fakhoury,22 Skulte-Ouaiss and Tabar,23 Pearlman,24 and Koinova25 have shown that, rather than challenging Lebanon’s sectarian system, the diaspora has replicated and perpetuated its sectarian divisions. Skulte-Ouaiss and Tabar argue that the diaspora is a powerful actor and is most able to affect political issues when the Lebanese state is absent, for example, in providing for development needs, financing local infrastructure, and funding social and political groups. Simultaneously, however, it is weak in its inability to change Lebanon’s sectarian politics.26 Similarly, Pearlman argues that Lebanon’s state weakness enables domestic actors to exploit the diaspora as “resources, bargaining chips, and turf to utilize in their struggles with each other for power.”27 These dynamics have failed to create a unified diaspora able to strategically challenge the political sectarian regime.28
2019 Thawra
In October 2019, street protests sparked by longstanding political and economic grievances broke out in Lebanon in what came to be known as the Thawra (Revolution). The protest movement, building on previous waves of contention, proved to be the most intersectional in Lebanon’s history, with protests taking place country-wide and social groups mixing across religious, economic, and political divides. As opposed to previous instances of contestation, the 2019 movement denounced the sectarian nature of the state and the political elite as a whole. While the protest movement became fractured and died down with the Covid-19 lockdowns and the ever-deteriorating economic and financial crisis, it provided the space for society to create alternative imaginaries, collective identities, and sentiments of belonging beyond sectarian divisions. In the following sections, I argue that a similar dynamic took place in the diaspora, as participation in the Thawra created a shared diasporic identity and political consciousness beyond the reproduction of sectarian divisions.
Spatialities of Protest: Deterritorializing the Thawra
The diaspora engaged in the Lebanese Thawra in various ways, thus deterritorializing and expanding the spatialities of the movement. Social movement scholars have analyzed the significance of social movements’ spatialities, where they are situated and how they cross, transcend, and utilize space. Geographers like Miller, for example, argue that the spaces in which social movements operate affect their resource mobilization and political opportunity structures.29 Furthermore, Nicholls shows how the geographical scale of social movements impacts the leverage and strategies available to them.30 In Lebanon, the involvement of the diaspora in the Thawra created a transnational and diasporic spatiality that opened up the possibility for new tactics, means of resource mobilization, and claims-making.
Firstly, the diaspora mirrored protest repertoires practiced by demonstrators in Lebanon. Diaspora groups organized marches and rallies in their countries of residence. In the UK, diaspora groups demonstrated in London, including outside the Lebanese embassy,31 and in cities such as Birmingham32 and Manchester.33 On the first Saturday after the protests started, news media reported over 1,300 protestors demonstrating at the Lebanese embassy in London,34 while that weekend saw protests in over a dozen cities worldwide.35 Moreover, around 600 diaspora members, mostly from Europe and the Gulf, travelled to Lebanon to join protests in Beirut for Lebanon’s Independence Day on 22 November.36 Diaspora members replicated key protest slogans (kellon ya3ne kellon) at protests and on social media and put forward their own, such as ‘Leave so we can come back.’ The diaspora also mobilized in the digital sphere, through social media such as Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook groups.37 On UK diaspora Facebook groups, members used their platform to share information such as news articles about the events in Lebanon and to amplify local Lebanese organizations’ posts. Diaspora protests thus transnationalized the physical and digital spatialities of the Thawra by replicating and amplifying the protests in Lebanon.
Beyond mirroring local protest repertoires, the diaspora also mobilized resources including financial and material aid, especially as the financial crisis deepened throughout the end of 2019 and 2020. Particularly after the Beirut port explosion on August 4th, 2020, the diaspora played an important role in mobilizing funds for first response and longer-term reconstruction needs. Given the depreciation of the Lebanese currency and Lebanese residents’ purchasing power, diaspora funds proved particularly important. Moreover, the diaspora organized crowdfunding initiatives on the platform GoFundMe, which is unavailable in Lebanon. The diaspora thus provided a locus for resource mobilization to support the protest movement in Lebanon.
Finally, the diaspora engaged in claims-making vis-à-vis governments in their countries of residence. Lebanese diaspora members in the UK, for example, submitted petitions through the UK governments’ petition platform, calling on the UK government to send aid and to support an international investigation into the Beirut port blast. Of all petitions archived on the platform, all those related to Lebanon were submitted in the timeframe of the Thawra. The diaspora thus wielded the political opportunities offered by their countries of residence to push for demands in Lebanon, mirroring tactics of human rights groups that use international institutions or third states to give leverage to local activists’ struggles through a “boomerang pattern.”38 By replicating and amplifying local protestors’ tactics and demands, mobilizing financial and material aid through diaspora networks, and leveraging the political opportunity structures of their countries of residence, diaspora members tangibly contributed to the Thawra, thus de-territorializing and transnationalizing the movement beyond Lebanon’s borders.
Mobilizing the Diaspora: Protest and Identity Construction
The diaspora’s involvement with the Thawra enabled the mobilization of diasporic identity and the construction of diasporic relations. As scholars of diasporas note, diasporas’ social and political construction is not necessarily linear, as diasporic identity and activity fluctuates throughout time.39 The diaspora’s mobilization in the Thawra, Casanovas and Kerras argue, “has been a cornerstone of ‘diasporic relations’ between the expatriates and residents in Lebanon.”40 Drawing on Tabar’s distinction between transnational and diasporic relations, Casanovas and Kerras argue that expatriates went beyond engaging in transnational relations. The distinction, according to Tabar, lies in the “public character of diasporic activities, being aimed at the state or being community-based,” which “sets them apart from transnational activities, which may be public or private in nature.”41 While diaspora members have mobilized politically before, for example during the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war, the diaspora, Fakhoury argues, “has neither communicated unified petitions back to their country nor have they mobilized for common goals.”42 Participation in the Thawra thus showed the mobilization of the Lebanese diaspora, rather than that of the Lebanese Maronite, Sunni, or Shi’i communities.
Moreover, this mobilization gave rise to the diaspora as a potentially transgressive political actor. Prior to the Thawra, the diaspora had rarely been in direct contestation with the regime and political elite.43 Rather, as discussed above, the diaspora has been seen as a resource for political actors in Lebanon and exploited by sectarian parties to support their interests. The transgressive role of the diaspora was particularly notable during the 2022 parliamentary elections in which the diaspora vote played a crucial role in the election of 13 “Thawra” candidates and 15 independents from outside the traditional parties. Voter turnout was significantly higher in the diaspora compared to residents (63.05% versus 45.61%, bringing total turnout to 49.19%). According to data from the American University of Beirut’s Electoral Lab, 30% of the diaspora voted for non-traditional parties and the diaspora accounted for 20% of the 13 “Thawra” candidates votes, securing at least four seats for independent or “Thawra” candidates that would otherwise have been lost.44
Beyond its manifestation in protest activities, the diasporic identity is reflected in the creation of diaspora-centric ngo s. While the diaspora had previously organized gatherings for social and cultural events, these ngo s created spaces for the diaspora to meet and engage on issues including national identity and intersectional politics.45 For example, the UK-based non-profit Impact Lebanon was founded in 2019 “to make activism and volunteering accessible, relevant and sustainable for the Lebanese diaspora.”46 The organization has supported a wide range of initiatives, including projects aimed at Lebanon, such as fundraisers in the wake of covid-19 and the 2020 Beirut Blast, but also diaspora-focused activities including discussions on Lebanese identity and politics, seminars, and panel discussions. Further centering the diaspora, Meghterbin Mejtemiin (United Diaspora) was founded on October 18, 2019 as a global network to unite Lebanese diaspora organizations in support of the Thawra. Stating: “We are the revolution, abroad,” its declared aim is for the diaspora to “become a major player in driving the change in Lebanon.”47 These organizations reflect the mobilization of the diaspora aimed at building the diaspora’s own identity, solidarity, and political power. It must be noted that this professed unity did not eliminate differences in political vision or values, nor did it necessarily include all members of the diaspora. However, the large-scale mobilization of the diaspora through protest actions and avowedly cross-sectarian, intersectional, and unified diaspora organizations constituted a clear break with previous expatriate activities and established the diaspora as an autonomous and potentially transformative political actor.
Diasporic Solidarities: Contesting Territorialized Citizenship
By highlighting transnational belonging, solidarities, and constructions of identity, expatriate involvement with the Thawra challenges state-centric notions of citizenship. Just as diasporas are sites of contestation and construction, so the notion of citizenship can be viewed as constituted through strategic processes of social construction, framing, and political mobilization. In Lebanon, citizenship has historically been tied to the sectarian system that pervades state-society relations on all levels.48 Since Lebanon’s creation as a nation-state, it has had a weak unified national consciousness, compounded by the sectarian nature of the state that divides political positions, and increasingly public sector jobs, by sectarian identity.49 Moreover, the central state is weak, highly patrimonial and corrupt, and relies on informal sectarian power relations and patronage networks.50 Public status laws that govern marriage, divorce, and inheritance are under the authority of confessional courts. Sectarian belonging is thus the most salient identity in everyday life.51 For the Lebanese to exist in Lebanon, access services or rights, exercise political power, and live a family life, they need to fall within the clearly defined sectarian groups institutionalized in the system.52 This situation creates an exclusionary notion of citizenship that discriminates against post- or anti-sectarian identities.
The Thawra provided the first large-scale and sustained contestation of the sectarian system in Lebanon and the articulation of a post-sectarian national identity. The diaspora contributed actively to this reframing of citizenship. Through its activism, the diaspora has contributed to the construction of alternative imaginaries for Lebanon and exemplified the common identity and solidarities beyond the common denominator of shared territorial experience. Diaspora organizations like Impact Lebanon and Meghterbin Mejtemiin explicitly hold a non-sectarian political stance and articulate post-sectarian, inclusive political and social visions for Lebanon. Meghterbin Mejtemiin’s manifesto, for example, states: “We stand firmly with ousting of the sectarian and classist system in all of its forms and institutions.”53 Casanovas and Kerras thus argue that the diaspora “can be a nation-state building partner”54 through its participation in the Thawra.
This stance reflects developments in the field of Critical citizenship studies that have proposed de-territorialized understandings of citizenship that “unbound”55 nations from territory and dissociate citizens from their status as rights-bearing subjects.56 Scholars such as Ní Mhurchú argue that “citizenship can instead begin to be associated with certain sites of struggle and contestation which have the potential to constitute citizenship anew.”57 Levy further contends that citizenship is enacted.58 This enactment, according to Ataç, Rygiel, and Stierl, can be manifested in solidarity networks, cognitive constructs, and a shared sense of belonging.59
The Lebanese diaspora’s involvement in the Thawra is a salient example of this understanding of citizenship. The diaspora encompasses people with a wide variety of migration histories and includes many long-term expatriates. Many do not retain the Lebanese passport, including the descendants of foreign fathers and Lebanese mothers, who cannot obtain their citizenship under the 1925 Lebanese Citizenship Act. Nevertheless, many Lebanese non-citizens in the diaspora participated in the Thawra abroad, enacting solidarity and asserting their belonging to the Lebanese political community.60 In a study of Lebanese diaspora members in France during the Thawra, Tan argues that “acts of solidarity as emotional acts of citizenship cultivated new modes of citizenship, producing new modalities of belonging to Lebanon.”61 A striking example of one of Tan’s interview participants shows the significance of protest participation as a means of asserting Lebanese identity and belonging: “I protest to get my Lebanese identity, it is a struggle for my own recognition by my own country.”62 Links to the diaspora were also part of the Thawra’s discourse in Lebanon. News about international protests were shared in activist networks on social media and diaspora protests were livestreamed, claiming the diaspora as members of the Lebanese polity.63 Thus, as Tan shows, “diaspora members overturned legal and territorial exclusions to reconfigure the Lebanese regime of citizenship.”64 Protestors in the diaspora thus demanded inclusion in the Lebanese polity through acts of citizenship articulated through emotion, solidarity, and contestation, thus challenging the state-centric, territory- and sect-bound notion of citizenship espoused by the Lebanese state.
Conclusion
Despite the sectarian elite’s continued hold on power, the Lebanese Thawra had an important impact on the Lebanese’s social and political imaginations, national consciousness, and notably its diaspora. In this article, I showed how the diaspora’s involvement in the Thawra transnationalized the protest movement, giving rise to new means of claims-making and contestation. Concretely, diaspora members replicated and amplified protest activities taking place in Lebanon, mobilized financial and material resources for the movement and leveraged the political opportunity structures in their countries of residence to articulate their demands. The transnational spatialities of the Thawra thus established the diaspora as a locus for contestation and autonomous political action. Moreover, I argued that the Thawra provided an opportunity for diaspora entrepreneurs to mobilize diaspora identity and organizations, thus constructing and consolidating a Lebanese diaspora. Finally, I discussed how diaspora members participating in the Thawra enacted citizenship through acts of solidarity and protest, thus claiming belonging to Lebanon and its polity and challenging Lebanon’s state-centric and sectarian citizenship regime. Conceptually, this article contributes to the debate on social movement spatialities and conceptions of citizenship, community, and belonging beyond the boundaries of the nation-state. Therefore, by adopting the diaspora lens, it is possible to gain a fuller understanding of social movements, their repertoires and the acts of solidarity, opportunities for identity-construction, and notions of belonging to which they give rise.
Laurie Brand, “State, Citizenship, and Diaspora: The Cases of Jordan and Lebanon,” Centre for Comparative and Immigration Studies (February 2007).
Sally Farhat, “Lebanese Youths Seek a Brighter Future Abroad Amid Economic, Political Crises,” France 24, April 26, 2022, https://www.france24.com/en/middle-east/20220426-lebanese-youths-seek-out-a-brighter-future-abroad-amid-economic-political-crises.
Jennifer Skulte-Ouaiss and Paul Tabar, “Strong in Their Weakness or Weak in Their Strength? The Case of Lebanese Diaspora Engagement with Lebanon,” Immigrants & Minorities 33, no.2 (2015): 141–164.
Wendy Pearlman, “Competing for Lebanon’s Diaspora: Transnationalism and Domestic Struggles in a Weak State,” International Migration Review 48, no. 1 (2014): 34–75.
Brand, “State, Citizenship, and Diaspora.”
Aida Casanovas and Nassima Kerras, “The Rights of Lebanese Expatriates and their Political Engagement with the Homeland,” Reidocrea 9, no. 13 (2020): 173–191.
Sarah Armouch, Reem Talhouk, and Vasilis Vlachokyriakos, “Revolting from Abroad: The Formation of a Lebanese Transnational Public,” pacm on Human-Computer Interaction 6, no. 406 (2022): 1–28.
Seetha Tan, “Belonging Beyond Borders: Mapping Citizenship, Solidarity and Protest in the Lebanese Diaspora in France,” (MPhil Thesis, University of Cambridge, 2021).
Fiona Adamson, “Constructing the Diaspora: Diaspora Identity Politics and Transnational Social Movements,” International Studies Association, San Francisco (26–29 March 2008): 5.
Helen Underhill, “Learning in Social Movements,” Australian Journal of Adult Learning 59, no. 3 (2019): 373.
Martin Sökefeld, “Mobilizing in Transnational Space: A Social Movement Approach to the Formation of Diaspora,” Global Networks 6, no. 3 (2006): 265.
Adamson, “Constructing the Diaspora,” 12.
Katrina Burgess, “Unpacking the Diaspora Channel in New Democracies: When Do Migrants Act Politically Back Home?” Studies in Comparative International Devevelopment 9 (2014): 13.
Maria Koinova, “Beyond Statist Paradigms: Sociospatial Positionality and Diaspora Mobilization in International Relations,” International Studies Review 19 (2017): 597, 602.
Félix Krawatzek and Lea Müller-Funk, “Two Centuries of Flows Between ‘Here’ and ‘There’: Political Remittances and their Transformative Potential,” Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 46, no. 6 (2020): 1004.
Ibid, 1010–1016.
Paul Tabar, “Transnational is not Diasporic: A Bourdieusian Approach to the Study of Modern Diaspora,” Journal of Sociology 56, no. 3 (2020): 463.
Tamirace Fakhoury, “Lebanese Communities Abroad: Feeding and Fueling Conflicts,” Arab Reform Initiative (2018): 2.
Guita Hourani, “Lebanese Diaspora and Homeland Relations,” Migration and Refugee Movements in the Middle East and North Africa, American University in Cairo (23–25 October 2007): 20.
Casanovas and Kerras, “The rights of Lebanese expatriates,” 180.
Ali Abdallah and Farid Abhallah, “The Lebanese Diaspora and Tourism in Lebanon: Migration and Economic Impacts,” in The Effects and Consequences of Migration and Immigration on the Lebanese Economy and Tourism Sector, eds. Mohammad Makki and Nadine Sinno (Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2018).
Fakhoury, “Lebanese Communities Abroad.”
Skulte-Ouaiss and Tabar, “Strong in Their Weakness or Weak in Their Strength?”
Pearlman, “Competing for Lebanon’s Diaspora.”
Maria Koinova, “Can Conflict-Generated Diasporas be Moderate Actors During Episodes of Contested Sovereignty? Lebanese and Albanian Diasporas Compared,” Review of International Studies 37 (2011): 5.
Skulte-Ouaiss and Tabar, “Strong in Their Weakness or Weak in Their Strength?”
Pearlman, “Competing for Lebanon’s Diaspora,” 37.
Fakhoury, “Lebanese Communities Abroad,” 4.
Byron Miller, Geography and Social Movements: Comparing Antinuclear Activism in the Boston Area (London: Minnesota Press, 2000).
Walter Nicholls, “The Geographies of Social Movements,” Geography Compass 1, no. 3 (2007).
Maya Hodroj “دايماً معكن ♡ جانب من الوقفة اللبنانية الليلة بلندن … ناطرينكن بكرا جنب السفارة اللبنانية الساعة ٢ بعد الضهر تيوصل صوت الدعم والحب للبنان,” Facebook post in “Lebanese in the UK”, November 22, 2019, https://www.facebook.com/groups/110833172278880/permalink/2984132198282282/.
Stephanie Dagher Menassa, “From Birmingham to Beirut,” Facebook post in “Lebanese in the UK”, October 22, 2019, https://www.facebook.com/groups/110833172278880/permalink/2913226115372891/.
“Diaspora,” Thawra Chronicles, https://www.thawra-chronicles.org/diaspora.
Heba Nasser, “Britain to Beirut: Hundreds of Lebanese protest outside London embassy,” Middle East Eye, October 19, 2019, https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/hundreds-protest-near-lebanese-embassy-london.
Sofia Farhat, “Edition spéciale Liban: notre rédaction au cœur du soulèvement,” Opinion Internationale, October 20, 2019, https://www.opinion-internationale.com/2019/10/20/edition-speciale-liban-notre-redaction-au-coeur-du-soulevement_67756.html.
“Lebanon Protest: Expats Return for Independence Day Demonstration,” bbc, November 23rd, 2019, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-middle-east-50529822; Casanovas and Kerras, “The Rights of Lebanese Expatriates,” 182.
Armouch, Talhouk and Vlachokyriakos, “Revolting from Abroad,” 6.
Kiyoteru Tsutsui and Jackie Smith, “Human Rights and Social Movements: From the Boomerang Pattern to a Sandwich Effect,” in The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Social Movements, eds. David Snow et al. (New York: Wiley-Blackwell, 2018), 586.
Gabriel Sheffer, Diaspora Politics: At Home Abroad (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 142.
Casanovas and Kerras, “The Rights of Lebanese Expatriates,” 174.
Tabar, “Transnational is not Diasporic,” 462.
Fakhoury, “Lebanese Communities Abroad,” 4.
Armouch, Talhouk, and Vlachokyriakos, “Revolting from Abroad,” 4.
Ibrahim Jouhari, “Expatriates Voting Analysis,” ifi Electoral Lab, 2022, https://www.aub.edu.lb/ifi/Documents/_Expatriates%20voting%20analysis%20.pdf.
Armouch, Talhouk and Vlachokyriakos, “Revolting from Abroad,” 14.
“About Us,” Impact Lebanon, https://www.impactlebanon.org/about.
“About,” United Diaspora, https://www.uniteddiasporalb.com/about.
John Nagle, “Consociationalism is Dead! Long Live Zombie Power-Sharing!” Studies in Ethnicity and Nationalism 20, no. 2 (2020): 138.
Bassel F. Salloukh, “Taif and the Lebanese State: The Political Economy of a Very Sectarian Public Sector,” Nationalism and Ethnic Politics 25, no.1 (2019): 44.
Boaz Atzili, “State Weakness and ‘Vacuum of Power’ in Lebanon,” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 33, no.8 (2010): 757.
Waleed Serhan, “Consociational Lebanon and the Palestinian Threat of Sameness,” Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies 17, no. 2 (2019): 240.
Bassel F. Salloukh and Renko Verheij, “Transforming Power Sharing: From Corporate to Hybrid Consociation in Postwar Lebanon,” Middle East Law and Governance 9, no. 2 (2017): 147.
“Manifesto,” United Diaspora, https://www.uniteddiasporalb.com/manifesto.
Casanovas and Kerras, “The Rights of Lebanese Expatriates,” 173.
Pearlman, “Competing for Lebanon’s Diaspora,” 40.
Aolieann Ní Mhurchú, “Citizenship beyond State Sovereignty,” in Routledge Handbook of Global Citizenship Studies, eds. Engin Isin and Peter Nyers (Abingdon: Routledge, 2014), 119.
Ní Mhurchú, “Citizenship beyond State Sovereignty,” 124.
Gal Levy, “Contested Citizenship of the Arab Spring and Beyond,” in Routledge Handbook of Global Citizenship Studies, eds. Engin Isin and Peter Nyers (Abingdon: Routledge, 2014), 26.
Ilker Atac, Kim Rygiel and Maurice Stierl, “Introduction: The Contentious Politics of Refugee and Migrant Protest and Solidarity Movements: Remaking Citizenship from the Margins,” Citizenship Studies 20, no. 5 (2016): 531.
Tan, “Belonging beyond Borders,” 38.
Ibid.
Ibid, 40.
For example, see Daleel Thawra, “Daily Calendar,” Facebook, November 22, 2019, https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=120424886077713&set=pcb.120424932744375.
Tan, “Belonging beyond Borders,” 84.
