Transnationalism and the state: recurring themes and new directions.

Transnationalism is central to our understanding of the impact and experiences of global migration. The paper by Levitt and de la Dehesa (2003) explores the policies and strategies of the sending state in relation to their emigrants and investigates the reasons for policy convergences and divergences. While the issues examined in the paper continue to be relevant there are other areas and methodological approaches that need to be developed and/or included in contemporary studies of sending state led transnationalism explored in this piece. These include the need for research to take a multi-level approach to include the different actors involved and their interactions; longitudinal analysis that examines the heterogeneous and complex nature of contemporary migration flows, the changing situations in sending and destination countries and among migrants and the need to incorporate the second and subsequent generations into research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]