Regional politics: The European union and citizenship

This article examines the development of citizenship within the European Economic Community as a model for citizenship as such, within a global environment. In historical terms, citizenship evolved within the nation‐state, but the nation‐state, which is no longer valid as the exclusive model of economic development, may be inappropriate as a framework for social rights. The fluidity of labour within the European community means that traditional means of political representation within the nation‐state are irrelevant. Within a global context, the economic barriers which are required by nation‐states constitute political barriers to social rights through the vehicle of citizenship. The article considers the European experience of regional politics as lessons for citizenship reform in a global system.     

American citizenship and expatriatism: identity and politics outside the state

This article seeks to interrogate the concept of global citizenship through the disruptive lens of the American expatriate. The goal of this inquiry is to use empirical research done on American expatriates, including the results of a survey conducted by the authors, to better understand issues of citizenship and politics amongst American expatriates. The theoretical literature on citizenship and transnationalism argues that immigrants and expatriates help challenge the hegemony of the nation-state, a claim that can be tested by investigating how expatriates view their own experiences. By juxtaposing the empirical work of researchers focused on American expats with the theoretical work of citizenship and globalization theorists, we find that political affinity and national identity continue to matter for those living outside the USA, but within a larger global context. Thus, if the path envisioned by those who embrace globalization is to be followed, how might concepts of citizenship and national policy towards their citizens need to change?     

Caregiving for identity is political: implications for citizenship theory

The citizenship literature now renders blurry the boundaries between ‘private’ and ‘public’. Feminist analyses of caregiving have contributed to this evolution. But while feminist circles widely depict caregiving to be on par with employment as a social aspiration and obligation of citizenship, the literature has stopped short of recognizing that caregiving can also represent political citizenship. The author argues that some caregiving for identity should be afforded this status. This recognition has implications for multiscalar approaches to environmental and queer citizenship studies; feminist visions of citizenship that imply a right to time for care; and multicultural citizenship.     

(Dis)qualified bodies: securitization,citizenship and ‘identity management’

This article attempts to think citizenship politics in the international security context of a post‐September 11th world. Considering specifically the introduction of biometric technologies, the article reveals the extent to which contemporary citizenship is securitized as a part of the wider post‐September 11th ‘securitization of the inside’. This securitization contributes directly to the intensification of conventional citizenship practice, as biometric technologies are employed to conceal and advance the heightened exclusionary and restrictive practices of contemporary securitized citizenship. The intensified restriction and preservation of particular rights and entitlements, vis‐à‐vis the application of biometric technologies, serves both private and public concerns over ‘securing identity’. This overall move, and the subsequent challenges to conventional notions of citizenship politics and agency, is referred to here as ‘identity management’. To then ask ‘What's left of citizenship?’ sheds light on these highly political transformations, as the restricted aspects of citizenship—that is, its continued obsession with the preservation and regulation/restriction of specific rights and entitlements—are increased, and the instrument of this escalation, biometrics, dramatically alters existing notions of political agency and ‘citizenship/asylum politics’.     

Transnational citizenship: German-Turks and liberalizing citizenship regimes

This article studies the multiple connections between contemporary structures of German and Turkish citizenship, and German-Turkish migrants' own practices of citizenship transcending national borders. Hence, the citizenship structures of the two countries and the ways in which they shape and are shaped by the migrants' civic activism shall be exposed in a dialogical way. It will be argued that German-Turks constitute a transnational space, making it imperative that the existing institutions of citizenship in both countries respond to their globalized and transnationalized experiences. Addressing the literature on transnational space, citizenship studies, diaspora studies and cultural studies, and referring to a survey conducted among German-Turks, this work will briefly refer to the production of transnational space by immigrants of Turkish origin and their descendants in Germany and the use they make of the means of globalization, which provide them with a set of diversified habitats of meaning away from their country of origin. Subsequently, it will claim that the traditional framework of national citizenship has been superseded as transmigrants have become mobile between their countries of origin and of settlement in a way that may require dual citizenship as well as dual loyalty, allegiance and orientation.     

Dilemmas of citizenship: Recent literature on citizenship and Europe

Citizenship, Nationality and Migration in Europe. David Cescarani and Mary Fulbrook (Eds), London, Routledge, 1996, hbk and pbk, pp. 225

Citizenship, Europe and Change. Paul Close, London, Macmillan, 1995, hbk and pbk, pp. 335

Citizenship and Democratic Control in Contemporary Europe. Barbara Einhorn, Mary Kaldor and Zenek Kavan (Eds), Cheltenham, Edgar Elgar, 1997, hbk, pp. 239

Citizenship, Democracy and Justice in the New Europe. Percy Lehning and Albert Weale (Eds), London, Routledge, 1997, hbk and pbk, pp. 212     

Sexual identity,citizenship and medical power of attorney: case illustrations from Northern Ontario,Canada1

Current analyses of sexual identity and citizenship offer complexity to debates about what it means to be a citizen in liberal democratic societies. However, thus far there is limited inclusion of ethnographic, narrative‐based research that addresses how lesbians and gay men experience and negotiate citizenship in their everyday lives. In this paper, I argue that attitudes about medical power of attorney are a lens through which we can examine how lesbians negotiate and experience citizenship in their daily lives and in medical settings. My analysis demonstrates how normative citizenship structures are experienced, reinforced and challenged by four lesbians living in a community in Ontario's Near North region, Canada. In providing case illustrations, I argue that the inclusion of lived experiences strengthens and deepens textual, historical and political analyses of citizenship.     

Rhetorical citizenship: studying the discursive crafting and enactment of citizenship

This article argues for the relevance of a rhetorical approach to the study of citizenship, proposing the concept of rhetorical citizenship as a term for a fourth dimension of citizenship and as a scholarly approach to the topic in addition to the dimensions of status, rights, and identity commonly recognized in the literature. We show how this view aligns with current views of the multidi Citizenship Studies mensionality of citizenship, explain our use of the term rhetoric, and illustrate the usefulness of a rhetorical approach in two examples. In close textual readings both examples – one vernacular, one elite – are shown to discursively craft and enact different notions of citizenship vis-a-vis the European refugee crisis. We conclude that a rhetorical perspective on public civic discourse is useful in virtue of its close attention to discursive creativity as well as to textual properties that may significantly, but often implicitly, affect citizens’ understanding of their own role in the polity, and further because it recognizes deep differences as inevitable while valorizing discourse across them.     

Multileveled citizenship and citizenship education: experiences of students in China's Beijing

With reference to three secondary schools in Beijing, this study investigates students' perceptions of multiple identities at four levels – self, local, national, and global – and the ways in which students form multiple identities. The study uses a mixed methodology of questionnaires and interview surveys to collect data, and identifies four patterns of Beijing students' multiple identities: a high value on self-identity, a strong affective orientation toward local and national identity, minimal distinction between local and national identities, and an imagined global identity. This study provides empirical data that both supplements and challenges the existing literature on citizenship and citizenship education in the context of globalization.     

Reconfiguring citizenship and nationality: dual citizenship of Taiwanese migrants in China

Many researchers have redefined citizenship to better understand the membership status aspired and demanded by contemporary migrants. As a result, the concept of ‘membership’ as opposed to citizenship was proposed in delineating the decoupling between citizenship and nationality; immigrant demands for rights and state policies in response can thereby be interpreted without considering the political meanings of citizenship. However, the decoupling of citizenship and national identity can be challenged when it comes to dual citizenship, especially when the homeland and host states are engaged in political tensions. This article examines the shifting policies of China (the People's Republic of China, or PRC) and Taiwan (the Republic of China, or ROC) towards the citizenship conferred to Taiwanese migrants in China. The findings of this research suggest that political dimension (including political rights and obligations) should be regarded as an integral part of citizenship (i.e. national membership) especially in the rival-state context. The Taiwan–China case can contribute to our understanding of citizenship policy changes under the double pressure of inter-state rivalry and globalization. The globalizing forces help create conditions for ‘flexible citizenship’ in the ‘zones of hypergrowth’, while in the case of Taiwan–China inter-state competition draws governments and people back to zones of loyalty, the nationally defined memberships.     

Two hypotheses about the emergence of a post-national European model of citizenship

Citizenship is not just a status (defined by a set of rights and obligations), it is also an identity that expresses membership in a political community. It also has a substantive political dimension of active participation in the public sphere. Traditionally, collective identity and the membership dimensions of citizenship have been seen as intrinsic to the nation-state. The processes of globalization that have undermined the sovereignty of the nation-state make it necessary to reconceptualize citizenship in light of a ‘post-national’ framework. At the same time, however, the ‘culturalization’ of the social and the ‘multiculturalization’ of societies are putting into question the homogeneity of a collective identity. According to a recent hypothesis, a new post-national model of citizenship is emerging, one of European construction. In seeking to explore this position, the paper advances two additional hypotheses: (i) EU policy-making and governance are likely to foster a post-national European civil society with multi-level citizenship participation; and (ii) European anti-discrimination regulations are likely to accelerate the emergence of an alternative model to multiculturalism that can address differences within a universal framework of rights.     

The Politics of European Referendum Outcomes and Turnout: Two Models

This survey briefly examines the EU accession process for the countries included in this collection and considers the distinctive features of this set of referendums, particularly the comparatively high levels of Yes vote and low levels of turnout. It argues that, although they represent a distinctive sub-type of European referendum, they can be used as a basis to draw at least tentative comparative and theoretical conclusions. Consequently, it then posits causal models that both provide an analytical framework for this collection and, more broadly, attempt to explain the results and turnout in these and, potentially, other (European) referendums.     

Thinking citizenship and its constitutive subject: interrogating the 2004 Irish citizenship referendum debate

This article considers a referendum which was held in the Republic of Ireland in 2004 involving a proposal to qualify the existing universal constitutional entitlement to birthright citizenship. Existing analysis of this referendum reflects dominant trends in citizenship scholarship. It does so by framing the issue in terms of two opposing perspectives – one particularistic (exclusive) and one universalistic (inclusive) – and positing the question of the ‘politics’ of citizenship as a trade-off between these diverging models. This article argues, however, that Rob (R.B.J.) Walker's notion of the constituent subject of (sovereign) politics challenges this dualistic framework as the necessary starting point for discussions about citizenship. It does so by problematizing the premise upon which it is based which is the taken-for-granted autonomous existence of persons (individuals) who are understood to be connected to, but ultimately separate from, ‘the state.’ This article concludes with reflections on what an alternative framework for exploring citizenship (based specifically on a historicization of subjectivity in relation to sovereignty) might look like. It suggests that this provides us with a different starting point to the prevalent form of a timeless dialectic of inclusion and exclusion, particularism and universalism, polis and cosmopolis currently determined by the boundaries of the Irish state.     

Assessing models of citizenship in the EU: the idea of responsive citizenship

There is an interesting debate about democracy and citizenship in the EU. Views diverge about the features of democratic deficits currently facing the EU and accordingly, about the scope for Union citizenship. The paper suggests an analytical distinction between asymmetric and symmetric normative models of dual – national and Union – citizenship. Moreover, it proposes an alternative model of dual citizenship that puts emphasis on the responsiveness of citizens vis-à-vis phenomena that undermine democratic governance and the claim for equal respect and concern. One of the main ideas of responsive citizenship is that effective democratic control should complement procedural legitimacy in the EU as a means to prevent phenomena of political domination and guardianship. This is possible through the combination of competences ascribed on citizens through national and Community legislation vis-à-vis national and Union executive bodies.     

Globalization and citizenship: an Australian dilemma

Democratic citizenship, as it exists in countries like Australia, is premised on a nation-state that has sovereignty over a specific territory demarcated by internationally agreed boundaries. According to this model, citizens are supposed to control the state through democratic processes, and the state is supposed to control what happens on its territory and to decide who or what may cross its boundaries. But today globalization is eroding the capacity of the nation-state to control cross-border flows of finance, commodities, people, ideas and pollution. Powerful pressures are reducing state autonomy with regard to economic affairs, welfare rights and national culture. This leads to important questions: Does the quality of democratic citizenship remain unchanged? Are citizens still the source of political legitimacy? Do we need to rethink the meaning and mechanisms of citizenship to find new ways of maintaining popular sovereignty? How can citizens influence decisions made by global markets, transnational corporations and international organizations? These are problems that all democratic polities face, and Australia is no exception. Political and legal institutions derived from the Anglo-American democratic heritage have worked well for a century and more, but they may need to change significantly if they are to master the new realities. The central question in Castles's article is thus: What can we do to maintain and enhance democratic citizenship for Australians in the context of a globalizing world? To answer this question, he examines some of the inherent contradictions of nation-state citizenship, discusses the meaning of globalization and how it affects citizenship and looks at the effects of globalization and regional integration on Australia. He concludes that it is important to improve the quality of Australian citizenship by various measures: recognizing the special position of indigenous Australians and action to combat racism; combatting social exclusion; reforming the constitution to inscribe rights of active citizenship in a bill of rights; and reasserting the model of multicultural citizenship.     

Gender and citizenship

She is the author of Media Messages in American Presidential Elections.     

Introduction: claiming social citizenship

Social citizenship in the classical sense of T.H. Marshall has been declared to be eroded and to have lost its significance. The introduction to this special issue challenges this assumption and argues that recent anthropological work on social citizenship in post-colonial, post Cold War and post-socialist states have shown that social citizenship is relevant and is being claimed by citizens of these states. Historical notions of citizenship as well as claiming rights to state support in return for having worked for the state are at work here. Furthermore the contributions to this issue illustrate how notions and practices of social citizenship compete and sometimes replace other practices of claiming citizenship on the basis of ethnicity, nationality or cultural ties.     

Green citizenship: a review and critique

This paper reviews the literature on green citizenship and argues that the concept of citizenship has done much to advance green theory building internally but that in order to deepen an already substantial area of scholarship, promote a more inclusive and emancipatory environmental politics, and augment their contribution to the larger body of citizenship studies, greens will need to broaden their approach to the concept. This review highlights the tendency within green theorizing to privilege particular conceptions of the natural world and humans' relations to it, and draws attention to the work of those scholars explicitly engaged in incorporating the social construction of nature into their theories of green citizenship. The essay concludes by identifying three particular areas in which green theorizing has contributed to citizenship studies.