From society to cyberspace: contentions with authoritarianism amongst second-generation Kurdish students in London

Abstract

Though diasporas no longer reside in their homelands, the proliferation of globalization and movement, as well as the exponentially increasing reach of the Internet has meant that the link between authoritarian regimes and their corresponding diaspora groups is very much alive. This paper argues that, in the Kurdish case, this link also extends to second-generation Kurds (who may not have directly encountered these authoritarian regimes). Drawing on ethnographic and interview fieldwork conducted with Kurdish university students in London, the paper argues that second-generation Kurds maintain a nexus with the authoritarian regimes of their ‘homelands’ in two ways: through their own local mobilizations against these regimes, as well as through their exposure to cultures of surveillance and fear instated by these regimes through the Internet. In a climate of ever-changing methods of political participation and influence, the paper calls for greater recognition of the role of the cyberspace in extending the reach of authoritarian politics.