Dr. Katya Long visits Truman School

Many Americans living abroad do not relinquish their citizenship, but rather embrace it a great deal as transnational citizens, explained Dr. Katya Long on November 18.

A Monroe-Paine distinguished lecturer, Long presented her talk before a group of MU faculty, students, and staff gathered at Memorial Union. The lecture, titled “Those Who Leave: How Americans Living Abroad Are Changing America”, focused on the political ties these citizens maintain with the United States.

Long explained that many Americans living in foreign countries intend to return to the U.S. or maintain interests within. She described this population as those living overseas long enough to develop interests, and those not abroad with the U.S. military or state department.

These people, a group of over 6 million, are shifting the existing relationship between territory, government, and citizenship, as they are no longer exchanging their domestic connections for foreign ones.

A short poll of her audience helped Long demonstrate her point. Her experiment showed that around one-third of the audience had previously lived overseas, but none held dual citizenship between another country and the U.S. She revealed this trend is not unlike that of Americans living overseas.

“Immigrants are also emigrants,” Long said, underscoring the central point of her lecture. She explained that those who move to another country are not only entering that country, but are leaving the U.S.

In doing so, they alter the demographic and democratic makeup of the US. The difference comes, however, when they make an effort to maintain their role as an integral functioning part of the United States while living abroad.

Dr. Long earned her PhD in Political Science from the Université Libre de Bruxelles, is a researcher at the Belgian Fonds National de la Recherche Scientifique, and is currently a visiting scholar at Michigan State University.

Her visit to the Truman School of Public Affairs came as part of the Monroe-Paine Distinguished Lecture Series, which brings scholars, policymakers, and public officials to the MU campus.

During their visit to campus, speakers give a public lecture, conduct a research seminar and meet with students and faculty from across campus.

Long’s research seminar, conducted over lunch prior to her lecture, focused on a process of change to better unify the higher education system across nations in the European Union.