How Durable and New Is Transnational Life?: Historical Retrieval through Local Comparison

Diaspora 9:2 2000 How Durable and New Is Transnational Life? Historical Retrieval through Local Comparison1 Robert C. Smith Barnard College Introduction Is transnational life among migrants "new," and, if so, how? How does a transnational perspective enable us to understand immigrants and immigration more deeply, both today and in the past? This article seeks to engage these questions through a comparative analysis of migration and related transnational social processes at the local level in two very different cases and time periods: a Swedish farming community in the American Midwest spanning most of the previous major wave of migration (1860s-1920s) and a contemporary Mexican community in New York City (1940s-present). Using two cases set in different time periods and contexts of reception both constrains our ability to answer the questions posed above and gives us leverage in answering them. The limits stem from the different methods used in the Swedish case (mainly archival historical; see Ostergren) and the Mexican case (mainly ethnographic; see Smith, "Los Ausentes," "Transnational Localities," "Migrant Membership"), and from the fact that the outcomes are known in the Swedish but not in the Mexican case. Analytical leverage is gained because the comparison enables us to understand this article as an exercise in historical retrieval. In essence, it asks, What will we see when we look at the Swedish case using a transnational perspective and comparing it to a current transnational case? Conversely, it asks, What limits and potential of local transnational life are suggested when we look at a contemporary local case with the benefit of historical hindsight? I frame the discussion using the concept of "transnational life" instead of "transnationalism" or some other term for two purposes. First, it enables me to keep the focus on the local-level, lived processes that will make the analysis more concrete. Second, it enables me to partly sidestep the problems associated with making processes (transnationalization) into nouns that describe larger categories (transnationalism). As I use the term here, transnational life includes those practices and relationships that link immigrants and their descendants abroad with the home country, where such 203 204 Diaspora 9:2 2000 practices have significant meaning; that are regularly carried out (Portes, Guarnizo, and Landholt; Portes, Conclusion); and that embody important aspects of identity and social structure that, in turn, help form the life world of immigrants or their descendants. I understand "transnational life" not as an all-encompassing concept or empirical reality but, rather, as one of several important spheres of life to which migrants can belong and in which they can participate . The nature and extent of involvement in transnational life varies: it is in general stronger than that in purely associational forms of social life, such as political parties and clubs, but less strong than that envisioned in the classic notion of "community," with its connotations of institutional completeness, pervasiveness, and harmony (for other discussions of the term "transnational," see Guarnizo, "Rise of Transnational"; Portes et al.; Glick-Schiller; Mato; Smith, "Migrant Membership"; on local-level transnationalism , including pieces that defend use of the term "community," see Levitt, "Transnational Community," Transnational Villagers; Goldring , "Blurring Borders"; Smith, "Transnational Migration," "Migration , Settlement," "Social Location"). I further argue that communal transnational life evolves both in response to different contexts and according to its own internal dynamic, which includes the life course of immigrants, maturation of the migrant stream, and other factors. In several instances, other cases are brought in to reinforce a point. Analytical Framework and Strategy This article deliberately focuses mainly on developments at the local level, but with the knowledge that these are, or were, affected by developments at higher levels. Indeed, changes in macro-level politics, economics, or institutions have important consequences and reset the parameters within which local-level processes are played out. In particular, several contextual or macro-level variables tend to make transnational life more durable, including today's greater tolerance for ethnic diversity and greater rights for ethnic minorities in the United States; the likelihood of continued high levels of immigration to the United States for the foreseeable future; the presence of an international human rights regime enforcing freedom of movement; an international political economy in which the...