Go vernments-in-Exile: Notes Toward a Theory of Formation and Operation
Michael Reisman · 2024
Throughout history, some losers in domestic political struggles, whether by choice or necessity, have fled their own countries and sought haven in others. Abroad, some have assimilated while some have only dreamed of return. But some have tried to turn their exile to advantage and to continue their struggle in various ways: by trying to influence foreign governments or key foreign political forces, by organizing fellow exiles, by providing information or material to cohorts still struggling at home, by planning or executing invasions, and so on. Some of these activities must try to be clandestine. Others are necessarily public, for they require the tolerance and sometimes more active support of the state in which haven has been sought. One of the more public modes by which losers abroad have tried to continue their struggle to regain control of their governments has been by establishing what they call “governments-in-exile.”