Summary
The book is also premised on the assumption that the citizenship concept is experiencing an identity crisis ("what it is?") and a crisis of confidence ("what should it be doing?") in an increasingly diverse, changing, and complex world, disenchanted with the certainties of the past although unsure of what lies in store. New citizenship narratives and practices are emerging that not only challenge the conventional citizenship model of a single nation-state within a territorially bounded framework but also capitalize on the complexities of transmigrant identities across a networked web of transnational linkages, postnational realities, and a postmulticultural world of diverse-diversities. No less salient are the postcolonial politics that accompany the politicization of Indigenous peoples’ citizenship arrangements commensurate with their constitutional status as "the (de facto) sovereigns within."
The paradoxes and possibilities that accompany the conceptual makeover of national citizenship regimes along "postcitizenship" lines are explored as well across the settler domains of Canada and (to a lesser extent) the United States, Aotearoa/New Zealand, and Australia.
Excerpt
Table Of Contents
- Cover
- Title
- Copyright
- About the author
- About the book
- This eBook can be cited
- Table of Contents
- Preface
- Part 1: Framing Citizenship: Paradoxes, Problems, Politics
- Chapter 1. Contesting Citizenship: An Identity Crisis, a Crisis of Confidence
- Chapter 2. Conceptualizing Citizenship
- Part 2: Unsettling Citizenship Regimes in the Settler Societies
- Chapter 3. Citizenship in Settler Societies: Citizenship Promises, Citizen Disappointments
- Chapter 4. Citizenship in a Multicultural Canada
- Chapter 5. Canada’s Citizenship/Immigration/Multiculturalism Nexus
- Part 3: A Postcitizenship World: Emerging Realities, Shifting Discourses, New Practices
- Chapter 6. A Transnational Citizenship, Across Borders; Postnational Citizenship, Beyond Borders
- Chapter 7. Indigenizing Citizenship, Citizenizing Indigeneity: Citizenship in the Postcolonies
- Chapter 8. Rethinking Citizenship in a Postcitizenship Age
- Index
Citizenship no longer means what it once meant. The accelerated realities in a world of “posts”, “trans”, and “isms” are challenging those citizenship discourses and practices that no longer apply although new models are not yet ready to preempt or displace. At the crux of this discursive erasure [a reassessment without a resolution or replacement] is the pending demise of state-centric notions of citizenship that historically informed national models, yet can no longer abide by the multiple modalities of belonging and identity in a seemingly “postcitizenship” world of “here”, “there”, and “everywhere”. Contradictions abound over the following paradoxes: the persistence of territorially bounded citizenship regimes despite a relatively unbounded world of mobility and increasingly porous borders; the paramountcy of formal citizenship rights that neither lead to substantive equality nor reflect peoples’ lived-experiences; universal citizenship models that paper over the realities of a hyperdiverse world of transmigration and multi-universes (“multiversality”); a seemingly progressive commitment to inclusion that’s offset by the reality of systemic exclusions in defining “who’s in” and “who’s out”; a one-size-fits-all citizenship narrative at odds with governance models for differently accommodating a diversity-of-diversities; and the promise of a global/cosmopolitan ideal that, ironically, remains tethered to the realpolitik of specific nation-states. A key theme framed as a core question captures a sense of ← ix | x → the politics and paradox at play: In a topsy-turvey world of transmobility, cosmopolitanism, and multicentricity, does it still makes sense to talk about a bounded national citizenship model when peoples’ notions of membership, entitlements, and identity are increasingly unbounded by postnational dynamics and de-spatialized by transnational patterns? Or differently rephrased as an answer: we no longer live in a citizenship world if defined along state-centric Westphalian lines; more accurately, ours is a postcitizenship world of diverse-diversities, transmigration and interconnectedness, identity politics and politicized identities, and the internationalization of a human rights agenda. These observations—conventional models of citizenship as increasingly obsolete; a growing realignment of citizenship as principle and practice; and a discursive shift in how we “think”, “talk”, and “do” citizenship—secure the basis for reframing the citizenship concept in an emerging postcitizenship era.
That the topic of citizenship is sharply contested should come as no surprise (Sejersen, 2008; Tarozzi and Torres, 2016). This domain has evolved into a field so littered with misconceptions and conceptual stretching that many despair of clarity or consensus (Bosniak, 2006; Isin and Nyers, 2014). The citizenship concept itself is riddled with an array of paradoxes and controversies that reflect divergent perspectives, competing arguments, and conflicting conclusions. Often acrimonious disputes arise over the meaning of citizenship in terms of status, rights, identity, and activity; what it means to be citizen in a world organized around a local/national/global nexus; what constitutes a meaningful citizenship in a rapidly changing and diversifying milieu; and whether citizenship still matters in postcitizenship context. Of particular note are debates over the question of, “What is citizenship for”: to protect the rights of individuals; improve pathways to inclusiveness; secure socio-political stability; impose social control; enhance the accumulation of wealth; provide a platform for challenge and resistance; or advance the nation-building project? The centrality of these concerns, notwithstanding, this book concedes a dearth of consensus over the “what”, “why” and “how” behind these complicated issues (also Isin and Nyers, 2014). Dissensus is the rule, not the exception, especially when polite fictions about identity, entitlement, and belonging conceal uncomfortable truths about “who belongs”, “how they belong”, and “what belonging entitles” (Fleras, 2017). However inconvenient or unsatisfying, a lack of agreement may not be detrimental to the overall project since answers need not overwhelm the objective of any inquiry. What counts, instead, is the asking of questions that challenge stale conventions and yield fresh perspectives. ← x | xi →
Citizenship in a Transnational Canada offers a distinct look at reconceptualizing citizenship in a contested world of shifting narratives, evolving models, and future possibilities. The book aims to provide readers with a critically informed understanding of the politics and the paradoxes accompanying the citizenship “turn” as discourse and practice in a world of posts, trans, and isms. Citizenship in a Transnational Canada is predicated on the assumption that a new vocabulary is required for thinking, talking, and doing citizenship if there is any hope of formulating a narrative consistent with contested domains and emergent realities. The book is also premised on the assumption that the citizenship concept is experiencing an identity crisis (“what it is?”) and a crisis of confidence (“what should it be doing?”), largely because the world we inhabit is more complexly diverse, increasingly connected yet disconnected, subject to unanticipated crises and general turmoil, and disenchanted with the certainties of the past although unsure of what lies in store (Noonan and Nadkarni 2016). The crux of the argument is fairly straightforward: New citizenship narratives and practices are emerging that challenge the conventional citizenship model of a single nation-state within a territorially-bounded framework (Mann, 2017). These discursive frames capitalize on the complexities of transmigrant identities across a networked web of transnational linkages and a postmulticultural reality of diverse-diversities. Once associated with belonging to a national community, citizenship rights are increasingly sourced and legitimated within a global framework of human rights although, paradoxically, peoples identities remain particularistic and locally defined while the nation-state continues to be the repository of formal rights and membership (Soysal, 2011). No less salient are the politics that accompany the politicization of Indigenous peoples’ citizenship commensurate with their constitutional status as “the (de facto) sovereigns within” (Fleras, 2017; Maaka and Fleras, 2005). The paradoxes and possibilities that attend to the conceptual makeover of national citizenship regimes along “postcitizenship” lines are explored as well across the settler domains of Canada and (to a lesser extent) the United States, Aotearoa/New Zealand and Australia.
The content of Citizenship in a Transnational Canada covers a lot of ground in analyzing the politics and the politicization of citizenship. A multidimensional approach to framing, analyzing, interpreting, and redefining the meaning and practice of citizenship is advocated, including citizenship as: a legal status consisting of formal rights, duties, and obligations: a state discourse involving narratives of control and cooptation (“hegemony”); an interpretive lens for better understanding wider issues of belonging and identity in a ← xi | xii → diversifying world; a heuristic device for analyzing and assessing claims to equality, justice and inclusion that pivot around a citizenship discourse; a normative theory that defines a set of political expectations; a contested site of challenge, resistance, and transformation (“counter-hegemony”); a set of practices from everyday political activism to claims-making politics; and a distributive ideal in pursuing the principles of social justice for newcomers and Indigenous peoples (Wood, 2003). The demands of citizens from the margins (especially those involving the politics of Indigeneity) are shown to have a powerful impact in disrupting the once snug fit between territory and nationality (Rygiel, 2015). A critical citizenship perspective is applied across the board: Euro/state-centric citizenship regimes are framed as controlling and exclusionary, in contrast to those not-yet-attained citizenship models that appear more fluid and flexible, uncoupled from territory, and inclusive of diverse-diversities. The (post)settler societies of Canada, Australia, the United States, and New Zealand appears to be embracing more inclusive citizenship regime—at least in theory if not always in practice. They also appear to be moving toward the principles and practices of a postcitizenship model—a belated recognition that acquiring full citizenship status involves more than claiming inclusion on terms already established, but also entails a commitment in which the boundaries of identity and belonging are redrawn beyond the contours of a single and undifferentiated citizenship (Marback, 2016). The book ends on a high note by demonstrating the utility of reframing citizenship along postcitizenship lines, employed in the broadest sense to incorporate the dynamics and demands of new citizenship regimes in the re-making.
References
Bosniak, Linda. The Citizen and the Alien. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006.
Fleras, Augie. “Rethinking Citizenship Through Transnational Lenses.” In Citizenship in a Transnational Perspective, edited by J. Mann, 15–48. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017.
Isin, Engin F. and Peter Nyers. “Introduction: Globalizing Citizenship Studies.” In Routledge Handbook of Global Citizenship Studies, edited by E. Isin and P. Nyers. New York: Routledge, 1–11. 2014.
Maaka, Roger and Augie Fleras. The Politics of Indigeneity: Challenging the State in Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand. Dunedin, NZ: University of Otago Press, 2005.
Mann, Jatinder. “Introduction.” In Citizenship in a Transnational Perspective, edited by J. Mann, 1–14. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017.
Marback, Richard. “Introduction.” In Representation and Citizenship, edited by R. Marback, 1–16. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2016. ← xii | xiii →
Noonan, Norma C. and Vidya Nadkarni. “Introduction: A Century of Challenges.” In Challenge and Change, edited by N.C. Noonan and V. Nadkarni,. 1–11. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016.
Rygiel, Kim. Governing Through Citizenship and Citizenship from Below. An Interview with Kim Rygiel. Movements Journal, 2015.
Sejersen, T.B. “‘I Vow to Thee My Countries’—The Expansion of Dual Citizenship in the 21st Century.” International Migration Review 42, no. 3 (2008): 523–549.
Soysal, Yasemin Nuhoglu. “Postnational Citizenship: Reconfiguring the Familiar Terrain.” In The Blackwell Companion to Political Sociology, Edited by Kate Nash and Allan Scott. Oxford UK: Blackwell, 2004.
Tarozzi, M. and C.A. Torres. Global Citizenship Education and the Crisis of Multiculturalism. Comparative Perspectives. New York: Bloomsbury Press, 2016.
Wood, Patricia K. “Aboriginal/Indigenous Citizenship: An Introduction.” Citizenship Studies 7, no. 4 (2003): 371–378. ← xiii | xiv →
PART 1
FRAMING CITIZENSHIP: PARADOXES, PROBLEMS, POLITICS
CONTESTING CITIZENSHIP: AN IDENTITY CRISIS, A CRISIS OF CONFIDENCE
Introduction: Framing the Issues, Reframing the Debates
Details
- Pages
- XIV, 236
- Year
- 2018
- ISBN (PDF)
- 9781433149979
- ISBN (ePUB)
- 9781433149986
- ISBN (MOBI)
- 9781433149993
- ISBN (Hardcover)
- 9781433149962
- DOI
- 10.3726/b11911
- Language
- English
- Publication date
- 2018 (November)
- Published
- New York, Bern, Berlin, Bruxelles, Oxford, Wien, 2018. XIV, 236 pp.
