[LINK] What do you do with the diaspora?

[rfmcdonald]

Jonathan Edelstein has a post up about the problems facing Lebanon as it debates extending voting rights to its diaspora. The central problem in Lebanon, as--Jonathan notes--it always is in countries with large diasporas, is that the diaspora is unrepresentative of the homeland, tracing a disproportionate share of its ancestry to some regions and supporting certain political factions out of all proportion to trends in the homeland. How can it be incorporated without destabilizing the homeland's affairs? Most often, the issue of diasporic representation is dealt with by denying diasporas any representation. It will be interesting to see if Lebanon manages to set new precedents.