Addressing the 'glocal' - 'expats' as a relevant case study?

Abstract

To illustrate several points made in the “Introduction” as to how the dimensions of traditional and non-traditional security and the factors related to uncertainty, security and sustainability seem to ‘dovetail’ in today’s more glocalised world, this essay draws on the authors’ recent research about ‘Australia and “People Beyond the State”: Researching Expatriate Identities, Citizen Security and States’ Jurisdictions—Case Studies of the People’s Republic of China and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region’. In focusing on expatriates (‘expats’), it poses a number of questions about the notions of ‘glocality’ and considers the challenges faced by expats from Australia in the PRC and the HKSAR and, ultimately, by expats in Australia from those jurisdictions (as well Aussie repatriates who have resided in those places). Among these very real challenges, now increasingly recognised by their home/host governments and societies, are such expats’ continuing search for identity, appropriate conditions of citizenship, and senses of broadly based security.