Citizenship Rights

Making (Ab)sense of Women’s Agency and Belonging in Citizenship Debates in India: Analysing the Shaheen Bagh Protests as ‘Act(s) of Citizenship’

“…Igor Stiks, asserted that, ‘…activist citizenship as protest can and often does develop a critique of the system questioning the socio-political, economic and cultural foundations of a given regime’ Through this he reaffirmed Michel Foucault’s definition of critique ‘…as not wanting to accept laws because they are unjust and hide illegitimacy’ (Foucault, 2007, p. 46 as cited in Stiks, 2017, p. 30). Protests, Stiks emphasised, can target aberrations, corruption or the malfunctioning of a system without necessarily putting the whole system into question.…”

“…Protests, Stiks emphasised, can target aberrations, corruption or the malfunctioning of a system without necessarily putting the whole system into question. This brings ‘activist citizenship as protest’ very close to ‘activist citizenship as critique’ (Stiks, 2017, p. 30). Seeking for ‘occupying citizenship, Stiks uses the concept of ‘activist citizens’ as not only those who have the ‘right to have rights’ (an Arendtian understanding), but also those who have ‘the right to claim rights’ (Isin, 2009, as cited in Stiks, 2017, p. 28).…”

“…This brings ‘activist citizenship as protest’ very close to ‘activist citizenship as critique’ (Stiks, 2017, p. 30). Seeking for ‘occupying citizenship, Stiks uses the concept of ‘activist citizens’ as not only those who have the ‘right to have rights’ (an Arendtian understanding), but also those who have ‘the right to claim rights’ (Isin, 2009, as cited in Stiks, 2017, p. 28). This strengthens my hypothesis that the AC methodology I undertake to analyse the anti-CAA protests is capable of enhancing and reformulating women’s agency and their transformative role as citizens and presents an alternative to the binary of citizenship approaches prevalent in Indian societal and academic circles, that is, the school of cultural diversity/pluralism and cultural nationalism.…”

British and disengaged: national identification and political engagement before and after naturalisation

“…In Western countries, citizenship is the chief conferrer of rights and privileges, but the distance from other forms of membership has lessened. It has become increasingly challenging to deny non-citizens civil and social rights that in the post-war era have become associated with the individual, rather than the citizen (Soysal 2000). Alternative forms of national and supra-national membership have developed in a context of economic and cultural globalisation, with relevant cross-border institutions and increased mobility resulting from more flexible borders.…”

‘Shunning’ and ‘seeking’ membership: Rethinking citizenship regimes in the European constitutional space

“…By the end of the 1980s it was also facing huge economic problems related to international debt and the failure of its economic model. Centrifugal political forces, which included challenges around issues of citizenship and identity, 156 along with economic problems, not to mention the absence of a clear single view from the European Communities of 12 Member States all contributed to the eventual, complex, and sometimes violent break-up processes. The (national) citizenship governance challenges arising from the break-up of SFRY are many and varied and there is now an extensive literature documenting them.…”