Canadian development workers, transnational encounters and cultures of cosmopolitanism

Abstract

This article focuses on cosmopolitanism as an object of sociological analysis, through an empirical study of Canadian development workers who were posted in Pakistan for extended periods of time and have subsequently resumed their lives in Canada. These global migrants developed various attachments to Pakistani culture and people through their transnational experiences. Employing a continuum of cosmopolitanism, the article describes these attachments, which, it argues, form the basis of a tentative and ambivalent culture of cosmopolitanism as it is lived by these development workers on their return to Canada. The study's aim is to clarify the concept of cosmopolitanism by documenting the emergence of a new sociality characterized by global connectivities that engender justice-oriented alliances and solidarities.

A Sociology of Foreign Aid and the World Society

“…What have sociologists contributed to the study of aid? Most commonly, the sociology of aid has been framed through the lens of: workers in the aid industry (Cook 2012;Fast 2010Fast , 2014Jackson 2005), aid NGOs (Chabbott 1999;Jalali 2013;Schnable 2015a;Watkins, Swidler and Hannan 2012), donor agencies and multilateral banks (Babb 2007(Babb , 2009Jones and Swiss 2014;Swiss 2011Swiss , 2012Swiss , 2014, aid's developmental impact Shandra, Shircliff and London 2011), or issues of public support (Paxton and Knack 2012;Schnable 2015b).…”

To Europe or Not to Europe? Migration and Public Support for Joining the European Union in the Western Balkans

“…It is also possible that people considering emigration or associated with the diaspora are favorably inclined to any developments that increase transnational interaction, openness, and choices and, therefore, favorably inclined toward the EU. This situation would reflect the cosmopolitan outlook associated with migration (Brown, 2018;Cook, 2012;Nedelcu, 2012).…”

Negotiating ‘national’ and ‘international’ elements of culture in a transnational social field

“…Yet, cosmopolitanism remains a problematic concept, since as Cook (2012) suggests, most authors struggle to operationalize the concept in empirical studies because they see ‘openness’ as the key feature of cosmopolitanism, and because they focus on ‘the cosmopolitan’ as a fundamental identity. As Tanu (2015), for example, argues, the concept of TCK is similarly essentialist.…”

“…As for ‘openness,’ it is an inherently subjective term. Cook argues, ‘these two problems combine to prevent most studies from examining the ways in which people can be locally and globally situated simultaneously’ (Cook, 2012: 6). This is particularly relevant here as the data I present contribute to the literature that suggest that contemporary mobile subjects are enmeshed within webs of local as well as global attachments and affiliations.…”