Exiled Among Nations compares two groups of German-speaking Mennonites from Russia. One group was composed of voluntary migrants and the other was composed of refugees. The voluntary migrants traveled from Imperial Russia to Canada in 1870, and from Canada to Paraguay in 1927. The refugees traveled from Soviet Russia to Germany in 1929, and from Germany to Paraguay in 1930. Settling next to each other in Paraguay’s Gran Chaco, the voluntary migrants established the Menno Colony and the refugees established the Fernheim Colony. Although the groups shared the same language, religion, and ancestry, they refused to associate with each other for nearly two decades. This book explains why.

History is a story, and even if two stories share similar reference points, the lessons people draw from them can be vastly different. So it was with the Mennonite colonies. Owing to the groups’ different migration routes, their contrasting statuses as voluntary migrants and refugees, and their divergent beliefs about God’s plan for their communities, the groups negotiated radically different relationships with the Paraguayan government, Germany’s Nazi government, and aid organizations in Germany and North America. They also provided different levels of support for Paraguay in the Chaco War (1932-1935) and pursued different relationships with indigenous Paraguayans.

The Menno Colony viewed modern governments’ nationalizing efforts as a new chapter in an old story of “worldly” institutions threatening to undermine their loyalty to God. Alternately, Fernheim colonists viewed the rise of modern nation-states as part of God’s unfolding plan to integrate humans into national communities.

Exiled Among Nations contrasts these dramatic case studies to shed light on how migrants and refugees negotiate loyalties to domestic and foreign governments, aid organizations, co-religionists, and other mobile populations. It also shows how mobile populations use (and abandon) national, religious, and racial identifications to aid their movements.