# From trans-migrants to trans-borders: insights from the comparison of cross-border activities across three categories of migrants in France

Mirna Safi, Cris Beauchemin

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## To cite this version:

Mirna Safi, Cris Beauchemin. From trans-migrants to trans-borders: insights from the comparison of cross-border activities across three categories of migrants in France. 2015. hal-03459677

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# FROM TRANS-MIGRANTS TO TRANS-BORDERS: INSIGHTS FROM THE COMPARISON OF CROSS-BORDER ACTIVITIES ACROSS THREE CATEGORIES OF MIGRANTS IN FRANCE

Cris BEAUCHEMIN (Ined)

Mirna SAFI (Sciences Po)
Résumé :

Nous mesurons dans cet article les échanges transfrontaliers de trois catégories de migrants en France : les migrants internationaux, les migrants des DOM-TOM ainsi que les « migrants nationaux » (migrants coloniaux ou expatriés). Nous décrivons pour ces trois catégories un large éventail de liens transfrontaliers regroupés en trois dimensions suite à une analyse factorielle: sociopolitique, économique et de « re-migration ».

Nos résultats montrent que si tous les migrants maintiennent des échanges transfrontaliers, ceux-ci s'avèrent plus particulièrement intenses chez les migrants des DOM-TOM. Les dimensions sociopolitiques, économiques et de re-migration des liens transfrontaliers sont affectés par des déterminants similaires pour les trois catégories de migrants. S'appuyant sur la possibilité inédite de comparaison des migrants nationaux et internationaux offerte par nos données, nos conclusions proposent des déterminants communs liés au type de frontière entre les espaces d'origine et de destination impliqués dans le processus migratoire.

Pour citer ce document :

Transnationalisme, migrants, migration internationale, migration nationale, liens transfrontaliers.

Pour une version électronique de ce document de travail et des autres numéros des Notes & Documents de l'OSC, voir le site web de l'OSC : http://www.sciencespo.fr/osc/fr/content/notes-documents-de-l-osc

Abstract:

In this article, we measure cross-border activities of three different categories of migrants in France: international migrants, French overseas department migrants and other "national migrants" (return colonial migrants or return expats). We describe for these three migrant categories a wide range of cross-border ties grouped together through factor analysis into three dimensions: sociopolitical, economic and re-migration. Our findings show that all migrants maintain trans-border activities, with particular intensity among French overseas migrants. The sociopolitical, economic and re-migration dimensions of cross-border activities are also shown to be affected by similar determinants across the three categories of migrants. Building on the unique opportunity offered by the data in comparing national and international migrants, our final analysis points towards some common determinants related to the type of the border between the origin and destination places involved in the migration process.

Readers wishing to cite this document are asked to use the following form of words:

Transnationalism, migration, international migrants, national migrants, cross-border ties.

For an on-line version of this working paper and others in the series, please visit the OSC website at:
http://www.sciencespo.fr/osc/fr/content/notes-documents-de-l-osc
Introduction

The concept of transnationalism has been increasingly used in the social sciences in a
wide variety of theoretical and empirical approaches. In its broadest usage, transnationalism
refers to a global process not specifically related to migration but more generally to
increasing economic, cultural and political cross-border connectivity enhanced by the
advancement of transportation and communication technologies. The concept was used in
international relations studies as early as the 1970s to describe the growing importance of
non-state actors; also in political studies describing social movements organized across
borders (Bauböck 2010). In some versions, the transnational perspective is assumed to have
foreseen the weakening role of the nation-state. Transnationalism has thus been seen as a
new model of post-national citizenship (Jacobson 1996; Soysal 1994), with consequences for
the future of the world's political organization.

However, it is in the migration literature that the concept has had its greatest success (Glick Schiller, Basch, and Blanc-Szanton 1992; Levitt and Jaworsky 2007). In the 1990s, transnationalism became a sub-field of migration studies, fueling theoretical and empirical debates about the migratory experience and the immigrant assimilation process (Waldinger 2015). Within this field, transnationalism was first identified as delineating a major transformation in modes of migration and incorporation, giving rise to a new figure of migrant, the *transmigrant* (Glick Schiller, Basch, and Blanc-Szanton 1995). The literature also discusses the impact of migrant transnationalism on the state's ability to control and manage immigration.

The overwhelming majority of empirical studies in the field uses data on international migrants. Most of the surveys used do not even ask transnational questions for other categories of migrants, as if transnationalism were to be found only among international migrants. This leads to conflating two meanings of the concept: transnationalism as a new mode of international migration and transnationalism as an intrinsic feature of population movement, regardless of the nature of the border-crossing.

What is the relation between transnationalism and migration or geographic mobility? To
what extent do the nature and the driving forces of cross-border ties differ across different
types of migrants? To what extent does this depend on the political nature of the border-
crossing? We argue in this article that comparing the cross-border engagement of national
and international migrants is a fruitful empirical strategy for investigating these research
questions. We use a unique dataset that allows us to compare a wide range of cross-border
activities across three categories of migrants in French society: international migrants and their offspring, French overseas migrants and their offspring and national migrants and their offspring (return expats or return colonials). The data also allow us to investigate the effects of a rich set of transnationalism determinants. Our findings show first that cross-border ties are not specific to international migrants. All migrants maintain relations with the place they emigrated from (place of emigration), and French overseas migrants have even higher levels of transnationalism than international migrants before and after controls. We then investigate differences in types of transnational activities and explore the extent to which driving factors are distinctive across migrant categories. In the final section, we focus on place-of-emigration effects. Our findings here point up similar transnationalism patterns for national and international migrants who crossed the same geographic border.

# I. Conceptual confusions and divides in the study of transnationalism

## 1. What is transnationalism? The rapid expansion of a non-consensual concept

Transnationalism has undoubtedly been one of the most fashionable concepts in migration studies over the last decades. It is also one of the most controversial (Foner 1997; Morawska 2003; Portes, Guarnizo, and Landolt 1999; Waldinger and Fitzgerald 2004; Waldinger, 2015). The frequent scientific polemics surrounding the uses and applications of the concept pertain mainly to its contested heuristic nature. Does it refer to a new phenomenon? Does it identify a new type of citizen? Does it refer to a new mode of migration and a new category of migrants? Scientific contentions are also related to a certain prophetic tendency in the use of the concept: scholars argue over the degree to which transnationalism is a worldwide process entailing structural and cultural world-system transformations that will have enduring implications in terms of membership and citizenship.

These often heated debates reflect an undeniable feature of the concept: transnationalism is fuzzy. The literature that uses this terminology is not quite clear about the scope of the phenomenon, the concrete social practices it refers to, the specific actors it applies to, etc. This fuzziness is aggravated by the fragmentary nature of empirical research in the transnational field, research that draws primarily on case-studies, with a wide range of variation in the potentially transnational groups, their relation to migration, the driving forces behind their transnational engagement and its sociological implications.
In an attempt to clarify the terms of the debate we have identified four questions that help in mapping the analytic contours of transnational studies in the social sciences:

- The question of the potential transnational population (*Who is transnational?*)

- The question of the relevant borders (*Which borders?*)

- The question of the multidimensionality of transnational practices (*Which type of transnationalism?*)

- The question of the driving forces of transnationalism (*What mechanisms?*).

## 2. Who is transnational?

In its broadest sense, transnationalism refers to worldwide transformations that have potential implications for a vast range of social facts; citizenship, political membership and loyalties, international relations, economic and financial dynamics, social movements, communication, transportation and mobility, etc. From this point of view, transnationalism is far from being exclusive to migrants and may be affecting the lives of virtually all of the planet's inhabitants.

The specificity of the migration studies lens when investigating transnationalism lies in the fact that the very research object at stake, namely population movement, is inherently transnational. In this sense, transnationalism, as a phenomenon, is in no way "new" to migration scholars (Foner 1997). Migrants have always been transnational actors and their experience has traditionally been regarded as such by social scientists, with cultural and political implications (Bourne 1916; Park 1928). The study of transnationalism in the migration literature has been characterized by a tendency to understate this intrinsic transnational feature, associating transnationalism instead with a specific new class of international migrants presented as transnational political, economic or cultural middlemen, or relating their transnationalism to a sort of ethnic retention and cultural resilience, with possible implications for nation formation and ethnoracial identity. Conversely, most recent research highlights connectivity as an inherent aspect of migration, the pre-condition for plural-local ties and activities (Soehl and Waldinger 2010; Waldinger, 2015). Through the migration of people, present and future connections between places are established. Research on transnationalism in situation of migration should thus widen its empirical scope to include different types of migrants. This may help us understand the specificity of international migration experience and its implications for cross-border ties.
### 3. Which borders?

As explicitly denoted by the very word that designates the concept, transnationalism entails nation-state border-crossing. From an empirical point of view, then, many studies draw on measurement of linkages – whether social, economic or political – between individuals, groups, institutions, firms, etc. across national borders. This leads to a profound paradox within the field: the national-methodologism of transnational studies (Glick Schiller 2010; Wimmer and Glick Schiller 2003). As pointed out by Waldinger and Fitzgerald (2004, p.1177), transnationalism scholars often end up speaking about its opposite.

Moreover, transnational studies tend to homogenize trans-state borders, giving priority to individual determinants and preferences in interpreting the intensity of transnational ties. Interstate combinations may vary in degree of institutionalization; through specific bilateral agreements, political and economic history, past migration flows, etc., and this may structurally affect cross-border ties between countries. Constraints on transnational relations may also be operational at the symbolic level. Some religious or ethnoracial groups' transnationalism may be particularly subject to suspicion with regard to loyalty (Waldinger 2003; Waldinger 2014). In the current anti-terrorist era, transnationalism may be more risky for international migrants than national ones and particularly for those of Islamic background. Suspicion toward transnationalism may be of particular importance in France given the persisting power of the Republican-assimilationist model (Safi 2008; Simon 2008; Amiraux and Simon 2006). Indeed, one third of the population living in metropolitan France agrees with the opinion that "to be accepted in France, you have to keep quiet about your origins" (Beauchemin, Lagrange, and Safi 2011; Simon 2012).

Hence, some scholars argue that the study of transnationalism must be "de-nationalized". This may be done by liberating the concept from geographical borders, shifting the focus to transnational social spaces defined by communal sociocultural identities. Transnationalism therefore does not need to identify a physical border; it intrinsically compresses space and transgresses geographical boundaries (Anderson 1991; Park 2007; Pries 2005). Transnationalism in this sense refers to a process of identity formation and membership construction (Levitt and Glick Schiller 2004).

Others argue that to de-nationalize transnational studies we need on the contrary to take the nature of the borders involved in the crossing more seriously (Guarnizo and Smith 1998). The focus on borders as transnational constraints highlights the specificity of international migrants' transnational experience since the border-crossing they may engage
in is of a quite particular type in a context of increasingly controlled and militarized nation-
state borders. From this perspective, international migrants are hardly the most emblematic
“transmigrants” of the modern world. De-nationalized transnational studies therefore should
extend their scope in order to cover engagements across different types of geographical and
institutionalized borders. Comparing diverse forms of long-distance mobility appears
particularly fruitful in this perspective as long as they involve identifiable source and
destination points so as to facilitate comparison with international migration. De-nationalizing
transnational studies is thus not about being post-national. Rather it signifies paying more
systematic attention to the political, economic and cultural nature of the border involved in
transnational of more generally translocal relations.

4. Which type of transnationalism?

Cross-border activities can take numerous forms that may be distinguished qualitatively and quantitatively. While most scholars agree on the multidimensionality of transnationalism, divisions vary within the transnational field. Some scholars separate by sociocultural, political and economic activities (Itzigsohn and Saucedo 2002; Portes, Guarnizo, and Landolt 1999; Vertovec 2004). Others speak of broad transnationalism, core transnationalism, selective transnationalism or expanded transnationalism (Itzigsohn 2000; Levitt 2001). T. Faist (2000) distinguishes between three transnational types: transnational kinship groups (linkages and obligation between family and household members or close friends), transnational instrumental activities (trading or business networks), transnational communities (mobilization of collective representations and the emergence of a sense of solidarity based on ethnicity, religion, nationality or place of origin).

While most of these divisions are conceptual and are rarely founded on empirical
evidence, they insightfully suggest that transnational practice intensity may vary across
specific domains for specific groups or individuals. They thus shift the conception of
transnationalism from “a condition of being” to a myriad of different, selectively practiced
activities (Waldinger 2008) that need to be measured through a wide range of social,
economic, political and symbolic ties. How distinct transnational dimensions are also of
analytic importance. As Faist (2000) points out, each type of transnational tie entails a
distinct “mechanism of integration”. For example, while sociopolitical and economic
transnationalism demand a sense of loyalty and responsibility to family members, they do not
necessary entail identification with a community or group.
This multidimensional view of transnationalism is nonetheless largely dependent on the quality of the data. Unfortunately, the scarcity of wide-ranging and representative data in this field results in studies that often rely on fragmentary information extracted from surveys that were not specifically conceived to investigate the heterogeneity of transnational engagement. While personal contacts, visits, remittances and voting are the most frequently studied transnational ties, the transnational dimension of the migration project itself (particularly circular and return migration) is rarely included in transnational studies. As shown in the following section, the data we use in this article are particularly valuable in assessing the multidimensionality of transnationalism and investigating its relation to migration.

## 5. What mechanisms?

Distinguishing between transnational activities is the first step in identifying the relevant mechanisms specific to each type of transnational linkage.

First, the literature shows a great deal of evidence of a resource-driven dimension in transnationalism (Itzigsohn and Saucedo 2002; Portes, Guarnizo, and Landolt 1999; Tamaki 2011). Education and income are shown to be major determinants. More generally, transnationalism requires a certain set of transnational “skills” and “competencies” that are not only a matter of individual choice (bi or multi-lingualism, dual citizenship, etc.). Some scholars also draw attention to the instrumental dimension of transnationalism, particularly as far as second-generation migrants are concerned, for whom engagement with the parental homeland may stem from a comparative assessment of host and origin societies’ potentialities (Levitt and Waters 2002; Mouw et al. 2014; Soehl and Waldinger 2012).

Apart from involving resources and competencies, transnationalism is also an inherent aspect of migration. People’s geographic mobility naturally involves some “linear” mechanisms that link migrants to their families and places of origins (Itzigsohn and Giorguli-Saucedo 2005; Itzigsohn and Giorguli-Saucedo 2002, p.899). These ties came into existence before migration and they become a pre-condition for post-migration cross-border activities, reflecting “connectivity between source and destination points” (Waldinger and Fitzgerald 2004, p. 1178). This linear transnationalism need not be conceived as restricted to international migrants: it may affect all migrants who still have exposure factors to their place of emigration (kinship, friends, citizenship, language, symbolic belonging, etc.).

Finally, transnationalism also has a political dimension. The frequency of transnational ties are indeed related to the nature of the border involved in the migration process: inter-state combinations and, more generally, political relations between sending and receiving
localities, together with geographical distance, dual nationality, migration history and immigration policies create a more or less porous structure for transnational ties (Espiritu 2003; Fouron and Glick Schiller 2002; Smith 2003). The political dimension of cross-border ties also pertains to transnationalism as a mode of ethnoracial boundary dynamics<fnref n="1" />. These processes may build on national identity<fnref n="2" /> and country-specific cultural repertoire (Brubaker 1992; Favell 1998; Lamont 2000) but they may also transcend state borders. Local geographic origins (villages or cities), pan-national ethnicity, religion or other types of ethnoracial markers may also be invested in transnational linkages (Basch, Glick Schiller, and Blanc-Szanton 1994; Espiritu 1992; Fouron and Glick Schiller 2002; Haller and Landolt 2005; Kastoryano 2006; Levitt 2003). Ethnoracial dynamics sometimes imply the formation of a sense of solidarity, considered by some scholars as a form of social capital (Faist 2000) that may translate into ethnic closure within economic, associative, political or social organizations (Kasinitz and Vickerman 2001; Portes, Guarnizo, and Haller 2002). Some ethnoracial aspects of transnationalism may also be more closely related to racialization and discrimination mechanisms. Here again, they may be specifically oriented towards some national groups<fnref n="3" /> but also equally relevant to broader categories of identification based on skin color, religion, broad geographic or third-world origins or any other type of ethnoracial classification.

Whether they are actively constructed within a community or externally ascribed to more or less specific groups or both, ethnoracial dynamics raise the idea of transnationalism as involving linkage to some sort of collective identity that gets formed in the context of migration. Migrants' country of origin only partially captures this dimension because regional, religious, linguistic or ethnoracial belonging may vary within some countries or on the contrary be similar across countries.

All in all, the preceding discussion of these four elementary questions points to the heuristic contribution to be gained from study that broadens the empirical scope of transnationalism. That is what we have sought to do in this article exploiting data that simultaneously comprise variant migrant categories, multiple border-crossing types, and a

<footnote n="1">¹ Ethnoracial boundary dynamics can be decomposed into a self-identification dimension (usually regarded as ethnicity) and a third-party identification (or ascription) dimension (usually referred to as race). There is an ongoing debate on the conceptualization of these processes with most influential developments in (Brubaker, Loveman, and Stamatov 2004; Cornell and Hartmann 2004; Jenkins 1994; Lamont and Molnar 2002; Omi and Winant, 1994; Wimmer 2013). Although French politics have been structurally reluctant to recognize such processes (Amiraux, and Simon 2006; Lorcerie 2007; Simon 2008), they are increasingly analyzed as sources of social inequality in French social sciences studies (De Rudder, Poiret, and Vourc'h 2000; Fassin, and Fassin 2006; Poutignat, and Streiff-Fénart 1995; Safi 2013).</footnote>

<footnote n="2">² As shown for instance with regard to Turkish immigrants in France and Germany (Kastoryano 2002; Kastoryano 2006).</footnote>

<footnote n="3">³ See for instance the case of Algerians in France in relation to the colonial legacy (Sayad 1999) or the case of Mexicans in the US relative to the combination of a conflictual history, long-term immigration and a racialization process (Cordero-Guzmán, Smith, and Grosfoguel 2001; Massey, Durand, and Malone 2002). See also the example of Filipinos in the US (Espiritu 2003).</footnote>
wide range of cross-border ties and determinants. Specifically, we have been able to investigate in considerable detail cross-border ties patterns across three categories of migrants in France: international migrants, French overseas migrants and other French national migrants, guided by the following three hypotheses:

**H1:** Transnationalism as measured by the frequency of border-crossing ties should be observed to a certain degree for all migrants, including national ones.

**H2:** Transnational structural determinants should prove quite similar across national and international migrants (kinship, citizenship, language, economic resources, etc.).

**H3:** The study of transnationalism not only reflects individual engagement; it also captures trans-border connectiveness.

## II. DATA AND METHOD

### 1. The Original Dataset

The data come from *Trajectoire et Origines* (TeO), a large, cross-sectional French survey conducted in 2008 on a nationally representative sample of 21,761 individuals aged 18 to 60. The sample covers all regions of mainland (metropolitan) France (thus excluding French overseas *départements*). The questionnaire covers a wide range of topics (education, employment, migration history, family formation, social relationships, etc.)<fnref n="4" />. It also includes a specific section on transnational relations that we have used extensively in this article.

#### a. Migrant categories in TeO

TeO is one of the few data sources in France that comprise precise information about individual migration trajectories. In this study, we define migrants as respondents who were born outside mainland France and were residing in mainland France at the time of the survey. Migrants' children are also included in the sample on the basis of information about parental migration background. We refer to them as second-generation migrants. Drawing on two main criteria used in French migration studies (place of birth and nationality at birth), we distinguish three types of first- and second-generation migrant categories:

<footnote n="4">⁴ More details on the survey and questionnaire may be found at http://teo_english.site.ined.fr/</footnote>
**-International migrants:** this category includes respondents who were born abroad and acquired foreign nationality at birth. Respondents with at least one international migrant parent are referred to as second-generation international migrants.

**-French overseas migrants:** this category includes respondents who were born in French overseas dependencies<fnref n="5" />. Second generations of French overseas migrants are defined as respondents with at least one parent who is a French overseas migrant.

**-National migrants:** this category includes respondents who were born abroad with French citizenship. It encompasses French citizens repatriated from former colonies and children of French expats who were born abroad but with French citizenship at birth. The TeO questionnaire includes a rich set of questions on interviewee's migration and citizenship histories and those of his/her parents that allow us to distinguish these migrants<fnref n="6" />. One question was especially designed to determine whether respondent or parents changed nationality when their country of birth became independent. This question makes the TeO survey unique in France, as it allows for distinguishing between national migrants and 'real' international migrants. Second-generation national migrants are defined as respondents with at least one national migrant parent.

Our sample comprises 16,280 respondents; 14,430 are international migrants and their offspring, 1,206 are overseas migrants and their offspring, and 644 are national migrants and their offspring.

## b. Transnational practices in TeO

As our data cover these three types of migrants, we refer to any activity that relates either to places other than mainland France or people living outside of mainland France as "transnational activities"<fnref n="7" />. Our definition is quite broad in terms of the nature of transnational

<footnote n="5">⁵ The French Overseas Departments (Départements d'Outre-Mer or DOMs) are four French territories with an administrative status of "département" and whose inhabitants are full French citizens: French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Martinique, and Réunion, In May 2011, Mayotte became the fifth DOM. In 2011, 2.9% of the French population lived in these territories. For more details, see www.insee.fr/fr/ppp/bases-de-donnees/donnees-detaillees/estim-pop/estim-pop-reg-sca-1990-2010.xls.</footnote>

<footnote n="6">⁶ Questionnaire available on http://teo.site.ined.fr/fichier/s_rubrique/20242/questionnaire.teovfinale_english.fr.pdf</footnote>

<footnote n="7">⁷ Transnationalism usually refers to activity and practices that cross national borders. The use of the term in our study might thus seem inappropriate. The fuzziness of the transnational concept is in fact more general; as Bauböck points, transnationalism is a misnomer (Bauböck 2010, p. 309). Although some scholars have suggested using trans-localism, or trans-territorialism instead, we prefer to keep the term transnationalism while broadening its empirical scope, drawing on the concept's use in migration studies.</footnote>
activities and it encompasses diverse types of out-linkages (personal, economic, political, intellectual, symbolic, etc.). Table 2 presents the 11 transnational variables<fnref n="8" /> selected for this study and how the related questions were worded<fnref n="9" />. Some call for a binary response (yes/no) while others allow for more qualified information. We have harmonized answers, transforming them all into binary categories <fnref n="10" /> to facilitate more straightforward interpretation.

<table><caption>Table 1. Transnational activities across migrant categories.</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th></th><th>International migrants</th><th>Overseas migrants</th><th>National migrants</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Abroad homeownership</td><td>“Do you own land, a house or an apartment, including one under construction, in a DOM, TOM or country other than France?”</td><td>0,097</td><td>0,066</td><td>0,028</td></tr><tr><td>Financial aid</td><td>“During the past 12 months, have you provided regular financial aid to persons outside your household?” if yes “was all or a part of this aid sent to a DOM, a TOM or another country outside of France”</td><td>0,090</td><td>0,040</td><td>0,034</td></tr><tr><td>Financial group project</td><td>“Have you ever given money to build a school, healthcare center or religious center or for other collective projects in [ego/parents’ country of origin]?”</td><td>0,095</td><td>0,051</td><td>0,042</td></tr><tr><td>Interest in politics</td><td>“Are you interested in national politics in [ego/parents’ country of origin] in your/parents’ country of origin” if at least one association: “Of the associations you belong to, do any of them comprise almost exclusively members who are from the same country DOM or TOM as you or your parents?”</td><td>0,586</td><td>0,614</td><td>0,373</td></tr><tr><td>Association</td><td>“Would you like to be buried in another country (than France)?”</td><td>0,231</td><td>0,229</td><td>0,064</td></tr><tr><td>Abroad burial plans</td><td>“Are you planning to settle one day in a DOM, TOM or country other than France?”</td><td>0,146</td><td>0,313</td><td>0,123</td></tr><tr><td>Abroad settlement plans</td><td>“Do you maintain contact by letter, telephone or Internet with your family or friends living in a country outside France, a DOM or a TOM?”</td><td>0,731</td><td>0,813</td><td>0,491</td></tr><tr><td>Personal contacts</td><td>For migrants: “Since you have begun living in Metropolitan France, have you returned to your country of origin?”; for descendants of migrants: “Have you ever been to your parents’ country of origin?”</td><td>0,825</td><td>0,863</td><td>0,334</td></tr><tr><td>Travels and visits</td><td>“Do you read newspapers, listen to the radio, watch television or visit websites from [ego/parents’ country of origin]?”</td><td>0,530</td><td>0,645</td><td>0,180</td></tr><tr><td>Medias</td><td>Say whether you totally agree, agree, disagree or totally disagree at all with the following: I feel [ego/parents’ nationality of origin].”</td><td>0,694</td><td>0,811</td><td>0,213</td></tr></tbody></table>

<footnote n="8">⁸ TeO also includes a question about voting abroad. However, only 3 French overseas migrants in our data sample voted abroad, and the proportion of national migrants is also too small. We have chosen to drop this variable for the sake of group comparability.</footnote>

<footnote n="9">⁹ All these questions were put to the three types of migrants distinguished above and are thus comparable across migrant categories. There are, however, some differences in the formulation of questions across migrant categories: questions for international migrants and their children sometimes refer explicitly to their “country of origin” while questions for national and overseas migrants measure connections to any place outside mainland France.</footnote>

<footnote n="10">¹⁰ The response items “never”, “not at all”, “don’t know” and “refusal to answer” were classified as “no”.</footnote>
While the literature on transnationalism usually makes conceptual divisions between
transnational activities, distinguishing between economic, political and sociocultural
transnationalism (Itzigsohn and Giorguli-Saucedo 2002; Portes, Guarnizo, and Landolt
1999), ours is an inductive empirical approach. In the interests of data reduction, we have
performed several factor analyses varying two parameters: the correlation type (Bravais-
Pearson, Tetrachoric) and the rotation type (Varimax, Oblimin) (Table A1 in the appendix
summarizes the results). Invariably across analyses, five variables load the highest on the
first factor: interest in politics, personal contacts, visits, media and belonging. We therefore
call this factor **sociopolitical transnationalism**. It explains the highest share of total
variance (eigen value= 2.56 with Bravais-Pearson and 4.15 with Tetrachoric correlations).
The variables that load highest on this factor are also those most frequently practised. This
suggests that linkages to people, media and politics are closely correlated and tend to form a
consistent transnational “package”.

Three variables always load highest on the second factor: financial aid, financial group project and associations. This factor clearly identifies **economic transnational** activities that appear to be consistently correlated and distinct from the sociopolitical transnational domain. Homeownership is also highly correlated with this factor.

Two variables always load highest on the third factor: first, plan to settle abroad, with exceptionally high loading, and second, plan to be buried abroad. Homeownership abroad is also highly correlated with this factor in all analyses (it actually loads the highest on this factor in analyses using Bravais-Pearson correlations). This factor captures what we call “re-migration transnationalism”. It is interesting to note here that the diversity of questions used in TeO highlights a less-investigated dimension of transnationalism, which relates to the possibility for migrants and migrants’ descendants to relocate and re-migrate. This dimension thus captures the circular and recursive feature of migration.

For each individual, predicted transnational levels were computed out of the factor
analysis (we used the analysis based on Tetrachoric correlation type and Varimax rotation
since those results look most like the average results)<fnref n="11" />. We then standardized these scores
and used them as dependent variables in the OLS regressions presented below.

Finally, we computed a global additive transnationalism score that lends itself to
intuitive interpretation; it captures the intensity of transnational practises all together for each
respondent. The score ranges from 0 (for respondents who do not engage in any

<footnote n="11">¹¹ Predicted scores on factors are in fact highly correlated across methods (see table A2).</footnote>
transnational practice selected in this study) to 11 (for respondents who engage in all the aforementioned transnational practices). Table 2 displays descriptive statistics for all variables used in the following analyses, including the four transnationalism indicators (sociopolitical, economic, re-migration dimensions and transnational score). On average, the transnational score is highest among overseas migrants (4.48 activities out of 11) and lowest for national migrants (1.90 activities out of 11). Overseas migrants seem particularly active in the sociopolitical dimension but they also exhibit high scores on the re-migration transnationalism factor. Conversely, national migrants have low levels of socio-political transnationalism but quite intense economic transnationalism compared to both overseas and international migrants. Interestingly, when compared to overseas and national migrants, international migrants appear only moderately transnational. While they show intermediate levels of sociopolitical transnationalism compared to national and overseas migrants (at the top) and international migrants (at the bottom), they are actually the least transnational of the three migrant categories in the economic and re-migration domains. These descriptive results clearly show that transnationalism is not a distinctive feature of international migration; it seems consubstantial with population movement itself<fnref n="12" />.

However, migrant categories do seem to differ by the type of transnational activities they engage in. French overseas migrants appear to be more inclined to re-migrate, which is not surprising given the nature of the border they cross, which, though geographically distant is still within the French nation-state. Re-migration seems much less common among international migrants, who are more constrained by administrative procedures than the other categories. Finally, French national migrants who cross international borders are much more inclined to engage in economic transnationalism.

<footnote n="12">¹² TeO also includes non-migrant respondents; i.e. people who are not international, French overseas, or national migrants (or children of any of those migrant categories). These respondents are thus French citizens at birth born in mainland France whose parents were also French citizens at birth born in mainland France. Although we exclude these respondents from our sample (because such respondent were only asked 5 out of the 11 transnational questions used in this study), there is some evidence that they also engage, to some extent, in activities outside mainland France (Beauchemin, Lagrange, and Safi 2011).</footnote>
<table><caption>Table 2. Descriptive across migrant categories.</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>International migrants</th><th>National migrants</th><th>Overseas migrants</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>% female</td><td>0,53</td><td>0,52</td><td>0,52</td></tr><tr><td>Age</td><td>33,26</td><td>33,37</td><td>31,95</td></tr><tr><td>Family status</td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>Single/ no children</td><td>0,35</td><td>0,38</td><td>0,42</td></tr><tr><td>Single/ with 1 or more children</td><td>0,07</td><td>0,05</td><td>0,11</td></tr><tr><td>In couple/ no children</td><td>0,12</td><td>0,14</td><td>0,12</td></tr><tr><td>In couple/ 1 child</td><td>0,14</td><td>0,13</td><td>0,14</td></tr><tr><td>In couple/ 2 children</td><td>0,19</td><td>0,20</td><td>0,15</td></tr><tr><td>In couple/ 3 or more children</td><td>0,14</td><td>0,10</td><td>0,07</td></tr><tr><td>Live with parents</td><td>0,24</td><td>0,22</td><td>0,24</td></tr><tr><td>Higher diploma</td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>No diploma</td><td>0,18</td><td>0,12</td><td>0,12</td></tr><tr><td>High School</td><td>0,32</td><td>0,26</td><td>0,34</td></tr><tr><td>BAC</td><td>0,22</td><td>0,23</td><td>0,24</td></tr><tr><td>Bac+2 and more</td><td>0,29</td><td>0,39</td><td>0,30</td></tr><tr><td>Still studying</td><td>0,14</td><td>0,16</td><td>0,15</td></tr><tr><td>Income</td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>Income 0/25</td><td>0,27</td><td>0,18</td><td>0,18</td></tr><tr><td>Income 25/50</td><td>0,22</td><td>0,18</td><td>0,23</td></tr><tr><td>Income 50/75</td><td>0,21</td><td>0,24</td><td>0,26</td></tr><tr><td>Income 75/100</td><td>0,19</td><td>0,30</td><td>0,22</td></tr><tr><td>Unknown</td><td>0,11</td><td>0,10</td><td>0,11</td></tr><tr><td>Generation 2</td><td>0,56</td><td>0,71</td><td>0,54</td></tr><tr><td>Multilinguism</td><td>0,46</td><td>0,25</td><td>0,56</td></tr><tr><td>Family member abroad</td><td>0,46</td><td>0,24</td><td>0,58</td></tr><tr><td>Dual nationality</td><td>0,21</td><td>0,09</td><td>0,00</td></tr><tr><td>Religion</td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>Non religious</td><td>0,26</td><td>0,44</td><td>0,29</td></tr><tr><td>Christian/low religiosity</td><td>0,26</td><td>0,38</td><td>0,49</td></tr><tr><td>Christian/high religiosity</td><td>0,07</td><td>0,04</td><td>0,16</td></tr><tr><td>Muslim/low religiosity</td><td>0,17</td><td>0,04</td><td>0,01</td></tr><tr><td>Muslim/high religiosity</td><td>0,17</td><td>0,05</td><td>0,01</td></tr><tr><td>Other religion/low religiosity</td><td>0,05</td><td>0,04</td><td>0,03</td></tr><tr><td>Other religion/high religiosity</td><td>0,02</td><td>0,02</td><td>0,02</td></tr><tr><td>Transnationalism score</td><td>4,08</td><td>1,90</td><td>4,48</td></tr><tr><td>Sociopolitical</td><td>0,03</td><td>-1,23</td><td>0,24</td></tr><tr><td>Economic</td><td>0,12</td><td>0,31</td><td>-0,31</td></tr><tr><td>Re-migration</td><td>-0,31</td><td>0,07</td><td>0,33</td></tr><tr><td>N</td><td>14430</td><td>644</td><td>1206</td></tr></tbody></table>
## 2. Multivariate specifications

In order to confirm these descriptive findings, we compared regression results (OLS) using each of these four variables (transnationalism score and the three dimensions of transnationalism) as dependent variables. In addition to sociodemographics (gender, age, education, income and family status), we take variability in transnationalism exposure into account by including control for variables that delimit a sort of transnational linkage opportunity structure. TeO data comprise information about transnational kinship (whether respondents have a partner, children, parent(s) or kin living abroad), multilingualism (for respondents who speak more than one language), and dual nationality. We also control for migration generation (migrant or descendant of migrants) as a way of measuring direct and indirect exposure to migration. All these variables can be understood as linearly affecting the probability of cross-border ties and may thus be assumed to impact transnationalism in a similar way across the three migrant categories. They are included secondly in a stepwise specification, in addition to sociodemographics.

We control for religion in a third specification. Religion may affect transnationalism in two ways: it entails an ethnoracial dimension (sense of belonging to a religious group and/or to a discriminated group) and a religiosity dimension (commitment to a belief system, faith, etc.). These two dimensions may have analytically separate effects: religiosity may be assumed to enhance transnationalism regardless of religious denomination while some religious memberships may be more or less conducive to cross-border activities because of specific transnational organization of the religious community and/or because of more or less tolerant host society attitudes (Levitt 2003). We have therefore tried to separate the effects of religious denomination and religiosity<fnref n="13" />.

Lastly, we have controlled for place of emigration<fnref n="14" /> in the analyses, using information as detailed as the sample will allow. The effect of place of emigration can also have distinct implications. First, it may be understood as a structural transnationalism factor entailing mechanisms related to geographic distance, ease of travel, security, inter-state (or inter-place) relations, etc. Second, it can be correlated to transnationalism through ethnoracial mechanisms as these relate to both the sense of ethnicity developed within a migrant community and the degree to which negative attitudes and discrimination practises in the host society target specific origins. While the first channel (structural origin effects) may be

<footnote n="13">¹³ Measured in a question about the extent to which religion is important to the respondent. For more details see (Simon and Tiberj 2013).</footnote>

<footnote n="14">¹⁴ Given the variability of migration status in our sample, we cannot speak of country of origin for all migrants. Instead, we use the expression “place of emigration,” which concretely refers to ego’s or parental place of birth.</footnote>
nationally (regionally or more generally geographically) specific, the second might be more
transnational, in the sense that migrants with different origins can experience similar
ethnoracial conditions in the host country and be subjected to similar discriminatory
practises. The final analysis explores the extent to which results using detailed or grouped
places of emigration lead to different findings.

### III. Findings

#### 1. Variability in transnational domains and intensity across migrant categories

Table 3 reports OLS coefficients for overseas and national migrants compared to international migrants across the four transnational indicators, controlling for all covariables except place of emigration. Overseas migrants are the most transnational on 3 of the 4 indicators; on average they have 0.7 (out of 11) transnational activities more than international migrants. This more intense transnationalism is also found for the sociopolitical and re-migration dimensions (equally around 0.4 standard deviations more than for international migrants). National migrants show a lower level of transnationalism for two of the four indicators: they have 1.4 transnational activities (out of 11) fewer on average than international migrants and their sociopolitical transnationalism is almost 1 standard deviation less. However, national migrants appear more transnational than their international counterparts in the economic domain (+0.3 standard deviation) and the re-migration one (+0.2 standard deviation). These results are not qualitatively different across specifications.
<table><caption>Table 3. Estimated coefficients for migrant categories across specifications (ref=international migrants).</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Model1</th><th>Model2</th><th>Model3</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td><strong>Total score</strong></td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>National migrants</td><td>-2,128***<br>(0,079)</td><td>-1,581***<br>(0,071)</td><td>-1,397***<br>(0,068)</td></tr><tr><td>Overseas migrants</td><td>0,541***<br>(0,059)</td><td>0,460***<br>(0,054)</td><td>0,710***<br>(0,052)</td></tr><tr><td>R2- Adjusted</td><td>0,080</td><td>0,270</td><td>0,348</td></tr><tr><td><strong>Sociopolitical</strong></td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>National migrants</td><td>-1,233***<br>(0,039)</td><td>-0,991***<br>(0,035)</td><td>-0,910***<br>(0,034)</td></tr><tr><td>Overseas migrants</td><td>0,278***<br>(0,029)</td><td>0,268***<br>(0,027)</td><td>0,383***<br>(0,026)</td></tr><tr><td>R2- Adjusted</td><td>0,090</td><td>0,246</td><td>0,315</td></tr><tr><td><strong>Economic</strong></td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>National migrants</td><td>0,274***<br>(0,039)</td><td>0,338***<br>(0,039)</td><td>0,354***<br>(0,039)</td></tr><tr><td>Overseas migrants</td><td>-0,305***<br>(0,029)</td><td>-0,368***<br>(0,030)</td><td>-0,364***<br>(0,030)</td></tr><tr><td>R2- Adjusted</td><td>0,051</td><td>0,071</td><td>0,079</td></tr><tr><td><strong>Re-Migration</strong></td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>National migrants</td><td>0,124***<br>(0,040)</td><td>0,150***<br>(0,040)</td><td>0,169***<br>(0,040)</td></tr><tr><td>Overseas migrants</td><td>0,357***<br>(0,030)</td><td>0,343***<br>(0,030)</td><td>0,378***<br>(0,030)</td></tr><tr><td>R2- Adjusted</td><td>0,041</td><td>0,044</td><td>0,054</td></tr><tr><td>Sociodemographics</td><td>yes</td><td>yes</td><td>yes</td></tr><tr><td>Exposure</td><td>no</td><td>yes</td><td>yes</td></tr><tr><td>Religion</td><td>no</td><td>no</td><td>yes</td></tr></tbody></table>

## 2. Heterogeneity of transnational determinants across transnational categories

We now turn to the determinants of transnational activities and systematically compare them across the three categories of migrants. This involves estimating models with a wide range of interaction terms. Figures 1 to 4 help interpreting them in an intuitive way. Figure 1 provides a comparative overview of interaction terms between migrant categories and 5 dummies: gender, migration generation (first or second generation), dual citizenship, and multilingualism and family ties. It shows quite similar patterns in the effect of these variables on transnationalism across migrant categories. First, for all of them gender is of remarkably little relevance as a transnational factor, and more importantly, it affects cross-border activity intensity across migrant categories very similarly. While international migrant females appear
slightly less transnational than their male counterparts, this only holds for economic cross-border engagement.

Although family ties have a more pronounced effect on sociopolitical transnationalism, they show no interaction effects with migrant categories in any transnational dimension. The mechanisms through which they affect transnationalism seem thus quite similar for all migrants.

The generation effect appears more heterogeneous across migrant categories and over the different transnational dimensions. Second-generation national migrants seem less sociopolitically transnational than first generations of the same migrant category while sociopolitical transnationalism decreases less across generations for French overseas migrants (significant interaction effects). Among overseas migrants, the second generation is much less inclined to re-migrate than the first generation compared to other groups (significant interaction effects). Interestingly, the intergenerational effect seems less relevant for economic transnationalism, especially for national and overseas migrants. Finally, some disparate effects are also found for multilingualism; the latter seems more correlated with national and overseas migrants' sociopolitical transnationalism than with international migrants'.

Figure 2 focuses on differential impacts of socioeconomic background as measured by both income and education. Many interaction effects are worth mentioning. First, the social stratification of transnationalism seems to be a more specific pattern of international migrants' cross-border activities. This is particularly true for economic transnationalism (with a pattern that clearly increases with income and education) and re-migration transnationalism, which seems on the contrary negatively correlated with international migrants' socioeconomic status. The effects of income and education are more ambiguous for national and overseas migrants; they are less often significant (the curves are more often flat) and in some analyses even U-shaped. Finally, both education and income only slightly affect gaps between curves; national migrants are the most economically transnational across all income and education categories, and French overseas migrants have the highest sociopolitical and re-migration transnational score regardless of socioeconomic status. Differences across migrant categories only tend to lose significance for the most advantaged socioeconomic categories.

Introducing interaction effects with religion also brings to light very few significant cases (analyses not shown). First, transnationalism seems highly associated with religiosity in
general; non-religious people are less transnational than religious people for all migrant categories and across all transnational dimensions. Highly religious Christians in particular tend to be more transnational in a remarkably similar way within migrant categories. Muslims have the highest transnational score compared to non-religious people. Interestingly, the Muslim religion effect very seldom differs across national and international migrants, except for economic transnationalism (significantly less practiced by international migrants who are highly religious Muslims). The Muslim religion effect is non-significant for overseas migrants, probably because N is very small.

### 3. Exploring the place of emigration effect

In the following analyses we enlarge the picture to include migrants' places of emigration (also referred to as "migration origins"). For international and national migrants, place of emigration pertains to ego's (or parents') country of birth. Given the comparatively small sample size of national migrants we have used as detailed classification as possible, to comply with statistical power constraints. Overseas migrants can be classified along ego's (or parents') specific French overseas territory of birth. Table 4 displays the distribution of "migration origins" across the three migrant categories.

To assess the place-of-emigration effect, we first introduce all of its categories in a general model, one that therefore omits the distinction between the three types of migrants (see complete results in the Appendix). Figure 3 compares these effects across the four transnational indicators. First, it is striking how the overall hierarchy of transnationalism across migrant categories still holds when the group is broken down by different places of emigration. All overseas migrant origins are significantly more transnational in the sociopolitical and re-migration dimensions than all international and national migrant origins (outliers were found for other French overseas origins and national migrants from Eastern Europe but they are mainly due to weak statistical power)<fnref n="15" />. In a similar vein, national migrants constitute a quite homogeneous group, with consistently lower sociopolitical and higher economic transnationalism. However, their higher transnationalism on the re-migration dimension seems less homogeneous across places of emigration. Interestingly, although the effect tends to be positive for all groups, it is only significant for national migrants from Algeria, who form both the largest and the most particular group. Indeed, almost 90% of the 283 national migrants from Algeria in our sample are return-colonial migrants (first or second-generation) and only 10% are children of return-expats. However, differences between

<footnote n="15">¹⁵ Migrants from Eastern Europe always displays quite wide confidence intervals but we have resisted the temptation to merge them with other groups given the particular nature of their migration compared to both European and non-European migrants.</footnote>
national migrants with Algerian and those with other African places of emigration are non-
significant, which works to put the specificity of the Algerian case into perspective.

Moreover, national migrants from African emigration places tend to be highly transnational on the economic level. Interestingly, this is also significantly the case for those of them who migrated from other places in the world (Middle Eastern and Far East Asian migrants).

Finally, international migrants from Western Europe and the Americas are significantly high on sociopolitical transnationalism while being much less active in the economic domain. Sub-Saharan Africans and South East Asians, East Europeans and also migrants grouped in the category "other" are relatively active economic transnationalists compared to other international migrants. Finally, the lower propensity of international migrants to re-migrate seems less subject to variation (with the exception of significantly high levels for sub-Saharan Africans).

The design of the TeO survey, focused on migration background, appears particularly useful in disentangling the different mechanisms embedded in the place of emigration effect. Our dataset offers a unique opportunity since it lends itself to comparing cross-border activities between international and national migrants with the same emigration place. This is why we have restricted this final analysis to those two migrant categories, working to measure the extent to which places of emigration have similar/disparate effects on their respective cross-border activities. We consequently include fixed effects for place of emigration interacted with migrant category (international/ national).
<table><caption>Table 4 Migrants' origin across migrant categories.</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th></th><th>International migrants</th><th>National migrants</th><th>Overseas migrants</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Algeria</td><td>2018</td><td>283</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>Mor-Tun</td><td>2033</td><td>125</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>Other Africa</td><td>2364</td><td>81</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>South-East Asia</td><td>1101</td><td>31</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>WEUN A</td><td>4297</td><td>80</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>EEU</td><td>682</td><td>11</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>Others</td><td>1935</td><td>33</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>Guadeloupe</td><td></td><td></td><td></td><td>410</td></tr><tr><td>Martique</td><td></td><td></td><td></td><td>400</td></tr><tr><td>Reunion</td><td></td><td></td><td></td><td>334</td></tr><tr><td>Other DOM</td><td></td><td></td><td></td><td>62</td></tr><tr><td>Total</td><td>14430</td><td>644</td><td>1206</td><td></td></tr></tbody></table>

In an attempt to summarize the findings, quite complex given the numerous interaction effects, Figure 4 shows pairwise comparisons of place of emigration effects within the international and national migrant categories and between them. The figure could be read as a contingency table. Interaction effects are only significant if bars relating to the same pairwise comparison do not overlap; which means that the comparison between the corresponding pair of places of emigration is not significantly different across migrant categories. Although the comparative scope of our findings is limited by the much smaller N of the national migrant subsample – leading to systematically wider confidence intervals and overwhelmingly non-significant pairwise comparisons within this group – the uniqueness of
the empirical design of the data and the suggestiveness of some findings are still worth commenting on<fnref n="16" />.

First, Western European and North American migration origins are significantly more conducive than African migration origins to sociopolitical transnationalism for both international and national migrants. These similar patterns (overlapping significant bars) suggest that the same structural mechanisms affect both national and international migration that takes place between Western or North American countries and France. Higher and easier state-level connectivity are possible explanations. As Waldinger and Fitzgerald (2004) suggest, the transnationalism of these migrants may be less suspicious, namely in terms of loyalty, which would explain its similar intensity irrespective of whether the migration in question was national or international.

There are also some noteworthy disparate effects of places of emigration. In the sociopolitical domain for instance, the deterrent effect of Algeria on transnationalism seems greater for national than international migrants (with significantly different pairwise comparison with other African or East-Asian places of emigration). The political and security context in Algeria and the return-colonial nature of French national migrants' departure from this country are possible explanations. Interestingly, we see quite the opposite pattern in the economic domain: the deterrent effect of Algeria on economic transnationalism is of significantly lesser magnitude among international migrants. Pairwise comparison of Algeria and sub-Saharan African shows the latter to be significantly more economically transnational among international migrants (the same pattern is also found for pairwise comparisons between sub-Saharan and Moroccan-Tunisian migrants and also between East Asian and Algerian and Moroccan-Tunisian migrants, visible in the non-overlapping bars). These patterns highlight the particularly high levels of sub-Saharan and East Asian economic transnationalism among international migrants.

The economic transnationalism of Western European and North American national migrants seems on the contrary significantly more intense than that of same-category migrants from sub-Saharan Africa (and to a lesser extent South East Asian international migrants) relative to the same pairwise comparison among international migrants. These patterns highlight the particularity of Western European and North American economic transnationalism among national migrants.

<footnote n="16">¹⁶ Although the precision of our estimators is sharply higher for international migrants, the stability of the patterns described in this section – even when we look into more detailed group classification – suggests that the findings are not too sensitive to the size of the sub-samples.</footnote>
Lastly, the re-migration dimension systematically shows overlapping pairwise
comparison between national and international migrants, irrespective of migration origin.
Moreover, the few significant effects of place of emigration are found only for international
migrants. National migrants, who are on the whole significantly more transnational than
international ones on the re-migration dimension, seem much less affected by the border
they cross; in this sense, they correspond more closely to the figure of the *transmigrant*, at
least in terms of propensity for recursive geographic mobility.

Discussion and conclusion

Using an exceptionally rich body of empirical material, this article broadly contextualizes transnational studies, going beyond the usual focus on international migration to explore intrinsic links with geographic population mobility.

Comparing the cross-border ties of international migrants, French overseas migrants and other national migrants puts the centrality of international migration in transnational studies into perspective. Taking into account a wide range of transnational activities, we show that cross-border linkages are hardly specific to international migrants; they are even more intense among French overseas migrants (in the sociopolitical and re-migration dimensions) and national migrants (in the economic dimension). The different types of migration thus seem to have a greater influence on the nature (or dimensions) of transnationalism than its intensity. Moreover, most of the basic driving factors of transnationalism seem to affect these three categories of migrants similarly, a finding that points to similar structural mechanisms. Our findings thus provide some support for H1 and H2.

Some transnationalism studies claim that the case of international migrants shows the
limited effectiveness of national boundaries when it comes to economic, political and
population management. Relating transnationalism to the fundamentally demographic aspect
of the phenomenon of migration puts this claim into perspective. Transnationalism in its
broadest sense refers not to a trans-state field, but to people's relations to places, with these
relations taking on direct interpersonal or economic, political and symbolic content. Adopting
this perspective allows us to bridge the gap between transnational studies and research on
geographic mobility (Sheller and Urry 2006). Exploring the diversity of transnationalities to be
found among different categories of migrants highlights in particular the fact that
transnationalism is also about relations that people try to maintain with a homeland (Waldinger and Fitzgerald 2004, p. 1177).

This leads us to the question of the nature of the political and geographical border involved in transnational ties. In our study, French overseas migrants' pronounced transnationalism may be understood as a certain type of regional attachment. It may be quite similar to other forms of inter-regional mobility (for instance, migration of Bretons to the Paris region). This type of migration involves a border whose crossing is less constrained by institutional factors than in the other cases: it may thus lead to high levels of circularity in the migration trajectory itself and also to intense sociopolitical transnationalism. However, while occurring within the space of the nation and among the national population, this transnationalism also tells us something about ethnoracial dynamics among those populations. The similarity of transnational relation patterns across different emigration origins within the French overseas category seems to suggest that these dynamics also involve mechanisms that are not spatially specific; the history of migration from overseas departments to mainland France and the particular ethno-racial characteristics of these populations may also point to a pan-identity that may encompass the diversity of these migrants' geographic origins (Byron and Condon 2007). Such a pan-identity may be related to this population's strong perception of being stigmatized and discriminated against, mainly reported to be linked to skin color (Safi and Simon 2014).

The transnationalism of other categories of national migrants, namely those who cross a national boundary, seems the most instrumental. Less intense overall, their cross-border linkages are primarily economic in nature. However, the very fact that they also cross a trans-state boundary leads to similarities in the structural determination of their cross-border linkages (distance, trans-state relations, security conditions, etc.). Despite some limitations due to sample size, our data offer a unique opportunity to compare these state-level determinants across international and national migrants involved in the same-border crossing. The results suggest similarities in state-level determinants that are most pronounced in transnational activity that implies a *re-crossing* of the border: re-migration. Although these first findings need to be investigated and consolidated in future research, they draw attention to the relevance of taking the nature of the border seriously in transnational studies. Transnationalism is not only about individual border-crossing ability (individual *transnationality*), it is also a space-relational phenomenon. Investigating differences between different categories of migrants in connection with the same space-relational units (international and national migrants with the same source-destination
combination) may thus represent a useful path for future research. It may be particularly valuable in disentangling the ethnoracial dynamics of transnationalism from structural factors related to the more or less political nature of the border-crossing. Doing so requires a scientific stance wherein transnationalism is an angle of study or a methodology rather than an ideology (Beauchemin, 2014; Faist 2012).
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<figure><img src="image_3.png" /><figcaption>Figure 1 Marginal effects of generation, nationality, multilingualism and family ties across migrant categories</figcaption></figure>

IM=International Migrants, NM=National Migrants, FOM= French Overseas Migrants
<figure><img src="image_4.png" /><figcaption>Figure 2 Marginal effects of income on transnational practices across migrant categories</figcaption></figure>
<figure><img src="image_5.png" /><figcaption>Figure 3 Place of emigration effects on transnational activities for the three categories of migrants</figcaption></figure>
<figure><img src="image_6.png" /><figcaption>Figure 4 Pairwise comparisons of place of emigration effects on transnational score across national and international migrants</figcaption></figure>
Sociopolitical

<figure><img src="image_7.png" /></figure>
Economic

compared to

Other world

EEU

Algeria

<figure><img src="image_8.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_9.png" /></figure>

WEU-NA

<figure><img src="image_10.png" /></figure>

South East Asia

<figure><img src="image_11.png" /></figure>

Other Africa

<figure><img src="image_12.png" /></figure>

Mor-Tun

<figure><img src="image_13.png" /></figure>

Mor-Tun

<figure><img src="image_14.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_15.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_16.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_17.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_18.png" /></figure>

Other Africa

<figure><img src="image_19.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_20.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_21.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_22.png" /></figure>

South East Asia

<figure><img src="image_23.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_24.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_25.png" /></figure>

WEU-NA

<figure><img src="image_26.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_27.png" /></figure>

EEU

<figure><img src="image_28.png" /></figure>

<figure><img src="image_29.png" /></figure>
Remigration

<figure><img src="image_30.png" /></figure>
<table><caption>Table A 1.Comparison of factor analyses findings varying correlation and rotation types (=r(axe,variable)) >.40)</caption><thead><tr><th rowspan="2">Transnational variables</th><th colspan="3">Bravais-Pearson varimax</th><th colspan="3">Bravais-Pearson oblimin</th><th colspan="3">Tetrachoric varimax</th><th colspan="3">Tetrachoric oblimin</th><th colspan="3">Average</th></tr><tr><th>F1</th><th>F2</th><th>F3</th><th>F1</th><th>F2</th><th>F3</th><th>F1</th><th>F2</th><th>F3</th><th>F1</th><th>F2</th><th>F3</th><th>F1</th><th>F2</th><th>F3</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Abroad homeownership</td><td>0,13</td><td>0,31</td><td>0,43</td><td>0,07</td><td>0,29</td><td>0,41</td><td>0,38</td><td>0,45</td><td>0,19</td><td>0,32</td><td>0,39</td><td>0,11</td><td>0,22</td><td>0,36</td><td>0,28</td></tr><tr><td>Financial aid</td><td>0,12</td><td>0,58</td><td>0,11</td><td>0,05</td><td>0,58</td><td>0,07</td><td>0,27</td><td>0,74</td><td>-0,05</td><td>0,17</td><td>0,74</td><td>-0,16</td><td>0,15</td><td>0,66</td><td>-0,01</td></tr><tr><td>Financial group project</td><td>0,08</td><td>0,66</td><td>0,09</td><td>0,01</td><td>0,67</td><td>0,05</td><td>0,13</td><td>0,72</td><td>0,20</td><td>0,00</td><td>0,73</td><td>0,11</td><td>0,05</td><td>0,69</td><td>0,11</td></tr><tr><td>Interest in politics</td><td>0,58</td><td>0,14</td><td>-0,06</td><td>0,59</td><td>0,09</td><td>-0,13</td><td>0,57</td><td>0,27</td><td>-0,03</td><td>0,57</td><td>0,19</td><td>-0,12</td><td>0,58</td><td>0,17</td><td>-0,09</td></tr><tr><td>Association</td><td>0,02</td><td>0,66</td><td>-0,10</td><td>-0,04</td><td>0,67</td><td>-0,13</td><td>-0,03</td><td>0,71</td><td>0,19</td><td>-0,17</td><td>0,74</td><td>0,12</td><td>-0,06</td><td>0,69</td><td>0,02</td></tr><tr><td>Abroad burial plans</td><td>0,37</td><td>0,14</td><td>0,50</td><td>0,33</td><td>0,09</td><td>0,46</td><td>0,58</td><td>0,18</td><td>0,47</td><td>0,54</td><td>0,06</td><td>0,40</td><td>0,46</td><td>0,12</td><td>0,46</td></tr><tr><td>Abroad settlement plans</td><td>0,02</td><td>-0,02</td><td>0,83</td><td>-0,05</td><td>-0,05</td><td>0,84</td><td>0,10</td><td>0,09</td><td>0,92</td><td>0,01</td><td>0,01</td><td>0,92</td><td>0,02</td><td>0,01</td><td>0,88</td></tr><tr><td>Personal contacts</td><td>0,62</td><td>0,14</td><td>0,12</td><td>0,61</td><td>0,08</td><td>0,05</td><td>0,64</td><td>0,46</td><td>0,11</td><td>0,60</td><td>0,37</td><td>-0,01</td><td>0,62</td><td>0,26</td><td>0,07</td></tr><tr><td>Travels and visits</td><td>0,59</td><td>-0,10</td><td>-0,04</td><td>0,62</td><td>-0,15</td><td>-0,09</td><td>0,74</td><td>-0,06</td><td>0,00</td><td>0,79</td><td>-0,18</td><td>-0,07</td><td>0,68</td><td>-0,12</td><td>-0,05</td></tr><tr><td>Medias</td><td>0,70</td><td>0,14</td><td>0,12</td><td>0,69</td><td>0,08</td><td>0,04</td><td>0,75</td><td>0,28</td><td>0,13</td><td>0,73</td><td>0,16</td><td>0,02</td><td>0,72</td><td>0,16</td><td>0,08</td></tr><tr><td>Sense of belonging to the origin country</td><td>0,67</td><td>-0,02</td><td>0,11</td><td>0,68</td><td>-0,09</td><td>0,04</td><td>0,77</td><td>0,04</td><td>0,18</td><td>0,79</td><td>-0,10</td><td>0,10</td><td>0,73</td><td>-0,04</td><td>0,11</td></tr></tbody></table>

We compare each variable's loading on the three factors across methods. For each variable, we highlight the factor with the highest loadings.
<table><caption>Table A2. Correlation between same-factor scale across factor analysis types</caption><thead><tr><th>Factor 1</th><th>BPV</th><th>BPO</th><th>TV</th><th>TO</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>BPV</td><td>1,00</td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>BPO</td><td>0,99</td><td>1,00</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>TV</td><td>0,99</td><td>0,98</td><td>1,00</td><td></td></tr><tr><td>TO</td><td>0,98</td><td>0,99</td><td>0,99</td><td>1,00</td></tr><tr><th>Factor 2</th><td></td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>BPV</td><td>1,00</td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>BPO</td><td>0,99</td><td>1,00</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>TV</td><td>0,93</td><td>0,90</td><td>1,00</td><td></td></tr><tr><td>TO</td><td>0,94</td><td>0,95</td><td>0,95</td><td>1,00</td></tr><tr><th>Factor 3</th><td></td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>BPV</td><td>1,00</td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>BPO</td><td>1,00</td><td>1,00</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>TV</td><td>0,90</td><td>0,88</td><td>1,00</td><td></td></tr><tr><td>TO</td><td>0,91</td><td>0,91</td><td>0,99</td><td>1,00</td></tr></tbody></table>