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Political and cultural figures who could've had lives/careers in different countries

Oh yeah, how could I have forgotten about Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed. While he worked in the foreign service of Somalia in the 1980's, and later was PM and President of the country in the 2010's; he also lived in Canada and later the USA for about two decades between this periods. He was even a registered Republican while living in Buffalo, and even worked in government on the municipal and county level.

It's not too outrageous for him to decide to permanently settle down in the USA and seek election on any level from city all the way up to Congress.
 
Harry Schwarz, one of the main white politicians who opposed Apartheid in South Africa, and later the South African ambassador to Britain, was born in Cologne to a German-Jewish family. His father was an SPD activist. Being Jewish his family had to flee after Hitler came to power; one wonders whether he'd have had a career back in Germany without Hitler.

The modern day US politician Ro Khanna's grandfather was Amarnath Vidyalankar, a leader of a socialist pressure group within the Indian National Congress. Perhaps if his family had stayed in India, he'd have become a Congress leader himself.

And speaking of India, 2 chief ministers of Tamil Nadu - Jayalalithaa and M.G Ramachandran, weren't born in the state. MGR was born in Kandy, Sri Lanka, into a Malayali family, and Jayalalithaa was born in modern-day Karnataka into a Tamil Brahmin family. Perhaps they would have led different careers in their places of birth.
 
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Steve Brinson said:
There are a couple of politicians outside the US who were born here - offhand, the first examples I can think of are Eamon De Valera and George Papandreou. The former could be especially interesting, because I have no idea how he would map his politics onto American demographics.
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Probably just another New York Irish politician.
 
Warthog said:
Peter Hain could have stayed in South Africa, ended up a cabinet minister under Mandela and Mbeki.

Alex Callinicos could have stayed in Zimbabwe, ended up an MDC MP until expelled with Gwisai for voting against the party line on land reform.

Essop Pahad could have stayed at the University of Sussex, ended up as Blair's enforcer instead of Mbeki's.

I have a classmate works for the US treasury, and could easily have ended up shadow finance minister for MDC/CCC if she had stayed. That said, probably better for the world she didn't, her kid sister followed her and gave us Okoye..
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Callinicos a raving Trot, Hain family couldn't have stayed in SA.
 
Current leader of the Democratic Party of Italy Elly Schlein worked on Obama's 2008 and 2012 presidential campaigns and holds American citizenship. Perhaps if she stays in America, she could win a House or Senate seat down the line as ironically a member of the Democratic Part, even replacing AOC as the face of the American left.
 
Radac said:
Jinnah began as a moderate Congressman before splitting due to his disagreements w/Gandhi. There is untapped potential here.
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Yeah that's a fascinating one really. I remember when reading about Partition how the Muslim League's rise in WW2 was by no means assured which creates a different dynamic for negotiations. Iqbal himself had imagined Pakistan as part of a federal All-India solution, although Nehru wasn't keen on federalism (as envisaged in earlier schemes) due to his economic and social ambitions.
 
AH Layard said:
Yeah that's a fascinating one really. I remember when reading about Partition how the Muslim League's rise in WW2 was by no means assured which creates a different dynamic for negotiations. Iqbal himself had imagined Pakistan as part of a federal All-India solution, although Nehru wasn't keen on federalism (as envisaged in earlier schemes) due to his economic and social ambitions.
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Iqbal's poem "Saare Jahan se Acchcha" is still a patriotic song in India LOL
 
Also not a politician or that influential a figure but apparently one of the most prominent figures of Christian Identity-adjacent movements was Armenian-descended R.J Rushdoony. A sizeable amount of Armenian and Assyrian-origin political and military leaders in the Middle East and the West, rather obviously, would qualify.
 
Tony Cliff and Ted Grant, 2 major British Trot leaders were born in Mandatory Palestine and South Africa respectively. Perhaps they may have had careers in their home countries.

The now ex-president of Portugal Antonio Costa is the son of a popular Goan poet and freedom fighter, Orlando da Costa.

And Italian socialist stalwart Angelica Balabanoff was actually a Russian (then the Russian empire, modern day-Ukraine)-born Jewish woman, who after leaving her home initially began working in socialist circles in Brussels.

And this is states, not countries but a number of Indian politicians (mentioned here in this article, but sadly it's paywalled) found success in other states than those of their birth. Some famous ones not already mentioned include Kanshi Ram (one of the country's tallest Dalit leaders; born in Punjab into a Ravidasia Sikh family but was prominent in Uttar Pradesh's politics), Vasundhara Raje (born into the royal family of Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh, but was two-term CM of Rajasthan), and George Fernandes (born into a Mangalorean Catholic family in Kanrataka, but became a trade union leader in Mumbai and stood for office in Bihar).

Also, Geert Wilders. He is of Indo (mixed Dutch-Indonesian) origin on his mother's side. A lot of Eurasians fled to New Guinea before it was ceded to Indonesia and there was even a proposal to turn it into a homeland for the Eurasians; depending on when his mother moved to the mainland, Wilders may have had a political career in Asia instead of Europe.
 
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Bumping this thread since its a favourite of mine, to inform the forum that Pedro Pascal (yes, that Pedro Pascal) is actually from a Chilean political family, being descended from a 19th century ex-president on his father's side and related to Allende on his mother's. If Allende had stayed in power or even if Pinochet hadn't taken over, perhaps he would've gotten into politics?
 
OHC said:
One I've never seen used (although I think I've talked about it on this forum) is David Miliband, who studied at MIT and was active in politics while he was there - he got beat up by racists while campaigning for Boston mayoral candidate Mel King. Could he have decided to pursue a political career in Massachusetts rather than Britain? I don't know if that's plausible, but it's the kind of thing I'm thinking of for this thread.
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Read this over and, apologies if this has been cited already, but you can cut it a generation above as Ralph Miliband was born-and-raised in Belgium as the son of Polish Jewish émigrés. Belgian PM Édouard or David Miliband in a world where Hitler's stopped at the Sudeten?
 
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