Denationalized citizenship

The concept of citizenship has historically been associated with national identity and the nation-state since the French Revolution saw the people claim sovereignty of the state and essentially become the state.[1] The growing importance of global processes has led to practices which were previously uniquely bound with the nation-state moving to other private, supranational and subnational institutions and spheres.[2] Denationalized citizenship is a concept which has emerged due to complex processes associated with globalization and the consequent changes of the role of the nation-state due to privatization, deregulation and increased human rights.[3] These globalization processes occurring most notably since the 1980s have created new and strengthened pre-existing divisions within nation-states.[4] Put simply, denationalized citizenship is when communities have a stronger sense of belonging and identification with smaller cultural and social groups than with their nation-state.[5] For example, some see the United States as a nation of nationalities more than a nation-state.[6] Denationalized citizenship suggests that citizenship can be practiced at a variety of scales and leads to a new understanding of the relationship between citizenship and the nation-state. Denationalized citizenship is not, however, entirely disconnected from the nation-state but indicates a new way of interacting with it and within it.[7]

Denationalized citizenship and an increase in self-determination can create new political spaces and arenas of participation. Denationalized citizenship may empower groups such as women who could establish a public presence and make claims on the state.[8] Therefore denationalized citizenship exists partly due to the actions of the excluded.[9] Increased civil rights facilitate the denationalization of citizenship as citizens can make claims against their nation-states and act autonomously in the political sphere.[10] Denationalized citizenship reflects the evolving and progressing capacity of democracy and the democratization of citizenship is therefore linked to denationalization and the changing authority of nation-states.[11] Another type of right which denationalizes citizenship is the portable rights within the European Union, for example, where there is a change in recognition from citizens of a nation-state to individuals as individuals.[12] Denationalized citizenship calls for a new understanding of citizenship as a concept which encompasses many, at times overlapping, communities and feelings of belonging and identification.[13]

Denationalized citizenship emerges from the premise that nation-states are no longer solely capable of enhancing political participation and can in fact create an obstacle for such activity. Additionally, identity is no longer synonymous with the nation-state[14] and citizenship is increasingly understood as "a form of identification, a type of political identity, something to be constructed, not empirically given" (Mouffe, 1992: 231). These points appear to challenge the sovereignty and authority of the nation-state as the traditional frame of reference for identity and political participation[13] which imply a pressure to fragment territorial structures.

Denationalized citizenship, postnational and transnational citizenship are frequently misused and used interchangeably, therefore a distinction between the terms is important. Denationalized citizenship is often used to mean any type of contemporary concept of citizenship which separates itself from the nation-state, however it alone means processes occurring within the borders of the nation-state. Postnational and transnational citizenship refer to new types of citizenship, such as citizenship of the European Union, which are outside of national borders[7] and, although all concepts share some characteristics, denationalized citizenship does not require that citizenship be relocated to outside of the nation-state, as is central to postnational and transnational citizenship.[15] Although denationalized citizenship can be associated with or caused by global and transnational processes, it occurs within the national and not outside of or across several nation-states.