Geographers have a long-standing interest in citizenship as the link between political and territorial membership. Yet, even when key political processes associated with citizenship, such as voting or lobbying government institutions are carried out from beyond the territory there is a more complex relationship with territory than the simple ‘inside/outside’ division that external voting suggests. This article develops a specifically geographical analysis of the territorial context of voting practices. Although a number of general explanations have been offered for the introduction of external voting, and for the nature of the systems introduced it seems that contextual, country-specific factors concerning the history and nature of the relationship between the government and emigrant groups are usually determinant.

Publication details and link to source: Michael Collyer, ‘A geography of extra-territorial citizenship: Explanations of external voting’, Migration Studies, July 2013.