Citizens of authoritarian states such as China, Iran or Russia, can nowadays freely travel and study or work abroad. How do authoritarian regimes control potentially dissident citizens overseas?

Citizens of the former Eastern bloc were stuck behind the Iron Curtain, while at the same time dictatorships ranging from Chile to the Soviet Union sent dissidents into permanent exile. Today, citizens of authoritarian states such as China, Iran or Russia, can freely travel and study or work abroad. Many have no interest in politics, but some are, or become, political activists, and can be a threat to the regime. How do authoritarian regimes handle potentially dissident citizens overseas? In a panel chaired by prof. Marlies Glasius (UvA), country specialists Dr. Min Ye (Boston University), Dr. Nicole Hirt (GIGA Hamburg) and Dana Moss (University of California) explain how the governments of China, Eritrea and Syria use diverse means such as patriotism, control of migrant organisations, Internet infiltration and pressure on family members in relations with citizens abroad.

Dr. Maria Koinova (University of Warwick) and Dr. Darshan Vigneswaran (UvA), experts on the politics of migration, will briefly reflect on how much a state can actually control citizens outside its territory; and on whether authoritarian states are a special category, or part of a broader shift in state-citizen relations.

This will be followed by a question and answer session with the audience.