Home Diplomacy Across Borders: Consular and Diaspora Diplomacy in France - Christian Lequesne

in Jan Melissen, HwaJung Kim, and Githma Chandrasekara (eds). Home Engagement in Diplomacy. Global Affairs and Domestic Publics, 23, Brill, pp.96-116, 2025.

It would be a mistake to consider home diplomacy as only the development of diplomats’ relations with citizens within the borders of the national territory. Home diplomacy is also extra-territorialized and requires that the diplomat develop relations with national citizens living abroad. For this reason, any research programme on home diplomacy that overlooks the relationship between the diplomat abroad and the diasporas from the home country would be incomplete, as this chapter based on the French case aims to demonstrate. The chapter is divided into three sections. It begins by explaining why French diplomatic practice favours consular protection of citizens living abroad. In the second section, it analyses the consequences for diplomatic practices of the export of national electoral politics to the diaspora through the right to vote. Finally, it explains why state historicity makes the shift of French diplomacy from consular diplomacy to diaspora diplomacy based on partnerships with diasporic citizens difficult.