On 13-14 October 2025, the Ancestral Citizenship in Europe (ACE) project hosted a two-day workshop at the International Institute of Social Studies, bringing together scholars and practitioners to explore how extraterritorial acquisition of ancestral citizenship is reshaping migration trajectories and challenging conventional notions of nationhood within and beyond Europe.
The workshop featured four thematic panels and a practitioners’ roundtable, creating space for interdisciplinary dialogue across diverse geographical contexts and research approaches. Participants examined ancestral citizenship as both a legal pathway and a site of contestation, investigating how descent-based claims to citizenship intersect with questions of restitution, belonging and mobility justice.
Panel 1: The legal architecture of ancestry: restitution, exclusion and paradox
The opening panel, moderated by Zeynep Yanaşmayan with discussant Yossi Harpaz, explored the legal frameworks and contradictions inherent in ancestral citizenship provisions. Maria D. Bermudez examined Spain’s Sephardic Law of Return, while Szabolcs Pogonyi analyzed the Hungarian case. MC Loureiro investigated how Portugal’s ancestral nationality provisions navigate questions of race and colonial legacy and Tosin Durodola presented a critical perspective on statelessness and negated descent among post-cessation Liberians in Nigeria.
Panel 2: Statecraft and the geopolitics of belonging
The second panel, moderated by Zeynep Kaşlı with discussant Szabolcs Pogonyi, examined how states deploy ancestral citizenship as a tool of statecraft and geopolitical strategy. Judit Molnar explored Hungary’s repatriation of Venezuelans of Hungarian descent, while Devlin Scofield analyzed historical naturalization politics among Alsatians after World War I. Zeynep Yanaşmayan, Jonna Rock, Jannes Jacobsen, Simona Maue and Long Nguyen presented a mixed-methods analysis of parliamentary debates on Aussiedler citizenship in Germany. Reinhard Schweitzer interrogated whether ancestral citizenship functions as restitution or selective immigration policy.
Practitioners’ roundtable: Return Migration in Action
A highlight of the first day was the practitioners’ roundtable, co-moderated by Jonna Rock and Marhabo Saparova, which brought together voices from civil society and policy organizations working directly with return migration and ancestral citizenship processes. Başak Yavcan, Head of Research at Migration Policy Group in Belgium, Giovanni Maria De Vita, Head of the Italea Project at Italy’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Nikita Heidt, Founder and Director of the Organization of Resettlers and Russian Germans Riwwel gUG in Germany, and Katherina Andreeva, Co-founder of ZaVrushtane v Bulgaria, shared their experiences facilitating and supporting ancestral citizenship acquisition.
Panel 3: Transnational routes to 'home': identity, ancestry and migration
The third panel, moderated by Melissa Blanchard with discussant Thales Speroni, examined how individuals and families navigate transnational routes in search of belonging and opportunity. Anna Kozlova presented research on onward migration of post-Soviet Germans from Germany to Canada, while Céline Heini explored how Chileans of European descent in Switzerland experience 'Europeanness' as a colonial privilege. Stavroula Koskina analyzed religious imaginaries and ancestral citizenship in the Middle East, and Cemre Erciyes and Didem Baş examined imaginaries of Circassianness and Caucasia.
Panel 4: Intergenerational relationships and the role of intermediaries
The final panel, moderated by Jonna Rock with discussant Reinhard Schweitzer, investigated how intermediaries facilitate ancestral citizenship acquisition and how these processes shape intergenerational relationships. Yossi Harpaz presented research on Sephardic citizenship and the quest for Jewish ancestry in Mexico, while Henrique Trindade offered reflections from the Immigration Museum of São Paulo, Brazil. Zeynep Kaşlı, Marhabo Saparova, Melissa Blanchard and Thales Speroni examined online promoters who share, sell and advocate for ancestral citizenship in Italy and Bulgaria.
Looking forward
The workshop illuminated ancestral citizenship as a complex and often-overlooked legal and safe migratory route that intersects with broader questions of migration governance, mobility justice, historical responsibility and racialized and gendered experiences of belonging. The rich discussions over these two days brought together empirical research from Europe, the Americas, the Middle East and Africa, revealing both the commonalities and specificities of how ancestral ties are mobilized, contested and institutionalized across different contexts.
We are grateful to all participants, moderators, and discussants for their contributions to these vital conversations. We look forward to continuing these collaborations and deepening our collective understanding of how ancestral citizenship shapes contemporary migration and belonging.
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