Conclusion: Practice and Policy

Abstract

Citizenship acquisition has an ambiguous texture, both in theory and practice — an ambiguity informing and borne out in the different contributions to this book. ‘Becoming a citizen’ has a formal, legalistic sense: the point at which one is counted, by relevant authorities and institutions, among the citizenry of a country. It also has a more substantive aspect, concerned with the lived experience of the individual, their relations to others, and their orientations towards the society of which, as citizen, they are a part. Thus while the granting of formal citizenship is one thing, gaining access to what the late Bernard Crick (2001, p. 1) called a ‘citizenship culture’ is another. While the first might be categorized in black-and-white terms — through the meeting of designated requirements — the second is more slippery to identify, or establish. Individuals for whom formal citizenship is never in doubt might be less than active in the sustaining of a vibrant civil society. And vice versa: if ‘citizenship culture’ suggests an active, constructive involvement in public affairs, this is by no means simply dependent on one’s possession of a passport, or even voting rights. Yet in both senses, of course, what counts — or should count — as citizenship is a deeply contested notion. In both senses it links up with other issues and factors — political, economic, moral, legal and sociological — with which, as a notion and in practice, it has become inextricably tied up. These factors too have been addressed, from different directions, throughout the foregoing chapters.