Transnational Political Spaces - Agents - Structures - Encounters

Introduction: The Communicative Construction of Transnational Political Spaces Mathias Albert, Gesa Bluhm, Jan Helmig, Andreas Leutzsch, Jochen Walter Political space does not inevitably correlate with nation-state borders and territories. In a world characterized by the permanent crossing and transformation of borders and boundaries, the political, stripped of large parts of its territorial connotations, is characterized by a heterogeneity and flexibility which is related to particular spatial conditions, junctions and disjunctions. However, the transnational character of the political is not a particular phenomenon of the 'global age' (Beck 2006; Albrow 1996), but can be observed throughout the existence, and in a certain sense, already before the emergence of the nation-state. Defining political space as a sphere in which common representations and identifications are negotiated, this volume investigates the following questions: If political space is no longer perceived as always and automatically congruent with the territory of the nation-state, how are transnational spatial units of the political formed and defined? And how can they be traced and conceptualized? Despite its rather extensive usage, which makes it resemble a catch-all phrase, the term transnationalism traditionally refers to phenomena and processes which cross national boundaries but are not global in scope, while at least involving one non-state actor. This definition was already contained in the basic characterization of transnational relations in world politics first developed by Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane in the early 1970s, which emphasizes that 'a transnational interaction may involve governments, but it may not only involve governments: We speak of transnational communication, transportation, finance, and travel when we refer to nongovernmental or only partially governmental interactions across state boundaries' (Nye/Keohane 1971: 332). In short, 'at least one actor' involved in transnational cross-border interactions 'is not an agent of a government or of an intergovernmental organization' (Nye/Keohane 1971: 332; also Risse-Kappen 1995b: 5). Transnational relations therefore do not leave aside the governmental level, but above all do not attribute a sphere of influence to state actors separate from or even superior to interactions among non-state actors. In a nutshell, transnational relations may encompass state actors, but they necessarily include non-state actors (Pries 2007: 16). The present volume is however not primarily about transnational relations in general, but more specifically about forms of political transnationalism. Following the definition by Hartmut Kaelble and others, transnationalization describes the development of social or institutional cross-border networks, whereas transnationalism comprises the 'semantic construction' of common representations and identifications among larger groups of state and non-state actors beyond the nation-state (Kaelble et al. 2002: 10). The focus therefore at least partly shifts from the disintegration or de-territorialization of the nation-state by direct circulation, mobility or migration, to the level of communication, imagery and symbolic practices as well as to the role which the media play in processes of common identity-building. A constructivist and semantic definition of political transnationalism presupposes an extended notion of what can be or become political and of which actors can act politically - beyond governments and other institutions of the state. Recent research in the history of the political, political theory and political sociology emphasizes that the political constitutes a flexible and highly contested sphere engendered by communication and interactions among various state and non-state actors (Schorn-Schütte 2006; Stollberg-Rilinger 2005; Frevert 2005: 23-24; Nassehi/Schroer 2003; Mergel 2002; Beck 1993: 204-14). By including certain social groups and excluding others, actors permanently (re-) configure the nature of the political. It is thus not politics as a fixed entity bound to nation-states and their governments 'above' - as opposed to other agents 'below' - which is of interest here, but the variability of political processes and their delimitations. The idea of the political as the point of convergence where collective representations are conceived, disputed and transformed facilitates the analysis of various types of cross-border exchanges on a broader social basis. By looking at groups of actors that, according to the dynamic negotiation of power relations, join in or are excluded from the production of representations and their configurations, a more detailed impression of the political in transnational contexts becomes possible.