Returned to Whose Homeland?

Abstract Between the 1950s and the end of the 1960s, thousands of Chinese Indonesians returned to China following various anti-Chinese policies and violence, marking one of the largest exoduses of Overseas Chinese out of Indonesia. Although many resettled in their ancestral homeland in China (governed by the People’s Republic of China), small numbers decided to go to Taiwan (governed by the Republic of China) as Returned Overseas Chinese. For many of this latter group, migrating to Taiwan also meant returning to the homeland, although they had no prior connection with the island. This paper argues that this diasporic return to Taiwan could only be imagined and be thinkable by the identity-making processes of various engagements with the Republic of China’s diaspora engagement policies, especially during the Cold War. Other than those cultural connections, personal social capital and networks also played a major role. This study offers an example of the overlapping and intersecting identity of belonging between a diasporic community and its imagined homeland.