Solidarity is a key concept in the literature on humanitarianism and social movements. Public discourse, too, promotes solidarity as a consistent feeling of belonging and empowerment. However, despite its popularity in the social sciences, there is little evidence about the phenomenological experiences underlying the concept. This article aims at moving beyond ethical considerations that underlie the boundaries between more conventional and contentious forms of civil engagement in examining the affective and emotional dimensions of solidarity. Building on long-term ethnographic fieldwork within deportation protest in Germany, I draw on cultural approaches to social movements and on the anthropology of affect in order to analyse resonance in four affective encounters. I argue that rather than communicating a political opinion, solidarity represents an attitude with which people explain their engagement in certain forms of affective and emotional exchange which are often just as ambiguous, challenging and contradictory as they are comforting and exciting.

La recherche sur la migration iranienne est en pleine croissance, or elle est limitée de par le focus géographique sur la Californie du Sud et sur les États-Unis, ainsi que par la centralité de l’État-nation comme cadre analytique. Contribuant à la recherche sur les politiques diasporiques iraniennes, le présent article se fonde sur une critique épistémologique afin de proposer une approche comparative centrée sur la relation entre l’intégration locale et l’engagement transnational. S’appuyant sur la recherche quant aux migrations transnationales et aux mouvements sociaux, une ethnographie historique illustrera mon propos portant sur les articulations entre l’engagement politique de trois groupes d’immigrés iraniens basés à Hambourg, à Florence et à Genève, entre 1951 et 2019. Penser l’ancrage territorial de manière comparative représente un effort urgent visant à complexifier les positionnements transnationaux iraniens au-delà du seul paradigme de l’opposition au régime iranien.

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How does diversity among Hamburg-based Iranians, that is, different positionings in internal relations, relate to their chances of generating capital in local and transnational social fields? I introduce the reader to this book’s theoretical argument that relies on bringing together research on internal differentiation, transnational social fields, and the anthropological theory of value. My approach consists in analyzing processes of evaluation that take place in different social fields through a fine-grained ethnography, allowing me to trace the way migrants engage with various systems of value that shape dynamics in social fields. I show why Germany as a country of immigration and Iranian migration to Germany are of particular historical and geopolitical relevance. The introduction is complete with a short presentation of the book’s storyline.