A Study Of The Political Participation By Diasporas In The Living Country

With the trans-border flow of a large number of the world's population, the use of the term of “diaspora” is becoming more generalized and it can be seen in many fields, such as anthropology, psychology, literature, etc,. In recent years, there are also some scholars noticing the significant influence of “diaspora” on international relations and started a preliminary discussion about the political participation of diasporas. However, before stepping into this topic, it is still necessary to figure out the main factors that are affecting the enthusiasm and participation of diaspora's political practices.By analyzing the interactive model of diaspora's political participation and political socialization, it can be easily found that, “ethnicity” is one of the most important factors that will affect diaspora's political participation. Nevetheless, “ethnicity” cannot be converted directly into political power. But with the process of political socialization, ethnicity can gather the scattered group members and condense them into a solidary unity so as to display the unique influence. And the condensed power will is embodied in the political society as the influence on the political system, big or small. Once diasporas get positive political feedback by political practice in the host country, the ethusiam and ethnic identity of the correponding will get promoted and strengthened. This actually constitutes the political cycle of political participation and enthnicity politicalization.In order to further verify the applicability of the model, the thesis chooses the U.S.A., the typical Western democratic country for sample collection. From various Diasporas in the U.S.A, the thesis selected Jewish American and Chinese American which respectively represented “strong ethnic identity-strong political participation” positive diaspora and “strong identity-weak political participation” potential diaspora. By comparing the similarities and differences between the two in political participation, this paper summarizes the main factors that will influence diaspora's political participation, including economic wealth and status, educational level, ethnic cohesion, traditional cultural background, indigenous country's political environment etc.. This is the key part of this paper. On basis of the comparative analysis the two Diasporas, this paper suggested on how to improve the Diasporas' status in the living country, namely as enhancing economic strength, strengthening ethnic identity, improving organizational ability and improving the indigenous nations.