The Europeanization of Citizenship

Between the Ideology of Nationality, Immigration and European Identity

Fiorella Dell'Olio

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351890175
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

The connection between immigration and citizenship in Europe is an increasingly important issue. This timely and informative book investigates three main aspects of the issue: the degree to which European citizenship encourages the development of a European identity; the impact of European citizenship at the nation-state level in Italy and the UK in regard to domestic policy-making in the areas of immigration and citizenship; and what is needed to make a supranational citizenship work in practice. Fiorella Dell'Olio examines changes in laws on citizenship, nationality, and immigration in Italy and the UK, and assesses the relationship between the political conceptualization of European citizenship and the public response as revealed by opinion polls. She argues that the establishment of a European citizenship has reinforced the ideology of nationality in both Italy and the UK and that it consequently has failed to forge a European identity.

Chapter 1
Theories, Concepts and Definitions

Introduction

The book does not follow a specific theoretical model, but its use of particular concepts sometimes differs from current usage. It is therefore necessary to delineate the definitions intended in the use of concepts such as citizenship, national identity, universalism, legal subjectivity, republicanism, and liberalism, comparing the definitions applied here with those used by other authors.

Formal and Substantive Functions of Citizenship

The concept of citizenship is neither purely legal nor exclusively sociological. Citizenship is an ‘idea’ that finds its expression in law. As a legal concept, it creates a ‘community’, or Rechtsgemeinschaft, which includes and protects those who belong to the same system of rules. Citizenship therefore may be considered as a set of rules that defines citizens as components of a polity. The creation of the community per se embodies an antithetical mechanism that defines a class of outsiders. Another aspect of citizenship concerns its sociological or empirical underpinnings, wherein identity plays an important role. In certain communities, identity is established by the active exercise of rights, which is to say that rights precede citizenship. This is a characteristic of the British tradition of citizenship, in contrast to the Italian tradition in which citizenship establishes identity. In Italy, in other words, rights stem from identity, which is to say that citizenship status precedes the allocation of rights.

Rawls addresses the problem by distinguishing between institutional and non-institutional identity, and he formulates a liberal democratic theory of citizenship in which members have a double identity, with two kinds of commitments and attachments (1996: 30–32). The distinction is founded on the notion that we understand ourselves as citizens within the political system differently from the manner in which we understand ourselves in our personal affairs. In this approach, it is argued that the institutional identity should take precedence over the non-institutional one. Citizenship is seen here as based on a universalist liberal principle while identity is based on democratic constitutional principles rooted in the political culture. Similarly, Bottomore’s criticism of Marshall attempts to distinguish formal from substantive citizenship, and substantive citizenship from nationality (Marshall and Bottomore, 1992: 83).¹ As Bottomore observed, formal citizenship raises issues ‘concerning national identity and the historical role of nation-states as the preeminent modern form of organisation of a political community’. Substantive citizenship, on the other hand, addresses the social rights of individuals living in a community (Marshall and Bottomore, 1992: 85). Brubaker’s book (1989) gathers several contributions on this theme. One of the more important contributions is that of Hammar which focuses on the concept of ‘dual citizenship’ and offers a theoretical approach to the separation of functions between formal and substantive citizenship (1989: 81).

Following these approaches, we have a dichotomy: substantive-citizenship-universal and formal-identity-particular. Citizenship is susceptible to universalisation only through its substantive functions. The question here is whether citizenship can be universal. For Turner, the process of modernisation provides a social context in which it is possible to develop a theory of universalistic citizenship. The autonomy of the market creates a space in which citizenship is susceptible to universalisation (1986; 1992). On the contrary, according to Weber, citizenship is not susceptible to universalisation as it refers to particular structural conditions that may be peculiar of the West (1966). Barbalet’s approach is even narrower when he considers the dichotomy between formal and substantive citizenship. The substantiation of citizenship is necessary because formal citizenship per se has no value, but the process of substantiation precludes the possibility of citizenship becoming universal (1988).²

Citizenship per se can never embrace a universal essence. The absolute preclusion of a universal approach to the concept of citizenship would nevertheless fail to take into account the changing structural conditions occurring in Europe. According to Bottomore, citizenship is susceptible to universalisation only if civil, social and political rights are based on a conceptual framework that emphasises human rights rather than citizenship.³ Within such a framework, the rights of citizenship ‘are in a continuous process of development which is profoundly affected by changing conditions’ and ‘by the emergence of new problems and the search for new solutions’ (Marshall and Bottomore, 1992: 89). In this approach, human rights are not conceived as separate from the set of civic, political and social rights but are seen as an integral part of them. Moreover, the dynamic change of citizenship is conditioned by external factors. The two problems that arise from this approach concern the value of ‘legality’ and the legitimisation of the political community. In other words, does ‘legality’ have a universal application, and is formal citizenship alone sufficient to establish and preserve the political community? An appropriate response to the questions would perhaps be oriented more towards the redefinition of legality within the conceptual framework of citizenship rather than collapsing citizenship within the category of human rights.

Understanding Citizenship between Liberalism and Republicanism

Citizenship is generally understood to mean membership in the republic but the meaning of the term republic is itself very broad and ill-defined. The conventional philosophical categorisation of citizenship between the republican and liberal-individualistic traditions can be re-formulated as a communitarian and a universalist understanding of citizenship (Preuß, 1995a). Civic republicanism places the ideal of a ‘common good’ above all considerations of individual advantage. The defensive attitude towards the ‘community’ is pervaded by a strong sense of civic virtue (Skinner, 1992). In the republican view, civic duties have priorities over individual rights and civic bonds are emphasised (Beiner, 1995: 12). In the liberal view, by contrast, citizenship rights help to promote individual self-interested definitions of good. The most propitious means by which to resolve the dilemma between universalism and particularism would be ‘to uphold the principle of state neutrality against the communitarian argument’ (Lehning, 1997: 113). Skinner argues against the liberal view, refusing in particular the claim that individual liberty and political participation can never be reconciled.⁴ Among those who try to reconcile civic republicanism and liberalism, Mouffe argues that while liberalism contributed to the formation of a universal citizenship, it also reduced citizenship to a mere legal status (1992). Civic republicanism, on the other hand, emphasises the value of political participation and the citizen ‘plays an active role in shaping the future direction of his or her society through political debate and decision-making’ (Miller, 1995: 443). Mouffe importantly questions the necessity of conceiving the political community as compatible with liberal pluralism and democracy. She attempts to harmonise the two approaches by rejecting both the concept of the common good and the definition of citizenship simply as a legal status (1992).

What emerges from Mouffe’s analysis is a minimalist approach that combines both liberal and communitarian elements by upholding the principles of freedom and equality for all while understanding citizenship as a form of political identification with a wider community.⁵ In other words, it conceives citizenship not as a given but as something to be constructed. The community, however, is ‘without a definite shape or a definite identity and in a continuous re-enactment’ (Mouffe, 1992: 233). People are bound together by their common recognition of a set of ethico-political values, though Mouffe fails to specify the nature of these values and whether or not they are universal. At the same time, she rejects the idea of an abstract universalism stating that the exercise of citizenship consists in identifying ethico-political principles of modern democracy and that there can be as many forms of citizenship as there are interpretations of those principles (1992: 237). Importantly, she claims that though politics aims at constructing a political community and creating a unity of we/us, such a community can never be realised since there will be permanently a ‘constitutive outside’ that will always redefine the construction of a we/us (1992: 233).

Delanty and Lehning both claim that neither republicanism nor liberalism is sufficient to address problems surrounding citizenship beyond the level of the nationstate and that the two traditions jeopardise the very idea of political community (Delanty, 1998: 353; Lehning, 1997: 109). Lehning stresses that the revision of citizenship in modern societies should address the question concerning the compatibility of national unity with increasing social and cultural pluralism, and he suggests that European citizenship embodies a more universal concept of citizenship. Lehning says that ‘the same citizenship that copes with the problem of pluralism in the nation-state should be also applicable across borders’, following a federalist approach as already envisaged by Meehan (Meehan, 1993: 21–22). To support this aspect of his argument, Lehning applies Rawls’ concept of ‘double identity’ (Rawls, 1996: 30–36)⁶ to a federal Europe. The idea is that in a federal Europe, a shared citizenship/identity will supersede rival identities based on nationality. An intrinsic element of the federal model is that ‘federal partners [and their citizens] do not have to or wish to accept deep, monolithic conceptions of citizenship and identity as the basis of their union’ (Lehning, 1997: 118). According to Lehning, European citizenship would be conceivable only in a federal state that emerges out of an ‘overlapping consensus’ (Lehning and Weale, 1997: 9).⁷ Both the idea of overlapping consensus and double identity should lead ‘not only to the idea of “belonging” that comes with the concept of national identity, but also to “belonging” that goes with a number of different levels of social organisation: the neighbourhood, the town, the country, and the region, in addition to the nation’ (Lehning, 1997: 119).

A comparison of citizenship policy between the UK and Italy serves to emphasise the limits of liberalism and republicanism in shaping the idea of a new community. In my view, the European Union context conceives citizenship as a civic value in which rights are derived from status, which is also one of the idiosyncrasies of civic republicanism. Identity, therefore, is not derived from the practice of citizens who actively exercise their rights, and as a consequence, rights and identity are not adequately experienced in the context of the EU. This is the reason why ‘it is a mirage to speak of European citizenship’ (Lehning, 1997: 157).

Normative Undertaking and Social Reality

One might say that citizenship is evolutionary in that it is constantly adapted to regulate social changes and conflicts, as Turner noted in his criticism of Marshall (1950). For Turner, citizenship is indeed ‘the outcome of struggles bringing the state into the social arena as a stabiliser of the social system’ (1992: 38). These processes of change also affect what I call citizenship’s means rather than citizenship as an institution per se. The means of citizenship are simply the civil, political and social rights that citizenship entails. The functions of citizenship are affected by its evolving regulatory aspect but only in relation to each means of citizenship. The means of citizenship, in other words, are distinct from the functions of citizenship, which refer to the exclusive and inclusive power that citizenship embodies in relation to each of citizenship’s means.

The establishment of new priorities for the means of citizenship requires a redefinition of the concept of legal status. While Turner argues that the evolution of citizenship is driven by social conflicts, Mann claims that this process is driven by ‘dominant powers that impose their strategies on lesser powers’ (1987: 351). The two approaches are not mutually exclusive but find common ground in Turner’s claim that citizenship evolves through its regulative power towards always new and changing social conflict in a sort of dialectical process. Turner and Mann are referring not to different processes but to different levels of analysis. Mann’s analysis is institutional and normative while Turner’s approach is social and empirical. The normative process involves the institutionalisation of citizenship with political and administrative practices that are detached from the social phenomena from which institutional change derives. Consequently, there is a disjuncture between the normative undertaking and the social/empirical reality. The book examines this dichotomy foremost in the formation of the typology within the European Union in which the attempt to establish a link between the normative undertaking and the social reality ends in failure. The main difference between Mann and Turner is that the former focuses on the normative undertaking and the latter on the social reality. In Turner’s view, Mann’s analytical framework appears to preclude the impact of new social movements on the expansion of citizenship from below. This also implies a conception of the citizen as a mere subject rather than as ‘an active bearer of effective claims against society via the state’ (Mann, 1987).

In analysing citizenship within the European Union system, it is clear that there exists a conspicuous gap between the European polity and individual citizen. The problem here is twofold: (1) European citizenship, like national citizenship, has become regulative in terms of its inclusive and exclusive functions; and (2) social needs now concern more the sphere of practical necessities than the need to identify with the new polity. The transformation of social needs affects the priority of citizenship’s means, which is to say that social rather than political rights constitute a more important means of social inclusion. What emerges at the EU level, however, is that European citizenship has become again regulative without developing new priorities for the means of citizenship. This, in my view, exacerbates the gap between the normative undertaking and social reality.

The line of reasoning pursued in this book follows that of Mann to the extent that it conceives European citizenship not as the outcome of social movements but as a political strategy for the regulation of social conflicts in favour of ‘vested interests’ (1987). Without denying the importance of social movements in expanding citizenship rights, it is also important to bear in mind that the relationship between citizenship rights and social movements is no longer simply causal. On the other hand, modifying Turner’s criticism of Mann, the influence of social movements on the expansion of citizenship from below consists of a greater direct relationship between the normative undertaking and social reality. From above, it occurs through a sharper analysis of public attitudes.

Social conflicts and social needs, by nature, have become more de-territorialised and more cross-national, reflecting more sectoral interests than community interests. Many claims, such as the right to work and the right to reside anywhere, occur in the name of legal subjectivity and humanity rather than citizenship. In this study, the categorisation of legal subjectivity is neither diametrically opposed to citizenship nor intended to displace citizenship, but refers instead to a redefinition of the concept of legality detached from nationality and based on the active exercise of civil, political, and social rights. Such a redefinition is necessary to side-step the difficulties entailed in any attempt to separate citizenship from nationality in theory and practice. The introduction of a legal subjectivity would deprive citizenship of its regulative functions in terms of inclusion and exclusion, and it would reduce the importance attached to the inherent link between citizenship and nationality.

Citizenship and Nationality

In analysing citizenship within the European Union system, one of the main problems consists in separating European citizenship from national citizenship (Kostakopoulou, 1998). In doing that, the main obstacle is to separate citizenship from nationality. At the supra-national level, at least in theory, citizenship and nationality are no longer interchangeable but in practice the interchangeability persists. The idea of liberating European citizenship from nationality is among the themes discussed in this book, and it relates to Preuß’s conceptualisation of the ‘status path’ (1996: 135). This idea conceives the basis of residence within the physical boundaries of the EU as entirely independent of whether a person is a national of a member-state. It would thus be possible to be a Union citizen without being a national of any of the member-states. Perhaps the designation of ‘Union subject’ would be more appropriate than ‘Union citizen’. This acknowledges the link between citizenship and nationality, but it also gives citizenship a more ethno-cultural connotation, and Union subjecthood would be relevant at both the national and European level.

Lehning sceptically argues that, in practice, European citizenship entails no departure from the traditional link between nationality and citizenship (1997: 183). In the formulation of European citizenship, as already noted, Lehning questions w...