Diaspora

choi

Diasporas | Gone but not Forgotten; Governments believe their diasporas can solve all sorts of problems. But they are a picky, unbiddable bunch. Economist, June 27, 2015.
http://www.economist.com/news/in ... lems-they-are-picky

Quote:

"The World Bank reckons that about 250m people live outside the country of their birth * * * And diasporas are not just composed of emigrants. The Irish government thinks that everybody of Irish descent—perhaps 60m or 70m people—is part of the Irish diaspora. Israel claims all Jews.

"Emigrants send remittances, often in vast quantities—India receives $70 billion [or ~3.5% of nominal GDP]a year, and remittances to Tajikistan are worth half of the country’s GDP [CIA World Factbook's 2014 estimates based on official exchange rate: India 2.048tn; Tajikistan 9.156bn]. Because they are a source of foreign exchange, rating agencies can take remittances into account when assessing a country’s creditworthiness.

"Prodigious sons * * * No country is hungrier than China. Emulating Taiwan, which built a technology industry with the help of Taiwanese Stanford graduates, it is trying to woo its most talented foreign-educated citizens to come back * * * The wooing is broad and relentless: one Chinese-British academic contacted for this article had been approached that very morning.  She is not interested, though—and in that she is typical. Patrick Gaulé, a researcher in Prague, has tracked the careers of foreign-born scientists in America. He estimates that less than 9% will return during their working lives. Scientists from well-off countries are most likely to go back: the Taiwanese are about five times more likely to return than are the mainland Chinese, for example. Surveys of PhD students in America find that 82% of Chinese and 84% of Indians plan to stay.

"Remittances are reliable—more so, in a recession, than foreign direct investment.

"Trying to use diasporans to lobby for national interests is even harder. People leave countries for a reason, and that reason is often disdain. * * * And expat politics is often a hothouse

Note:
(a) English dictionary
* biddable
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/biddable
* diaspora (n; Greek, dispersion, from diaspeirein to scatter, from dia- + speirein to sow): "the Jews living outside * * * modern Israel"
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/diaspora
* prodigious (adj; noun is 'prodigy'): "exciting amazement or wonder"
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/prodigious

(b) "Kathleen Newland of the Migration Policy Institute, a think-tank" based in Washington, DC.
(c) section heading "prodigious sons" is a wordplay on "prodigal son" in the bible.
(d) "China is now cutting some of the red tape that is required to start a business partly because of pressure from returnees, says Wang Huiyao of the Centre for China and Globalisation 中国与全球化智库, a think-tank in Beijing."

个人简介. 王辉耀主页, undated
www.wanghuiyao.com
("王辉耀，教授，博士生导师，中国与全球化智库(CCG)咨询委员会理事长兼主任，国务院参事")