‘You should have come back earlier’: the divisive effect of Australia’s COVID-19 response on diaspora relations

ABSTRACT

Australia is largely considered an immigrant-receiving country, however, it is estimated that over one million Australians are living overseas at any given time. Despite this, diaspora relations have never been particularly robust, the consequences of which have become particularly visible during the Covid-19 pandemic. Australia used a strict closed-border approach in handling the pandemic and, although effective at reducing the spread of the virus, it will be argued that this isolationist approach was at the detriment of diaspora relations. This paper uses the findings from in-depth interviews with Australians living overseas to demonstrate that the country’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic created an intergroup divide between Australia and its expatriates. Social identity theory and the theory of intergroup threat will be used to support the findings that Australian expatriates became the ‘outgroup’, perceived as a realistic threat by the resident national ‘ingroup’. Public fear of the virus and Australia’s strict isolationist stance created a divide between those within the border, and those trying to get in. This paper provides the first-hand experiences and sentiments of Australian expatriates, while further research exploring the perspective of resident nationals is recommended to facilitate a more robust understanding of the topic.

KEYWORDS:

• Australian expatriates
• diaspora relations
• COVID-19
• social identity theory
• intergroup threat
• emigration

Data availability statement

Due to the nature of this research, participants of this study did not agree for their data to be shared publicly, so supporting data are not available.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethics statement

The study that produced the findings in this paper received ethics approval by the Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC) at the University of Adelaide, and research was conducted under approval number H-2019-170.

Additional information

Funding

This work is part of the author’s PhD research. The author was funded by the RTP Research Scholarship during the duration of her PhD, but no conflict of interest has been identified in relation to this funding.

Notes on contributors

Anna Larson

Anna Larson is completing her PhD in the department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Adelaide. She has a double degree in International Relations and Development Studies, as well as a First-class Honours degree in Human Geography. Anna has seven years of interdisciplinary research experience, and has worked across the fields of migration, international development, and Australian Indigenous culture. She has a specific interest in the field of migration, and her current project is on national identity and citizenship practices of Australian expatriates. Anna’s interest in citizenship and identity stems from her own experience of migration and growing up as an expat. Anna plans to complete her PhD in 2022, and then continue her career in social research.