Massive emigration and the making of transnational social networks raise the question of the adequacy of the notion of diaspora in the study of the collective experience of Haitians abroad. The paper explores the meaning of such a qualification on the bases of migrant dispersion and the network of exchange characterizing Haitian emigration. It also analyzes the existence of an identity scheme lending their collective organization a spatial and temporal continuity. Based on the polycentric and reticular configuration of this migratory field, the Haitian diasporic territory can be analyzed both at the transnational level and the local level.
