Transnationalism Practices by the Kurdish Diaspora Elite -The role of the Swedish Kurdish diaspora elite - Globalization, Environment and Social Change A Master Thesis Supervised by Prof. Bo Malmberg By Media Royan Stockholm University May 2012 0 Erbil 2012 “People unite beyond the boundaries and differentiate within them” (Münch 2001: 189) 1 Statue of the former Swedish prime-minister “Olof Palme” has been placed in Solymania Swedish village has been build near Howler 2 Table of content ACKNOWLEDGEMENT .............................................................................................................................. 5 ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................................... 6 INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................................... 8 AIM ..................................................................................................................................................................... 9 RESEARCH QUESTION ......................................................................................................................................... 9 THE ORGANIZATION OF THE PAPER .................................................................................................................... 10 THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVE ............................................................................................................... 11 DIASPORA ......................................................................................................................................................... 11 PERSPECTIVES OF THE DIASPORA ...................................................................................................................... 12 DIASPORAN AND TRANSNATIONAL ELITES ........................................................................................................ 16 TRANSNATIONALISM ......................................................................................................................................... 19 DIASPORA VS. TRANSNATIONALISM .................................................................................................................. 21 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND .................................................................................................................. 22 THE IMMIGRANT HISTORY OF THE KURDS ........................................................................................................ 22 IMMIGRATION TO SWEDEN ................................................................................................................................ 23 THE KURDISH DIASPORA .................................................................................................................................. 25 RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN IRAQI KURDISTAN AND SWEDEN ............................................................................... 26 METHOD ..................................................................................................................................................... 28 QUALITATIVE INTERVIEW METHOD ................................................................................................................... 29 3 SELECTING PARTICIPANTS ................................................................................................................................. 30 MATERIALS: MAIN QUESTIONS ASKED ............................................................................................................. 32 PROCEDURE OF THE INTERVIEW ........................................................................................................................ 33 LIMITATIONS ..................................................................................................................................................... 34 ANALYSIS .................................................................................................................................................... 36 WHAT KIND OF CONTRIBUTION DO THE MEMBERS OF THE KURDISH DIASPORA ELITE MAKE TO THE DEVELOPMENT PROCESSES IN IRAQI KURDISTAN? ............................................................................................ 36 WHAT MAKES THE CONTRIBUTION BY MEMBERS OF THE KURDISH ELITE WORTHY OF BEING CATEGORIZED AS TRANSNATIONALISM PRACTICE? ....................................................................................................................... 43 TO WHAT EXTENT AND HOW DOES THE SPECIFICITY OF THE SWEDISH POLITICAL CONTEXT INFLUENCE THE TRANSNATIONAL PRACTICES AMONG THE KURDISH DIASPORA? ....................................................................... 52 DO THE SWEDISH INTEGRATION AND MINORITY POLICIES FACILITATE THE CONTRIBUTION OF MEMBERS OF THE KURDISH ELITE AND THEIR TRANSNATIONAL PRACTICES OVER THE BORDERS? ................................................ 57 WHAT CHARACTERISTICS DISTINGUISH THE SWEDISH KURDISH DIASPORA FROM OTHER DIASPORA? ............... 61 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................................................. 66 REFERENCES ............................................................................................................................................. 71 APPENDIXES .............................................................................................................................................. 83 APPENDIX 1:...................................................................................................................................................... 83 APPENDIX 2:...................................................................................................................................................... 84 4 Acknowledgement I would like to show my gratitude for the help and support of the great people around me, to only some of whom it is possible to give particular mention here. Above all I owe my deepest gratitude to Professor; Bo Malmberg; for his provided tolerant, guiding, supervising and his personal support when I first became interested on my research topic. He was the one who taught me how to pave the way and helped me through all my MS study. It is a pleasure to thank him who made this thesis possible. He is a great professor. This thesis would not be possible without the technical support, assist, good advice and friendship on both an academic and a personal level of my second supervisor Dr. Khalid Khayati. He is an admired pioneer in this research topic. I owe my gratitude to my dear friend Golale sharafkandi for unsurpassed knowledge of linguistics method who played a major role by dedicate her precious time reading the thesis and let me have her opinion. This thesis would not have been possible unless by kindly contribution of; dear Jamal Alamdar, Houssein Kordnejad, Asos Shafeek, Jamile Hashemie, Seyran Duran, Sliva Cigerxwin, Saman Shali and Kamal Artin. It is a pleasure to thank and show my gratitude for which my expression of thanks would not be enough compare to bequest. I am indebted to my Parents, my husband Sidar and my sister Homa for their unequivocal encouragement, promoting, stimulating and support throughout financial and emotional and my children Didar and Ronya for their great patience at all times. Last, but by no means least I owe thank to Prof; Abbas Vali, Dr. Ann-Catrin Emanuelsson, Dr. Minoo Alinia, Dr. Berzoo Eliassi for sharing their reference books with me and to all my friends in Iraqi Kurdistan, Sweden, United State and UK. For any errors or inadequacies that may remain in this work, of course, the responsibility is entirely my own. 5 Abstract In the past, the main focus of migration studies was the investigation of influences of immigrants on the host society and their integration into the country of settlement. However, transnationalism studies currently place much greater emphasis upon the other side – which is the effect of living in diaspora, in the society of origin with trans-border citizenship. The cultural, social and political interactions and connections between Sweden as a country of settlement and Kurdistan (especially Iraqi Kurdistan), create a transnational social space where the members of the Kurdish elite can play a major role in improvement of Kurdistan. From here, their adoption of a double identity makes it possible for them to permanently define and redefine their position in Swedish society while simultaneously participating in the inherent development of Kurdistan. The merging of the members of the Kurdish elite’s discourse in rebuilding of democracy and development with regard to reconstruction, leads to more focus on the role of diaspora and understanding the Swedish Kurdish elite’s impact on “functionalizing” and major contribution in the current state of Kurdistan. The ways of expression, increasing academic value, multicultural behavior, and the elite’s activities in civil society organization in between two or several states, their appearance in the international scene, experiences of living in both host / home societies, and multi-relations in a diasporic context continuing and re-adjusting national identities are essential indications of trans-border identity formation of Kurdish diaspora. After the liberation of Kurdistan (northern Iraq 2003), members of the Kurdish elite experienced transnationalism mainly through transferring