Is citizenship necessary for being part of a democracy?

Today, many civil rights are linked to citizenship of a country. But this may need to change as a result of increased globalisation and mobility.

Researchers in the Exploring Rules and Principles in Citizenship project are addressing these questions.

“We’re interested in how citizenship should be seen in light of increased mobility in the world. One of the questions is whether rights in a society have to be linked to citizenship. People who contribute to society economically often receive citizenship and thereby rights, while other groups are completely excluded,” says Jonas Hultin Rosenberg, a Department of Government researcher.

With rising global mobility and migration, the traditional way of connecting civil rights with citizenship of a specific country needs analysing, and there is a need to investigate alternative options. The research group are currently working on a pilot study on American attitudes towards voting rights for migrants.

Multidisciplinary group

To jointly explore and answer the research question, four researchers from philosophy, law and political science have formed a group.

“I became interested in questions that are unanswerable in my subject, political science, alone,” comments Hultin Rosenberg.

Anna-Sara Lind, Professor of Public Law, says: “Multidisciplinarity is important to me. It isn’t a matter of competing with our subjects; rather, we ask different questions. What does a multidisciplinary approach enable us to understand that we can’t figure out in our own subject departments?”

In spring 2017, the Disciplinary Domain of Humanities and Social Sciences awarded research funding for Exploring Rules and Principles in Citizenship to develop interdisciplinary collaboration and draw up applications for external funds.

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Further reading

• Exploring citizenship (web pages of the research project)
• Centre for Integrated Research on Culture and Society (brief presentation of an initiative for interdisciplinary cultural and societal research in the Disciplinary Domain of Humanities and Social Sciences).